Labs
McCain talks wilderness, economy, immigration
McCain granted an approximately 25-minute interview today to five New Mexico reporters -- including NMI's Heath Haussamen -- who rode with him on the Straight Talk Express, his campaign bus, from the Albuquerque International Airport to a campaign fundraiser at the Hilton Albuquerque.
Keeping tabs on TB
International travel and bio-terrorism have upped the ante in the need for quick turnaround times in disease forensics. But quick turnarounds require that scientists and clinicians have access to a pathogen-centric database. Three scientists explain to NMI how such a national database for one of today's greatest health threats -- tuberculosis -- could be up and running in six months at the University of New Mexico.
Wilson: Lab funding threatened by two extremes
U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson said Wednesday that Democrats want to gut funding for the Los Alamos National Laboratory while some Republicans want to slash government spending no matter what. One could interpret those remarks as veiled attacks on her two rivals also running for the soon-to-be-vacant U.S. Senate seat.
Nuke power poised for explosive growth
Energy has exploded onto center stage as one of the key issues of Campaign '08, driven there by skyrocketing fuel prices and concerns about global climate change. And all candidates say nuclear power deserves a place at the nation's energy table, despite lingering questions that go to the heart of fission technology: what to do with the waste.
Editor's note: This article is the first of a two-part series.
NM solicits perceptions of Los Alamos from those who live nearby
The State of New Mexico has organized "listening sessions" to evaluate the issues and perceptions of residents who live near Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Notice of these sessions appeared a week after an AP story reported northern New Mexico resident's concern over the U.S. Department of Energy proposal to increase plutonium pit production at the nuclear weapons lab by over 800%. Plutonium pits are the core of nuclear warheads.
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Domenici opposes immunity takeaway proposal
Pete Domenici disagrees "wholeheartedly" with an amendment in the FISA bill that would preclude retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies who allowed the U.S. government to use their infrastructure to spy on phone conversations of U.S. citizens. In a conversation with New Mexico radio reporters yesterday, he replied to a question by Elaine Baumgartel of KUNM that he was sure the bill would pass with the retroactive immunity provision intact, because the only reason the companies were involved in the first place was because the United States government asked for their help.
The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development yesterday finalized its Fiscal Year 2009 funding proposal for the Army Corps of Engineers, plus the Departments of Interior and Energy. Chaired by Dem. Senator Bryan Dorgin, the bill increases funding overall by $2.4 billion over Fiscal Year 2008, which is $1.9 billion over the Bush administrations request. The Los Alamos Monitor reports that the bill would "restore" cuts to Los Alamos Lab funding cut in the House bill, specifically for LANL's Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement facility, plus $145 million for pit manufacturing that was unfunded by the House.
An Albuquerque City Hall transportation task force heard from a consultant yesterday that the most feasible part of Central for a street car project would be between Downtown and San Mateo, according to the Albuquerque Journal.
Shadow over solar
Large-scale solar power plants -- ideally suited for states like New Mexico -- are "straining to burst onto the Southwest utility scene," in the words of one expert testifying at a U.S. Senate hearing on solar energy Wednesday. But without an immediate eight-year extension of the 30 percent federal investment tax credit, the concentrating solar power industry, or CSP, will be "stopped dead in its tracks."
LANL to house world's fastest supercomputer
Beep. Beep. Make way for Roadrunner -- the world's fastest computer. The U.S. Department of Energy announced today that the IBM-built machine, which will be housed at Los Alamos National Laboratory, has broken the petaflop barrier. That's geek speak for the number of calculations the computer's processors are capable of performing -- 1,000 trillion operations per second in the case of Roadrunner. In today's news release, the Energy Department described it this way:
To put this into perspective, if each of the 6 billion people on earth had a hand calculator and worked together on a calculation 24 hours per day, 365 days a year, it would take 46 years to do what Roadrunner would do in one day.
Report questions LANL nuke production
Political change isn't the only challenge New Mexico's national labs are facing. Federal investigators released a report Monday underscoring the uncertain future of Los Alamos National Laboratory's nuclear weapons mission.
The General Accountability Office concluded that that the National Nuclear Security Administration has significantly underestimated the cost of producing plutonium bomb cores at the lab and that NNSA's long-term strategy for pit production is in "a state of flux." GAO investigators also found that LANL lacks adequate lab, storage and waste handling facilities to expand its pit production capability "for the foreseeable future."
Nuclear uncertainty
Nuclear policy experts and arms control advocates are closely watching the state's congressional elections, which will reshape the state's congressional delegation in the absence of retiring U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici -- a man who some think has helped influence the country's nuclear weapons policy through his years of tenacious support for Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories.
N.M. labs lauded in Business Week
New Mexico's two national laboratories are lauded as "national treasures" in an article in Business Week this month.
Sandia National Laboratories and Los Alamos National Laboratory are the focus of a piece that has private industry executives praising the labs as essential partners in coming up with new product technology, including "green" technology.
Proctor and Gamble president Thomas J. Lange, for example, tells Business Week the company is trying to "go green" but "natural materials may not be as pure, as strong, or as stable over time" as petro-plastics, and the company needs Sandia's supercomputers and expertise to create eco-friendly materials.
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Secrecy lifted on Sandia's anthrax scientists
Since February 2002, scientists at Sandia Laboratories have worked in secrecy to determine if anthrax that killed five people in the autumn of 2001 came from a terrorist group or foreign state. Now they're laying out the chronology of their research to the Albuquerque Journal's John Fleck.
Not only was New Mexico State University in Las Cruces host to retiring Sen. Pete Domenici's Policy Conference this week, NMSU is getting papers and memorabilia the senator accumulated over his 36 years in Congress, the Las Cruces Sun-News reports and which the Independent noted yesterday.
Analysis of June's 17-acre Ancho fire near a weapons test facility at Los Alamos National Laboratory has led to some changes to prevent recurrence, the Los Alamos Monitor reports.
Biofuels get a boost
Principals from the New Mexico Biodiesel Policy Summit held in March have taken that groundbreaking summit a step further, forming the Southwestern Biofuels Association to promote and guide policy in use of this "green" source of energy.
Those who attended the summit received letters earlier this month about the formation of the association, which includes members of the industry, government and Sandia National Laboratories.
The group made its debut on the opening day of the Legislature's special session and has a Web site touting the Southwest, and New Mexico in particular, as well-suited for biodiesel fuels production:
The potential for New Mexico and the Southwest to become major players in the production of biofuels and biodiesel feedstocks is very promising. While the region's climate is too arid for the production of many agricultural products, some of the most important biodiesel crops are well suited to the region's high altitude, low moisture levels, and high summer heat. Where other crops would fail, crops used for biodiesel production -- such as Camelina and Jatropha -- prosper favorably in the Southwest's climate.
Hydrogen tour comes to Albuquerque
By Denise Tessier 08/20/2008
Eleven hydrogen-powered vehicles from major automakers like BMW, GM, Honda and Toyota will be available for public view -- and some for short test drives -- from 2 to 4 p.m. today at the Sandia Science & Technology Park.According to Sandia National Labs, several of the hydrogen-fueled cars will be displayed in the parking lot of the Ktech building at Eubank Boulevard and Gibson Avenue SE, and some will be available for test drives.
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Creepy crawlers and a massive sink hole
By Denise Tessier 08/08/2008
We're not making this up, but some of the news from around the state sounds like something out of the National Enquirer.
Streets in affected neighborhoods around Las Cruces are being painted greenish yellow as vehicles squish thousands of crawling caterpillars, reports the Las Cruces Sun News, which posted graphic pictures and an up-close-and-personal YouTube video of the creeping critters that have arrived by the millions, thanks to abundant rainfall and food sources.
Deadly denial: Sick nuclear weapons workers fight for compensation.
By Marjorie Childress 07/29/2008
American workers who built the nation's nuclear weapons are still fighting a cold war, and you can read all about it in Deadly Denial, a comprehensive series rolled out last week by the Rocky Mountain News.
Deadly Denial paints a grim picture of "tens of thousands" of sick nuclear weapons workers from across the country who've applied for compensation under a program put in place in 2000. But most have never seen a dime, says the Rocky Mountain News.
"Heroes from the Cold War who risked their lives to build nuclear weapon," is how Gov. Bill Richardson characterizes the workers. And regarding the lack of compensation, he told the Rocky Mountain News, "The bureaucracy has placed so many barriers, it's almost criminal that workers and their families are not being compensated."
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Congress overrides presidential veto
By Gwyneth Doland 07/16/2008
Congress voted last night to override President Bush's veto of a bill that would have prevented a cut in the amount Medicare pays doctors. In the House, Tom Udall and Heather Wilson voted to override the veto; Steve Pearce did not vote, but a spokesman said this morning that he would have voted with his colleagues. In the Senate, Jeff Bingaman voted to override the President's veto, but Pete Domenici voted against it. As the Washington Post blogged last night, the override required the cooperation of many Republican legislators, despite the Administration's efforts to keep them in line.
PNM announced yesterday that gas bills are going to be significantly higher this winter. As the Journal points out, PNM is prohibited from making a profit on the cost of gas; they make money on the transmission of the gas.
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: The fight over food, pollution and plutonium pits
By Marjorie Childress 06/30/2008
The Associated Press reported over the weekend about the opposing viewpoints regarding a Department of Energy proposal that would expand the making of plutonium pits, which are the core of nuclear weapons, from just a few to 80 per year at Los Alamos National Laboratory.
The Albuquerque Police Department's party patrol got taken to task, after the ABQ Journal looked at the 70% dismissal rate in 2007 of "refusing to obey" arrests in the city. In other ABQ metro news, City Hall and Bernalillo County have teamed up to create a Climate Task Force.
The Sandia Ranger District of the Cibola National Forest has essentially been shut-down due to fire danger, as of today.
Udall votes against lab cuts
By John Arnold 06/25/2008Rep. Tom Udall on Wednesday voted against a spending bill that would significantly cut Los Alamos National Laboratory's budget and halt plutonium pit production at the lab. Over Udall's objection, the House Appropriations Committee passed the measure on a voice vote, and it will now head to the House floor.
TODAY'S TOP STORIES: Proposed nuke funding cuts for LANL
By Gwyneth Doland 06/25/2008
In the news today, the U.S. House Appropriations Committee has recommended in a report that funds be slashed for a $1.29 billion nuclear warhead program at LANL, according to the Albuquerque Journal.
In Albuquerque, City Councilor Debbie O'Malley has sharply criticized Mayor Martin Chavez for thwarting the council's wishes by cutting a deal for a balloon landing site just before the council would have taken that power for itself, according to Albuquerque Journal.