Yucca Mountain News Clips
Friday, November 9, 2007
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Las Vegas SUN
November 09, 2007
State may pull punch as Yucca fight intensifies
Feds spend big; Nevada faces budget cuts
By David McGrath Schwartz
Las Vegas Sun
Even as the federal government plans to add up to $109 million in attorney power to push Yucca Mountain forward, Nevada's modest budget to fight the nuclear waste dump might shrink because of Gov. Jim Gibbons' demands for spending cuts.
The Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects is not exempt from 5 percent budget cuts that Gibbons has asked most state agencies to prepare. Such a cut would amount to about $200,000 over the next two fiscal years, just as the fight enters a critical juncture.
Bob Loux, executive director of the agency, said the reduction would mean less money to hire outside scientists and attorneys to fight the federal government.
The possible reduction in Nevada firepower comes as the Energy Department has hired a second law firm to prepare the application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for Yucca Mountain. The government plans to spend nearly $50 million at the outset for the legal services, with possible contract extensions that would bring the lawyers' tab to upward of $100 million.
"I still think we're going to kick their butts. I don't care how many law firms they have," Gibbons said Wednesday after meeting with elected officials to discuss the state's budget problems.
But news of the Bush administration's heightened efforts to prepare the Yucca Mountain application, coupled with Nevada's financial problems, frustrated others.
Nevada Republican Rep. Jon Porter said he understands the need to cut some areas of state spending because revenue isn't meeting expectations.
The fight against the nuclear waste dump, though, should be exempt, he said.
"Yucca Mountain should be in the top-tier level of priorities," Porter said. "I would hope it remains a priority in the budget."
Nevada Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley was more forceful. She pointed to the Energy Department's stated commitment to submit its Yucca Mountain application by June.
"At this moment, to be considering cutting rather than adding resources for Nevada to be able to fight the Department of Energy is insanity," Berkley said.
Even if the state's attorney general's office can step in and help on legal matters, there's no one to pick up the work of scientists, Berkley said.
"To be credible, the science should be legitimate," she said. "Why would we cut that now?"
Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto's office referred calls to the governor.
Loux, the state's point man in the anti-dump efforts, finds himself delicately in the middle of the issue. "Clearly, we would rather not have the budget cut," he said. "We're in a rather critical stage of the Yucca program. On other hand, if the governor feels like we need to be cut, we will."
Gibbons has not made any decisions on which state agencies face budget cuts, but has promised to protect budgets for public safety, corrections, K-12 education and forest fire suppression.
The possibility of cutting the state's efforts to fight a repository at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, did not come up at Wednesday's budget summit in Carson City.
The Energy Department hired the law firm Lewis & Bockius LLP in September. The initial contract runs through 2011 and is worth $48 million, with five one-year options. It could eventually be worth $109 million.
Before that the department retained the law firm Hunton & Williams LLP . Its five-year contract, signed in 2004, is worth $45 million.
Gibbons ' decision not to protect Nevada's battle against the dump is not the first reason opponents of a Yucca repository have had to question the governor.
Earlier this year, Cortez Masto and Loux pushed Gibbons and his key aides to stop the federal government from using the state's water for drilling at Yucca Mountain.
Gibbons allowed the water to be used for a time anyway.
Gibbons also removed a fierce repository opponent on the Nevada Nuclear Projects Commission, a driving force against the dump, and replaced that member with a well-known Yucca advocate. The appointment later was rescinded.
He also did not attend a Senate hearing in Washington on Yucca Mountain to which he had pushed to be invited.
Melissa Subbotin, Gibbons' press secretary, said the governor remained staunchly against the dump.
"There is no question whatsoever to the governor's commitment to fighting the Yucca Mountain project," she said.
--David McGrath Schwartz can be reached at 259-2327 or at david.schwartz@lasvegassun.com.
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The Nation
November 09, 2007
No-Nukers Sing a New Green Tune
Harvey Wasserman
Bonnie Raitt, Jackson Browne and Graham Nash are again singing the praises of solar energy. But it's a hard song for reactor backers now desperately seeking more than $50 billion in federal loan guarantees.
The nuclear energy industry is selling "new generation" reactors as a cheap fix for global warming. But a booming renewable energy industry now makes the atomic option sound even more nonsensical than it did when the musicians first sang "No Nukes" three decades ago.
At an October 23 press conference in Washington, Raitt, Browne and Nash delivered 120,000 signatures demanding that Congress strip reactor loan guarantees from this year's energy bill. The industry wants $25 billion in 2008, $25 billion more in 2009 and a blank check for the future. But the rockers' rapid-fire Internet-based campaign--complete with a music video--may have put a serious crimp in their plans.
Joined by Democratic Representatives Ed Markey and John Hall (a fellow musician), backed by a wide range of environmental organizations and gathering support through their NukeFree.org website, the three musicians followed their press conference with a series of visits to Congressional leadership and an intriguing new message.
In 1979, when Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE) staged a legendary series of five concerts in Madison Square Garden (90,000 attended) and a rally at Battery Park City (which drew 200,000), their argument was that nuclear power was dangerous (Three Mile Island had just melted) and that renewable energy would be cost-effective "someday soon."
Today, the musicians and their environmental cohorts can still say that nuclear power has failed. But what's different is that the renewable energy industry has come of age. "Wind power is booming," says Brian Parsons of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
No new reactors are currently under construction in the United States. But Parsons says about $6 billion worth of wind farms are in "various stages of development," representing "between one and 1.5 years' worth at the current pace," a number that towers over what was happening thirty years ago. Worldwide, the industry is in the $15 billion range annually, according to the American Wind Energy Association. With turbines costing less than $2 million a megawatt, and with fuel perpetually free (operation and maintenance costs run about 5 percent per year), wind energy can leave nuclear reactors in the radioactive dust.
The same can now be said for photovoltaic (PV) cells. Major breakthroughs in amorphous (flexible) applications have allowed American factories to pour out ever-cheaper roofing laminates that can power the buildings on which they sit. Assembly lines longer than football fields now produce them by the mile, at production costs that continue to plummet.
The Michigan-based United Solar Ovonic claims to have doubled its annualized production capacity in the past year to fifty-eight megawatts and will have another threefold expansion by the end of next year. Company officials predict the capital cost of machines to be $150 million, for an annual capacity of 100 megawatts. Industry experts predict an annual market of more than ten gigawatts in 2012, the equivalent of ten nukes per year. The cost of solar electricity is coming down rapidly, according to Ovonic, and with "suitable infusion of money to build new plants," industry experts and Energy Department officials predict "grid parity" by 2015, the very earliest new reactors could come on line under optimum conditions.
Part of the new economic advantage of PV cells comes from the fact that they can be installed on the rooftops and south-facing walls of buildings that use their energy, thus avoiding transmission costs from central power stations, which can be extremely high.
Other solar technologies, such as desert-based "power towers" and concave "trough mirror" farms, have proved themselves over the past two decades to the point that investors are lining up to build new ones. These long lines of mirror arrays focus sunlight on multiple tubes of heat-exchanging liquid, have run successfully at nine large farms since the 1980s.
Millions of new investment dollars are also pouring into biofuels, ocean-wave generators, geothermal devices and more. Each has technical, financial and even ecological problems. But the message is clear: the renewable energy industry is in the process of achieving liftoff.
By contrast, say the nuke-free organizers and their green cohorts, the atomic reactor business is mired in hype. Some things about it have not changed since 1979. Most important, there is no solution to the radioactive waste problem. Nevada's Yucca Mountain dump is as unlicensed now as it was during the MUSE concerts. What's different is that Harry Reid, an adamant Yucca foe, is now Senate majority leader.
Also new is the legacy of September 11. The prospect of terror attacks was always high on the list of reasons to oppose atomic energy. But the first jet that flew into the World Trade Center passed over the three reactors (two active, one retired) at Indian Point, forty-five miles north of Manhattan.
The nuclear industry vehemently denies Indian Point's containment domes could have been penetrated. But the aging, rickety complex remains supremely vulnerable in myriad ways, as do dozens of other reactors around the globe. Despite claims of "inherent safety," no private insurer will take the liability risk for a major reactor disaster, past or future, with old reactors or new. After fifty years, responsibility still reverts to the taxpayer, now and for the foreseeable future.
The industry needs federal loan guarantees because it can't get private investors any more easily than it can find private insurers.
The Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the industry's PR front group, says atomic energy is cheaper than renewables, but it can only do so by downplaying the "intangible" costs of radioactive fuel production and waste disposal, human error and terror attacks, heat and radioactive emissions and much more. The NEI also claims net gains in fighting global warming, but it would posit hundreds of reactors to do so even under optimal circumstances. Amory Lovins's Rocky Mountain Institute has shown that a dollar spent on increased conservation can save seven times more energy than a dollar spent on nuclear power can produce.
The NEI also says new reactors can be built for $4 billion to $5 billion, in five years or less. But atomic energy's history is defined by massive delays and overruns. The cost of New Hampshire's Seabrook nuclear power plant went from $250 million for two reactors in the 1960s to $7 billion for one that opened in 1989. Scores of other "first generation" plants came on line horrifically late and wildly over budget.
The industry likes to blame all that on protesters. And the wide range of environmental groups and the tens of thousands still signing Raitt, Browne and Nash's NukeFree.org petition make it clear that even after all these years, they are not going away.
But the industry is also building its first "new generation" plant in Finland. Barely two years since ground was broken, it is nearly two years behind schedule and $2 billion over budget. Small wonder a green power industry that was barely an embryo in 1979 now sings a song that sounds a lot like success.
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Virginia Tech Collegiate Times
November 09, 2007
Reconsidering a switch from coal to nuclear power
Rosanna Brown, CT News Reporter
The annual Choices and Challenges Forum took place yesterday, hosting a variety of speakers who illuminated the history, logistics, benefits, and set-backs of nuclear energy.
The all-day event, titled "Nuclear Power Reconsidered," was held in both the Lyric Theater and the Graduate Life Center.
The open forum structure of the event allowed participants to question and challenge the thoughts of others regarding the facts of nuclear energy.
"We thought that was a perfect issue and a very timely issue," said Daniel Breslau, co-coordinator for the Choices and Challenges forum.
Breslau said that for a long time the United States' interest in constructing nuclear power plants has been in a lull because of cost and safety concerns.
He said that the current resurgences of interest is coming from corporate industries and those concerned with finding an alternative fuel source to oil.
"They are all coming at the issues from a different kind of disciplinarian or professional background," Breslau said.
At the forum, Richard Hirsh, director of the consortium on energy restructuring at Virginia Tech, spoke alongside Benjamin Sovacool, post-doctoral fellow in energy policy at the National University of Singapore. Both described the historical evolution, concerns and proponents of nuclear energy.
Research, regulation, and promotion of nuclear energy began in 1946 with the creation of the Atomic Energy Commission, Hirsh said.
"Almost every other new transition to a new technology has been because of demand changes," Sovacool said.
The advent of the AEC was the first time the U.S. government decided to promote a new invention prior to its demand.
This promotion was about the positive aspects of going nuclear.
The United States currently derives 49 percent of its energy from coal, 20 percent from natural gas, and 19 percent from nuclear power, Hirsh said.
For every one pound of uranium required by a nuclear power plant, a coal plant requires 1,500 tons of coal, he said.
Hirsh explained that a well-operated nuclear power plant will not release greenhouse gases.
Some fears of nuclear power are the effects of radiation if a plant were to fail.
In 1974 the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pa. had a failure in its Emergency Core Cooling System.
No one was hurt or killed during the event; however, there is speculation that some animals may have been injured and psychological effects remain, Hirsh said.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission required that evacuation plans be in place near the vicinity where a nuclear power plant is built after the TMI incident.
Another downfall of nuclear power is the money required to build the plant.
The first demonstration nuclear power plant built in Shippingport, Pa. cost $84 million in 1957, Hirsh said.
Not only are there health affects and money issues with nuclear power, there is the problem of where to put waste.
Nuclear waste in the United States is collected in storage within the plants themselves, Hirsh said.
This form of storage is not ideal, so Bush proposed in 2002 that the waste be stored in Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
This proposition never took effect because of local adversity to the plan, Hirsh said.
France, who has 70 percent of its energy supplied by nuclear power, uses a reprocessing plant that recycles the nuclear waste into plutonium. The main use for this plutonium is weaponry, Hirsh said.
The implementation of a reprocessing plant in the United States was rejected by former President Carter because he did not want the American people to think the use of nuclear power was for weaponry, Hirsh said.
As a result, there still remains no political solution for the placement of nuclear waste in the U.S., Hirsh said.
The most current diplomacy that advocates nuclear power is the Energy and Policy Act of 2005.
This act provides financial support to companies building nuclear power plants and gives them tax credit, Hirsh said.
In Virginia, there was a reregulation law passed this past April.
This act gives companies an extra 2 percent in rate return for over 12 years if they are to invest in a nuclear power plant, Hirsh said.
Hirsh said it is now in the works for Dominion Virginia Power to build a nuclear power plant.
"Nuclear Power Reconsidered" is Choices and Challenge's 26th forum. Choices and Challenges have been organizing these forums since the project was established at Virginia Tech in 1985.
Breslau began organizing the event with co-coordinators Eileen Crist and Saul Halfon in Jan. 2007.
--Comments:
Posted by: Susanne
There are scientific concerns about the suitability of Yucca Mountain for storing spent fuel which remains radioactive for hundreds of thousands of years. The presence of Chlorine 36 indicates that the repository may be penetrated by water much faster than originally thought leading to corrosion of the spent fuel containers and release of radioactive material into drinking water.There is also a volcanic crater, the Lathrop Crater which I have viewed from the top of Yucca Mountain. This crater was caused by an eruption. An earthquake in the last twenty years damaged a building on the Yucca Mountain repository site. Transportation of spent fuel largely from sites east of the Mississippi also poses risks of traffic accidents and terrorist attacks. No state is willing to permanently store spent fuel either that produced by reactors in their own state and much less that originating in other states.
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State of Nevada
November 08, 2007
Letter from Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto to Senator Barbara Boxer
The Honorable Barbara Boxer, Chairman
United States Senate
Committee on Environment and Public Works
410 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-6175
Dear Chairman Boxer:
On behalf of the State of Nevada, I want to extend my profound thanks to you and the Committee for last week’s hearing which examined the Yucca Mountain licensing process and the status of the Environmental Protection Agency’s radiation standards for the proposed repository. I appreciate your invitation to present testimony concerning the Yucca Mountain project. The hearing was exceptionally informative and I was impressed by the level of understanding exhibited by the Committee members. Questions from the Committee revealed the members’ comprehension of the complexity of the licensing issues and the grave public health and safety risks the project poses for residents of Nevada and California.
Second, I direct your attention to the reports prepared by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Government Accounting Office which illustrate the problems associated with the lack of final designs for projects such as new reactors and various other DOE projects. These reports document how the lack of final designs contributes to substantial schedule and cost overruns, and raises serious health and safety concerns. During the hearing, DOE representative Edward Sproat testified that final designs are not required at this stage of the project. Aside from the obvious harm this creates for public confidence, a review of the NRC and GAO reports underscores how schedule, cost and safety are all negatively impacted by the lack of final designs. I ask you and the Committee to prohibit the NRC staff from accepting for review any DOE license application that does not contain final designs for all the proposed Yucca Mountain facilities.
Lastly, I accept your offer of assistance to secure key Yucca Mountain documents that DOE refuses to provide to Nevada. I attach a list of these documents necessary for Nevada’s review and preparation for a licensing proceeding. In addition, DOE has denied Nevada access to certain documents on the NRC License Support Network by inappropriately claiming a work product privilege. Recent decisions by both the PAPO, NRC’s Pre-application Presiding Officer, and United States District Court Judge, Edward Reed, in a Freedom of Information Act case brought by Nevada concluded that DOE’s documents prepared for its NRC license application cannot be shielded under the work product privilege because these documents are prepared for the licensing process rather than for litigation. We therefore ask that these documents be included in your request as well.
I thank you again for your assistance and offer my office’s resources to help you in any way possible. I look forward to working with you and your staff on this matter of vital importance to the country.
Sincerely,
Catherine Cortez Masto
Attorney General
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KLAS-TV
November 08, 2007
Nuclear Agency Gets Sparkling New Building in Las Vegas
Edward Lawrence
In a shiny new building, employees at the government agency deciding if a nuclear waste dump in Nevada gets a license to open waits for the application.
Eyewitness News looks in depth at the Nuclear Regulatory agency's new hearing room in their new building in Las Vegas and why the federal agency says it's not wasted tax dollars.
As shiny as a new bank and as secure as a federal courthouse, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's building will be the sight of a showdown 20 years in the making.
Although Eyewitness News could not get an exact figure, the building cost taxpayers between $25 million to $30 million. It's just another example of waste according to Nevada's elected leaders.
Senator John Ensign (R) said, "The politics of Yucca Mountain, the science of Yucca Mountain being very questionable, I believe we are pouring money down a large rat hole in the state of Nevada."
A spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission does not agree. The NRC, as it's called, will decide if a Yucca Mountain repository gets a license to accept nuclear waste.
David McIntyre justifies the expense saying the hearings should be in Las Vegas. "The board wants to make it as easy as possible for various parties to participate in the hearing."
Former Governor Bob List agrees. He's on the payroll of a nuclear lobby group that supports the Yucca Mountain repository.
Fmr. Gov. Bob List, with the Nuclear Energy Institute, said, "It's very important for our state that we have these hearings here in Nevada and that everybody be able to have a seat at the table."
The NRC has a full time staff working there. Eventually the building will be a West Coast satellite where hearings for new nuclear power plants are heard. That's because there are now dozens of government employees looking for something to do.
They are in a $25 million to $30 million taxpayer funded building waiting on an application that has been delayed and delayed and delayed by more than a decade sending the total cost of the nuclear waste project from $80 million to $77 billion.
During the first hearing on Dec. 5, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will decide if the data the Department of Energy is using to support a nuclear waste dump in Nevada is complete enough to move forward to licensing.
In 2004, the state made the same challenge and won, which delayed the project three years.
The DOE wants to submit a license application by June of 2008.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 07, 2007
DOE boosts Yucca team
Second major legal firm hired for waste project
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- With work piling up toward a June deadline, the Department of Energy has hired a second major law firm at a potential cost of $109 million to handle legal matters for the Yucca Mountain Project.
Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP was awarded a contract Sept. 26 to prepare and defend a formal license application for the government to build the Nevada nuclear waste site, DOE officials confirmed.
One attorney said it has the potential to become the richest legal contract ever for a nuclear project, and signals a new level in the Energy Department's resolve to complete the project.
It also began raising questions as to whether Nevada should beef up its own legal resources as it fights plans to bury high-level nuclear waste 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
"That certainly is a bit more money than we were planning to spend or have available to spend, but despite that I feel very confident about our chances," said Bob Loux, director of Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects.
The state has been budgeting between $2 million and $3 million annually for legal help, and had been looking to increase that amount after DOE enters a critical licensing phase of the Yucca project in summer 2008.
The Energy Department and Morgan, Lewis signed for an initial contract period that runs through Dec. 31, 2011, for $47.7 million, with five succeeding one-year options, according to information supplied by DOE.
If carried to the full term, the company could earn up to $108.89 million. DOE authorized an initial payment of $400,000.
Morgan, Lewis, which describes itself as one of the world's largest law firms and has a thriving nuclear practice, becomes the second big firm working for the Energy Department on the Yucca project.
Hunton & Williams, LLP already is on the job. The firm based in Richmond, Va., was hired in 2004 on a five-year contract paying $45 million.
Legal sources said for the amounts being paid to the firms, about 30 lawyers or more could be assigned to the Yucca project, in addition to Energy Department in-house counsel.
By contrast, the state of Nevada is represented by a three-person firm, Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch, plus resources within the state attorney general's office.
DOE officials declined to supply a copy of the Morgan, Lewis contract pending review of a request filed under the Freedom of Information Act.
Besides providing more specifics of the work arrangements, the contract also would be expected to detail how DOE and Morgan, Lewis might be handling potential conflicts of interest.
Morgan, Lewis, one of only a handful of major law firms with nuclear expertise, represents more than a dozen utilities in separate nuclear waste lawsuits against the Energy Department.
Now Morgan, Lewis is working for DOE as well. Lawyers consulted Tuesday said it is probable but not known for certain that safeguards against conflict of interest were written into the contract.
Defending the contract, a DOE official who spoke on the condition of not being identified said the department approached three firms for the job and demanded "very strict and very specific requirements" to avoid conflicts.
Morgan, Lewis has erected a "Chinese wall" between its litigation practice that represents utilities, and the nuclear regulatory practice that is working for DOE, the official said.
"There are different attorneys and the file systems are segregated and they even have different locations and different computer systems," the official said.
Morgan, Lewis did not comment Tuesday on its arrangements or the contract in general.
Joseph Egan, Nevada's lead outside counsel, said the Morgan, Lewis contract could become the richest payday for lawyers working on a nuclear energy matter.
"I am not aware of anything that even comes close," Egan said, except perhaps for the DOE contract awarded to Hunton & Williams three years ago.
Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said she has asked the Energy Department to detail the contract, saying it sends "red flags" concerning potential conflicts of interest.
"In the past, DOE has said that law firms handling cases for nuclear power plant operators should not be allowed to also represent the Energy Department during the licensing process for Yucca Mountain," Berkley said.
"I would hope that the prohibition on these potential conflicts of interest is still in place and that those who entered into this contract are not actively involved in such litigation," Berkley said.
Berkley added she was "staggered by the sheer dollar amount contained in this contract."
Part of the job for the attorneys is harmonizing the Energy Department's planned 7,000-page repository application with federal laws and technical regulations.
Another part consists of defending the application in courtroom-style hearings before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
DOE sources said it became clear the department needed more lawyers for the undertaking, and that Morgan, Lewis was perceived as having more current nuclear licensing experience than Hunton & Williams.
Contact Stephens Washington Bureau Chief Steve Tetreault at stetreault@stephensmedia.com or (202) 783-1760.
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Pahrump Valley Times
November 07, 2007
Amargosa urges limits to growth
Town Board Chairwoman Sees Crisis Looming
By Mark Waite
PVT
AMARGOSA VALLEY -- Town advisory board Chairwoman Jan Cameron, almost choking back tears, urged Nye County commissioners last week to adopt the Amargosa Valley area plan without delay.
"We're going to get raped just like Pahrump has by developers. They've found us. There are developers in the parceling process, trying to bypass the subdivision process, so that the infrastructure is not being developed. They're being allowed to do whatever they want," Cameron said.
What set Cameron off was a comment by Nye County Commission Chairman Gary Hollis that he wanted to continue the item to a later date to study it. Hollis said he received a copy of the plan only last week.
(Commissioners agreed to review the plan during the next meeting yesterday in Tonopah. A separate request to create a regional planning commission in Amargosa Valley was tabled until Dec. 4.)
The concept of an Amargosa Valley area plan was first suggested by former Nye County Commissioner Jeff Taguchi from Beatty in 1999. But Amargosa town officials said emphatically no, to planning at the time.
Since then, rapid parceling of lots has led to concerns. Realtor John Buchanan, for one, is eyeing up Crystal Heights as a subdivision to house workers on spin-off industries from Yucca Mountain like the Gateway Project, proposed by Nye County officials on 900 acres surrounding Gate 510.
Cameron said a nine-member subcommittee looked at parcels to see what was available in terms of utilities and resources and gather input.
"We don't want our community parcelled down to 5,000-home developments," subcommittee member Shelia Rau said.
While Pahrump had back-to-back farms when a regional planning district was formed, Rau, an Amargosa Valley resident since 1956, said they have mostly public land and little patented property.
"We went to everyone here and talked to them. If there was a community plan, that's it," Rau said.
The Amargosa Valley town board recommended approval.
An existing Amargosa Valley planning board is almost impotent. Cameron said it is largely confined to asking about road rights-of-way, easements and boundaries for parcels.
During the discussion at the Amargosa Valley Community Center Tuesday, Nye County Commissioners Butch Borasky and Peter Liakopoulos pointed out one glaring error: Each wondered why the Amargosa dairy wasn't included in the plan. Cameron said it was an oversight. Liakopoulos said the Amargosa Dairy provides 210 local jobs, $21 million in personal income in Nye County and nearly $4.3 million in taxes.
The valley's economic base listed in the area plan includes one mining company, two tree farms, one boarding school, one casino/hotel and three convenience stores.
The current economic picture got a little dimmer however, with the closure of the Fort Amargosa truck stop on Highway 95 in Lathrop Wells. The Stateline Casino, a bar on Highway 373 at the California state line, has been closed for some time. The LongStreet Inn and Casino closed its restaurant and hotel for the slow, summer season this year.
Many of the existing developments still resemble mirages on the wide-open desert horizon, with only 1,379 residents in a sprawling valley of 575 square miles. By contrast, Pahrump Valley has 38,068 people in 286 square miles. Nye County Manager Ron Williams said Amargosa Valley has perhaps 2,000 parcels, as opposed to almost 50,000 parcels in Pahrump Valley.
State planner Skip Canfield suggested Amargosa Valley create a planning district that would draw up a more detailed plan, Cameron said. That would require more planning staff, she said.
"I believe if they take care of these things now, they won't have the issues Pahrump suffered through these past 10 years, and I would really like that to happen," Nye County Commissioner Roberta "Midge" Carver said.
"This document, I look at it as a policy document basically," said Nye County Planning Director Jack Lohman. "Take these policies and have a map that has the land use designations on it. We'll move as expeditiously as we can ... This will be a blueprint for the community. We want to make sure all things line up properly."
"The pleasure the Pahrump meeting brings me, I would not want to wish that on any other community in this county," Liakopoulos said jokingly.
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NEI Nuclear Notes
November 07, 2007
Report: Energy Considering Recycling Fuel from Closed Reactors
From Energy Daily
In next year's budget request, the Energy Department is planning to ask Congress for authority to take title to spent nuclear fuel stockpiled at closed U.S. nuclear plants and to reprocess it, most likely in France, sources tell The Energy Daily.
DOE officials in recent years have resisted congressional pressure to move spent fuel stockpiled at U.S. reactors to regional storage facilities, saying the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA) bars them from taking title to the fuel until the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nevada is granted a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license.
Now, sources say, the department is planning to ask Congress to amend the NWPA to remove that limitation as part of its fiscal 2009 budget request to Congress, which DOE is in the early stages of preparing.
However, DOE's goal is apparently to transport it for reprocessing, most likely at La Hague in France, not to move the spent fuel to regional storage facilities in the United States as some lawmakers have requested. It is unclear whether DOE intends to ask for authority to take title only to fuel from closed plants, or to spent fuel stockpiled at operating U.S. reactors as well.
A DOE spokeswoman Tuesday would neither confirm nor deny that DOE was considering the recycling plan, but noted DOE was pursuing recycling options through its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) initiative.
--comments:
Joffan said...
The nuclear industry needs to put together and propose a plan to take spent fuel handling out of the operational hands of the government. There is $20 billion sitting in the fund to deal with commerical spent fuel. The use that money could be put to in building an actinide burner and reprocessing facilities along with medium-term localized storage is just incredible.
Yucca is not interesting. Yucca is making the whole damned process too hard. Shelve it, come back to the idea later when needed. Take away the "waste" stumbling block that gets thrown again and again in front of nuclear power projects.
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Science Daily
November 07, 2007
Science News
Seismic Hazard: Stateline Fault System Is Major Component Of Eastern California Shear Zone
ScienceDaily (Nov. 6, 2007) — The 200-km (125 miles)-long Stateline fault system is a right-lateral strike-slip fault zone with clear Late Quaternary surface ruptures extending along the California-Nevada state line, from Primm, Nevada area along Interstate 15 to the Amargosa Valley.
The fault passes within 40 km of the Las Vegas strip, 10 km of the town center of Pahrump, Nevada, and appears to end near the town of Amargosa Valley, Nevada (about 40 km west-southwest of the site of the proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain).
This fault has long been considered inactive and of only minor importance to the tectonic pattern of eastern California and southwestern Nevada, whereas fault systems like the Death Valley, Panamint Valley, and Owens Valley have received much more attention.
New research focused on the Stateline fault system is beginning to change how we view this fault zone. Guest et al. present geologic data that establishes the minimum offset on the southern segment of the fault system to be 30 ± 4 km over the last 13 million years.
This implies a minimum average slip rate for the southern segment of the fault system of 2.3 ± 0.35 mm/yr. This is twice the slip rate estimated from geodetic monitoring in the region, and therefore the fault is either in a transient period of slow slip or has been abandoned as activity in the eastern California shear zone has migrated west.
The magnitude of accumulated offset, evidence for Late Quaternary slip, and rapid long-term slip rate indicate that the Stateline fault system is a major component of the Eastern California shear zone. Given its proximity to population centers and important infrastructure in southern Nevada, the fault warrants close scrutiny in seismic hazards analyses of the region.
Adapted from materials provided by Geological Society of America.
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Baltimore Sun
November 07, 2007
No government subsidies for new nuclear plants
By Bonnie Raitt and Harvey Wasserman
A clause in the landmark energy bill now before Congress could open the door for massive loan guarantees meant to entice investors to build nuclear power plants.
This is an extremely important piece of legislation, and we strongly support its green features, including higher mileage standards for motor vehicles and a renewable electricity standard.
But as longtime anti-nuclear activists, we believe guaranteeing loans to build new reactors is exactly wrong for a nation that needs to solve the global warming crisis while building a sustainable economy.
That these guarantees are being proposed at all is painful testimony to the 50-year failure of the "peaceful atom."
When the first commercial reactor opened at Shippingport, Pa., in 1957, Lewis Strauss, the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, promised a technology that would produce electricity "too cheap to meter."
But a very expensive half-century of time lags and cost overruns has made a mockery of that promise.
Nor does it seem to be getting better: The first "new generation" reactor, being built in Finland, is 18 months behind schedule and $900 million over budget.
When utility executives first balked at building these reactors, Congress passed the 1957 Price-Anderson Act, making the federal government the primary insurer against catastrophic accidents. A study by the Sandia Laboratories around that time said such an accident could irradiate an area "the size of Pennsylvania." The industry promised that with improving technology, private insurers would soon step forward.
But it hasn't happened. And with the increased potential for terror attacks since 9/11, the industry is now demanding such coverage for its proposed new reactors, which could stretch taxpayer liability for decades to come.
Way back when, the industry also assured the public an answer would soon be found for managing high-level radioactive waste. But as of today, the still-unlicensed dump at Yucca Mountain, Nev., cannot open for at least another decade, if at all.
A repository for the waste produced by proposed new reactors remains unsited, undesigned, unfunded and unnamed. Moving radioactive waste to Yucca Mountain or any such central repository would expose tens of millions of Americans on the highways and railroads and in their homes.
The industry has lately made much of the idea that atomic reactors might help solve global warming.
But in fact they can do little, if anything, to help.
Rather, the way to solve the climate crisis, and to guarantee a sustainable economy, is with conservation, increased efficiency and renewable energy, including wind, solar, biofuels, geothermal, ocean thermal and a wide range of other rapidly advancing, safe energy technologies.
Investments in increased efficiency or renewable energy can lead to much greater energy savings and job creation than investments in nuclear power. To solve global warming and guarantee us a safe, reliable energy future, that's where our money needs to go.
Bonnie Raitt and Harvey Wasserman are co-founders of Musicians United for Safe Energy.
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New York Times
November 07, 2007
Radioactive Nimby: No One Wants Nuclear Waste
By James Kanter
Würenlingen, Switzerland
SWEEPING his hand across the surface of a warm cask heated by some of the most radioactive material on earth, Walter Heep says he is confident that the contents can be kept safely and securely aboveground for the next few decades.
Asked what might happen beyond that time frame — particularly if Swiss voters continue to reject proposals to bury nuclear waste permanently at a deep underground site — Mr. Heep is blunt about the problems that a lack of such a site will present for the future of the nuclear industry in Switzerland.
“We are not planning on a Plan B,” said Mr. Heep, chief executive of Zwilag, a company that safeguards waste from the country’s five reactors in storage buildings here in Würenlingen, near the border with Germany. “We need a final repository in Switzerland.”
Because the production of nuclear energy generates virtually no carbon dioxide, around the world the industry is trying to ride a wave of enthusiasm for green sources of power as demand for energy is surging. But a huge obstacle remains: more than a half century after the opening of the first commercial reactor, there is still no permanent disposal site anywhere for highly radioactive waste of the kind overseen by Mr. Heep.
The industry and many governments are seeking to entomb the waste — the long-delayed Yucca Mountain project in Nevada is the most prominent example — but aversion to nuclear facilities remains strong, making it hard to find suitable sites and damping the industry’s hopes for a nuclear renaissance.
“The failure to properly address waste disposal in the first decades of nuclear energy development has left a legacy of doubt in the minds of the public and politicians over its overall safety,” Tomihiro Taniguchi, the deputy director general for nuclear safety and security at the International Atomic Energy Agency, said at a conference in Bern, Switzerland, in October. “If this doubt is not ameliorated soon, it could well lead to all the ambitious plans to expand the use of nuclear power on a global scale being significantly delayed.”
Around the world, waste and spent fuel are stored on an interim basis in pools of water or in casks, many near ground level. That leads to concerns about the vulnerability of the materials to disasters like terrorist attacks, and it raises persistent questions about whether the materials can be effectively monitored for periods that exceed recorded human history many times over.
Firing neutrons at waste in a process called transmutation can speed up radioactive decay, reducing the amount of time the waste remains dangerous. Reprocessing spent fuel reduces its volume and toxicity. But neither procedure eliminates waste. So international officials like Mr. Taniguchi say permanent disposal in a combination of clay and rock, or in salt domes, is the best long-term option for isolating waste like spent fuel, which contains materials that can take up to a million years to degrade to the extent that the toxicity is negligible.
Posiva, a waste disposal company owned by Finnish nuclear operators, is digging a tunnel at Olkiluoto, an island in the west of Finland, in anticipation of final approval for storing waste a quarter of a mile underground. Burial could begin in 2020. That could make the site the first of its kind, demonstrating to opponents of nuclear power that long-term disposal is feasible and helping the Finnish nuclear industry save money on storage in future decades.
But the Finnish case is exceptional. Many residents in the Olkiluoto area accept nuclear facilities because there are already nuclear power plants on the island that provide employment and hefty tax revenue. The local geology also turned out to be favorable.
In other parts of the world, similar efforts face seemingly implacable opposition. For decades, United States authorities have sought to put high-level waste inside Yucca Mountain, in Nevada. President Bush gave the green light in 2002, but Nevada’s governor vetoed the plan. Although Congress overrode that veto and government officials say they could open a site there by 2017 if all goes according to schedule, few people consider that timetable realistic.
The prospect of sustained opposition from Nevada has left officials in the federal government hinting at the need to restrict transparency in the future.
Winning local support is “a noble objective,” said Edward F. Sproat, the director of the federal Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management.
But “if you set your program up so that local acceptance is an absolute necessity to site your repository, I’m not going to say you will fail, but you should be prepared to fail,” he said.
In Japan, which generates a third of its electricity at nuclear plants and where authorities are aiming to raise that proportion, the central government is offering up to $17 million each year in subsidies to municipalities that volunteer to be considered as disposal sites.
In January, Toyo, a rural town in southern Japan, was the first to apply for the subsidies. But some town assembly members and residents, as well as neighboring local governments, protested. The Toyo mayor, Yasuoki Tashima, who backed the project, called an early election to seek endorsement for his plan, but he lost overwhelmingly. His successor promptly withdrew the application, saying that the town had narrowly avoided a “reckless act.”
Kenji Ogiwara, a vice minister of economy, trade and industry, said no other municipalities had applied since the election in Toyo. Mr. Ogiwara, who spoke in Bern, also seemed to say that the Japanese government should get tougher by nominating sites rather than waiting for volunteers.
In France last year, to increase public acceptance after widespread protests in the 1980s against burial, legislators made such plans contingent on the ability of future generations to exhume waste. The law in France — which relies on nuclear plants for more than 80 percent of its electricity and has one of the largest accumulations of waste in Europe — was written to allow for other means of disposal if new technology comes along.
Some experts warn that those requirements make sites more costly to maintain and could undermine the viability of underground storage.
“The idea is that at some point you’ll seal the shaft and walk away because you can’t guarantee monitoring for hundreds, let alone thousands, of years,” said Simon Webster, the head of a unit responsible for nuclear fission at the European Commission. “Leaving a channel of escape into the biosphere could be self-defeating.”
At Zwilag, the interim storage site overseen by Mr. Heep and owned by four Swiss nuclear operators, the temperature of high-level waste inside the casks is about 575 degrees Fahrenheit. But because they are insulated, the casks deliver a steady warmth similar to a household radiator.
Openings in the walls of the storage building naturally move fresh air around the casks and through the roof, even during warm weather, removing the heat without spreading radioactivity, Mr. Heep said.
There is plenty of room for casks at Zwilag, which is not expected to fill up until much later this century. But the industry may need all the space it can get if opponents continue to find ways to stop burials.
Voters in Nidwalden, a Swiss canton, rebuffed the government in 1995 and 2002 on plans to bury waste there.
After those setbacks, Switzerland passed legislation that took effect in 2005, depriving cantons of the right to veto plans to bury waste, but allowing for a national vote on the final selection of a site.
“We think that’s not fair,” said Jean-Jacques Fasnacht, a doctor who lives in Zürcher Weinland, one of many areas that Swiss authorities are studying as a future waste site. “We worry that people living in Geneva won’t be concerned about what happens in the north of Switzerland.”
Dr. Fasnacht, a co-president of a Swiss antinuclear group, KLAR Schweiz, is joining forces with similar groups in France, Germany and Austria to raise money for studies with the intent of persuading Swiss voters that underground burial will still leave waste vulnerable to attacks by terrorists and to radiation leaks from geological changes.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 05, 2007
Editorial: Nuclear meltdown
Governor's actions show an unacceptable softening of state's resolve on Yucca Mountain
By his actions, Republican Gov. Jim Gibbons is threatening to undercut the state's fight against the Energy Department's dangerous plan to make Nevada a nuclear waste dump.
For two decades the state's top political leadership has been unified in opposition to the department's proposal to send tens of thousands of tons of highly radioactive waste across country to Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Gibbons has professed to be a strong opponent of the plan, but his actions, as witnessed last week, concern us.
On Wednesday Gibbons skipped a U.S. Senate committee hearing on Yucca Mountain, despite having begged to get on the witness list. His spokeswoman said Gibbons couldn't "accommodate" both the hearing and meetings in Nevada, thinking it "prudent" to stay in the state.
On Thursday, as Las Vegas Sun columnist Jon Ralston reported last week in his daily e-mail Flash newsletter, Gibbons apparently found it "prudent" to be in Las Vegas to attend a meeting co-hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The U.S. Chamber is one of the biggest cheerleaders for Yucca Mountain in Washington. It has pledged to lobby for the Energy Department's irresponsible push to build the site and says it will "oppose efforts to undercut the repository licensing process."
In other words, the U.S. Chamber opposes Nevada and all the state's efforts over the past two decades - from lawsuits to the work of the state's leaders - to derail the Energy Department's ill-conceived proposal that has failed to pass scientific muster.
Gibbons' choice of the chamber over a chance to stand strong for Nevada is, sadly, not surprising. Earlier this year he appointed a dump supporter to the state commission that has led the fight against Yucca Mountain, only to watch her withdraw in the ensuing public outcry.
Because Gibbons likes to pose as a populist, he should realize that the overwhelming majority of Nevadans oppose a Yucca waste dump and schmoozing with dump advocates betrays their trust. That is unacceptable.
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Reno Gazette-Journal
November 05, 2007
Nevada primary hasn't put local issues on national stage
If presidential candidates are forced to campaign in the West, then Western issues surely will become a focus of the presidential campaign.
At least, that's according to the philosophy behind the Democratic National Committee's decision to elevate the Nevada Caucus to a coveted early position.
So far, that hasn't necessarily been the case. Voters here, as well as the candidates when they speak here, tend to focus mostly on traditional national issues: the Iraq War, health care, energy policy.
But, last week, U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York decided to use her position on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works to put the spotlight on the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.
The hearing received some national press coverage from the Associated Press and other outlets, as well as from some regional newspapers.
Nevada reporters covered it extensively, giving Clinton an arrow in her quiver when it comes to convincing Nevadans she really is against Yucca Mountain.
But the issue clearly has ramifications beyond Nevada. And they were on display during the hearing.
U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint testified that his constituents in South Carolina, another important early primary state, have been paying a surcharge on their power bills to fund Yucca Mountain.
Most of the Democratic candidates come from states with nuclear power plants and have constituents motivated to rid their neighborhoods of the waste.
How nuclear power fits into the nation's pursuit of energy independence has been thrust into the debate on the heels of the Yucca Mountain issue.
Some Nevada political observers worried the blurring of presidential politics and Yucca Mountain policy during the hearing actually would hurt the cause of dump opponents.
But even if the hearing failed to result in any new evidence, Nevadans fighting the dump said the most important thing is that the debate receive constant public scrutiny.
"It seems to me this is the kind of issue that when it is discussed in public, we gain advantages," said Dan Hart, a Democratic consultant not affiliated with any of the presidential campaigns. "When it just goes along its merry way, as in the past, is when things happen that aren't beneficial for the state."
The battle for the center
America's "political center" often is overlooked in partisan primary elections, when candidates cater to the most fervent voters in their party's base to get the nomination.
But Al From, co-founder of the Democratic Leadership Council, made a two-day swing through Nevada last week to remind pundits and candidates alike that most voters are not ideologues.
From is one of the pioneers of the "New Democrat" philosophy embodied by Bill Clinton's presidency. He advocates for a more conservative approach to Democratic politics and argues the political center will decide the next general election.
"Most Americans just want somebody to solve their problems," he said. "Not somebody who can put on the boxing gloves and bash the other guy into submission."
In an interview with the Reno Gazette-Journal on Friday, From also argued that Nevada could end up standing between Hillary Clinton and the nomination. Nevada's caucus is Jan. 19, coming after Iowa and New Hampshire.
"Depending on what happens there, it will either be the place where there will be a last ditch effort to stop the Clinton nomination, or it will be the place where somebody really tries to launch a campaign," he said.
In 1992, Bill Clinton lost Iowa and came in second in New Hampshire. His first victory was in Wyoming, From said.
"I don't know if people took a lot of notice of it, but it was important to him," From said.
Fred Thompson debut
Former U.S. Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee made his first campaign stop in Nevada on Thursday. According to the Associated Press, about 100 Republicans showed up to a breakfast fundraiser at Stoney's Rockin' Country in Las Vegas, including Gov. Jim Gibbons. The country music night club boasts bikini bull-riding.
Coming up
Former President Clinton will speak at a rally for his wife on Monday in Las Vegas, and Republican candidate Rudy Giuliani is set to campaign there on Thursday.
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KLAS-TV
November 05, 2007
National HAZMAT Conference Held in Las Vegas
Edward Lawrence
Reporter
The people around the nation who deal with the most dangerous substances are here in Clark County. First responders, fire fighters, local homeland security, and government representatives converged at the Tuscany Hotel for a national HAZMAT conference.
Clark County commissioned a study to see the impact of adding nuclear shipments to Yucca Mountain in the valley. The study tracked what kind of hazardous materials and how much travel here in Las Vegas by rail and by truck.
Everyone who has seen the study was surprised at the sheer volume of dangerous material on the roads.
The stuff inside one truck could kill if the driver crashed, breaking open the tanker. It's just as deadly as the gas in a rail car. Recent near disasters opened some eyes in Las Vegas.
On Aug. 29, a runaway tank car full of deadly chlorine raced within a quarter of a mile of the Las Vegas Strip. Clark County HAZMAT experts say a crash, cracking the tank, releasing the gas could kill everyone outside within a half-mile radius.
On Nov. 1, a truck full of diesel fuel hit debris on Interstate 15, near the Spaghetti Bowl, cracking the tank. Two miles later, the driver realized it had been ruptured. The spill caused six accidents and seriously injured one person.
Both incidents could have been worse. The new HAZMAT flow study shows how lucky we have been.
Sheila Conway, Urban and Rural Research Managing Partner said, "Some of the nastiest materials known to man are coming through here every day now."
Sheila Conway actually did the study for the county. She found that Clark County has just 19-percent of the highways in the state, but 64-percent of the hazardous material in Nevada travels though here -- mostly on Interstate 15.
We are talking about 753 truck loads carrying about 8,000 tons a day of potentially deadly materials on our roads each year.
"That congestion, coupled with the growth we are experiencing, is a potential prescription for disaster," said Conway.
Conway says rail schedules are predictable raising another concern, especially since nuclear waste the government wants to store at a Yucca Mountain repository would take the track next to the Strip.
"To add this type of material, when you know the schedule which makes it more vulnerable to a terrorist attack," said Conway.
Las Vegas lawmakers cannot ban HAZMAT shipments by federal law, so we are stuck with this growing issue.
What's worse is the trucks carry poisonous gasses, military bombs, other explosives, even infectious substances -- and 42 other types of material which could kill a lot of people very quickly.
Clark County Nuclear Planning Manager Irene Navis says an accident on Interstate 15 behind the mega-hotels where a container breaks could cripple the Las Vegas tourism.
"When I am next to a tanker, I usually move. I know that if I see certain placards on a vehicle, I usually move out of the way," said Navis.
As dangerous as that may be, Navis says what's on the railroads may be worse.
"The quantity is higher on rail because you can ship more, but the frequency, because of smaller quantities at a time, is going to be truck," said Navis.
The chance of an accident on the highways may be greater. But an incident on the railroad could cause more deaths because amount being hauled. Rail safety records have been improving over the past 10 years. Accidents are down. Still, all it would take is one time to cause a major problem.
Each shipment is supposed to be labeled. Sometimes the driver forgets. Regardless, 71-percent of the dangerous stuff just travels through Las Vegas.
Twice a week, Kelley Kirk drives his 18-wheeler between Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. "I have hauled everything from cattle to explosives."
He sees the accidents congestion can cause. It just takes one crash with a truck carrying something needing a warning to change our luck in Las Vegas.
This kind of study has not been done in the past decade. Meanwhile, the conference started Monday morning and will go until Thursday. It's called the HAZMAT Explo.
It highlights the importance of knowing how to handle what materials come through a community. It also deals with weapons of mass destruction and homeland security issues.
All of the people at the conference from Virginia to Missouri to Nevada need to plan for the worst, because HAZMAT accidents can be some of the deadliest.
"A lot of folks come back with tools they can use right in the workplace, with tools they can use Monday morning," said Carolyn Levering, Clark County Emergency Management Planning Manager.
Eight hundred people attended the conference.
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Charlotte Observer
November 05, 2007
OFF AND ON THE HILL
Graham signs on with Mukasey camp
But senator wants waterboarding treated as illegal torture
LISA ZAGAROLI
N.C. officials press for nuke disposal
A member of the N.C. Utilities Commission was in Washington last week asking Congress to move ahead with its long-term nuclear waste disposal plans at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
"In our view it is time, indeed past time, for the process to move forward," said commissioner James Kerr, who also serves as president of the National Association of Regulatory Utilities.
Kerr testified before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.
"If we're going to have low-cost energy and if we're going to have a clean environment, we have to stop burning coal and have more nuclear power," said Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., who sits on the committee. "But nuclear power's going nowhere unless we have a predictable storage facility."
Rep. Sue Myrick, a Republican from Charlotte, also spoke out in favor of the expansion of nuclear power last week. She attended a press conference that included a consortium of energy companies, among them Duke Energy, that want more nuclear facilities to get licensed.
"Nuclear is clean, it does everything environmentalists want -- no emissions, no greenhouse gases," she said in an interview. "The safety issue is really moot now because the technology has improved so much.
"In Charlotte, we have two (nuclear power) plants on either side of us. Even from people who live around those communities, you don't hear those concerns anymore. People have gotten comfortable with the fact that nuclear is safe."
Immigration bill fell short of 60, failed
Last week, I said that an immigration measure, which would have allowed illegal aliens to seek citizenship if they were brought to this country as children and want to attend college or join the military, "passed" 52-44 in the Senate. Actually, an astute reader pointed out, a simple majority wasn't enough. It needed 60 votes, and therefore, didn't advance.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 04, 2007
Editorial: A new tone in Congress
Hearing highlights how the Yucca Mountain project is a disaster in the making
One of the Bush administration's top energy goals has been to get Yucca Mountain opened as the burial site for the nation's nuclear waste. Shoving safety concerns expressed by Democrats aside and coddling the pseudoscience of government agencies were among its strategies for achieving that goal.
A hearing on Yucca Mountain last week before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee was the first since Democrats gained control of Congress, and it truly showed what a difference an election can make.
Even Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., gave Democrats credit for the way they handled the hearing. "It was a different tone," he told the Sun's Washington reporter, Lisa Mascaro. "The fact that the Democrats held this hearing is a very positive move in trying to get alternatives (to a Yucca repository) on the table."
Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., a candidate for president, had called in July for the hearing. She expressed impatience at the Bush administration's stonewalling on the release of scientific information on safety at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Determining how much radiation from Yucca can leak into the environment without creating a health hazard is the role of the Environmental Protection Agency. A federal court in 2004 rejected the EPA's initial radiation standard. A revision released in 2005 was denounced at public hearings and placed back under review.
Now, two years later, and with the project's scheduled licence application just eight months away, the agency still has not issued an updated radiation standard.
Clinton's direct, no-nonsense questioning at the hearing of an EPA representative got to the heart of the matter. After 20 years of work, the EPA still cannot say when its scientific analysis of Yucca Mountain's effect on human health will be ready.
The admission adds credence to Nevada's point that a "safe" radiation standard for Yucca Mountain is an impossibility. We are encouraged that all the Democratic presidential candidates are on record as opposing a repository at Yucca Mountain, and that a new tone on this issue is being heard in Congress.
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Washington Post
November 04, 2007
COUNTDOWN
Democratic Clout Brings Early Caucus to Nevada
By Shailagh Murray And Chris Cillizza
Will the Democratic Party regret gambling on Nevada?
Many party officials were skeptical when the Silver State sought the No. 3 position on the nominating calendar. Other than casinos, Yucca Mountain and the culinary workers union, what else is there out there? The more logical Western candidate was Arizona, but even a popular governor such as Janet Napolitano couldn't match the clout of Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.).
Nevada got its wish, securing a Jan. 19 caucus date, but the state remains an outlier on the campaign circuit. Former president Bill Clinton holds a rally tomorrow in Las Vegas for his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, but events featuring actual candidates have been few, with a steady diet of surrogates showing up, instead. According to a running tally by washingtonpost.com, Democratic candidates have logged about 100 trips to Nevada since January, although a big date still looms: Nov. 15, when a debate will be in Las Vegas.
One issue in Nevada is settled: All the Democrats oppose dumping nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. But a few other issues remain unresolved, and they could make the contest interesting:
- Will special attention from New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson pay off? The state's most frequent visitor, he's hoping a Nevada win will jump-start his candidacy.
- What will the culinary workers do? This is the mother lode of union endorsements here, representing 60,000 casino and restaurant workers in Las Vegas and Reno, many of them Hispanic. Word is the nod will come sometime after Thanksgiving.
- Is the fix in for Clinton? Reid's son, Clark County Commission Chairman Rory Reid, is chairing her campaign in Nevada. The senator himself is the state's Democratic power broker. (The elder Reid, of course, is neutral.)
- Will the veterans show up? Party officials hope they will caucus in big numbers, fueled by opposition to the Iraq war. One of Nevada's selling points was its growing population of this potentially vital voting bloc. "The energy is really high, but the key thing is we do well in January," said Elliot Anderson, a party official who is helping to organize the group.
TWO DAYS: The bloodbath between state Rep. Bob Latta (R) and state Sen. Steve Buehrer (R) in Ohio reaches its merciful conclusion. What once looked like a semi-sedate special election to replace the late Rep. Paul E. Gillmor (R) has turned increasingly nasty as charges and countercharges are exchanged nearly every day. Depending on whose polling you believe, the two men are either knotted in a close race, or Latta has a double-digit lead. Regardless of the eventual nominee, Republicans should keep this northwestern seat that went 61 percent for President Bush in 2004.
SEVEN DAYS: Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) goes toe to toe with NBC's Tim Russert on "Meet the Press." It's Obama's first appearance on the granddaddy of all Sunday talk shows since declaring for president. Will he shine or wither under Russert's inquisition?
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Las Vegas SUN
November 03, 2007
Letter: Consolidating nuclear waste seems safer
As we approach the presidential caucus it seems that Yucca Mountain has come back into the political arena. As a topic of great concern to many Americans, this has gone on for more than 20 years.
Wouldn't it be better to store nuclear waste in one spot rather than have it sit out in the open, in 108 nuclear facilities across the country?
I'm not saying it should be stored in Yucca Mountain or Crawford, Texas, for that matter, as I don't know where the best site is. But surely one storage site would be better than what we have now , considering the possibility of a terrorist attack with so many targets as options for our enemies.
Sam Pizzo
Henderson
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Daily Camera
November 03, 2007
Meek and Butterfield: Tackling global warming, we can't afford hot air
By Ivan Meek and Anne B. Butterfield
As voters and consumers, we need to be more savvy about how we make, buy and consume energy. Both our national security and our climate depend on it. As more attention is paid to energy, however, more opinions appear in the Camera that do not have research to support the verbiage. This is alarming and disappointing. The climate is warm enough, we don't need any more hot air posing as energy solutions.
In mid September, Ralph Shnelvar offered an opinion titled "Free trade is actually good for greenies" that attempted to eviscerate the value of solar photovoltaics. He quoted Don Lancaster whose views were as vague as they were inflammatory: "Not one net watt hour of conventional silicon photovoltaic energy has ever been generated. Nor is any net energy ever likely to be when one properly computes the full burden on the total systems level. The entire industry is a scam..." The critique is based on the concept of paybacks, an assessment of energy put in versus energy coming out, over time.
"Paybacks started as a bogus concept," says David Johnston, internationally renowned expert in sustainability who consulted to the Department of Energy under the Carter Administration. "It was introduced by coal, oil and gas to blunt the rapid development for solar. It was part of a disinformation campaign to create skepticism."
The payback story nonetheless has been pursued with scientific rigor, and solar has come out a winner. In 2006 researchers Fthenakis and Kim of Brookhaven National Labs found that the various types of PV solar had payback times falling between 1.5 and 2.6 years, and their life-cycle impacts were drastically lower than those earlier reported and are less than fossil fuels' by many orders of magnitude.
It's irresistible to surmise that the life-cycle impacts for coal and uranium are so terrible, with their mining and transport which are extremely power-intensive, that the metric of paybacks was imposed onto renewables specifically as a smoke-screen to hide fossil fuels' terrible values.
Another opinion on energy appeared in the Camera on Oct. 21, by Bruce Briegleb. He presented his credentials as a climate scientist to conclude that it's, "Time to get over our fear of nukes." In over a thousand words, he never gave a reason to get over that fear which he summarily dismissed as "irrational." But we know from a string of nuclear accidents the fear is rational and probably sufficient to rule out nuclear energy.
This fall, the New York Times reported that Swedish babies who were in utero when winds were blowing from Chernobyl now have significantly worse school outcomes than other Swedish children. Radiation's ability to do harm over large distances is serious but still dwarfed by its power to convey harms over great expanses of time, providing our heirs ad infinitum with the gift of poisonous waste and security challenges. There is still no feasible means of disposal or storage for the waste. Nevada's Yucca Mountain, the proposed location for storing our nuclear waste, isn't as impregnable as claimed: Cesium-137 from the 1950s bomb testing has been detected in the cavern. It leaks. Charles Benjamin, Nevada director of Western Resource Advocates, gives voice to his state's defiance: "The days of Nevada being the nation's sacrifice zone are over."
Aside from the waste, nuclear power plants vent radioactive tritium and Xenon-135. Mining, refining and enriching uranium are quite energy intensive; indeed, enriching uranium for the bomb used in World War II summoned 6 percent of our nation's electrical capacity, and nuclear power plants require cooling with water, another resource we need to track more carefully in today's warming climate. Illogically, people want nukes to solve the crisis of global warming, even though nuclear power plants require longer permitting and building time than any type of plant, and they cannot be insured, while renewable energy is widely known as the fastest to install.
As more environmental pains like sea-ice loss, extreme drought and radiation effects are felt, we expect ourselves to take more complete responsibility for our energy choices. This value gains viability as we open our minds and pocketbooks to market-ready, truly clean energies such as solar and wind. But Briegleb belittled these modes of energy with prejudice and ignorance: "Given the track record of renewables to date, does anyone really believe they can replace all fossil fuel consumption for electricity by mid-century?"
NREL's Chuck Kutscher asserts exactly that in his executive summary of "Tackling Climate Change," a 200-page road map for transferring our energy system to very low emissions by 2030 through efficiency and renewable energy. This report is being weighed by the Colorado Public Utilities Commission and can be downloaded at www.ases.org/climatechange.
There are orders of magnitude more available solar and wind energy than the total U.S. energy consumption. Recent calculations indicate rooftop photovoltaic and wind energy to be as cheap as new coal plants when all factors are included. And the cost of sun hasn't gone up in the past 4.3 billion years, including delivery to your home. With the V2G — Vehicle-to-Grid — concept as one of many ways that are ready to store electricity from these renewable sources, people griping about intermittency will soon be sounding like secretaries hugging their Selectric Typewriters. Xcel will soon be converting six Ford SUV hybrids to V2G for testing, and Google has installed solar carports at their facility to empower a fleet of plug-in employee cars, and there are many other demonstration projects. Renewable-energy technologies are dependable: photovoltaic solar has 99-plus percent reliability, wind turbines 98 percent, and hydro, 91 percent. An average coal fired plant's uptime is only 85 percent; nuclear is worst at 73 percent. (Source: NERC, Generating Availability Report 1990-1994.)
Briegleb's and Shnelvar's writing explores no information that supports renewable energy, even though both seem intent on a huge influx of new power generation for the sake of our climate stability. The rancor and shallowness of their claims stem most likely from carelessness, but may also stem from buying in to propaganda on talk radio and blogs.
Books such as "the Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming" offer deliberately disingenuous arguments with standards that shift midway through analyses. Civilization was founded on trustworthy measures and standards, and through this turning point in our civilization, we need careful, honest thinking in how we review energy modes. The Camera can also help — by insisting that opinion pieces about energy technology offer a whole lot more than hot air.
Ivan Meek is a retired electrical engineer who lives in Lafayette. Anne B. Butterfield tracks energy and climate issues and is a member of the Camera's editorial advisory board.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 02, 2007
Questionable appointment not Gibbons' first
Steve Kanigher and Jeff German
The appointment of Michael Efstratis to the Nevada Contractors Board is merely the latest in a string of questionable personnel moves made by Gov. Jim Gibbons since he took office this year.
Other appointments that have drawn criticism:
* Joe Waltuch was named to run the Nevada Mortgage Lending Division after serving as a vice president and senior counsel for New Century Financial Corp., a defunct subprime lender from California that became the target of a criminal investigation.
* Nye County Commissioner Joni Eastley, who supports shipping the nation's high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain , 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, was initially appointed to the state Nuclear Projects Commission, a driving force against the dump. After Democrats and the media revealed Eastley's pro-Yucca position, Gibbons rescinded the appointment.
* Mike Dayton, the governor's chief of staff, left a similar position when Gibbons was in Congress in 2002 after House officials began investigating Dayton for possible misuse of office funds for personal travel and moving expenses, furniture and entertainment. The matter eventually was dropped.
* Phil Galeoto, Gibbons' public safety director, was named to that post despite having retired as a Reno police lieutenant in 1999 amid an investigation into his failure to enter a large number of arrest warrants into the department's computer system . At the time, Reno's police chief said Galeoto's oversight could have jeopardized other officers by preventing them from knowing, for example, whether someone stopped for a traffic violation was wanted for a crime.
--Steve Kanigher can be reached at 259-4075 or at steve@lasvegassun.com. Jeff German is the Sun's senior investigative reporter. He can be reached at 259-4067 or at german@lasvegassun.com.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 02, 2007
FLASHPOINT for Nov 02, 2007
By Jon Ralston
<ralston@vegas.com>
Las Vegas Sun
So imagine you are Hillary Clinton and you get your pal Bar- bara Boxer to call this Yucca Mountain hearing Wednesday and then you see this in The Hill's online version later that day: "Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) skipped an Environment and Public Works Committee hearing Wednesday that she called for earlier this year ... " She was nowhere to be seen at Wednesday's hearing." Nowhere to be seen, that is, if you don't count being on the dais and asking questions and participating and ensuring she got enough sound bites to be transmitted back to Nevada, where she wants to win the Democratic caucus. Whoops. The Hill pulled the story shortly after the mistake was pointed out - probably by the Clinton folks!
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Reno Gazette Journal
November 02, 2007
Editorial
Opposition to Yucca Mountain growing on the campaign trail
Nevadans should be pleased to see the Democratic presidential candidates lining up against the federal government's plan to dispose of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, even if the opposition isn't likely to sway many votes in next year's presidential elections.
The decision to support an individual candidate is a complex one for most voters, based largely on issues but also on emotion, history and a variety of other factors that undoubtedly will outweigh what goes on at a remote location in Southern Nevada.
But the future of Yucca Mountain is important -- both to the citizens of Nevada, who are being asked to accept the consequences of the short-sighted thinking over several decades by the nuclear power industry and the federal government, and to the industry, which hopes to begin a new round of power plants in the coming years.
Increasingly, it is becoming obvious -- if not to the Bush administration and the Department of Energy, then to just about everyone else -- that the planned nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain simply is not going to fly with the American public. The opposition is increasing, as was obvious at a Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works Committee hearing Wednesday, where U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York, one of the leading Democratic candidates, made clear her opposition to the plan. Other candidates have joined in, despite the support that some of them gave to it in the past, and their opposition seems to be intensifying as the Nevada caucuses approach.
If the Democrats retake the White House and keep their hold on Congress in 2008, the Yucca Mountain project would appear to be dead.
The growing opposition is understandable. The problems with the plan and the licensing process have been piling up, and it's now recognized that even an expanded Yucca Mountain site won't be enough to handle all of the nuclear waste that has been building up at nuclear power plants around the country and is expected to be generated by new plants in the works.
Unfortunately, the candidates have yet to offer an alternative, choosing instead to recommend that the government go back to the start and develop a new plan.
That's what many in Nevada have been suggesting for years now, with little impact on the federal government, which has a contractual obligation with the nuclear power industry to deal with the waste. (The government has been sued by the industry to force it to move ahead with the plan.)
It's way past time for the feds to accept reality. There has to be a better, more cost-effective way to deal with the nuclear waste accumulating at power plants (none of which are in Nevada) than burying in the Nevada desert. Let's get to work finding it.
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Pahrump Valley Times
November 02, 2007
Natural disaster declared
By Mark Waite
PVT
AMARGOSA VALLEY -- Nye County commissioners Tuesday declared a natural disaster after the heavy rain Sept. 21, allowing the use of emergency money from the payment equal to taxes the county receives for the land value of Yucca Mountain.
Nye County Public Works Director Samson Yao estimated the cost of the repairs roughly at $247,000.
Much of that will go toward repairing a sinkhole about 150 feet in diameter on Park Ridge Avenue. The last time that neighborhood experienced a soil collapse the county spent about $300,000 to fix larger sinkholes on Hacienda Street in 2005, he said.
Nye County road crews have been working overtime to repair the damage from the rain, which Yao estimated as the equivalent of a 100-year flood. A National Weather Service observer estimated 2.7 inches fell in Pahrump in one day.
Part of the problem was the start of the annual chip-seal program at the same time, Yao said.
"We're behind on other work. There's many places we need to accomplish repair. As a result of that we'll have a maintenance problem. It puts us way behind schedule," Yao said.
He estimated road crews put in about 3,360 hours of overtime.
"This is only an estimate. We don't know how much it's going to cost. The only thing we know for sure that to repair Park Ridge Avenue we have an estimate of $150,000 to repair the sink hole," Yao said.
The emergency funding will also take care of washouts in Crystal and Amargosa Valley, he said.
Two other road-related matters were discussed at the Tuesday Nye County Commissioners meeting.
The commission approved the closure of State Highway 318 which passes through easternmost Nye County, for the Silver State Classic Challenge from Hiko to Lund on May 18, 2008 and Sept. 21, 2008.
Yao complained a new Nevada Department of Transportation traffic engineer was imposing more requirements on Nye County than others, in asking for pedestrian lights, a handicapped ramp, warning lights and approach lights at the intersection of Highway 160 and Homestead Road.
"I'm looking at the county's interest and the fact they put up this onerous requirement," Yao said. "They shouldn't be exercising a double standard."
Pahrump residents have been waiting a long time for a traffic signal at that busy intersection.
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Pahrump Valley Times
November 02, 2007
Nye officials say park still is possible
By Mark Waite
PVT
Local officials are optimistic the Amargosa Valley Science and Technology Park project can be completed and tenants moved in.
The U.S. Office of Inspector General has recommended the county return a $3 million U.S. Economic Development Administration grant awarded in 1999 for failure to complete the industrial park.
The industrial park, and the Pahrump High Technology Center, now the Great Basin College building, were supposed to be part of a high tech corridor along Highway 95 designed to create jobs after the downsizing at the Nevada Test Site in the early 1990s.
"Our plan is to finish the park," said Dave Swanson, Nye County Nuclear Waste Project Office assistant administrator.
"We didn't have enough money to finish it with the original grant and there are a number of reasons for that. One is the escalation of the cost of the materials, particularly steel, from the original project grant," Swanson said. "The second one is a big one. When we originally talked to NDOT about the highway, a turn lane was not part of the equation."
Eventually items like fire hydrants had to be dropped from the improvements and electricity wasn't provided to the site. The audit notes there are unfinished roads in the industrial park, no lighting, a water tank with less than half the specified capacity and a well producing only 50 gallons per minute which had unacceptable arsenic levels.
"As a result of that we couldn't market the office park, it wasn't finished. Now we do have a prospect for buildings there," Swanson said.
The U.S. Department of Energy has talked about moving a sample management facility from the Nevada Test Site to the proposed office park, he said. The State of Nevada has also talked about establishing a site to store geologic materials in environmentally controlled conditions.
The OIG audit stated Nye County should develop a sound marketing plan for the industrial park and labeled the county a high-risk recipient for future EDA grants.
U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D.-Nev., announced the awarding of the grant during a function in Pahrump in December 1999 in which he said it was the largest grant approved in the state by the EDA. The county had the opportunity to purchase 350 acres in Lathrop Wells at fair market value, but only ended up buying 60 acres.
"At the time, this seemed like a worthy and promising project with widespread support in the community," said Senator Reid's spokesman, Jon Summers. "Senator Reid supported this as a hedge against the ongoing job losses at the Nevada Test Site and expected the Economic Development Administration to work with the local leaders to ensure the final project work plan was both viable and stood a reasonable change of succeeding."
Swanson said it would be useful for the U.S. Department of Commerce to send an expert appraiser to establish the value of what was eventually built there.
Nevada District 36 Assemblyman Ed Goedhart, R-Amargosa Valley, was a member of the now defunct Science and Technology Regional Development Corporation in 2001-2002, the board that conceived of the high tech corridor concept. It was also to have included an automotive testing facility in Beatty, refurbishing the old Beatty Bullfrog Mine and enhancing the Tonopah Airport among other projects.
"There were so many people involved and so many consultants. These things drag on for months and years," Goedhart said. "Some things don't get followed up on, t's don't get crossed and i's don't get dotted."
Goedhart called it "paralysis by over-analysis." But he said, "whenever everything was disbanded we were told we didn't have a fully functioning park but we were in compliance with the EDA grant."
The best thing that happened was the county got land privatized that had been under federal control, Goedhart said.
"Whenever you go out for these types of grants it gets exhausting. You get caught in so much red tape," he said. "As you have turnover and consultants come and go it's possible some of that information was not turned over to the EDA on a timely basis."
Nye County used a New Mexico consultant, Don Watson, to supervise the high tech corridor project. The Economic Development Authority of Esmeralda and Nye counties was expected to form an economic development district.
Goedhart noted former Nye County Nuclear Waste Project Office Director Les Bradshaw left in 2004, he also mentioned former consultant Rachel Nicholson worked on the corridor project.
While there were problems drilling a well at the industrial park site, Goedhart said a well was drilled across Highway 95 at the rest stop which turned out to be a good producing well.
"We have 60 acres and at some point people are going to settle in there. We have water rights purchased," Goedhart said. "Now it's just a question of whether they have to pump (water) in from a mile away."
Electricity could also be extended fairly easy to the site, Goedhart said, noting industrial prospects will have more infrastructure there than buying a bare piece of desert.
Goedhart envisions possibly a solar power project on that land, with Valley Electric Association wheeling the power to Nevada Power. A previous solar and wind project however was rejected by the U.S. Air Force on the Nevada Test Site due to interference with radar.
The county has pushed to get the U.S. Department of Energy to have more of a stake in Nye County and house workers at the local level, Goedhart said. While the project wasn't really targeted at Yucca Mountain, the OIG audit noted that repository now isn't set to open until 2017 or later, putting off any economic spin-offs farther into the future.
Nye County Commissioner Joni Eastley, the oldest sitting member of the commission who first took office in January 2001, said the county will absolutely repay the $3 million if that's what it has to do.
"We have to respond to actions that were taken by staff members who aren't even here any more," Eastley said. "We've got a whole new board of commissioners, whole new staff members.
"If somebody did something wrong in the past and we have to take the licks for that we'll do that. We're not going to shirk our responsibility."
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Woodbury Bulletin
November 02, 2007
Nuclear waste setback feared; Clinton comments anger Prairie Island Community
Mike Longaecker
RiverTown Newspaper Group
U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's gloomy assessment of a proposed nuclear dump raised concern Wednesday among Prairie Island Indian Community leaders.
Nevada's Yucca Mountain is too flawed and risky to house the nation's nuclear waste, the Democratic presidential front-runner declared during a Senate hearing in Washington, D.C.
"We do need to find a long-term storage solution for our nation's nuclear waste," she said following comments that the site's geologic composition and threat to water tables are problematic.
"But Yucca Mountain is not the answer."
Prairie Island Assistant Secretary-Treasurer Ron Johnson suspected the New York senator of playing politics.
"She was using the political gain effort to shut Yucca Mountain down," he said after the Senate Environment and Public Works hearing. "It's a steppingstone of political gain in running for the office of president."
Johnson and Prairie Island spokesman Jake Reint attended Wednesday's hearing, preparing to testify before the panel. Reint said it wasn't hard to read between the lines.
"She declared Yucca Mountain - basically - dead," he said.
The Department of Energy plans to submit a license application for the project in June 2008 to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Clinton noted at the hearing.
Tribal leaders have long supported Yucca Mountain, and again urged lawmakers to support the project.
"We believe the federal government must deliver on its promise to move the nation's nuclear waste to a safe, secure facility before it embraces this so-called nuclear power renaissance and turns to nuclear power as a preferred energy source for this country,"
tribal leaders wrote in a letter to the panel.
Prairie Island tribal members reside 600 yards from casks containing radioactive waste from the nearby nuclear plant.
U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, DFL-Minn., also sits on the Environment and Public Works Committee. A spokesman for Klobuchar did not issue a comment on Wednesday's hearing by the R-E's deadline.
During the hearing, Clinton and other committee members claimed national security would be at risk by transporting the waste to the site, Reint said. Yucca Mountain critics have argued that nuclear waste hauled on rail cars could make an easy target for terrorists.
"Yeah, that's exactly right," Reint said, noting that above-ground casks like those in Red Wing are stationary targets. "If terrorism is an issue, it's certainly an issue for those temporary sites."
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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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