Ed Courtney: loss of a great anti-nuclear campaigner

I have only just heard yesterday the sad news that Edward Courtney, a stalwart campaigner trying to shut Oldbury power station, died last month. Ed, who lived in Charfield, was a great source of information and kept me regularly up-to-date with news items and information. I never met him but spoke many times on the phone: his loss is a great shock.

As another campaigner wrote: "Ed was the bane of the local nuclear industry and regulators. He wrote long detailed letters using his former civil service skills to unpick spin and cover-ups on issues such as nuclear incineration, local cancers and plant safety. His local MP picked up on Ed's concerns and followed through his suggestions."

Indeed Ed wrote many papers and letters - he never used a computer so I have a collection of his letters and papers - some of his papers are also scanned into websites like his submission to the Nuclear Policy Framework. His work led to many of our Green party news releases like the lack of filters at Oldbury nuclear power station - amazingly he discovered that the operators there say the reason they are releasing radioactivity into the air is because they do not want the problem of radioactive filters - the filters would apparently become radioactive waste and would then have to be disposed of in a safe manner - far better just to release it into the air!

Ed was also behind the local campaigns re potassium iodate tablets and Emergency safety procedures at Oldbury. Many news releases on these stories like here and here. Infact today I read that Weymouth and Portland Borough Council are overseeing the distribution of information booklets to 4,300 people in Portland, advising homeowners what they should do in the event of a radiation emergency in Portland Port. The homes concerned are those that lie within a 2km radius of berths to be visited by Royal Navy nuclear submarines. While this improvement to safety would have pleased Ed it would have also highlighted the complete nonsense and craziness of the situation - as he said repeatedly, nuclear makes no sense and the only sane and safe way to deal with nuclear is to shut it down and not build any more.

I get a regular bulletin of nuclear news and just in the last week or so here are some of the items that are typical - and daily confirm Ed's views:

- 30 safety incidents were investigated at Torness nuclear power station in 2005, sparking fears about the reliability of the plant.
- the Russian submarine - 800ft down on the bed of the Barents Sea and carrying almost three-quarters of a ton of nuclear fuel has been an environmental menace since it sank 14 years ago with the loss of nine crew members.
- The head of the Democratic Republic of Congo's dilapidated and poorly guarded nuclear reactor plant has been arrested on suspicion of illegally selling enriched uranium, following the disappearance of large quantities of the material.
- Two South Korean nuclear power plant workers were burnt by heated, radioactive liquid waste while helping repair a device that transforms liquid waste into a material for storage at a nuclear reactor.
- Global nuclear watchdog IAEA is cooperating with South Africa to develop a security plan ahead of the 2010 Soccer World Cup to avert any "dirty bomb" attack.
- Safety alarms have been routinely ignored, operating instructions flouted, and safety equipment left broken at the controversial Sellafield nuclear plant, a devastating official inquiry has found. The inquiry report - one of the most damning ever on a British nuclear installation - condemns "an alarm-tolerant culture", "long-standing failings in some key safety arrangements" and a "failure to learn from previous events" at the Cumbrian complex. Dr Mike Weightman, HM Chief Inspector of Nuclear Installations, says that the investigation found "a significant prolonged reduction in attention to the high standards demanded for the unique nature of nuclear operations, something we are not prepared to tolerate."

I am sure Ed would be disappointed that I cannot make the Glos County planning meeting tomorrow to discuss the nuclear store at Berkeley - I was invited to make a statement after I had made a submission to the planning application to both the District Council and the County Council - unfortunately I wont be there but he will be pleased that the three key points made earlier will be available to the meeting (see also my previous post of 16th Feb) - in brief these were:
- An intermediate level nuclear waste store is the least worst option.
- Planning Committee should seekassurancesthat the store will not take waste from elsewhere.
- Planning Committee should seek assurancesthat the store will beprotected from sea-level rises: the area around the power station is known to be prone to flooding. The Environment Agency estimates risks from flooding by the sea will at least double by the 2080s and could increase by up to 20 times.

One of Ed's latest concerns was regarding 'Wifi' - see my blog for 22nd December 2006 for a discussion on that.

Ed always preferred a low-profile style of campaigning and veered away from opportunities to do TV, radio and newspaper interviews. He also He did however turn out for local demos holding up placards outside Oldbury power station and attended meetings at Oldbury and Berkeley power stations to argue his point with local pro-nukes.

I enjoyed our phone calls and discussions - I think if we had met we would have got on wonderfully - I will miss him lots.

Growing a Green Future - Vote Green Party on May 2nd

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Vote for the Green Party on May 2nd in the County Council Elections. Vote for a Party that not only cares for the environment, but also cares about people. With our progressive, practical policies on a range of issues including welfare, employment and banking reform only the Green Party offers a real alternative vision for Britain that's also realistic.

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Green bees graffiti for Green party

I just came across the Bristol Graffitti website - great stuff - they also carried a piece of work painted for the Green Party office in Old Market by Mark “Skip” Courtney - see here article and photo left pinched from that website - he calls them wasps but infact I am assured they are bees! The site is worth a look at some of the other blogs - and of course Banksy - liked this one here in the light of expenses row about wanting to be an MP!

Photo: Green party wasps and below a piece I saw and liked in Cinderford recently

Interestingly one of my previous blogs about art or graffiti is still the one being hit most - not sure why!! See it here - I wrote it in a hurry and wish I'd now spent more time writing something more useful and interesting!!

Election means nuclear news is cancelled

As it is local election time the local press go into their state of ignoring news releases - hence no local nuclear news for people. I've recently sent out a couple of unsuccessful news releases re Oldbury - our local reactor - some 16 miles from Stroud. I also bring news re Burnham before it hopefully will get into press in Somerset at least.

Photo: Oldbury power station

Oldbury to restart in summer

Firstly there was the news that this dangerous old plant would be restarted - see my news release here.

Oldbury reactors have been shut since maintenance in June 2005 raised concerns over the safety of its graphite core. Last year I, along with other Greens, helped Radio 4's flagship investigative programme File on Four look at information obtained under the Freedom of Information Act - this shows a catalogue of incidents from leaking cooling system pipes, cracks in boiler tubes and cracks to the graphite core. Oldbury has the worst weight loss of any UK reactor core and independent nuclear engineer John Large has said this could lead to a catastrophic nuclear-fuel fire and release of radiation. Why on earth take the risk? This is putting profit before safety."

Were organs of former nuclear workers at Oldbury nuclear power station secretly been removed?

The Radio 4 Today programme revealed that nuclear workers at Sellafield and other nuclear sites had organs and tissues removed from their bodies at post-mortems apparantly without the knowledge or permission of their relatives. This occurred from 1962 to as late as 1992. Stroud District Green party campaigners asked whether Oldbury workers were subject to this process. See here.

Edward Courtney dies

It was good to finally see Edwards death have a place in the Western Daily Press today and apparently the Gazette are also doing something this week. He was one of my greatest sources of info on nuclear matters and I feel his loss greatly. See Glos Green party note here and my previous blog item here.

Burnham breast cancer excess 70% over ten years

Also today I hear that newly released figures show that Burnham North has suffered a seventy percent excess of breast cancer mortality over the decade to 2005. Greens haven't yet done a news release on this as it seems pointless when the papers refuse to pick the story up - hopefully as the Stop Hinckley group have released lots of info the Western Daily may pick it up. Anyhow I enclose below some of their info - yet more evidence to shut these reactors down for good.

The Office of National Statistics figures were analysed by Dr Chris Busby from Green Audit, who was commissioned by campaign group Stop Hinkley. The new statistics confirm a worrying trend first discovered in research by Dr Busby in 2000 where Burnham North stood out from 150 Somerset electoral wards studied for cancer deaths with twice the expected number.

In 2002 a doorstep health survey by local group, Parents Concerned About Hinkley, PCAH and analysed by Dr Busby also showed breast cancer incidence was 85 percent above average together with excesses of leukaemia, kidney cancer and cervical cancer. The PCAH survey, considered a breakthrough in community epidemiology, was the subject of a row with the Government body charged with auditing radiation-linked health trends, COMARE who later softened their criticism based on their faulty understanding of the large 1,500 sample size, one third of all the Burnham North residents.

The South West Cancer Intelligence was then prompted to conduct a study which also showed a thirty percent excess of breast cancer registrations between 1990 and 1999. When they added three more years' figures up to 2002 their overall thirteen year pattern still showed a statistically significant 21 percent excess. Although SWCIS attributed this rise to efficient breast cancer screening, campaigners argued that good screening should reduce mortality from the illness which is worryingly excessive.

Dr Busby said: "This clearly shows that the breast cancer cluster in Burnham North is a convincing phenomenon and is clearly, in my opinion, related to releases or a release from Hinkley Point. Since radiation causes cancer through mutation we might expect some effect on infant mortality in the area around Hinkley Point and we are now looking to see if that is the case in a study covering West, Mid and North Somerset."

Jim Duffy, spokesman for Stop Hinkley said: "The figures speak for themselves and all sorts of white-washing have not stood up to reasoned examination. Some environmental cause is triggering these cancers and logic points to Hinkley's constant sea and air discharges of radioactive particles upwind of the town: a good reason to shut down these crumbling reactors."