New research suggests diabetes is becoming a global problem, with more than 60% of all cases likely to occur in Asia.
A study in the Journal of the American Medicine Association shows those hit in Asia are younger and less likely to be overweight than those in the West.
The study says numbers worldwide could grow by a third by 2025, with low and middle income countries worst hit.
The disease is expensive to treat and could hit Asian economies hard.
The study said trends of diabetes in Asia are influenced by everything from genetic and cultural differences, to smoking and rates of urbanisation.
Weighty surprise
While in the West, type-2 diabetes is often seen as a consequence of diet, age and obesity, researchers say those affected in Asia are relatively young and less likely to be struggling with weight gain.
Citing figures from the International Diabetes Federation, researchers say while people from Japan to Pakistan generally have lower rates of fat, they can have a similar or even higher prevalence of diabetes than in the West.
The problem is that although Asian obesity rates are low, changing diets and sedentary lifestyles, associated with rapid economic development, are taking their toll.
That transition, which took about 200 years in Europe, has taken just half a century in Asia, experts noted.
The age differential was also stark. Diabetes most often affects people in the West at the age of 60 to 79 years, compared to the age range of 20 to 59 years in Asia.
The study suggested that this appears to be the result of both low birth weights and over-nutrition in later life, partly because Asian women are two- to three-times as likely to have gestational diabetes as their white counterparts.
India will see its numbers grow from 40 million to nearly 70 million; China 39 million to 59 million; and Bangladesh 3.8 million to 7.4 million; the numbers for Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam and others will also rise dramatically.
The findings were based on analysis of hundreds of articles, data and studies published between January 1980 and March 2009.
Friday, May 29, 2009
US launches cyber security plan
US President Barack Obama has announced plans for securing American computer networks against cyber attacks.
He said that from now on, America's digital infrastructure would be treated as a strategic national asset.
He announced the creation of a cyber security office in the White House, and said he would personally appoint a "cyber tsar".
Both US government and military bodies have reported repeated interference from hackers in recent years.
Mr Obama pointed out that al-Qaeda and other groups had threatened computer warfare.
Acts of terror today, he said, could come "not only from a few extremists in suicide vests, but from a few key strokes of a computer - a weapon of mass disruption."
The president said the United States was particularly dependent on its computer networks and therefore particularly vulnerable to cyber attacks.
In 2007 alone the Pentagon reported nearly 44,000 incidents of what it called malicious cyber activity carried out by foreign militaries, intelligence agencies and individual hackers.
Security priority
Mr Obama said that protecting America's digital infrastructure, the networks and computers everyone depended on every day, would be "a national security priority".
"It is now clear," he said, "this cyber threat is one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation."
He said the United States had failed to invest in its digital infrastructure. "We are not as prepared as we should be," he said.
In the past, no one US department was responsible for cyber-security, resulting in poor communication and co-ordination, he said.
The new cyber-security office will be a multi-billion dollar effort designed to restrict access to government computers and to protect systems - such as those that run the stock exchange and air traffic control - that keep the country going.
But Mr Obama emphasised that it would also help protect individual Americans, adding: "Millions... have been victimised: their privacy violated, their identities stolen, their lives upended, and their wallets emptied."
He pointed out that according to one survey, cyber crime cost Americans more than $8bn over the last two years. Worldwide, it was estimated that cyber criminals stole intellectual property from businesses worth up to $1 trillion.
"In short, America's economic prosperity in the 21st century will depend on cyber-security," he said.
The Obama administration is also expected to create a new cyber command at the Pentagon with the dual task of eradicating potential vulnerabilities in America's sensitive computer networks, while simultaneously creating ways to exploit them in the systems of potential enemies.
An influential study published last year suggested that having an offensive computer warfare capability would have a deterrent effect against would-be attackers.
He said that from now on, America's digital infrastructure would be treated as a strategic national asset.
He announced the creation of a cyber security office in the White House, and said he would personally appoint a "cyber tsar".
Both US government and military bodies have reported repeated interference from hackers in recent years.
Mr Obama pointed out that al-Qaeda and other groups had threatened computer warfare.
Acts of terror today, he said, could come "not only from a few extremists in suicide vests, but from a few key strokes of a computer - a weapon of mass disruption."
The president said the United States was particularly dependent on its computer networks and therefore particularly vulnerable to cyber attacks.
In 2007 alone the Pentagon reported nearly 44,000 incidents of what it called malicious cyber activity carried out by foreign militaries, intelligence agencies and individual hackers.
Security priority
Mr Obama said that protecting America's digital infrastructure, the networks and computers everyone depended on every day, would be "a national security priority".
"It is now clear," he said, "this cyber threat is one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation."
He said the United States had failed to invest in its digital infrastructure. "We are not as prepared as we should be," he said.
In the past, no one US department was responsible for cyber-security, resulting in poor communication and co-ordination, he said.
The new cyber-security office will be a multi-billion dollar effort designed to restrict access to government computers and to protect systems - such as those that run the stock exchange and air traffic control - that keep the country going.
But Mr Obama emphasised that it would also help protect individual Americans, adding: "Millions... have been victimised: their privacy violated, their identities stolen, their lives upended, and their wallets emptied."
He pointed out that according to one survey, cyber crime cost Americans more than $8bn over the last two years. Worldwide, it was estimated that cyber criminals stole intellectual property from businesses worth up to $1 trillion.
"In short, America's economic prosperity in the 21st century will depend on cyber-security," he said.
The Obama administration is also expected to create a new cyber command at the Pentagon with the dual task of eradicating potential vulnerabilities in America's sensitive computer networks, while simultaneously creating ways to exploit them in the systems of potential enemies.
An influential study published last year suggested that having an offensive computer warfare capability would have a deterrent effect against would-be attackers.
Global Humanitarian Forum report on climate change death toll
CLIMATE change kills about 315,000 people a year through hunger, sickness and weather disasters, and the annual death toll is expected to rise to half a million by 2030.
A study commissioned by the Geneva-based Global Humanitarian Forum, estimates that climate change seriously affects 325 million people every year, a number that will more than double in 20 years to 10 per cent of the world's population (now about 6.7 billion).
Economic losses due to global warming amount to over $125 billion ($160 billion) annually - more than the flow of aid from rich to poor nations - and are expected to rise to $340 billion ($345 billion) each year by 2030, according to the report.
"Climate change is the greatest emerging humanitarian challenge of our time, causing suffering to hundreds of millions of people worldwide," Kofi Annan, former UN secretary-general and GHF president, said.
"The first hit and worst affected are the world's poorest groups, and yet they have done least to cause the problem."
The report says developing countries bear more than nine-tenths of the human and economic burden of climate change, while the 50 poorest countries contribute less than one percent of the carbon emissions that are heating up the planet.
Mr Annan urged governments due to meet at UN talks in Copenhagen in December to agree on an effective, fair and binding global pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, the world's main mechanism for tackling global warming.
"Copenhagen needs to be the most ambitious international agreement ever negotiated," he wrote in an introduction to the report.
"The alternative is mass starvation, mass migration and mass sickness."
The study warns that the true human impact of global warming is likely to be far more severe than it predicts, because it uses conservative UN scenarios.
New scientific evidence points to greater and more rapid climate change.
The report calls for a particular focus on the 500 million people it identifies as extremely vulnerable because they live in poor countries most prone to droughts, floods, storms, sea-level rise and creeping deserts.
Africa is the region most at risk from climate change, home to 15 of the 20 most vulnerable countries, the report says.
Other areas also facing the highest level of threat include South Asia and small island developing states.
To avoid the worst outcomes, the report says efforts to adapt to the effects of climate change must be scaled up 100 times in developing countries.
International funds pledged for this purpose amount to only $400 million ($510 miilion), compared with an average estimated cost of $32 billion ($40 billion) annually, it notes
A study commissioned by the Geneva-based Global Humanitarian Forum, estimates that climate change seriously affects 325 million people every year, a number that will more than double in 20 years to 10 per cent of the world's population (now about 6.7 billion).
Economic losses due to global warming amount to over $125 billion ($160 billion) annually - more than the flow of aid from rich to poor nations - and are expected to rise to $340 billion ($345 billion) each year by 2030, according to the report.
"Climate change is the greatest emerging humanitarian challenge of our time, causing suffering to hundreds of millions of people worldwide," Kofi Annan, former UN secretary-general and GHF president, said.
"The first hit and worst affected are the world's poorest groups, and yet they have done least to cause the problem."
The report says developing countries bear more than nine-tenths of the human and economic burden of climate change, while the 50 poorest countries contribute less than one percent of the carbon emissions that are heating up the planet.
Mr Annan urged governments due to meet at UN talks in Copenhagen in December to agree on an effective, fair and binding global pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, the world's main mechanism for tackling global warming.
"Copenhagen needs to be the most ambitious international agreement ever negotiated," he wrote in an introduction to the report.
"The alternative is mass starvation, mass migration and mass sickness."
The study warns that the true human impact of global warming is likely to be far more severe than it predicts, because it uses conservative UN scenarios.
New scientific evidence points to greater and more rapid climate change.
The report calls for a particular focus on the 500 million people it identifies as extremely vulnerable because they live in poor countries most prone to droughts, floods, storms, sea-level rise and creeping deserts.
Africa is the region most at risk from climate change, home to 15 of the 20 most vulnerable countries, the report says.
Other areas also facing the highest level of threat include South Asia and small island developing states.
To avoid the worst outcomes, the report says efforts to adapt to the effects of climate change must be scaled up 100 times in developing countries.
International funds pledged for this purpose amount to only $400 million ($510 miilion), compared with an average estimated cost of $32 billion ($40 billion) annually, it notes
Thursday, May 28, 2009
1,000 species of bacteria found on healthy humans
Here's a finding that'll make your skin crawl: A healthy human epidermis is colonized by roughly 1,000 species of bacteria.
Furthermore, the microorganisms have evolved to exploit the unique attributes of those body parts they call home, according to a study to be published today in the journal Science.
Some thrive in the desert of the forearm. Others are happiest in the tropical rain forest of the armpit.
The study, conducted by a team of researchers from the National Institutes of Health, reflects a growing realization that bacteria have colonized us inside and out -- and that their presence is not only harmless but also probably essential to the proper functioning of the body.
One striking example of that fact: Mice bred to be entirely germ-free have smaller hearts and are unable to digest food properly.
"We live in a microbial world, and these things are not all out to get us," said Noah Fierer, a microbial ecologist at the University of Colorado at Boulder, who has analyzed bacteria that live on hands.
"You don't want to live in a sterile world," said Fierer, who wasn't involved with the new report. "You probably can't live in a sterile world."
The results reported today will lay some groundwork for the Human Microbiome Project, a $115-million NIH venture aimed at cataloging the bacteria and other organisms that inhabit the skin, gut, nose, mouth and vagina.
Among the more than 19 square feet of skin on a typical adult, the NIH team focused on 20 specific areas, ranging from the oily patch between the eyebrows to the moist spaces between the toes.
Senior author Julia Segre and her colleagues used Q-Tip-style swabs to gather bacterial samples from 10 racially diverse volunteers, half men and half women. They collected 112,283 organisms altogether.
The specimens were classified according to a gene known as 16S rRNA, which is easy to identify and gives each bacterial species a unique signature. More than half belonged to one of three big groups that made them a cousin either of the bacterium that causes acne; one that causes diphtheria; or Staphylococcus aureus, the culprit behind many dangerous antibiotic-resistant infections.
Moist areas -- such as the belly button and the inner bend of the elbow -- have up to 10 times as many bacteria per square inch compared with dry areas, like the inside of the mid-forearm, the scientists found.
But the forearm turned out to have the greatest diversity of bacterial species, with a median of 44 among the 10 human volunteers.
The least diverse site sampled was the oily area behind the ear, with a median of 15, according to the study.
The study deliberately focused on regions associated with diseases such as eczema and psoriasis in the hope that the discoveries will help scientists understand those disorders better.
"We don't really know what causes skin diseases," said Segre, a senior investigator at the National Human Genome Research Institute. Perhaps, she suggested, an outbreak ensues when a dominant species of bacteria gets kicked out by a rival species.
Also a mystery is what all these microbes use for food.
"They obviously have to be eating something," Fierer said. "Probably some of them are eating dead skin cells or oils that come from your skin. Who knows?"
Roughly 100 billion individual bacteria live on skin, and when you add all their genes together they dwarf the 20,000 contained in the human genome, researchers said.
The microbes are probably doing something useful, said Dr. Martin Blaser, a microbiologist and infectious disease specialist at New York University Langone Medical Center, who in his studies has identified 183 kinds of bacteria on human arms.
After all, the locations of bacterial species is relatively consistent from person to person, perhaps implying some function that confers a benefit to the host.
"I can't prove it, but I think the idea that they are just hanging out is completely incorrect," Blaser said.
Segre agreed that bacteria have been getting a bad rap.
"We have to lose this language of warfare," she said. "Our goal is to keep the bacterial ecosystem in balance and move away from the concept that all bacteria are bad."
Furthermore, the microorganisms have evolved to exploit the unique attributes of those body parts they call home, according to a study to be published today in the journal Science.
Some thrive in the desert of the forearm. Others are happiest in the tropical rain forest of the armpit.
The study, conducted by a team of researchers from the National Institutes of Health, reflects a growing realization that bacteria have colonized us inside and out -- and that their presence is not only harmless but also probably essential to the proper functioning of the body.
One striking example of that fact: Mice bred to be entirely germ-free have smaller hearts and are unable to digest food properly.
"We live in a microbial world, and these things are not all out to get us," said Noah Fierer, a microbial ecologist at the University of Colorado at Boulder, who has analyzed bacteria that live on hands.
"You don't want to live in a sterile world," said Fierer, who wasn't involved with the new report. "You probably can't live in a sterile world."
The results reported today will lay some groundwork for the Human Microbiome Project, a $115-million NIH venture aimed at cataloging the bacteria and other organisms that inhabit the skin, gut, nose, mouth and vagina.
Among the more than 19 square feet of skin on a typical adult, the NIH team focused on 20 specific areas, ranging from the oily patch between the eyebrows to the moist spaces between the toes.
Senior author Julia Segre and her colleagues used Q-Tip-style swabs to gather bacterial samples from 10 racially diverse volunteers, half men and half women. They collected 112,283 organisms altogether.
The specimens were classified according to a gene known as 16S rRNA, which is easy to identify and gives each bacterial species a unique signature. More than half belonged to one of three big groups that made them a cousin either of the bacterium that causes acne; one that causes diphtheria; or Staphylococcus aureus, the culprit behind many dangerous antibiotic-resistant infections.
Moist areas -- such as the belly button and the inner bend of the elbow -- have up to 10 times as many bacteria per square inch compared with dry areas, like the inside of the mid-forearm, the scientists found.
But the forearm turned out to have the greatest diversity of bacterial species, with a median of 44 among the 10 human volunteers.
The least diverse site sampled was the oily area behind the ear, with a median of 15, according to the study.
The study deliberately focused on regions associated with diseases such as eczema and psoriasis in the hope that the discoveries will help scientists understand those disorders better.
"We don't really know what causes skin diseases," said Segre, a senior investigator at the National Human Genome Research Institute. Perhaps, she suggested, an outbreak ensues when a dominant species of bacteria gets kicked out by a rival species.
Also a mystery is what all these microbes use for food.
"They obviously have to be eating something," Fierer said. "Probably some of them are eating dead skin cells or oils that come from your skin. Who knows?"
Roughly 100 billion individual bacteria live on skin, and when you add all their genes together they dwarf the 20,000 contained in the human genome, researchers said.
The microbes are probably doing something useful, said Dr. Martin Blaser, a microbiologist and infectious disease specialist at New York University Langone Medical Center, who in his studies has identified 183 kinds of bacteria on human arms.
After all, the locations of bacterial species is relatively consistent from person to person, perhaps implying some function that confers a benefit to the host.
"I can't prove it, but I think the idea that they are just hanging out is completely incorrect," Blaser said.
Segre agreed that bacteria have been getting a bad rap.
"We have to lose this language of warfare," she said. "Our goal is to keep the bacterial ecosystem in balance and move away from the concept that all bacteria are bad."
Obama clashes with Israel on settlements
President Obama and top Israeli officials staked out sharply opposing positions over the explosive issue of Jewish settlements Thursday, propelling a rare dispute between the two longtime allies into full public view just days before the president is scheduled to deliver an address in Egypt to the world's Muslims.
Obama brushed aside Israeli objections to his call for a complete freeze on settlement activity in Palestinian territory and insisted a halt was one of Israel's obligations in peace talks, a point he made in a meeting last week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
I was very clear about the need to stop building settlements, to stop the building of outposts," Obama said Thursday after meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The developments put Obama in the unusual position of taking a hard line with Israel early in his administration, adding a note of contention to the start of a grueling period of peace talks that the White House has vowed to aggressively pursue.
By contrast, former President Bush, like most other U.S. leaders, took pains to avoid any appearance of disagreement with the Israelis, even when differences existed.
However, both Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also have made pointed remarks to Israelis. Clinton on Wednesday said the administration stance on settlements provides for no exceptions, not even for "natural growth," the Israeli term for population increases.
In response, the Netanyahu government reiterated its position Thursday that natural growth should be permitted to occur, to accommodate growing families, for example.
Netanyahu has said he is willing to hold the line on new projects and even to dismantle some smaller "outposts," a stance unpopular with many Israelis who passionately defend the settlements. But the status of existing settlements would be decided later by Israelis and Palestinians, said Mark Regev, the prime minister's spokesman.
"In the interim period, normal life in those communities should continue," he said.
Obama refused to accept that view or to ease his administration's call, stressing the importance of halting settlement growth. He also after meeting with Abbas that Palestinians deserved more freedom of movement in the region and called on Palestinians to follow through on steps to safeguard Israel's security.
Obama also asked Abbas to try to temper vehemently anti-Israeli public sentiment among Palestinians.
"I also mentioned to President Abbas, in a frank exchange, that it was very important to continue to make progress in reducing the incitement and anti-Israel sentiments that are sometimes expressed in schools and mosques and in the public square, because all those things are impediments to peace," Obama said.
The president said he would address the issue of Mideast peace during his speech next Thursday in Egypt, but said his message also will be more basic.
"I want to use the occasion to deliver a broader message about how the United States can change for the better its relationship with the Muslim world," he said. "That will require, I think, a recognition on both the part of the United States as well as many majority-Muslim countries about each other; a better sense of understanding and, I think, the possibilities of achieving common ground."
He said he would stress in the speech the contributions of Muslim Americans, an area he said often is overlooked.
Obama noted the split in Palestinian government, controlled by Abbas' Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and by the militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
"I very much appreciate is that President Abbas has been under enormous pressure to bring about some sort of unity government and to negotiate with Hamas," Obama said, noting Abbas has recognized Israel's right to exist. Hamas does not accept a right of Israel to exist.
Obama brushed aside Israeli objections to his call for a complete freeze on settlement activity in Palestinian territory and insisted a halt was one of Israel's obligations in peace talks, a point he made in a meeting last week with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
I was very clear about the need to stop building settlements, to stop the building of outposts," Obama said Thursday after meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The developments put Obama in the unusual position of taking a hard line with Israel early in his administration, adding a note of contention to the start of a grueling period of peace talks that the White House has vowed to aggressively pursue.
By contrast, former President Bush, like most other U.S. leaders, took pains to avoid any appearance of disagreement with the Israelis, even when differences existed.
However, both Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton also have made pointed remarks to Israelis. Clinton on Wednesday said the administration stance on settlements provides for no exceptions, not even for "natural growth," the Israeli term for population increases.
In response, the Netanyahu government reiterated its position Thursday that natural growth should be permitted to occur, to accommodate growing families, for example.
Netanyahu has said he is willing to hold the line on new projects and even to dismantle some smaller "outposts," a stance unpopular with many Israelis who passionately defend the settlements. But the status of existing settlements would be decided later by Israelis and Palestinians, said Mark Regev, the prime minister's spokesman.
"In the interim period, normal life in those communities should continue," he said.
Obama refused to accept that view or to ease his administration's call, stressing the importance of halting settlement growth. He also after meeting with Abbas that Palestinians deserved more freedom of movement in the region and called on Palestinians to follow through on steps to safeguard Israel's security.
Obama also asked Abbas to try to temper vehemently anti-Israeli public sentiment among Palestinians.
"I also mentioned to President Abbas, in a frank exchange, that it was very important to continue to make progress in reducing the incitement and anti-Israel sentiments that are sometimes expressed in schools and mosques and in the public square, because all those things are impediments to peace," Obama said.
The president said he would address the issue of Mideast peace during his speech next Thursday in Egypt, but said his message also will be more basic.
"I want to use the occasion to deliver a broader message about how the United States can change for the better its relationship with the Muslim world," he said. "That will require, I think, a recognition on both the part of the United States as well as many majority-Muslim countries about each other; a better sense of understanding and, I think, the possibilities of achieving common ground."
He said he would stress in the speech the contributions of Muslim Americans, an area he said often is overlooked.
Obama noted the split in Palestinian government, controlled by Abbas' Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and by the militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
"I very much appreciate is that President Abbas has been under enormous pressure to bring about some sort of unity government and to negotiate with Hamas," Obama said, noting Abbas has recognized Israel's right to exist. Hamas does not accept a right of Israel to exist.
Schwarzenegger proposes 5% cut in state worker salaries [Updated]
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has proposed a 5% cut in 200,000 state workers’ salaries.
Combined with existing mandatory furloughs, that would mean about a 15% pay cut for those workers. The proposal would affect appointees and civil servants in agencies run by the governor but not employees of other elected officials, such as the attorney general or controller.
“Everyone in the state is cutting back right now — businesses, families,” said Matt David, spokesman for Schwarzenegger. “The governor feels it’s very important that state workers do the same thing.”
The proposal, to be announced Friday, would save the state $470 million, David said, and is part of the governor's plan to close a projected $24-billion budget gap.
[Updated at 4:30 p.m.: Schwarzenegger last year forced state workers to take off two days a month without pay, amounting to about a 10% salary reduction.
The new decrease, which would have to be approved by lawmakers during budget negotiations, would not come with any time off. It would take effect with the new budget in July. The governor in recent weeks has proposed closing $21 billion of the budget gap mostly through drastic cuts to a variety of state programs that provide healthcare, welfare, education and law enforcement, and he also wants to borrow $2 billion from local governments.
Besides the wage cuts, his new proposal will include additional reductions to funding for education, health and human services, sources said.]
Combined with existing mandatory furloughs, that would mean about a 15% pay cut for those workers. The proposal would affect appointees and civil servants in agencies run by the governor but not employees of other elected officials, such as the attorney general or controller.
“Everyone in the state is cutting back right now — businesses, families,” said Matt David, spokesman for Schwarzenegger. “The governor feels it’s very important that state workers do the same thing.”
The proposal, to be announced Friday, would save the state $470 million, David said, and is part of the governor's plan to close a projected $24-billion budget gap.
[Updated at 4:30 p.m.: Schwarzenegger last year forced state workers to take off two days a month without pay, amounting to about a 10% salary reduction.
The new decrease, which would have to be approved by lawmakers during budget negotiations, would not come with any time off. It would take effect with the new budget in July. The governor in recent weeks has proposed closing $21 billion of the budget gap mostly through drastic cuts to a variety of state programs that provide healthcare, welfare, education and law enforcement, and he also wants to borrow $2 billion from local governments.
Besides the wage cuts, his new proposal will include additional reductions to funding for education, health and human services, sources said.]
In Finland, Nuclear Renaissance Runs Into Trouble
As the Obama administration tries to steer America toward cleaner sources of energy, it would do well to consider the cautionary tale of this new-generation nuclear reactor site.
The massive power plant under construction on muddy terrain on this Finnish island was supposed to be the showpiece of a nuclear renaissance. The most powerful reactor ever built, its modular design was supposed to make it faster and cheaper to build. And it was supposed to be safer, too.
But things have not gone as planned.
After four years of construction and thousands of defects and deficiencies, the reactor’s 3 billion euro price tag, about $4.2 billion, has climbed at least 50 percent. And while the reactor was originally meant to be completed this summer, Areva, the French company building it, and the utility that ordered it, are no longer willing to make certain predictions on when it will go online.
While the American nuclear industry has predicted clear sailing after its first plants are built, the problems in Europe suggest these obstacles may be hard to avoid.
A new fleet of reactors would be standardized down to “the carpeting and wallpaper,” as Michael J. Wallace, the chairman of UniStar Nuclear Energy — a joint venture between EDF Group and Constellation Energy, the Maryland-based utility — has said repeatedly.
In the end, he insists, that standardization will lead to significant savings.
But early experience suggests these new reactors will be no easier or cheaper to build than the ones of a generation ago, when cost overruns — and then accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl — ended the last nuclear construction boom.
In Flamanville, France, a clone of the Finnish reactor now under construction is also behind schedule and overbudget.
In the United States, Florida and Georgia have changed state laws to raise electricity rates so that consumers will foot some of the bill for new nuclear plants in advance, before construction even begins.
“A number of U.S. companies have looked with trepidation on the situation in Finland and at the magnitude of the investment there,” said Paul L. Joskow, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a co-author of an influential report on the future of nuclear power in 2003. “The rollout of new nuclear reactors will be a good deal slower than a lot of people were assuming.”
For nuclear power to have a high impact on reducing greenhouse gases, an average of 12 reactors would have to be built worldwide each year until 2030, according to the Nuclear Energy Agency at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Right now, there are not even enough reactors under construction to replace those that are reaching the end of their lives.
And of the 45 reactors being built around the world, 22 have encountered construction delays, according to an analysis prepared this year for the German government by Mycle Schneider, an energy analyst and a critic of the nuclear industry. He added that nine do not have official start-up dates.
Most of the new construction is underway in countries like China and Russia, where strong central governments have made nuclear energy a national priority. India also has long seen nuclear as part of a national drive for self-sufficiency and now is seeking new nuclear technologies to reduce its reliance on imported uranium.
By comparison, “the state has been all over the place in the United States and Europe on nuclear power,” Mr. Joskow said.
The United States generates about one-fifth of its electricity from a fleet of 104 reactors, most built in the 1960s and 1970s. Coal still provides about half the country’s power.
To streamline construction, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Washington has worked with the industry to approve a handful of designs. Even so, the schedule to certify the most advanced model from Westinghouse, a unit of Toshiba, has slipped during an ongoing review of its ability to withstand the impact of an airliner.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has also not yet approved the so-called EPR design under construction in Finland for the American market.
This month, the United States Energy Department produced a short list of four reactor projects eligible for some loan guarantees. In the 2005 energy bill, Congress provided $18.5 billion, but the industry’s hope of winning an additional $50 billion worth of loan guarantees evaporated when that money was stripped from President Obama’s economic stimulus bill.
The industry has had more success in getting states to help raise money. This year, authorities permitted Florida Power & Light to start charging millions of customers several dollars a month to finance four new reactors. Customers of Georgia Power, a subsidiary of the Southern Co., will pay on average $1.30 a month more in 2011, rising to $9.10 by 2017, to help pay for two reactors expected to go online in 2016 or later.
But resistance is mounting. In April, Missouri legislators balked at a preconstruction rate increase, prompting the state’s largest electric utility, Ameren UE, to suspend plans for a $6 billion copy of Areva’s Finnish reactor.
Areva, a conglomerate largely owned by the French state, is heir to that nation’s experience in building nuclear plants. France gets about 80 percent of its power from 58 reactors. But even France has not completed a new reactor since 1999.
After designing an updated plant originally called the European Pressurized Reactor with German participation during the 1990s, the French had trouble selling it at home because of a saturated energy market as well as opposition from Green Party members in the then-coalition government.
So Areva turned to Finland, where utilities and energy-hungry industries like pulp and paper had been lobbying for 15 years for more nuclear power. The project was initially budgeted at $4 billion and Teollisuuden Voima, the Finnish utility, pledged it would be ready in time to help the Finnish government meet its greenhouse gas targets under the Kyoto climate treaty, which runs through 2012Areva promised electricity from the reactor could be generated more cheaply than from natural gas plants. Areva also said its model would deliver 1,600 megawatts, or about 10 percent of Finnish power needs.
In 2001, the Finnish parliament narrowly approved construction of a reactor at Olkiluoto, an island on the Baltic Sea. Construction began four years later.
Serious problems first arose over the vast concrete base slab for the foundation of the reactor building, which the country’s Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority found too porous and prone to corrosion. Since then, the authority has blamed Areva for allowing inexperienced subcontractors to drill holes in the wrong places on a vast steel container that seals the reactor.
In December, the authority warned Anne Lauvergeon, the chief executive of Areva, that “the attitude or lack of professional knowledge of some persons” at Areva was holding up work on safety systems.
Today, the site still teems with 4,000 workmen on round-the-clock shifts. Banners from dozens of subcontractors around Europe flutter in the breeze above temporary offices and makeshift canteens. Some 10,000 people speaking at least eight different languages have worked at the site. About 30 percent of the workforce is Polish, and communication has posed significant challenges.
Areva has acknowledged that the cost of a new reactor today would be as much as 6 billion euros, or $8 billion, double the price offered to the Finns. But Areva said it was not cutting any corners in Finland. The two sides have agreed to arbitration, where they are both claiming more than 1 billion euros in compensation. (Areva blames the Finnish authorities for impeding construction and increasing costs for work it agreed to complete at a fixed price.)
Areva announced a steep drop in earnings last year, which it blamed mostly on mounting losses from the project.
In addition, nuclear safety inspectors in France have found cracks in the concrete base and steel reinforcements in the wrong places at the site in Flamanville. They also have warned Électricité de France, the utility building the reactor, that welders working on the steel container were not properly qualified.
On top of such problems come the recession, weaker energy demand, tight credit and uncertainty over future policies, said Caren Byrd, an executive director of the global utility and power group at Morgan Stanley in New York.
“The warning lights now are flashing more brightly than just a year ago about the cost of new nuclear,” she said.
And Jouni Silvennoinen, the project manager at Olkiluoto, said, “We have had it easy here.” Olkiluoto is at least a geologically stable site. Earthquake risks in places like China and the United States or even the threat of storm surges mean building these reactors will be even trickier elsewhere.
The massive power plant under construction on muddy terrain on this Finnish island was supposed to be the showpiece of a nuclear renaissance. The most powerful reactor ever built, its modular design was supposed to make it faster and cheaper to build. And it was supposed to be safer, too.
But things have not gone as planned.
After four years of construction and thousands of defects and deficiencies, the reactor’s 3 billion euro price tag, about $4.2 billion, has climbed at least 50 percent. And while the reactor was originally meant to be completed this summer, Areva, the French company building it, and the utility that ordered it, are no longer willing to make certain predictions on when it will go online.
While the American nuclear industry has predicted clear sailing after its first plants are built, the problems in Europe suggest these obstacles may be hard to avoid.
A new fleet of reactors would be standardized down to “the carpeting and wallpaper,” as Michael J. Wallace, the chairman of UniStar Nuclear Energy — a joint venture between EDF Group and Constellation Energy, the Maryland-based utility — has said repeatedly.
In the end, he insists, that standardization will lead to significant savings.
But early experience suggests these new reactors will be no easier or cheaper to build than the ones of a generation ago, when cost overruns — and then accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl — ended the last nuclear construction boom.
In Flamanville, France, a clone of the Finnish reactor now under construction is also behind schedule and overbudget.
In the United States, Florida and Georgia have changed state laws to raise electricity rates so that consumers will foot some of the bill for new nuclear plants in advance, before construction even begins.
“A number of U.S. companies have looked with trepidation on the situation in Finland and at the magnitude of the investment there,” said Paul L. Joskow, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a co-author of an influential report on the future of nuclear power in 2003. “The rollout of new nuclear reactors will be a good deal slower than a lot of people were assuming.”
For nuclear power to have a high impact on reducing greenhouse gases, an average of 12 reactors would have to be built worldwide each year until 2030, according to the Nuclear Energy Agency at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Right now, there are not even enough reactors under construction to replace those that are reaching the end of their lives.
And of the 45 reactors being built around the world, 22 have encountered construction delays, according to an analysis prepared this year for the German government by Mycle Schneider, an energy analyst and a critic of the nuclear industry. He added that nine do not have official start-up dates.
Most of the new construction is underway in countries like China and Russia, where strong central governments have made nuclear energy a national priority. India also has long seen nuclear as part of a national drive for self-sufficiency and now is seeking new nuclear technologies to reduce its reliance on imported uranium.
By comparison, “the state has been all over the place in the United States and Europe on nuclear power,” Mr. Joskow said.
The United States generates about one-fifth of its electricity from a fleet of 104 reactors, most built in the 1960s and 1970s. Coal still provides about half the country’s power.
To streamline construction, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Washington has worked with the industry to approve a handful of designs. Even so, the schedule to certify the most advanced model from Westinghouse, a unit of Toshiba, has slipped during an ongoing review of its ability to withstand the impact of an airliner.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has also not yet approved the so-called EPR design under construction in Finland for the American market.
This month, the United States Energy Department produced a short list of four reactor projects eligible for some loan guarantees. In the 2005 energy bill, Congress provided $18.5 billion, but the industry’s hope of winning an additional $50 billion worth of loan guarantees evaporated when that money was stripped from President Obama’s economic stimulus bill.
The industry has had more success in getting states to help raise money. This year, authorities permitted Florida Power & Light to start charging millions of customers several dollars a month to finance four new reactors. Customers of Georgia Power, a subsidiary of the Southern Co., will pay on average $1.30 a month more in 2011, rising to $9.10 by 2017, to help pay for two reactors expected to go online in 2016 or later.
But resistance is mounting. In April, Missouri legislators balked at a preconstruction rate increase, prompting the state’s largest electric utility, Ameren UE, to suspend plans for a $6 billion copy of Areva’s Finnish reactor.
Areva, a conglomerate largely owned by the French state, is heir to that nation’s experience in building nuclear plants. France gets about 80 percent of its power from 58 reactors. But even France has not completed a new reactor since 1999.
After designing an updated plant originally called the European Pressurized Reactor with German participation during the 1990s, the French had trouble selling it at home because of a saturated energy market as well as opposition from Green Party members in the then-coalition government.
So Areva turned to Finland, where utilities and energy-hungry industries like pulp and paper had been lobbying for 15 years for more nuclear power. The project was initially budgeted at $4 billion and Teollisuuden Voima, the Finnish utility, pledged it would be ready in time to help the Finnish government meet its greenhouse gas targets under the Kyoto climate treaty, which runs through 2012Areva promised electricity from the reactor could be generated more cheaply than from natural gas plants. Areva also said its model would deliver 1,600 megawatts, or about 10 percent of Finnish power needs.
In 2001, the Finnish parliament narrowly approved construction of a reactor at Olkiluoto, an island on the Baltic Sea. Construction began four years later.
Serious problems first arose over the vast concrete base slab for the foundation of the reactor building, which the country’s Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority found too porous and prone to corrosion. Since then, the authority has blamed Areva for allowing inexperienced subcontractors to drill holes in the wrong places on a vast steel container that seals the reactor.
In December, the authority warned Anne Lauvergeon, the chief executive of Areva, that “the attitude or lack of professional knowledge of some persons” at Areva was holding up work on safety systems.
Today, the site still teems with 4,000 workmen on round-the-clock shifts. Banners from dozens of subcontractors around Europe flutter in the breeze above temporary offices and makeshift canteens. Some 10,000 people speaking at least eight different languages have worked at the site. About 30 percent of the workforce is Polish, and communication has posed significant challenges.
Areva has acknowledged that the cost of a new reactor today would be as much as 6 billion euros, or $8 billion, double the price offered to the Finns. But Areva said it was not cutting any corners in Finland. The two sides have agreed to arbitration, where they are both claiming more than 1 billion euros in compensation. (Areva blames the Finnish authorities for impeding construction and increasing costs for work it agreed to complete at a fixed price.)
Areva announced a steep drop in earnings last year, which it blamed mostly on mounting losses from the project.
In addition, nuclear safety inspectors in France have found cracks in the concrete base and steel reinforcements in the wrong places at the site in Flamanville. They also have warned Électricité de France, the utility building the reactor, that welders working on the steel container were not properly qualified.
On top of such problems come the recession, weaker energy demand, tight credit and uncertainty over future policies, said Caren Byrd, an executive director of the global utility and power group at Morgan Stanley in New York.
“The warning lights now are flashing more brightly than just a year ago about the cost of new nuclear,” she said.
And Jouni Silvennoinen, the project manager at Olkiluoto, said, “We have had it easy here.” Olkiluoto is at least a geologically stable site. Earthquake risks in places like China and the United States or even the threat of storm surges mean building these reactors will be even trickier elsewhere.
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