[DRAFT]Repeal GAR #60 "Nuclear Disaster Response Act"

[John Turner]

Repeal "Nuclear Disaster Response Act"
A resolution to repeal previously passed legislation.

Category: Repeal | Resolution: GA# 60 | Proposed by: John Turner

The World Assembly,

Lauding the goals of General Assembly Resolution #60 "Nuclear Disaster Response Act" to protect the environment and life forms from the adverse effects of nuclear contamination,

Believing it is the duty of the international community as a whole to provide assistance when possible to help contain and cleanse the area affected by a nuclear disaster,

However believing that General Assembly Resolution #60 "Nuclear Disaster Response Act" also possesses certain flaws and questionable definitions which necessitate a repeal and replace of this resolution,

Concerned clause 1(A) which defines a nuclear disaster as "as any event, brought about intentionally or accidentally, that results in the widespread expulsion of harmful concentrations of nuclear radiation" to be questionable as this would classify open atmosphere nuclear tests which are not presently banned by the World Assembly as a nuclear disaster, thus requiring the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization to intervene and provide cleanup and assistance to the nation conducting said test,

Believing clause 3 which states "mandates that all member nations report nuclear disasters to the NDRO, and any surrounding nations that may have been affected by the disaster" to be seriously questionable as it would require member nations to report all nuclear tests to the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization as well as their neighbours thus possibly compromising sensitive or classified data regarding those nuclear tests,

Firmly believing it is the duty of nations which are directly responsible for the cause of a nuclear disaster to take the lead role in the clean up and remediation of the environment,

Strongly suggesting the World Assembly pass a better defined resolution which will ensure the effects of a nuclear disaster cause as little damage as possible,

Hereby repeals GENERAL ASSEMBLY RESOLUTION #60 "Nuclear Disaster Response Act".

Hoping to successfully repeal so the effects of this resolution can be incorporated into a broader more encompassing resolution.

As always comments, questions and concerns are welcome.

[Kaboomlandia]

Why do you find it necessary to repeal every last resolution on nuclear energy to replace them with blockers?

[Separatist Peoples]

Why do you find it necessary to repeal every last resolution on nuclear energy to replace them with blockers?

"Probably because, this way, they can be addressed with a more streamlined regulatory system and also give individual nations more freedom to diversify their own approaches to nuclear energy and peripheral facets. Unless you'd rather the entire collection of nuclear-based laws be cobbled together by different people with different agendas, leaving cracks and loopholes everywhere?

"It doesn't hurt that the author likely has more experience with nuclear science and regulation than your entire staff combined."

[John Turner]

Why do you find it necessary to repeal every last resolution on nuclear energy to replace them with blockers?

The fact you tried to repeal the Nuclear Testing Protocol on the grounds that it does not allow nuclear testing on "willing" subjects says says boatloads as to your intentions. Your comment is therefore irrelevant and shall be discarded as such. Have a pleasant day Ambassador, and feel free to stop by my office sometime if you need pointers on actually drafting palatable legislation.

[Sierra Lyricalia]

Concerned clause 1(A) which defines a nuclear disaster as "as any event, brought about intentionally or accidentally, that results in the widespread expulsion of harmful concentrations of nuclear radiation" to be questionable as this would classify open atmosphere nuclear tests which are not presently banned by the World Assembly as a nuclear disaster, thus requiring the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization to intervene and provide cleanup and assistance to the nation conducting said test,

Believing clause 3 which states "mandates that all member nations report nuclear disasters to the NDRO, and any surrounding nations that may have been affected by the disaster" to be seriously questionable as it would require member nations to report all nuclear tests to the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization as well as their neighbours thus possibly compromising sensitive or classified data regarding those nuclear tests,

"I'm afraid we can't support this repeal. Anything that makes nuclear tests within a planetary biosphere more difficult and obnoxious to carry out is a feature, not a bug, as far as we're concerned. Any such detonation is, in fact, a disaster. We applaud the voters who wisely put the original resolution in place."

"I do, however, thank Mr. Turner for calling the world's attention to the ongoing scourge of nuclear energy used to the detriment, rather than the betterment, of all people."

[John Turner]

That is disappointing, but I understand your position.

[Atomic Utopia]

"I'm afraid we can't support this repeal. Anything that makes nuclear tests within a planetary biosphere more difficult and obnoxious to carry out is a feature, not a bug, as far as we're concerned. Any such detonation is, in fact, a disaster. We applaud the voters who wisely put the original resolution in place."

"I do, however, thank Mr. Turner for calling the world's attention to the ongoing scourge of nuclear energy used to the detriment, rather than the betterment, of all people."

Herr ambassador, it does far more than that.

ANY open core nuclear reactor located anywhere will be required to be shielded, even if the reactor would not harm any animals, plants, or anything for that matter, thus making space based reactors significantly heavier. Any orbital nuclear testing for any means, even peaceful ones, is considered a nuclear disaster that must be reported. The lack of definition on what widespread explosion means that nuclear reactor cores could be considered nuclear disasters, despite the radiation never actually leaving the CV and the reactor being safe. Thus I believe that it does far more than just compromise nuclear tests.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that it could define any area that has any detected background dose as a contaminated area. You see, herr ambassador, this very room is quite radioactive, if I were to use a geiger counter or other such radiation detector I would detect around 20-30 CPM, or counts per minute. Over prolonged periods of time this would result in an increased risk of cancer and death from cancer compared to no radiation at all, thus meaning that this place, and by extension all places, must be evacuated right now. You can see now that the NDRA appears to be just as bad as the WSA, if not worse, considering that it mandates evacuation of all places.

Now there is a creative interpretation, because of the vagueness of radiation in definition 2, clause 1 you could simply state that radiation is 'Divergence out from a central point, in particular evolution from an ancestral animal or plant group into a variety of new forms' which works quite well. Of course that is if you are willing to get creative instead of evacuating everyone in the multiverse to somewhere with no "radiation"."

[Sierra Lyricalia]

Herr ambassador, it does far more than that.

ANY open core nuclear reactor located anywhere will be required to be shielded, even if the reactor would not harm any animals, plants, or anything for that matter, thus making space based reactors significantly heavier. Any orbital nuclear testing for any means, even peaceful ones, is considered a nuclear disaster that must be reported. The lack of definition on what widespread explosion means that nuclear reactor cores could be considered nuclear disasters, despite the radiation never actually leaving the CV and the reactor being safe. Thus I believe that it does far more than just compromise nuclear tests.

In fact, I would go so far as to say that it could define any area that has any detected background dose as a contaminated area. You see, herr ambassador, this very room is quite radioactive, if I were to use a geiger counter or other such radiation detector I would detect around 20-30 CPM, or counts per minute. Over prolonged periods of time this would result in an increased risk of cancer and death from cancer compared to no radiation at all, thus meaning that this place, and by extension all places, must be evacuated right now. You can see now that the NDRA appears to be just as bad as the WSA, if not worse, considering that it mandates evacuation of all places.

"Any loophole that tenuous can't seriously affect member nations to the extent you describe. This interpretation only holds water if you require nations to define the Horrendous Space Kablooie (Big Bang, if you're the prosaic type) as a nuclear disaster, requiring the cleanup of the entire universe. That can't be a rational interpretation, couldn't possibly have been intended by the author, and can't be reasonably undertaken, even by ridiculously advanced FT nations. By contrast, the WSA was a malicious act of jurisprudential vandalism that knew exactly how godawful it was, and was so on purpose. You can't possibly compare the two."

"Anyway, since space is already filled with all kinds of radiation, no exo-atmospheric nuclear detonation can 'result[] in the widespread expulsion of harmful concentrations of nuclear radiation' - in that soup of subatomic bombardment, there's simply no pissant emission by artificial sources that could be considered 'harmful,' even counting Orion-type nuclear pulse propulsion and more exotic future-tech arrangements. You don't want to be next to it, but it can't 'contaminate' anything, since everything is already contaminated! Or adequately shielded against it."

Now there is a creative interpretation, because of the vagueness of radiation in definition 2, clause 1 you could simply state that radiation is 'Divergence out from a central point, in particular evolution from an ancestral animal or plant group into a variety of new forms' which works quite well. Of course that is if you are willing to get creative instead of evacuating everyone in the multiverse to somewhere with no "radiation"."

"Now you're just being preposterous on purpose. The resolution specifically discusses 'nuclear radiation.' The only argument you could reasonably make in terms of the definition is that this therefore only covers harmful releases of alpha and neutron radiation (since gamma and X-rays, and beta particles, are not nucleons). Now that might (I say might) hold some water; but since any nuclear disaster worth the label will result in the emission of neutron radiation, it's not a serious weakness."

"As I've said my piece, I'll hold my peace now, and not derail the discussion further for those who have differing arguments for or against the repeal."

Reasonable Nation Theory does have a place in interpreting these things. Neat argument (you always seem to be good for those), but I ain't buying it.

[John Turner]

Moving this up for further feedback.

[Atomic Utopia]

"Now you're just being preposterous on purpose. The resolution specifically discusses 'nuclear radiation.' The only argument you could reasonably make in terms of the definition is that this therefore only covers harmful releases of alpha and neutron radiation (since gamma and X-rays, and beta particles, are not nucleons). Now that might (I say might) hold some water; but since any nuclear disaster worth the label will result in the emission of neutron radiation, it's not a serious weakness."

"As I've said my piece, I'll hold my peace now, and not derail the discussion further for those who have differing arguments for or against the repeal."

Reasonable Nation Theory does have a place in interpreting these things. Neat argument (you always seem to be good for those), but I ain't buying it.

"You realise that most locations have some neutron flux that is slightly harmful, and indeed radon does emit alpha particles which is also slightly harmful, it is also quite common inside buildings, making up quite a dose compared to other isotopes, thus we should, assuming nuclear radiation uses your interpretation, evacuate all buildings due to the slightly higher alpha dose. I mean, really, it is quite obvious that the only interpretation is "as low a dose as possible ignoring reason" unless you get creative. It also bans radiation therapy using boron neutron capture or other such programs as the radiation which is indeed harmful also has beneficial results."

OOC: If you use the random house dictionary (the only one that defines nuclear radiation) than it is all radiation emmited by radioactive decay or nuclear fission, including gamma rays.

EDIT:OOC: though, if you use a threshold model for radiation induced cancer and sickness you could in effect ignore background radiation completely, heck even allow some elevated exposures as well.

[Povinksi]

The Povinksian Government gives it's full support.

[Wallenburg]

"Should Wallenburg ever pursue nuclear research, we would be quite happy to accept help in cleaning test sites. We see no real issue with the present law, although it does confuse us as to why it uses the term 'nuclear disaster' rather than something more accurate, such as 'nuclear event' or 'nuclear detonation'."

[Palsada]

We in Alberta see the current resolution as sufficient, and does not need to be altered at the present time.

We will not support this repeal.

[Socialist Republic of the French People]

We'll stand in firm support of this bill and grant it our affirmative vote should it be presented to the entire GA.

[Rotovia-]

"While our government takes exception to the nuisance of not being able to oversea our own testing, when contracted to non-WA nations. We would not be testing on our own soil to begin with.

I can see no reason to repeal a resolution which has no major practical affect on our ability to maintain a nuclear deterrent"

[Blorbs]

"It is the full opinion of Blorbs that, while meant in good intentions, GAR #60 has too many loopholes and also interferes with GAR #10 to the extent that being mandated to publicly inform about any nuclear tests could interfere with Clause 3, as it may lead to the releasing of sensitave information about nuclear weaponry. However, we certainly do beleive that a replacement act should be put in place immediately that is better thought out and created."

Thats weird. For some reason it posted as my other nation :/

[Reploid Productions]

Time out while I go through the thread, and probably trim out a threadjack.

EDIT: And done.

Povinksi, I strongly urge you to spend some time reviewing the site rules before proceeding further. I see you've already had a couple of unofficial warnings for flamebaiting and for trolling in the past few days. As such I really cannot let your threadjack/spam go, so I'm going to have to issue you a *** warning for threadjacking/spam ***. A thread that has not seen much activity in a few days in the WA forum is hardly dead. Some people can spend weeks, even months fine-tuning their proposal drafts for submission. And even if it was dead, posting in the thread to say it's dead is not what you should be doing; we have a specific thread in Moderation specifically for reporting "zombie" threads.


~Evil Forum Empress Rep Prod the Ninja Mod
~She who wields the Banhammer; master of the mighty moderation no-dachi Kiritateru Teikoku

[Atomic Utopia]

Hey, C/JPT/JT/UFoC, considering you submitted it, please mark it as submitted.

[Nouvelle o France]

"I'm afraid we can't support this repeal. Anything that makes nuclear tests within a planetary biosphere more difficult and obnoxious to carry out is a feature, not a bug, as far as we're concerned. Any such detonation is, in fact, a disaster. We applaud the voters who wisely put the original resolution in place."

"I do, however, thank Mr. Turner for calling the world's attention to the ongoing scourge of nuclear energy used to the detriment, rather than the betterment, of all people."

I must say that I share the view that any nuclear testing outside of deep space where the radiation and explosion are harmless is an irresponsible conduct that should not be made easier. Having an experimented team clean up the site afterwards just strike me as good old common sense. We shall oppose this repeal.

[Araraukar]

I must say that I share the view that any nuclear testing outside of deep space where the radiation and explosion are harmless is an irresponsible conduct that should not be made easier. Having an experimented team clean up the site afterwards just strike me as good old common sense. We shall oppose this repeal.

Nuclear detonations in deep space are only harmless if you have nothing outside a planet's atmosphere, but if you are a space nation - meaning that you have, for example, space stations up there - you definitely want to be careful with such experiments as well.

[Nouvelle o France]

I must say that I share the view that any nuclear testing outside of deep space where the radiation and explosion are harmless is an irresponsible conduct that should not be made easier. Having an experimented team clean up the site afterwards just strike me as good old common sense. We shall oppose this repeal.

Nuclear detonations in deep space are only harmless if you have nothing outside a planet's atmosphere, but if you are a space nation - meaning that you have, for example, space stations up there - you definitely want to be careful with such experiments as well.

As our nation have yet to develop any effective space program, it was our assumption that such testing would be safe. Lacking the expertise necessary, we shall leave the decision concerning space-usage up to the concerned nations.

[John Turner]

Bumping for further feedback.

[Wallenburg]

Believing clause 3 which states "mandates that all member nations report nuclear disasters to the NDRO, and any surrounding nations that may have been affected by the disaster" to be seriously questionable as it would require member nations to report all nuclear tests to the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization as well as their neighbours thus possibly compromising sensitive or classified data regarding those nuclear tests,

You can report your tests to foreign and international parties without releasing sensitive data.

[John Turner]

Believing clause 3 which states "mandates that all member nations report nuclear disasters to the NDRO, and any surrounding nations that may have been affected by the disaster" to be seriously questionable as it would require member nations to report all nuclear tests to the Nuclear Disaster Response Organization as well as their neighbours thus possibly compromising sensitive or classified data regarding those nuclear tests,

You can report your tests to foreign and international parties without releasing sensitive data.

No you can't. Clause seven of Nuclear Testing Protocol specifically prohibits it, as all information regarding nuclear tests are to be classified state secrets.

[Wallenburg]

You can report your tests to foreign and international parties without releasing sensitive data.

No you can't. Clause seven of Nuclear Testing Protocol specifically prohibits it, as all information regarding nuclear tests are to be classified state secrets.

I see. That does create a significant dissonance between these two resolutions. I don't see much else to question here, so I'll extend my tentative support.