Yucca Mountain News Clips
Monday, May 29, 2006
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Daily Telegraph
May 29, 2006
Quest for a nuclear waste sign that goes beyond words
Robert Colvile
Nuclear scientists are facing an unusual challenge: how to develop warning signs that will last for longer than the English language.
Last month, the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management presented its initial findings on how to deal with Britain's 16.6 million cubic feet of nuclear waste, recommending the construction of a concrete bunker 1,000ft or more beneath the surface at an estimated cost of £7 billion.
Radioactivity from the waste in such a store would last for thousands of years, raising the issue of how to warn future generations not to reopen the sealed chamber.
It is far from certain that English will be understood in 10,000 years, or that our rather benign pictogram for radiation - three circular wedges emanating from the central "atom" pictured - will denote anything dangerous at all.
In 1993 the US gathered a team of experts - an anthropologist, astronomer, archaeologist, environmental designer, linguist and materials scientist - to outline the best design for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (Wipp) in New Mexico, a nuclear waste dump housed in a salt mine half a mile below ground.
The design of the site had to reflect various messages, from "this place was made by humans" to "this place was dangerous and repulsive to us" to "this is a place of danger, the danger is to the body and it can kill".
The design eventually adopted for Wipp, and shared with the planned Yucca Mountain depository in Nevada, consisted of a giant earthwork surrounding the site, with monuments, markers and information centres scattered around.
Danger messages would be written in each of the official UN languages - Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish - as well as Navajo in the case of the Wipp site.
This latter-day Rosetta Stone would have blank space, for future languages to be added when current tongues have drifted from memory.
The work being carried out in the UK is on a far less gargantuan scale, and at the moment focuses on preserving detailed knowledge of the depositories for future generations - what exactly they contain, how the waste was produced and why it was placed where it was.
"The Americans have got rather more space, so their approach would be rather different," said Andy Baker of the Environment Agency. "Our emphasis would be more on how to record information in archives and libraries."
Files on waste from the recently-closed Windscale reactor at Sellafield are stored on acid-free paper, due to the difficulty of reading computer files or CDs from decades before. They are stored in copper bags, with no plastic binders or staples to contaminate the pages.
"In the Fifties and Sixties, when the nuclear industry was in its infancy, they really didn't know if the world would be around in the next generation, so passing the information on wasn't a priority," said Ben Russell of Nirex, the UK firm responsible for radioactive waste. "Now we have to concentrate on preserving our records for the next 10 generations and beyond."
As any UK deep waste depository would not be opened for another 30 years at least, the experts still have plenty of time to get the signs right.
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CattleNetwork
May 29, 2006
Bush´s Energy Initiative - Coal, Nuclear, Natural Gas, Renewable Sources
The President's Advanced Energy Initiative promotes America's four main sources of electricity: coal, nuclear, natural gas, and renewable sources.
To Continue Economic Growth In A Competitive World, America Must Find Solutions To Its Energy Needs. Over the past 30 years, our economy has grown three times faster than our energy consumption. During that period, we created more than 55 million jobs, while cutting air pollution by 50 percent. But America´s dynamic economy is also creating a growing demand for electricity; electricity demand is projected to increase nearly 50 percent over the next 25 years.
As The Global Economy Becomes More Competitive, America Must Find New Alternatives To Oil, Pursue Promising New Technologies, And Find Better Ways To Generate More Electricity. America faces new energy challenges as countries like China and India consume more energy – especially oil. Global demand for oil is rising faster than global supply. As a result, oil prices are rising around the world, which leads to higher gas prices in America.
The President Is Working To Meet America´s Energy Demands And The Challenges Of The Global Economy By Developing Clean, Domestic, Affordable Supplies Of Energy. We must safeguard the environment, reduce our dependence on energy from abroad, and help keep prices reasonable for consumers.
Nuclear Power
Nuclear Power Is Abundant And Affordable. Nuclear power is America´s second-leading source of electricity. Today, more than 100 nuclear plants operate in 31 states. Once a nuclear plant is constructed, its fuel and operating costs are among the cheapest forms of energy available today.
Nuclear Power Is Clean. Nuclear power produces no air pollution or greenhouse gases, and there is a growing consensus that it is an environmentally responsible choice. Without nuclear energy, carbon dioxide emissions would have been 28 percent greater in the electricity industry in 2004, America would have an additional 700 million tons a year of carbon dioxide, and nitrogen-oxide emissions would rise by the equivalent of 58 million passenger cars.
Nuclear Power Is Safe. Advances in science, engineering, and plant design have made nuclear power plants far safer than ever before – plant workers and managers focus on security above all else.
President Bush Is Helping Expand America's Use Of Nuclear Power In Four Important Ways:
1. The Energy Bill The President Signed In 2005 Provides Loan Incentives, Production Tax Credits, And Federal Risk Insurance For Builders Of New Nuclear Plants. Loan incentives will give investors confidence that the Federal government is committed to the construction of nuclear power plants. Production tax credits will reward investments in the latest in advanced nuclear power generation. Federal risk insurance for the first six new nuclear power plants will help protect builders of these plants against lawsuits, bureaucratic obstacles, and other delays beyond their control.
2. The Bush Administration Has Launched The Nuclear Power 2010 Initiative – A $1.1 Billion Partnership Between The U.S. Government And Industry To Facilitate New Plant Orders. At this time last year, only two companies were seeking to build nuclear power plants. Now, 16 companies have expressed interest in new construction – and they are considering as many as 25 new plants. By the end of this decade, America will be able to start construction on nuclear plants again.
3. President Bush Has Proposed Legislation That Will Help Complete A Nuclear Waste Repository At Yucca Mountain. Yucca Mountain is critical to expanding nuclear power in the United States because it will provide a safe geologic repository to store spent fuel and nuclear waste. Yucca Mountain was selected based on sound science after many years of scientific study. Making Yucca Mountain fully operational would inspire confidence among builders and entrepreneurs that the government fully supports the expansion of nuclear power. The President urges Congress to pass this important legislation to move our efforts forward.
4. Under The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, America Will Work With Nations That Have Advanced Civilian Nuclear Energy Programs, Such As France, Japan, And Russia. The President's budget includes $250 million to launch this initiative.
GNEP Will Use New Technologies That Effectively And Safely Recycle Spent Nuclear Fuel. Re-processing spent uranium fuel for use in advanced reactors will allow us to extract more energy. It also has the potential to reduce storage requirements for nuclear waste by up to 90 percent. With re-processing, Yucca Mountain could hold America´s nuclear waste through the end of the 21st century.
Working With Other Nations Under The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, America Can Provide The Cheap, Safe, And Clean Energy That Growing Economies Need, While Reducing The Risk Of Nuclear Proliferation. We will help developing countries meet their growing energy needs by providing them with small-scale reactors that will be secure and cost-effective. We will also ensure that developing nations have a reliable nuclear fuel supply. In exchange, these countries would agree to use nuclear power only for civilian purposes and forego uranium enrichment and re-processing activities that can be used to develop nuclear weapons.
Coal
President Bush Is Encouraging The Research And Development Of Clean-Coal Technologies. Coal is by far America´s most abundant and affordable energy resource. America has enough coal to last about 240 years at current rates of consumption.
In 2000, President Bush Promised To Invest $2 Billion Over Ten Years To Promote Clean Coal. The Administration is several years ahead of schedule in keeping that promise.
By 2012, Under The FutureGen Initiative, America Will Build The World´s First Power Plant To Run On Coal And Remove Virtually All Pollutants.
Natural Gas
The Energy Bill President Bush Signed In 2005 Addressed The Increasing Demand For Natural Gas. Natural gas is the most versatile fuel, but demand for it has increased, and the price has more than doubled between 2001 to 2005. The Energy Bill President Bush signed last year expands our ability to receive liquefied natural gas – a super-cooled form of natural gas that can be transported from overseas on tankers. The bill clarifies Federal authority to license new sites, reduces bureaucratic obstacles to open new terminals, and streamlines the permitting process for onshore development.
Alternative And Renewables
President Bush's FY2007 Budget Proposes $44 Million In Funding For Wind Energy Research.
About Six Percent Of The Continental United States Has Been Identified As Highly Suitable For Construction Of Wind Turbines. This area alone has the potential to supply up to 20 percent of our Nation´s electricity. Our goal is to expand the use and lower the cost of wind turbine technology – so that our country can get more electricity from clean, renewable wind power.
The President Has Proposed A New Solar America Initiative To Accelerate Research And Development In Solar Technology. Solar technology has the potential to change the way all Americans live and work. President Bush's FY2007 budget proposes nearly $150 million in funding for government and private research into solar technology – an increase of more than 75 percent over current levels. This support can help make solar power competitive by 2015.
The President Is Working To Boost Oil And Gas Supplies To Relieve High Gas Prices.
In April, President Bush Directed The Strategic Petroleum Reserve To Defer Filling The Reserve This Summer. In addition, he has directed EPA Administrator Steve Johnson to use all his available authority to grant waivers that would relieve the restrictions on getting fuel delivered to the pump. The President has also called on Congress to simplify the process for building new refineries and to make it easier for refiners to make modifications to increase production.
We Need More Access To The Domestic Resources On The Outer Continental Shelf, While Respecting The Concerns Of Nearby States. In the long term, America must find alternatives to oil and the way we power our cars.
It will take time for America to move from a hydrocarbon economy to a hydrogen economy. In the meantime, there are billions of barrels of oil and enormous amounts of natural gas off the Alaskan Coast and in the Gulf of Mexico.
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Las Vegas SUN
May 28, 2006
Brian Greenspun wonders why the Review-Journal's boss unleashed a diatribe against Harry Reid
Sherm Frederick has a fascination with women's dresses.
There were two things I could have taken from the Review-Journal publisher's column last Sunday. The first one is that he doesn't like Nevada's senior U.S. senator, Harry Reid. Despite what he said in his attempt to read the tea leaves of Nevada politics, it was made abundantly clear that Harry is not Sherm's favorite U.S. senator.
If I had to make a guess, it would be that Rick Santorum, the darling of the ultra-far right and a man who may go down in flames in the November election because his constituents have figured him out, is more to the R-J leader's liking.
I am still perplexed as to the reason Sherm tried to gut the good senator when there are 4 1/2 years left on his current term. We all know that a year is forever in politics, so what makes the man think that what is or isn't happening in 2006 will have any real bearing on the kind and quality of senator the voters will want in 2010?
Maybe Sherm just didn't have anything else to write about. Maybe he really didn't like his walk in the desert with Harry - for the life of me I can't imagine what would cause Harry to take a walk anywhere with Sherm, let alone the desert! Whatever the reason, the hit piece was not very manly because it attacked the good senator on the wrong issues and on issues he was wrong to bring up.
First, there was a not-so-subtle reference to Harry's religion. Who does that in this day and age? Everyone knows that Sen. Reid is a devout Mormon who believes deeply and consistently in the kind of family values that have served this country well since the beginning of our democracy.
As a pro-life Democrat, Harry has stood up to his pro-choice constituents every time he puts his name on the ballot. And while I am sure some Democrats won't vote for him because of his deeply held moral beliefs, he has never wavered, even though doing so could have saved him sleepless nights as election day drew near.
The truth is that Sen. Reid is the kind of politician our Founding Fathers envisioned - a man who holds strong moral and religious beliefs and a man who is guided by that moral code. But, also, a man who knows the difference between his personal morality and the oath he has taken in which he swore to represent all the people and act in the best interests of his country. Simply put, to attack a man through his religion is not only unfair, it is un-American.
Sherm tried to show his bona fides by saying that his newspaper had supported Harry every time he ran for the Senate. As if that inoculates a person when he expresses bad taste, bad genes, and bad manners. Shame on Sherm.
At a time when the political heat in this country is so high that the peoples' business cannot get done and normally decent people can't even talk to one another without some political hack taking them to task, what are Sherm and his newspaper trying to do? Make things that much worse?
The least he could have done was tell his readers the truth. This is where I come in. Thanks to the latest amendment to our Joint Operating Agreement, I get to be the one-man truth squad for Sherm and all his wacko writers at the other paper. They tell it the way they want it, however wrong that may be, and I get to set the facts straight.
For instance: "The Review-Journal has endorsed Sen. Reid every time he has run for the U.S. Senate." So says Sherm. But the facts say something entirely different. Not that the truth ever got in the way of an R-J diatribe, but the truth is supposed to be that sacred trust between a newspaper and its readers.
If Sherm would fib about something as easily ascertainable as the R-J's endorsement record, what else would that newspaper say that would be untrue and much harder to ascertain? For the record, the Review-Journal did endorse Harry Reid in 1992 and in 2004. However, it endorsed his opponent in 1986 and 1998.
And then to call our senior senator, who just happens to be the minority leader of the U.S. Senate, a "lily-livered coward on terrorism," is an outrageous lie. Nevadans know their senator. They know him to be one of the toughest public servants ever to be elected by the people of Nevada. Tough on crime, tough on terrorists and tough on anyone who attacks him, his family, his friends, his countrymen and the way of life that has become so important to Nevadans.
No one can claim a front seat in the fight against worldwide terrorism while Harry is aboard. The problem with that other paper is that it hasn't printed the facts in so long that it is starting to believe its own (what's another word for manure?).
There is one area where I understand the depth of Sherm's distaste. That's when he talks about Harry's support from working men and women and the unions that often represent them.
It is no secret that the R-J hates unions. So much so that it has refused to endorse any politician who runs for office who is supported by, been a member of or even says something nice about union men and women. And that is regardless of the eight ball who may be running against an otherwise qualified candidate! I understand it, but I cannot fathom the reasoning behind such hatred.
I don't know what possessed Sherm to go after Harry Reid. Perhaps he is trying to soften him up for the 2010 elections. What I do know is that the last time the Review-Journal went on the offensive like this, it convinced a majority of Nevadans to support the challenger against Nevada's then-senior senator, Howard Cannon.
With Cannon out of the picture and out of seniority in the U.S. Senate, all kinds of bad things happened and no good things happened to Nevada. We got no money and no respect. What we did get was this 25-year fight by the federal government to put the nation's high-level radioactive waste in our Yucca Mountain.
Had the R-J stayed out of the fight, or at least acted in the best interests of Nevadans by supporting a good man with gobs of seniority, there would be no Yucca Mountain and Nevada would be near the top of the heap of federal dollar recipients instead of near the bottom.
With Harry's new job as minority leader and, dare I say it, possibly as majority leader, Nevada is well on its way to the kind of respectful position among its sister states that its growth, its vision and its people deserve. Unless, of course, Sherm Frederick gets his way and convinces Nevadans to do the dumbest thing they have ever done - again - and send Harry home from the highest elected position a Nevadan has ever achieved.
So, that's the first thing a person could take from Sherm's column last week.
The second thing one might get from reading through his rant is that the head of the other paper knows a lot about transvestites and cross-dressers. Maybe there is a reason.
Brian Greenspun is editor of the Las Vegas Sun.
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Trenton Times
May 28, 2006
Nuclear power is essential
The shadow of Chernobyl and Three Mile Island hang over the debate on nuclear energy and drives the emotional opposition to its use. But today's nuclear power generating technology has come a long way, and security measures are available to prevent any repetition of that disaster and near-disaster. No effective U.S. program to reduce the environmental harm done by conventional energy sources can be created without assigning a major role to nukes.
Nuclear reactors are the largest source of clean-air, carbon-free energy in North America. Nuclear power plants produce no sulfur or airborne particulates and none of the greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide that are warming up the planet at frightening speed. The use of nuclear energy, along with other renewable sources, helps avert ground-level ozone formation and acid rain.
"Nuclear energy must become the primary generator of baseload electricity, thereby relieving the pressure on natural gas prices and dramatically improving atmospheric emissions," said the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural Resources. "To enhance competitiveness and protect American jobs, natural gas must not be used for baseload electricity generation, nor for new generating capacity. Natural gas should be reserved for industries that use it as a feedstock or for primary energy -- and cannot substitute for it by fuel-switching."
It's not just conservatives who see the wisdom of expanding nuclear energy production with proper safeguards. Twenty-three U.S. senators of both parties, including Democrats Barak Obama, Evan Bayh, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton and independent James Jeffords, wrote to the Senate Appropriations Committee requesting support in the fiscal 2007 budget for Department of Energy university nuclear science and engineering programs and university reactors. Patrick Moore, a founder of Greenpeace and co-chair with former New Jersey Gov. Christie Whitman of a coalition advocating greater use of nuclear power, has delivered this strong endorsement:
"uclear energy may just be the energy source that can save our planet from another possible disaster: catastrophic climate change. ... Nuclear energy is the only large-scale, cost-effective energy source that can reduce emissions while continuing to satisfy a growing demand for power. And these days, it can do so safely. ... n the question of a sustainable energy future ... the only way to reduce fossil fuel emissions from electrical production is through an aggressive program of renewable energy sources (hydroelectric, geothermal heat pumps, wind, etc.) plus nuclear."
One of the major snags to widespread development of new nuclear power plants is the question of disposal of the highly dangerous spent fuel it generates. Although Congress in 2002 designated Yucca Mountain, Nevada, as the site of a state-of-the-art repository for spent fuel, resistance to the plan in Nevada and neighboring states led by Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., continues to slow progress on its development. Last year, Yucca Mountain opponents pushed through Congress a bill mandating that nuclear waste be stored in dry casks on-site where it is produced and requiring the federal government to take responsibility for its possession, stewardship, maintenance and monitoring. Clearly, the on-site storage law is only a stopgap and not a long-term solution to the problem. Until a better one can be found, Yucca Mountain remains the best such solution.
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BlueOregon
May 28, 2006
Clean nuclear power? Same ol' song and dance.
Russell Sadler
The media coyly called it the “Trojan Implosion.’ It was a controlled demolition of the 500-foot cooling tower that loomed as a landmark over the lower Columbia River for nearly 30 years at the site of now-defunct Trojan Nuclear Power Plant.
The demolition of the cooling tower was an inconvenient reminder that Trojan was sold as a “clean, inexhaustible’ supply of electric power in the 1970s. It went on line in 1976 after a protracted political battle over nuclear energy´s safety and economics. It was expected to produce power for 30 years or more.
Trojan´s owner, Portland General Electric, shut it down just 17 years later in 1993, not because of environmental or safety concerns, but because of economics. The utility learned that the corrosion inside the reactor´s cooling system was so severe that the plumbing would have to be replaced. It would be so costly that Trojan could no longer generate affordable electricity. So PGE shut it down. Trojan´s ratepayers are still paying off the 30-year bonds sold to build the plant even though it has not produced electricity for 13 years.
Trojan cost about $400 million to build in 1976. It is costing ratepayers $410 million to decommission the plant.
The reactor and its associated radioactive machinery went first. Encased in concrete and lead, it was dropped on barges and hauled up river to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington. The stately parade had a funereal air. The barge, pushed by a tugboat, was followed by a Navy grey warship, operated by a private contractor, constantly sniffing the air for any escaping radiation.
Last week, the huge cooling tower came down. But decommissioning is not done. Every year over its 17-year life span, Trojan was shut down for a month or so while technicians replaced one-third of the fuel rods in its reactor core.
These radioactive fuel rods were supposed to be moved to a federal nuclear waste repository for reprocessing and safe storage. But the promised federal repository never materialized. The official repository under Yucca Mountain in Nevada hasn´t opened because of public opposition. So spent radioactive fuel rods have accumulated at every nuclear power plant in the country, stored in basins of water, from the time each plant began producing electricity. At Trojan, there are 17 years of spent fuel rods, accumulated in a glorified swimming pool, on the flood plain of the lower Columbia River, sitting on an earthquake fault with no serious plans to move them in the foreseeable future.
The legacy of the Atomic Age has not been kind to the Pacific Northwest. The Hanford Nuclear Reservation is a product of the Manhattan Project, the super-secret effort to build the atomic bomb during World War II. Plutonium from Hanford was in one of the two bombs dropped on Japan in 1945, persuading the Japanese to surrender and ending World War II.
During the war, officials at Hanford deliberately released radioactive gas from Hanford to see where the wind currents would carry it. Decades later thousand of people who had lived downwind were treated for or were dying of cancer -- usually thyroid cancer -- attributed to the radioactive releases.
After the war, Hanford became a facility for producing more material for atomic and hydrogen bombs. It also became a repository for high-level radioactive waste from all over the country.
Radioactive material is highly corrosive. It has eaten through the tanks designed to hold it and it is leaching into the water table below Hanford. A plume of radioactive water is advancing on the Columbia. The federal government is years behind and billions of dollars short doing what it promised to stop the leaks and clean up the ground water. No one is sure what the consequences will be if radioactive tritium reaches the Columbia and heads for the sea.
There is also the saga of the Washington Public Power Supply System, aptly nicknamed Whoops! WPPSS began construction of five nuclear powerplants in the 1970s. Only one ever generated electricity. The other four were doomed by huge cost overruns when construction was stopped in 1982, resulting in the largest public bond default in history -- $2.25 billion.
The Northwest has not built a new thermal power plant in decades and is not running out of electricity. Why? It´s the accelerated construction of wind farms in Eastern Oregon and Washington, conservation of electricity we already generate and more efficient use of the hydropower generated in the region.
The long, tragic history of incompetence in the nuclear industry and government has made the Pacific Northwest skeptical. You will forgive us, please, if their PR offensive hailing a “revival’ of “clean’ nuclear power sounds like the same old song and dance.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 27, 2006
Energy, NRC nominees confirmed
Posts linked to Yucca Mountain Project
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Four officials expected to influence the future of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site were installed in key posts Friday by the Senate.
The Senate confirmations unclogged personnel impasses at the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, enabling the Bush administration to move forward on nuclear power initiatives including the proposed Nevada repository.
Edward "Ward" Sproat, a nuclear industry executive from Pennsylvania, was approved as director of the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management at the Energy Department. The post makes him head of the Yucca Mountain Project.
Dale Klein, a Defense Department assistant secretary, was confirmed to a five-year term as chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which will decide the safety of a Yucca repository based on an application expected at some point from DOE.
Gregory Jaczko and Peter Lyons, who had been serving on the five-member NRC on temporary appointments, were extended to full terms.
Frank "Skip" Bowman, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, said the NRC appointments will allow the agency to work toward licensing new nuclear power plants "that will expand nuclear energy's role as a key component of the U.S. energy portfolio."
The NRC officials were approved in a deal between the Bush administration, Senate Republicans and Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., congressional officials said.
Klein, a nuclear waste expert and former University of Texas professor and associate dean, was opposed by some officials in Nevada because he appeared in a series of television commercials funded by the nuclear industry during a Yucca Mountain public relations drive in the early 1990s.
Reid and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., allowed Klein's appointment to go forward after a meeting this week in which the nominee pledged to be objective in weighing the proposed repository. The deal also allowed Reid to win full appointment for Jaczko, his former science adviser who handled Yucca Mountain matters. Lyons is a former aide to Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., the chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
The Nevada senators concluded that they were not going to be happy with almost anybody the pro-Yucca Bush administration proposed for the NRC, and they accepted Klein to cement Jaczko's post, Senate sources said.
"For that spot that Klein has, we are not going to get someone who says they hate Yucca Mountain," Reid said in an interview Wednesday. "The best we can get is somebody who will say they have an open mind, and (Klein) said that."
Reid had blocked Sproat's confirmation since last November but removed his hold a week or so ago, spokeswoman Sharyn Stein said. That came after DOE agreed to give Reid a full copy of its investigation report into the Yucca Mountain e-mail scandal.
A redacted copy of the report made public this month explored allegations that hydrologists with the U.S. Geological Survey authored e-mails discussing possible quality assurance document falsification at the site.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 27, 2006
Editorial: Yucca Mountain Johnny
Rep. Shelley Berkley fights a gallant battle
He seems an innocuous enough character -- square-jawed like G.I. Joe, donning a miner's helmet and protective glasses.
But to Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., Yucca Mountain Johnny is just another symbol of the federal government's insistence on shoving nuclear waste down the throats of Nevadans.
On Wednesday, Rep. Berkley fought a gallant battle in an effort to erase Johnny, a cartoon miner who serves as the mascot for the youth pages on the Department of Energy's Yucca Mountain Web site. She offered an amendment to an energy appropriations bill that would have cut off funding for portions of the Web site, thus killing Yucca Mountain Johnny.
"This character was created with taxpayer money to convince elementary school children that nuclear waste is a good thing," she said.
Alas, the amendment was soundly defeated, 271-147. Johnny lives on.
Rep. Berkley took a bit of ribbing for her crusade, with a DOE spokesman calling it "pure silliness."
But perhaps Rep. Berkley was on to something: There's a fine line between government "awareness" campaigns and outright propaganda. And when it's all paid for by taxpayers -- many of whom may oppose the message at issue -- strict oversight is even more important to ensure that such "educational" efforts don't deteriorate into advocacy.
In addition, far too many government "informational" campaigns are the result of public agencies with way too much money on their hands. You don't have to be an opponent of Yucca Mountain to argue that spending taxpayer funds to create a cartoon character to teach children about safety at the nuclear repository is a dubious use of funds.
Let's hope Yucca Mountain Johnny is eventually sealed up in a mine shaft, where he belongs.
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Pahrump Valley Times
May 26, 2006
Boosters plan yucca strategy
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
Fifty VIPs, political allies in their support for the Yucca Mountain Repository, rallied Tuesday at a technical workshop held at Pahrump's Community College of Southern Nevada.
The workshop speakers and invited attendees included local government and high-ranking federal Energy Department officials, planners, nuclear industry consultants and sales managers, nuclear waste cask designers and waste recyclers, as well as other persons interested in business development.
The speakers presented what appeared to be a coordinated new marketing strategy that unites the administration's new GNEP initiative.
GNEP is the administration's new Global Nuclear Energy Partnership program, intended to increase U.S. and global energy security and to reprocess - or "recycling," as the conferees put it - spent nuclear fuel.
The regional "Vision 2020" program promises the economic development of rural Nevada along the 318-mile Caliente corridor in the central part of the state where the Yucca railroad is to run, bringing high-paying jobs to towns from Caliente to the proposed repository site.
The convention was a more lively follow-up to one held at the community college last June. Tuesday's all-day workshop focused on the status of the proposed nuclear waste repository in light of developments in the past year that have set the project back.
Alan B. Brownstein, chief operating officer for the Department of Energy's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management in Washington, D.C., presented the keynote address - "The Imperative for Yucca Mountain, the Outlook for New Nuclear Plants."
The forum was sponsored by the Central Nevada Community Protection Working Group in cooperation with the U.S. Transport Council.
"Delay, political fallout and timidity are our worst enemies," said Brownstein. "As Winston Churchill once said, 'Never, never, ever give up.'"
Brownstein emphasized the Department of Energy's new approach to transporting nuclear fuel by using "clean canisters," designed to minimize the handling of packaged fuel rods, limiting the need for multiple facilities for repacking at the Nevada repository.
Brownstein also spoke of DOE's recent development of "a safety culture" in which to conduct its transport and storage operations.
A cavalier regard for quality assurance has underlain much recent criticism of Yucca Mountain's safety management over the past year. An email scandal and an earlier court decision brought to an abrupt halt DOE's scheduled licensure application with the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Legislation pending in Congress proposes Yucca Mountain's budget at $306 million, Brownstein said.
Adam H. Levin, director of spent fuels and decommissioning strategy for Exelon Generation Co. in Warrenville, Ill., said licensing of the Yucca Mountain facility ought to become an easier task because of pending "legislative streamlining of amended application procedures."
Exelon operates a nuclear power plant and sued the government over its failure to take nuclear waste off its property as promised, Levin said.
He touted the advantages of nuclear power and how "clean energy development around the world" would reduce the nation's dependence on fossil fuels as well as the risk of nuclear proliferation by reducing the volume of uranium stockpiles.
Perhaps a dozen new repositories would need to be constructed to securely store nuclear waste if research and development on reprocessing under the new Global Nuclear Energy Partnership program didn't proceed, participants said.
Already, there are 42 facilities around the nation where spent nuclear fuel waits in dry storage for transport to the Yucca Mountain Repository for final deposition. Some 60 civil lawsuits, conservatively estimated, are in the courts asking for damages against the federal government for the long delays in opening the repository as promised.
The cost to taxpayers for settling litigation with nuclear power companies related to Yucca Mountain's failure to open on schedule has been estimated at $1 billion per year, according to reports.
"What you're seeing now is just the tip of the ice berg," said Don Baepler, director of the Nevada Environmental Monitoring and Research Institute, referring to coming damage claims against the government even when - or if - Yucca Mountain is opened, due to the anticipated growth in industry waste stockpiles.
David C. Blee, executive director of the U.S. Transport Council, added, "Until you have the storage problem solved, you won't get substantial new plant generation."
David C. Jones, director of policy and strategic issues at Duke Energy in Charlotte, N.C. reported there were 10 new nuclear power plants planned across the southeastern U.S.
The growth of the industry is such that nuclear power is becoming a more attractive alternative to fossil fuels but creates issues of storage with the exponential growth of nuclear waste.
Technological advances in nuclear reactors - such as the new Westinghouse A1000 model - are leading in the direction of simplification of design, ease of operation, cheaper maintenance costs and increased safety.
Bob Quinn, president of the spent fuel division of Energy Solutions of Campbell, Calif., called for disposal of spent nuclear fuel as European countries have done through reprocessing, or recycling.
Currently, 95 percent of uranium is wasted, Quinn said. "The waste volume can be dramatically reduced and reused as new fuel," he said, improving on space management at Yucca Mountain.
"You still need Yucca Mountain," Quinn said, but "You would only need one repository." Otherwise, in 30 to 40 years, other repositories would have to be built.
One uninvited person at the meeting silently dissented from that view: Longtime activist Marge Detraz from Caliente wore a T-shirt that said it all: "Nevadans say nuclear waste no way."
Detraz added privately that Yucca Mountain was a federal project conducted by and for the benefit of consultants.
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Pahrump Valley Times
May 26, 2006
Working on the railroad
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
"We're losing our very best assets and resources," said Mayor Kevin Phillips of Caliente at Tuesday's workshop on the future of Yucca Mountain's and a dried up Central Nevada.
Phillips told how his daughter recently left home for college. "I probably won't see her again," he said sadly. "We want to create economic opportunity so our kids can live here."
He and other central Nevada officials believe there is a way to guarantee that.
Phillips said the National Transportation Project, otherwise known as the Caliente Railroad, which would transport high-level nuclear waste from across the nation to Yucca Mountain, would be a boon to the economy of the region.
The rail corridor follows a 318-mile route from Caliente in Lincoln County about 30 miles from the Utah line, snaking around the Nevada Test and Training Range through Nye and Esmeralda counties to the proposed repository site at Yucca Mountain.
Phillips and Lincoln County Commission Chairman George "Tommy" Rowe, along with Esmeralda County Commissioner Bill Kirby, are proponents of what they want to see designated as "the Central Nevada Energy Corridor."
The remote railroad corridor, containing 0.3 people per square mile, should become home to America's energy's future, the boosters say.
"The corridor can become the place for America to begin to solve its energy challenge," said Kirby.
At the same time, Nevada could diversify its economic dependence on gambling, said Phillips.
Ballast rocks for the roadbed would engage various businesses; some 9,000 railroad ties would come from area timber, which he estimated to cost $28 million; cement and steel brackets to hold the ties would come from a local supplier; castings and molds used in the construction process would likewise need someone already established in the region to provide them for less than the cost of shipping them from outside the region.
"We need to build them out here," Phillips said. "We're an old railroad town. We know how to take care of railroads."
The goal of the "Vision 2020" program is to designate "energy zones" within the Caliente corridor. The zones would be identified as "ideal places for solar, wind, geothermal, nuclear and other promising energy technologies," Rowe said.
Kirby said Esmeralda County needs to increase its tax base by 8 percent by 2008. The county is facing a 15 percent deficit by that time, Kirby said, but with the geothermal potential the county has, that threat would be diminished if it were developed.
By developing the energy zones before the U.S. Department of Energy applies for a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license to operate Yucca Mountain, objections to locations for construction of electrical power plants would be minimized, the planners reason.
The vast empty spaces of central Nevada would provide plenty of room for laying out power lines and transmission substations, Kirby said.
The zones would be designated in 2007 in conjunction with designation of Yucca Mountain as a "national energy reserve."
Construction of the reserve would begin next year, providing a place to hold spent nuclear fuel until it is reprocessed.
Caliente could see construction of the railroad begin in 2008. An energy grid along the corridor would begin the following year, with energy production facilities initiated in 2010.
By 2020 the goal is to be producing 100,000 megawatts of electrical energy.
Plans also call for an energy research center at the Yucca Mountain site.
"The fertile minds of America's youth would have a place to develop energy solutions for America's future," said Kirby.
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Pahrump Valley Times
May 26, 2006
Think tank seen as possible for Nye Co.
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
Could a major center for research and development be on the Nye County horizon?
Don Baepler, former University of Nevada, Las Vegas president and now head of the Nevada Environmental Monitoring & Research Institute, told the VIPs convened in Pahrump earlier this week that central and southern Nevada has a great opportunity to create a larger employment base by obtaining a center for research and development, calling the think tank "a white hat project."
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reported late last month that Sen. Democratic leader Harry Reid, (D-Nev.) is pushing for a $5 million DOE contract "to conduct a site study for a test-scale nuclear waste reprocessing factory."
Reid is reportedly advocating that the current head of the nuclear science division of the Harry Reid Center for Environmental Studies at UNLV be appointed to head up the project, along with the center's original director, Don Baepler, according to reports.
The cost of such a development would be $2 billion to $10 billion, Baepler said, depending on the number of facilities to be located at the facility: a research lab, a development lab and a demonstration project site with a nuclear reactor.
Baepler said the facilities should be located on land owned by Nye County in its still largely undeveloped industrial park at Lathrop Wells, near the entrance to Yucca Mountain.
He said the site, near which the county is currently acquiring public land from the Bureau of Land Management for future expansion, was "a perfect place," environmentally speaking, for such a development and conveniently located close to the future repository gate.
The site for the nuclear reactor would demonstrate to the nation the capability of reprocessing spent nuclear fuel, Baepler said, raising visions of another Sandia National Laboratory (in New Mexico) in Nye County, 45 miles from Pahrump.
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The State
May 27, 2006
Future uncertain for SRS MOX plant
House bill provides no funding for nuclear conversion program
The Associated Press
AIKEN — The future of a program at the Savannah River Site that would take material from nuclear weapons and turn it into fuel for nuclear power plants is uncertain after the U.S. House approved an energy bill without money for the effort.
The program to convert the weapons-grade plutonium into mixed oxide fuel, or MOX, may still be funded by the U.S. Senate, which has yet to vote on the energy bill.
TheNational Nuclear Security Administration plans to continue to work to get the money for the MOX facility, spokeswoman Julianne Smith said.
“At this point it´s very early in the congressional process,’ she said. “Things can change at any point, especially in Congress.’
Six years ago, the United States and Russia each agreed to dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium by converting it to fuel for use in commercial nuclear reactors. Duke Power wants to use the fuel in four of its reactors.
South Carolina agreed in 2002 to accept 34 tons of weapons-grade plutonium at SRS if the U.S. Energy Department built a facility to convert the plutonium into fuel. At the same time, the United States agreed to help fund the construction of a similar MOX plant in Russia, meant to operate on a parallel track with the SRS plant.
Liability issues and Russia´s full-funding demands have delayed the construction of both plants, U.S. Rep. John Spratt, D-S.C., has said.
The process could create commercial energy, reduce the amount of waste going to the Yucca Mountain waste storage site in Nevada and allow MOX fuels to be burned in nuclear reactors, said Rep. Gresham Barrett, R-S.C., whose district includes SRS, which is near Aiken.
“Plus, we´re making the country safer. It gets the weapons-grade plutonium in a fashion that cannot be used by terrorists,’ Barrett said.
Joining Barrett to vote against the energy bill were Reps. Joe Wilson, R-S.C., Charlie Norwood, R-Ga., and others.
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State of Nevada
Agency for Nuclear Projects
www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/
nwpo@nuc.state.nv.us
775-687-3744
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