Fact Sheets

Nuclear Energy How nuclear energy is created, the side effects of nuclear power, the politics of nuclear energy, current controversies over nuclear power and other resources.

Depleted Uranium What is depleted uranium and what is it used for? What are the dangers of it? Are there laws governing its use? Learn more about this controversial weapon- another byproduct of the nuclear age- including resources from non-governmental and governmental sources.

Health Populations and individuals around the world have been affected by the increase of radioactive materials in the global ecosystem. Cancers, birth defects, genetic damage, lowered immunity to diseases: these are only some of the potential effects of nuclear testing, uranium mining, radioactive waste burial and all the phases of nuclear weapons and nuclear energy production.

Environment The environmental damage resulting from nuclear technology is not limited to the two largest nuclear weapons states.  All nuclear weapons and nuclear energy producing nations have caused some level of environmental contamination, both in their own countries and abroad - such as, nuclear testing in the South Pacific, Nevada, Kazakhstan, China, India and Pakistan; water and airborne discharges from reprocessing plants in the UK and France; and uranium mining in Namibia, Canada, former East Germany and Australia. Moreover, the ongoing production of both nuclear weapons and nuclear power continues to create nuclear waste.  Any long-term approach to ‘clean-up’ must be tied to a halt in the production of nuclear weapons, weapons usable materials and nuclear power.

Secrecy The nuclear age began in a shroud of secrecy that was the Manhattan Project. It comprised three facilities in three different states. The primary site, Los Alamos in New Mexico, was established in 1942 with no reference on a map, no post office, no publicity. Although its physical presence was unknown, it was here that a team of international scientists, supervised by General Leslie Groves of the Army Corps of Engineers, worked to develop the bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Indigenous Of the eight nations in the world that have detonated nuclear weapons during the last 55 years, five have used the sacred land of indigenous peoples. The United States, Russia, Britain, France and China have ‘tested’ their nuclear might on lands held sacred by the people of First Nations. The Western Shoshone nation of North America, the Marshall and other South Pacific Islanders, Australian Aboriginals, the Kazakhs, and Tibetans are but a few of those whose land has been consistently contaminated with nuclear poison.

Law Weapons of mass or indiscriminate destruction are now the object of a planetary taboo rooted in the conscience of humankind and articulated through binding law. As the International Court of Justice (ICJ), the judicial branch of the United Nations, affirmed in its 1996 advisory opinion on nuclear weapons, under humanitarian law governing the conduct of warfare states "must never use weapons that are incapable of distinguishing between civilian and military targets" (emphasis added). The Court held the threat or use of nuclear weapons to be generally illegal under humanitarian and other law.

Religion There are many spiritual perspectives that challenge or help people to cope with living in a world where nuclear weapons threaten all life on the planet. The following draws on Christian and Buddhist attempts to grapple with the 21st century conundrum of how to remain engaged against the impossible odds of the nuclear age. As General Omar Bradley stated, "We live in an age of nuclear giants and ethical infants, in a world that has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. We have solved the mystery of the atom and forgotten the lessons of the Sermon on the Mount. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about dying than we know about living".

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