News
Publish date: October 28, 2003
News
On October 7th and 8th, 2003, Murmansk hosted a meeting of the Presidium Russian State Council working group meeting headed by the Murmansk region Governor Yury Yevdokimov. The meeting raised the issue of international cooperation development in the field of nuclear and radiation safety. Deputy Minister of Atomic Energy Sergey Antipov, representatives of the Foreign Ministry, Natural Resources Ministry, Transport Ministry, delegations of Kamchatka, Chelyabinsk and Astrakhan region participated in the meeting.
According to Regnum news agency, the main issue discussed at the meeting was how to attract foreign investments to solve the problem of radioactive waste in Murmansk region. The Russian State budget allocates $66m annually for nuclear and radiation safety, while $1.2 billion total is needed to solve all the problems. Therefore, western aid could significantly speed up the clean-up works in the region. Today the biggest problem for western donors is Russian high taxes and access to the nuclear sites, head of Murmansk region information department Kirill Babayev admitted. Yury Yevdokimov said the hardest sites for access in Murmansk region are Andreeva bay, Sayda bay and technical base in Ostrovnoy as well as retired multipurpose nuclear submarines. The members of the working group should report about the work done to the State Council Presidium and the Russian President in December this year.
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After years of inaction, Germany is working on its Carbon Management Strategy to resolve how CCS can play a role in climate action in industry. At the end of February, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action published first key points and a proposal to amend the law Kohlenstoffdioxid Speicherungsgesetz (KSpG). Bellona Deutschland, who was actively involved in the previous stakeholder dialogue submitted a statement in the association hearing.
In the midst of a global discussion on whether natural gas should be used as a transitional fuel and whether emissions from its extraction, production, transport and use are significantly less than those from other fossil fuels, Russia has developed ambitious plans to increase its own production of liquified natural gas (LNG) in the Arctic – a region with 75% of proven gas reserves in Russia – to raise its share in the international gas trade.
In this news digest, we monitor events that impact the environment in the Russian Arctic. Our main focus lies in identifying the factors that contribute to pollution risks and climate change.