Yucca Mountain News Clips
Friday, May 16, 2008
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Las Vegas SUN
May 15, 2008
Sun editorial:
Joe Egan, 1955-2008
Lawyer who led the legal challenge to Yucca Mountain fought the good fight
In Nevada’s David and Goliath fight against the federal government’s plans to dump more than 77,000 tons of nuclear waste in Nevada, Joe Egan was a giant-killer.
Egan was the state’s lead attorney in the effort to stop the planned dump at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. He and his Washington, D.C., firm gave national exposure to the Energy Department’s faulty scientific work and helped file legal challenges that severely set back the project.
Egan, 53, died last week after a long fight with cancer. He will be sorely missed.
He took Nevada’s case in 2001 and filed several lawsuits pointing out problems with the Energy Department’s work. In 2004 an appellate court in Washington agreed, finding the government used the wrong standard to measure the project.
The decision was a major blow to the project. Coupled with the efforts of the state’s congressional delegation, particularly Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to cut the project’s funding, Yucca Mountain has been stalled ever since.
Egan was uniquely suited for the fight. An M.I.T.-trained nuclear engineer, he left work at a nuclear reactor to study law at Columbia University and became one of the nation’s foremost legal experts on nuclear issues.
Although a proponent of nuclear energy, he took Nevada’s case after learning that Yucca Mountain is highly porous and would leak radiation faster than anyone thought.
A memorial posted on his firm’s Web site said Egan had arranged to have his ashes scattered over Yucca Mountain with the words: “Rad (radioactive) waste buried here only over my dead body.”
We are thankful for all of his tireless work, and we hope that in time we will be able to say that Joe Egan helped stop the government’s plans to make Nevada a nuclear waste dump.
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Platts
May 15, 2008
DOE seeking bids for M&O contract at Yucca Mountain
Washington (Platts)--14May2008
DOE is seeking bids for a contract worth up to $2.6 billion to manage and operate the repository project at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, the department said May 13. The request for proposals indicates that the contractor must produce top-quality work during the initial five-year contract period and each of the five possible yearlong extensions to receive the maximum available award fees cited. DOE announced in February that it would recompete the job now held by Bechtel SAIC Co., which has been the M&O contractor since 2001. DOE spokesman Allen Benson said May 14 that nothing precludes BSC from seeking to keep the job. BSC officials were reviewing the RFP on May 14 before deciding whether to bid, company spokesman Jason Bohne said.
The new M&O contractor's duties will include completing the repository design, responding to NRC questions during repository licensing, and managing repository construction and, possibly, operation, DOE said. The department is said to be targeting early June for the submittal of a repository license application to NRC.
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Las Vegas SUN
May 14, 2008
Yucca license application expected in early June
By Lisa Mascaro
WASHINGTON — Energy department officials meeting today before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Las Vegas are expected to confirm they will submit the long-awaited application to license the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump in early June – a few weeks earlier than expected.
Nevada officials who are fighting the project believe the application could come as soon as June 3. An Energy spokeswoman declined to pin down a date, saying it will come “possibly within the first week of June.”
While the submission may be coming a few weeks earlier than expected, the application is actually nearly four years overdue. The department botched its earlier attempt to make its case before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Critics say the Energy department is rushing to get this application in before President Bush leaves office. His administration has been supportive of the repository at Yucca Mountain, and some believe a new president, with a potentially less-friendly policy toward nuclear waste, could doom the project.
The commission is expected to decide within three months of receiving the application if it is adequate for review. Then the commission has up to four years to review the license before deciding whether it is accepted.
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Reno Gazette-Journal
May 14, 2008
Lyon board to hear presentation on state perspective on Yucca Mountain
The Lyon County Board of Commissioners at its meeting Thursday is due to hear a presentation on the Yucca Mountain Project regarding the State of Nevada perspective from a state official.
Joseph C. Strolin, administrator of the Planning Division for the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects/Nuclear Waste Projects Office, is expected to attend the meeting for the presentation and discussion regarding the state's perspective on the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.
The meeting starts at 9 a.m. in the commissioners meeting room inside the LyoN County Administrative Complex in Yerington (27 So. Main St., Yerington).
According to the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects website, its mission "is to assure that the health, safety, and welfare of Nevada's citizens and the State's unique environment and economy are adequately protected with regard to any federal high-level nuclear waste disposal activities in the State."
The State of Nevada officially opposes the Yucca Mountain project.
The website also says, "The Agency for Nuclear Projects operates as part of the Nevada Governor's Office and consists of a Division of Technical Programs and a Division of Planning. The Executive Director [Bob Loux] is appointed by the governor and serves at the pleasure of the Commission on Nuclear Projects. The seven-member Commission advises the governor and legislature on nuclear wastes issues and oversees Agency activities."
It continues, "The Agency oversees the federal high-level radioactive waste disposal program; carries out independent technical, socioeconomic and other studies; works closely with state agencies and local governments on matters relating to radioactive waste; and provides information to the governor, legislature, and any interested parties. The Agency uses a small, central staff supplemented by contractual services for needed technical and specialized expertise in order to provide high quality oversight and monitoring of federal activities, to conduct necessary independent studies, and to avoid unnecessary duplication of efforts and resources."
Among some of its specific functions include: "Monitoring all DOE [U.S. Department of Energy] activities relative to the federal high-level nuclear waste repository proposed for Nevada; coordinating State and local responses and reviews of DOE technical and planning documents and proposals, and assuring that all affected State and local governmental agencies are appropriately involved in all phases of federal repository activities."
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KTNV
May 13, 2008
Lawyer's dying wish: Scatter ashes at Nevada nuke dump site
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Even after death, Joe Egan wanted to keep fighting Yucca Mountain.
In an obituary he wrote to be posted on his law firm's Web site, the anti-nuclear lawyer said he made plans for his ashes to be scattered at the site of the proposed federal nuclear waste dump with the eulogy: "Radwaste buried here only over my dead body."
Egan died May 7 of gastro-esophageal cancer. He was 53. A Catholic Mass and memorial service is scheduled May 22 in Naples, Fla.
"Radwaste" is short for radioactive waste, which Egan fought for seven years while under contract with the state of Nevada.
A spokesman for his Washington, D.C.-based firm, Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch PLLC, said it was unclear when or how Egan's wishes would be carried out.
A spokesman for the Energy Department, which controls Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, declined comment.
--On the Net: Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch PLLC: http://www.nuclearlawyer.com
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Las Vegas SUN
May 13, 2008
Yucca foe fought till his death — and beyond
By Lisa Mascaro
Washington — Even in death, Joe Egan plans to keep fighting Yucca Mountain.
The attorney whose small law firm has led the state’s legal campaign against the proposed nuclear waste repository died last week of stomach cancer. He was 53.
But now we discover Egan isn’t quite done.
In the obituary he wrote for his law firm’s Web site, Egan said he had arranged to have his ashes scattered at Yucca Mountain, with the eulogy: “Radwaste buried here only over my dead body.”
“Radwaste” is nuclear-speak for radioactive waste, the stuff Egan had been keeping out of Nevada since he was hired by then-Gov. Kenny Guinn to represent the state in 2001. The New York Times first wrote about Egan’s wishes, on Monday.
Robert Loux, the state’s point man on Yucca, confirmed the family’s intentions. Loux spent time with the attorney at his Florida home a few weeks ago.
“They all want to do this,” he said. But, he added, “I’m sure the Department of Energy is going to object.”
The Energy Department controls access to Yucca Mountain. The only way in is through the Nevada Test Site, a highly guarded facility. The airspace overhead is restricted.
Energy Department spokesman Allen Benson declined to comment Monday.
But some of Nevada’s lawmakers are weighing in on Egan’s side.
Republican Rep. Jon Porter’s spokesman said: “The congressman respects the will of Mr. Egan and is grateful for his life of service.”
A spokesman said Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley “supports allowing the Egan family to access these federal lands so that Joe’s request can be honored along with his memory.”
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 13, 2008
ERIN NEFF: 'Buried here only over my dead body'
It's hard to find Nevada residents who still think Yucca Mountain is the biggest issue in the state, but this election year might just put it back on the map.
After all, Sen. John McCain is solidly behind the proposed nuclear waste dump, even though he sometimes wears an environmentalist hat and at other times a fiscal conservative hat.
Yucca Mountain could be a huge environmental disaster -- and it's already cost enough billions of dollars to actually deserve the honor of federal government boondoggle.
But the recent passing of environmental lawyer Joe Egan pushed Yucca Mountain to the forefront again in my mind.
Egan wasn't just the state's best face against attempts to shove nuclear waste upon Nevada, he was one of those good guys who used his unbelievable knowledge to push hard against nuclear proliferation and win so many battles for the little guy.
Nevada has always been the little guy in the fight against Yucca -- a prolonged war waged by Democrats and Republicans alike, all in the name of "sound science."
Egan helped defend us with his own in-depth training in the field. He had a bachelor's degree in physics and a master's in nuclear engineering, technology and policy from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He then graduated with honors from Columbia University Law School and launched his own law firm devoted exclusively to nuclear environmental law.
While so many Nevada politicians would publicly stand up against Yucca Mountain, there were times when the public's eye was turned away that they would denounce the project not over safety concerns, but because they felt it helped them politically.
Even before Bill Clinton vetoed interim nuclear storage or before George W. Bush and Al Gore both parsed the "sound science" promises, Egan was on our side. Before John Kerry made a 30-second television commercial solely about Yucca Mountain, Egan was uncovering scathing e-mails and shoddy science within the Department of Energy.
Egan was our face at the Federal Court of Appeals and was one of the reasons the little guy was gaining the upper hand.
The formidable mind who was our truest outside believer lost his battle with cancer. His ashes are to be spread at Yucca Mountain with a simple message: "Radioactive waste buried here only over my dead body."
Egan won't see the day Nevada finally wins the fight against Yucca, either politically or in the courts. But we all owe him a proper resting place where his epitaph never rings true.
Thank you, Joe. Rest in peace, neighbor.
--Contact Erin Neff at eneff@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2906.
Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 13, 2008
Nuclear waste foe sought burial at Yucca Mountain
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Combative to the end, the attorney who led Nevada's legal fight against nuclear waste said his ashes would be scattered at Yucca Mountain.
In an obituary he wrote before he died on May 7, Joe Egan said he arranged for his remains "to be spread across the volcanic terrain."
The scattering, he wrote, would be accompanied by a eulogy: "Radwaste buried here only over my dead body."
Egan, 53, died of gastro-esophageal cancer, his family said, after he battled the disease for more than two years. A memorial Mass and a remembrance service are scheduled for May 22 in Naples, Fla.
Egan was Nevada's lead attorney since 2001 in lawsuits against the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. The obituary is posted at www.nuclearlawyer.com, the Web site of the firm, Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch, PLLC.
A spokesman for the firm said when or how Egan's wishes would be carried out was unclear. The Department of Energy, which controls access to the Yucca Mountain site, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, had no comment.
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Los Angeles Times
May 13, 2008
Why we need nukes and Gitmo
Jonah Goldberg:
Fighting climate change and winning the war on terrorism are not for the squeamish.
What do Yucca Mountain and Guantanamo Bay have in common?
Well, there's the obvious stuff. Both have Spanish names. Neither is a great spot for a family vacation. And each is under the control of the federal government.
Oh, and both are essential tools in wars a lot of people claim they want to win.
See, Yucca Mountain is where the government wants to keep incredibly dangerous substances -- nuclear waste -- until we figure out a better way to handle it.
And Guantanamo Bay is where the federal government keeps incredibly dangerous people -- jihadi enemy combatants -- until we figure out a better way to handle them.
Victory in the war against climate change is inconceivable without nuclear power. Even if we turned America's breadbasket into ethanol-corn and solar farms, we wouldn't come close to reducing American carbon emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050 (Hillary Clinton's and Barack Obama's avowed goal, slightly more than John McCain's target of 60%). Even if every American lived like a Prius-driving, vegan eco-feminist, we'd still fall far short. A recent MIT study found that even the homeless in America have twice the carbon footprint of the global average.
Clean, efficient, safe nuclear energy could force enormous savings in CO2 emissions, replacing coal- and gas-burning power plants on a scale solar never can. It also would boost America's "energy independence," a phrase environmentalists use to enlist support from Americans immune to climate fear-mongering.
Is it a silver bullet? Surely not. But expanding our nuclear energy infrastructure certainly belongs near the top of the list of options for anybody who actually means it when they say we need to do "everything in our power" to stop global warming. (I'm not one of those people, by the way.)
But generating nuclear power produces radioactive waste, so we really should find a safe place to put it. Yucca Mountain, in the Nevada desert, is just such a place. But anti-nuclear environmentalists have done everything they can to keep it from opening, largely because having a safe waste repository would make nuclear power more attractive.
Which brings me back to Guantanamo Bay, where the Yuccafication process is nearly complete.
Much like Yucca Mountain, lots of things are said about Gitmo that aren't true. Yucca is derided as unsafe, when its biggest shortcoming is that its designers can't promise that in 10,000 years a passerby who digs it up won't be exposed to much more than a few chest X-rays' worth of radiation.
Gitmo, likewise, is routinely lumped in with the more legitimate outrage over mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib and the more complicated controversies about renditions and CIA black sites. In reality, argues Andrew McCarthy in the current National Review, Gitmo "is probably the most scrutinized prison in modern history." McCarthy, who as assistant U.S. attorney prosecuted the first World Trade Center bombers, is the author of the invaluable new book, "Willful Blindness: A Memoir of Jihad." His assessment of Guantanamo continues: "It is also among the most humane, complete with halal meals, a bursting library, lush recreation facilities, communal prayer breaks and even white-gloved U.S. soldiers -- Muslims only, please -- delivering to each detainee a Koran (U.S. government-issued, even though the inmates believe it commands them to kill Americans)."
Nonetheless, Gitmo will soon be closed. President Bush wants it closed, as do all of his likely successors. And that's probably for the best, given the stink it puts on America in the world, deservedly so or not. But here's the thing: If you want to fight a war on terrorism, or any war, you need to put captured combatants someplace -- someplace other than a conventional U.S. prison, where they're treated like any other criminal.
McCarthy prosecuted jihadi terrorists as criminals in the 1990s, but he rightly scorns the idea that we can treat terrorists like bank robbers. That Clinton-era strategy "can be considered a success only if one's chief preoccupation is due process. Viewed through the prism of national security, the effort was an abysmal failure." According to McCarthy, from the first World Trade Center bombing in 1993 to the second on 9/11, only 29 mostly low-level operatives were caught and convicted in the U.S., costing taxpayers millions and doing next to nothing to prevent the 9/11 attacks.
The halls of Congress echo with righteous denunciations of Gitmo's alleged horrors, but silence reigns supreme when it comes time to offer serious alternatives. Likewise, Yucca Mountain is ridiculed as a white elephant by the same politicians who want to pour billions into ethanol and solar power.
The Yuccafication of Gitmo, or the Gitmoizing of Yucca Mountain, are two versions of the same story. Political elites passionately declare their total commitment to a desired end -- victory in this war or that -- but are feckless about providing means to those ends.
--jgoldberg@latimescolumnists.com
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Tri-City Herald
May 14, 2008
Last of FFTF fuel sent to Idaho
By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer
The last of the fuel has been removed from Hanford's shutdown Fast Flux Test Facility and shipped to Idaho almost a year ahead of a legal deadline.
The research reactor is being deactivated to allow it to be put into a long-term surveillance and maintenance mode at minimum cost by August 2009. The Department of Energy was required under the Tri-Party Agreement to have the last of the fuel removed from the reactor in March 2009.
That included 375 fuel assemblies transported to central Hanford earlier for storage. They will be considered for disposal at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
In addition, FFTF had 11 sodium-bonded fuel assemblies that were shipped from FFTF to the Idaho National Laboratory because Hanford does not have the capability to remove the sodium inside the fuel pins. At Idaho the uranium will be extracted for possible reuse by commercial nuclear power plants
The first of 11 shipments to Idaho was made in October, with contractor Fluor Hanford receiving word the last shipment arrived May 1.
"We are pleased to see the FFTF reactor fuel removed from the Hanford site," Jane Hedges, the Washington State Department of Ecology nuclear waste program manager, said in a statement. "Ecology appreciates the commitment shown by the work force to do the job safely and ahead of the TPA schedule."
Shipping went smoothly, despite some brief delays because of icy roads, said Steve Doebler, Fluor Hanford vice president of the FFTF Closure Project.
The sodium-bonded fuel was a design used for experiments at the reactor, which operated from 1982 to 1992. Melted sodium was poured around the fuel pellets inside each fuel pin to conduct heat from plutonium and uranium. The sodium bonded the pellet to the cladding.
At the Idaho National Laboratory, the fuel is to be stored inside the Hot Fuel Examination Facility until it is scheduled to be processed beginning in fiscal year 2009, according to the Department of Energy in Idaho. Processing is expected to take two years.
The uranium will be extracted at the Fuel Conditioning Facility using an electro-metallurgical treatment process. The rods will be cut into pieces, dissolved in a bath of molten chemical salts and subjected to an electric current. Uranium from the fuel should gather on a steel rod inserted into the molten salt.
Extracted uranium 235 then will be blended with uranium 238 and cast into ingots. Waste from the process will include steel from the fuel tubes that will be melted into ingots for eventual disposal at Yucca Mountain. Small amounts of other radioactive substances, such as americium and plutonium, will be captured in the molten salt, which will be formed into ceramic ingots for disposal.
The Idaho National Laboratory uses the same process for spent nuclear fuel from the Experimental Breeder Reactor II. Its fuel is similar to FFTF's fuel. Uranium from the fuel of both reactors will be stored until a customer is found for it, according to DOE.
At FFTF, about 110 workers are continuing to deactivate equipment and to remove hazardous materials from the reactor. That includes transformers that have PCB contamination, refrigerants, oils and some residual sodium that has puddled in low areas of the piping system, Doebler said.
About half the workers have been at FFTF for three decades and many were there when the first fuel assemblies were brought in, he said.
All but the residual sodium had earlier been removed from the reactor's primary and secondary cooling systems. The sodium, which includes radioactive contamination, is expected to be used as a caustic additive to help turn radioactive waste now stored in underground tanks at Hanford into a stable glass at the vitrification plant under construction.
FFTF is being deactivated after the federal goveronment has so far found no use for the reactor that top officials consider cost effective. Supporters of saving it have proposed it be used for research for reprocessing fuel as part of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.
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Rutland Herald
May 13, 2008
NRC avoids answer to terror question
By Susan Smallheer Herald Staff
BRATTLEBORO — Officials from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Monday refused to tell residents whether the new waste storage facility on the grounds of Vermont Yankee nuclear plant could withstand an attack without releasing deadly radiation.
NRC officials were in town Monday to discuss Vermont Yankee's annual assessment for 2007, a year in which Entergy Nuclear and the Vernon reactor was the top news story in Vermont for the partial collapse of its cooling tower, among other problems at the reactor.
Residents peppered officials with questions about the long-term implications of the cooling tower collapse, asking the regulators if they could guarantee that their inspections would or could uncover similar problems.
NRC officials said that the problem that landed Vermont Yankee on the front page — the partial collapse of one of the plant's cooling towers — was not a safety problem. It did reveal problems in Entergy's overall inspection program, officials said. The tower collapse didn't earn the plant any demerits in its annual assessment, in which the plant received good marks.
Newfane resident Michael Granger asked NRC officials repeatedly whether the new steel and concrete casks that will hold the old nuclear fuel from the plant could withstand an attack, such as a plane hitting them.
The more Granger politely asked the question, the less direct a response he got.
Granger said he wanted additional information about the new form of storage of the waste fuel, which will later this year be transferred to five large concrete and steel-lined casks on a concrete pad north of the plant and near the Connecticut River.
Granger said the storage of high-level radioactive waste was the "800-pound gorilla" that no one in the room wanted to address. "It's just brushed aside as an issue," he said.
James Clifford, NRC deputy division director, said that the Department of Energy had primary responsibility for building the national waste facility, proposed for Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
"Will those casks survive a hit from a plane?" Granger asked.
Raymond J. Powell, branch chief for the Division of Reactor Projects, said that the country was approaching that issue by making planes and their cockpits safer and immune to takeover.
"But will they survive a direct hit?" Granger persisted.
Granger said that the casks were open to the air with little or no camouflage and could be seen from the Connecticut River.
"They are very robust structures," Clifford said, adding that he had gone to school with one of the pilots whose plane crashed into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001.
Earlier in the evening, the NRC panel also refused to answer any questions about the integrity of the plant's reactor vessel, noting it is the focus of one of the challenges filed by the New England Coalition over Entergy Nuclear's plan to extend its operating license by 20 years. The issue is still pending before the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board.
And while the NRC faulted Entergy Nuclear for its lax inspection program that failed to uncovered the rotting wood inside the cooling towers, and that Entergy and previous owners had ignored a similar problem at other power plants with similar or identical cooling towers.
But the NRC admitted that they hadn't "gotten around" to making sure that Entergy had paid attention to nuclear industry directives to assess the problems at cooling towers.
After the meeting, Entergy Nuclear spokesman Robert Williams said the new storage casks were not fixed to the concrete pad, and thus could move and absorb energy from any terrorist attack. But he said that the Atomic Licensing and Safety Board had considered the issue and had approved the casks for use.
--Contact Susan Smallheer at susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com.
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WSJ blog
May 13, 2008
It’s the Economics, Stupid: Nuclear Power’s Bogeyman
Posted by Keith Johnson
It turns out nuclear power’s biggest worry isn’t Yucca Mountain, Three Mile Island ghosts, or environmental protesters. It’s economics.
Rebecca Smith reports today in the WSJ (sub reqd.) on the biggest hurdle to the nascent nuclear-energy revival in the U.S.—skyrocketing construction costs. Though all power sectors are affected to different degrees by rising capital costs, nuclear power’s vulnerability puts it in a class by itself. Notes the paper:
A new generation of nuclear power plants is on the drawing boards in the U.S., but the projected cost is causing some sticker shock: $5 billion to $12 billion a plant, double to quadruple earlier rough estimates. Part of the cost escalation is bad luck. Plants are being proposed in a period of skyrocketing costs for commodities such as cement, steel and copper; amid a growing shortage of skilled labor; and against the backdrop of a shrunken supplier network for the industry.
Over the last five years, cost estimates for new nuclear power plants have been continually revised upward. Even the bean counters can’t keep pace. The paper notes:
Estimates released in recent weeks by experienced nuclear operators — NRG Energy Inc., Progress Energy Inc., Exelon Corp., Southern Co. and FPL Group Inc. — “have blown by our highest estimate” of costs computed just eight months ago, said Jim Hempstead, a senior credit officer at Moody’s Investors Service credit-rating agency in New York.
Why is that such a big deal? Coal plants have been shelved recently because of rising capital costs, and renewable energy isn’t immune, either—and the nuclear power industry enjoys healthy loan guarantees and other federal subsidies designed precisely to alleviate those kinds of uncertainties.
It matters because nuclear power’s ability to provide electricity at a competitive price compared to regular sources like coal and natural gas depends largely on those construction costs. Fuel costs for nuclear power are miniscule. The only way to handicap the field in nuclear power’s favor is to put a big price tag on emissions of carbon dioxide. Since nuclear plants don’t emit CO2, they win when legislation penalizes carbon-heavy sectors like coal (and even natural gas).
The Congressional Budget Office just finished a rosy-glasses report on nuclear economics. Even while acknowledging that historical costs for nuclear plants always doubled or tripled their initial estimates, the CBO took heart from promises made by manufacturers of next-generation reactors and a single on-time and on-budget project in Japan to project cheaper nuclear construction costs in the future. And if those cost estimates are wrong? From the CBO:
If those factors turned out not to reduce construction costs in the United States, nuclear capacity would probably be an unattractive investment even with EPAct incentives, unless substantial carbon dioxide charges were imposed.
Everybody from John McCain to Newt Gingrich to Patrick Moore is pitching more nuclear power as a zero-emissions answer to America’s energy needs. The question, though, is the same: Who’s going to pay for it?
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American Thinker
May 12, 2008
The nuclear waste over/under
Otis A. Glazebrook IV
A leading foe of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal facility in Nevada has left a peculiarly-worded request for the disposal of his earthly remains.
The following is from today's New York Times:
Joseph R. Egan, a nuclear engineer-turned-lawyer who led Nevada's legal campaign to block a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, died Wednesday at his home in Naples, Fla.
"Mr. Egan, in an obituary he wrote weeks ago that was posted on his law firm's Web site after his death, said that he had arranged for his ashes to be spread at Yucca Mountain, in Southern Nevada, with the words "radwaste buried here only over my dead body."
Perhaps Mr. Eagan might have been more successful in his quest, had he realized that the nuclear waste in question was actually being buried under him? His request was clumsily written for an attorney.
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New York Times
May 12, 2008
Joseph Egan, Lawyer Who Fought Nuclear Waste Site, Is Dead at 53
By Matthew L. Wald
WASHINGTON — Joseph R. Egan, a nuclear engineer-turned-lawyer who led Nevada’s legal campaign to block a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, died Wednesday at his home in Naples, Fla. He was 53.
The cause was gastroesophageal cancer, his family said.
Mr. Egan, in an obituary he wrote weeks ago that was posted on his law firm’s Web site after his death, said that he had arranged for his ashes to be spread at Yucca Mountain, in Southern Nevada, with the words “radwaste buried here only over my dead body.”
Mr. Egan’s wife, Patricia, said by telephone on Friday that Mr. Egan had been cremated, adding, “We are going to do it.”
Legal challenges by Mr. Egan’s firm, Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch, have helped set back the Energy Department’s project at Yucca by years. In 2001 he filed a lawsuit raising a variety of legal objections to the site, which was chosen by Congress. In 2004 the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit agreed with one challenge, that the repository should be judged over one million years, not over 10,000 years as the Energy Department and the Environmental Protection Agency had planned. The Yucca project’s fate is not clear today, 10 years after it was to have opened.
Mr. Egan’s specialties included nuclear nonproliferation law. He lobbied the federal government to take back highly enriched uranium that could be useful in a weapons program but had been exported to various countries under the Atoms for Peace program beginning in the 1950s.
On behalf of workers and an environmental group, he sued Lockheed Martin for illegal waste storage and disposal when it operated a government-owned uranium enrichment plant in Paducah, Ky. The Justice Department later joined the lawsuit. He filed an antitrust suit against the operator of a nuclear waste dump in Utah on behalf of a client who wanted to open a competing dump in Texas. (The suit was settled after the Texas site opened.)
Mr. Egan earned an undergraduate degree in physics from M.I.T., and then two master’s degrees, in nuclear engineering and in technology and policy. He worked as a nuclear reactor engineer for Commonwealth Edison in Illinois and later for the New York Power Authority. He received a law degree from Columbia University, and was a partner at Shaw Pittman in Washington and a senior associate at LeBoeuf Lamb Greene & MacRae in New York before founding his own firm in Washington.
In addition to his wife, Mr. Egan is survived by two children, Jennifer and Warren, of Naples; his parents, Dick and Lucy Egan of Melrose, Minn., where Mr. Egan grew up; a brother, Timothy, of Billings, Mont.; and three sisters, Michelle Langlas of Naples and Anne Gant and Denise Loonan, both of Minneapolis.
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Egan, Fitzpatrick & Malsch
May 12, 2008
In tribute to Joseph R. Egan
Melrose, Minnesota native, Joe Egan, one of the nation’s top nuclear attorneys and a champion of non-proliferation causes, died May 7, 2008, of gastro-esophageal cancer. He was 53. As lead attorney for the State of Nevada in its multi-year battle against the Federal Government’s proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles north of Las Vegas, he arranged for his ashes to be spread across the volcanic terrain there with the eulogy, “Radwaste buried here only over my dead body.”
The son of turkey farmer Dick Egan and his wife Lucy from Melrose, Egan made his way to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, earning three degrees, in physics, nuclear engineering, and technology & policy. He was also captain of MIT’s varsity track team and an accomplished concert pianist. After working in the control room of a nuclear power plant and consulting on policy issues for the United Nations and other organizations, he attended law school at Columbia University, where he graduated with honors and went on to practice nuclear law, first at LeBoeuf, Lamb, Green & MacRae in New York, and later at Shaw Pittman in Washington, D.C. In 1994, he formed his own firm devoted exclusively to nuclear environmental and non-proliferation law. His small firm played a role in almost every significant nuclear legal dispute in the world in the ensuing years.
Teaming with nuclear shipper Edlow International Co. in 1994, Egan brought together over a dozen countries to prosecute the return to the U.S. of more than 5000 tons of weaponsgrade uranium that had been disseminated across the globe under the Government’s “Atoms for Peace” program in the 1950s and 60s. Forming alliances with such unlikely partners as reactor operators, environmental groups, and arms control advocates, he lobbied the Government to reinstitute its defunct take-back program for spent nuclear fuel containing the highly sensitive uranium, and then defended that program in emergency litigation twice brought by the Governor of South Carolina to block the material from entering the country and being stored at the Government’s Savannah River Site in that state. In the end, Egan saw the return and neutralization of weapons-grade uranium from nearly all of the 42 countries supplied by the U.S. The late Paul Levanthal, founder of the non-proliferation group Nuclear Control Institute, called Egan’s campaign the greatest achievement in non-proliferation in his lifetime.
Representing Texas billionaire Harold Simmons in his planned development of a huge low-level radioactive waste disposal site in remote West Texas, Egan tangled with Envirocare of Utah in the late 90s, then the nation’s only such dump, owned by Iranian national Khosrow Semnani. When Semnani tried to block permitting for the Texas site, Egan filed a federal antitrust suit, shutting off multi-million-dollar government shipments to the Utah dump for nearly 11 months. During that time, Egan suffered a series of harassments, including death threats, break-ins at his home and office, and late-night harassment by thugs in unmarked cars. Though he never formally pegged these infractions to Semnani, the harassment ceased when the case was settled and Semnani’s monopoly was broken. Semnani, who had admitted getting his disposal license by paying Utah’s chief regulator $600,000 in cash and gold coins, later sold his site to Energy Solutions, Inc. for over $500 million. Semnani was represented in the case by Brent Hatch, son of Utah’s Senator Orrin Hatch, then head of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
Egan represented 19 national governments on nuclear issues and was past president of the International Nuclear Law Association. In what became the first significant transnational environmental dispute, Egan represented the nation of Ireland in its battle with Great Britain over Britain’s pollution of the Irish Sea with radioactive waste and discharges from the Sellafield facility, Britain’s giant bomb-making and nuclear fuel reprocessing complex in Cambria. As was his hallmark, Egan used experts in probabilistic risk assessment to assess the risks and damages associated with operation of the facility.
Closer to home, Egan sued Lockheed Martin over its mismanagement of the Government’s giant Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Paducah, Kentucky on behalf of several whistleblowers and the Natural Resources Defense Council, arguing that the firm had helped contaminate hundreds of acres of land and illegally disposed of both radioactive and hazardous wastes in the area by the thousands of truckloads. It became the first case in which the Department of Justice intervened as lead prosecutor in an environmental case of this type, arguing that the Government had been defrauded of hundreds of millions of dollars.
Egan launched his largest effort, however, as lead counsel for Nevada in its opposition to the government’s proposed $77 billion high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. He was deputized by Governor Kenny Guinn on the afternoon of the September 11 terrorist attacks, and terrorist threats became a key issue in his battle over the proposed transport of thousands of shipments of nuclear waste from across the country to Nevada. Though ardently supportive of nuclear energy as an electric power source, Egan said he took on the project after learning in 1996 that the mountain had been discovered by the Energy Department to be highly porous and would leak radioactive contamination far more quickly than was ever anticipated. Since 2001, he led several lawsuits by Nevada in the D.C. Federal Court of Appeals, some of which overturned key government actions and legal assumptions and put the project on the verge of extinction. In parallel, he argued for the safe storage of nuclear waste at reactor sites.
Yucca Mountain was not Mr. Egan’s first foray into the Silver State. In 2000, he was appointed president of the Non-Proliferation Trust, Inc., a venture composed by, among others, Judge William Webster (former CIA- and FBI-Director), Admiral Bruce DeMars (former head of the U.S. Nuclear Navy), General P.X. Kelley (former Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps) Admiral Dan Murphy (former Commander of the Sixth Fleet), and Dr. Tom Cochran (a top arms control advocate) to bring a “Red October” type submarine from Russia to the Strip in Las Vegas, where it would serve as a Cold War Museum and adjacent casino. The project, part of a larger effort to enhance non-proliferation and cleanup efforts in Russia by raising $10 billion through Russia’s importation of used nuclear fuel from Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea, stalled for lack of U.S. government approval.
Egan is survived by his wife Patricia, daughter Jennifer, and son Warren, who live in Naples, Florida, as well as his parents and siblings Timothy, Michelle Langlas, Anne Gant, and Denise Loonan.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 12, 2008
Letter: Democrats and energy
To the editor:
Like all other liberal Democrats, Rep. Shelley Berkley ignores the facts of the oil and gasoline shortages we face today, which are almost entirely due to her Nevada colleague, the hypocritical Sen. Harry Reid, and the environmentalists. They continue to oppose increasing our natural resource capabilities in Alaska, deep-water exploration and building more refineries.
They have cost the taxpayers millions and millions of dollars with their determined opposition to the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage facility, and have put us at least 20 years behind all developing nations that are searching for oil and gas resources wherever they can drill a well -- even just a few miles off the Florida coast.
Rep. Berkley had a classic remark in the May 5 Las Vegas Sun, that "The Republican Congress and this president -- this oil and gas man president -- is fiddling like Nero when Rome burns." She refuses to realize that thanks to the environmentalists and a hypocritical senator from Nevada, they have kept this country dependent on foreign oil, that "they" have already succeeded in burning Rome, and we are left with nothing but a fiddle.
Al Wengert
Boulder City
Rutland Herald
May 12, 2008
Two Yankee talks tonight
By Susan Smallheer
Herald Staff
BRATTLEBORO — Residents interested in issues associated with the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant have two very different choices tonight.
They can go listen to officials from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission talk about the plant's recent performance or they can go hear a member of the Western Shoshone Nation talk about the effect nuclear power is having on his native tribal lands on Yucca Mountain in southern Nevada.
Both meetings were scheduled way in advance.
"It's just a happy coincidence," said Chris Williams of Hancock, an anti-nuclear organizer working with both the Vermont Yankee Decommissioning Alliance and the Citizens Awareness Network, a regional anti-nuclear group.
Williams said the decommissioning alliance had been working on bringing people who deal with the beginning stages and the end stages of nuclear power for two years.
"The Vermont Yankee Truth Tour: the Reality behind the 'Clean and Green' Façade" has been traveling around Vermont this past week, and will culminate today in Brattleboro at the Gibson River Garden on Main Street. The meeting starts at 7 p.m.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is holding its annual assessment report on Vermont Yankee's performance for the calendar year 2007, which includes last year's partial collapse of one of the plant's cooling towers. NRC officials recently said the collapse did not pose a safety problem and said Entergy Nuclear would not be fined for the problem. The meeting starts at 6 p.m. at the Red Roof Inn.
The NRC meeting will start with a presentation from NRC staff, and then will include a question and answer period with the public.
For the downtown meeting, the main speaker will be Ian Zabarte, the secretary of state of the Western Shoshone Nation and Yucca Mountain, which is 100 miles north of Las Vegas and is part of the traditional Shoshone Nation.
"He's been telling people all week, that he and his nation own it. It's quite an eye-opener," Williams said. An 1859 agreement between the Shoshone and the federal government, The Treaty of Ruby Valley, is under dispute, Williams said.
The federal government claims it owns the property, which is part of a large military reservation.
While federal spending has been cut in the past several years for the Department of Energy's plans to open the nation's waste facility for high-level radioactive waste from the country's commercial nuclear reactors, work is still progressing, according to Williams.
The cut in funding, coupled with the adamant opposition from Senate Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, has lulled some people into a false sense that Yucca Mountain isn't being actively pursued, he said.
He said licensing hearings are expected to start shortly. "People are still working at Yucca Mountain," he said.
Also speaking will be Lorraine Rekmans of Elliot Lake, Ontario, whose hometown is a former uranium mine boom town. She is a member of the Serpent River First Nation, and is Ojibway-French descent.
Williams said the tour was planned well before the recent public relations campaign launched by Entergy Nuclear, the owner of Vermont Yankee, against legislation that would bring more state control over the Vernon reactor and its owner.
Williams, reached Sunday at his home, said Rekmans and Zabarte had drawn interested crowds in other towns and cities that were on the tour, which started last week.
"We had 45 people in Hardwick," he said.
--Contact Susan Smallheer at susan.smallheer@rutlandherald.com.
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Nevada Appeal
May 11, 2008
Reprocessing nuclear waste makes more sense than storing it at Yucca Mt.
By John Scire, PhD
The United States has 104 nuclear power plants, and six more are planned — enough to produce 3,000 tons of waste per year, all of which would be stored at Yucca Mountain if an alternative isn’t found.
Instead of storing the nation’s nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain (Plan A), or leaving waste where it is, as Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid has proposed (Plan B), we should instead reprocess nuclear waste (Plan C). This plan would reduce waste, storage requirements and transportation risks, thereby eliminating the need for Yucca Mountain. Furthermore, two strategically placed regional reprocessing centers — one for the West coast and the other for the East coast — make the country’s nuclear waste terrorist-proof.
Plan A seems popular with everyone but Nevadans. Why? Yucca Mountain is almost ready, more resistant to theft by nuclear terrorists, and inexpensive; however, those reasons are insufficient. An accident at the storage facility could hurt the state’s economy. Secondly, one should consider the transportation risks involved when a significant amount of nuclear waste is moving on our nation’s roads. Thirdly, waste has to be stored for at least 10,000 years because of uranium’s extensive half-life.
Sen. Reid’s Plan B to leave waste at its current storage locations seems a viable alternative to keep nuclear waste out of Nevada, but it leaves the U.S. vulnerable to terrorist attacks. Leaving waste currently stored near major cities would be cheaper than shipping or reprocessing but poses huge security risks.
Plan C (reprocessing) might be the most efficient, intelligent and best way to handle nuclear waste in the U.S. Using electro-metallurgical reprocessing, this plan reuses the uranium and elements that can be put into mixed oxide fuel. Reprocessing burns very long-lived waste products in a fast burner reactor, reducing the duration of storage to 300 years and waste volume by 95 percent. Most importantly, the residual waste cannot be made into a nuclear bomb and is substantially cooler than non-reprocessed waste. It also emits less radiation than the wastes planned for Yucca Mountain.
Reprocessing still requires transportation but total miles are massively reduced with just two regional centers. Critics say reprocessing is too expensive, but their argument is based on old data for uranium costs and outdated reprocessing technology. While the plan may be more expensive initially, storing nuclear waste for 300 years instead of 10,000 years is less expensive in the long run.
Plan C, however, doesn’t come without its own byproduct. Reprocessing creates low weapons grade plutonium. Fortunately, the plutonium could immediately be put into new fuel rods and sent back to thermal plants to create new electricity. The remaining long-lived wastes would be incinerated in a fast burner reactor. To facilitate the plan, we need to build one or two sites, each with three separate structures: one to reprocess, one to fabricate new fuel rods, and a fast burner reactor to burn up the long-lived elements so the remains have a shorter half life of 30 years.
To head off Yucca Mountain, Nevada should push Plan C while simultaneously pointing out the technical flaws in Plan A. It is in the best interest of Nevada and the country to end the stalemate on Yucca Mountain and create new nuclear plants to meet increasing demand for electricity, which is predicted by the DOE to increase 30 percent by 2030. Nuclear plants have the side benefit of adding zero greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, gases that contribute to pollution and global warming.
While nuclear waste reprocessing may not be the perfect solution, it is certainly the most intelligent approach for Nevada.
• John Scire is an Adjunct Professor of Energy Policy at the University of Nevada, Reno. His editorial assistant, Ricardo Lopez, a journalism student in the Honors Program at UNR, assisted with research for this column. To read more about nuclear waste reprocessing, visit the Web site www.sciam.com and type in “nuclear option” in the search box.
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Los Angeles Daily News
May 11, 2008
No Nukes
Despite claims, new reactors are no answer to California's energy needs
By Thomas D. Elias
Columnist
EVER since former Vice President Al Gore won an Oscar and a Nobel Prize for his fight against expanding climate change, there have been claims that nuclear power plants are the easy solution. They give phenomenal amounts of energy, after all, without much carbon production.
Some who seek facile solutions say it's about time to dump the safeguards of 1976's Proposition 15, which essentially put a stop to atomic-power facility construction in California after completion of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant on the central coast.
One example: Last fall, Republican Assemblyman Chuck DeVore of Orange County introduced a bill aiming to permit construction of a new nuclear power plant if 20percent of the power were used for desalination facilities. That bill went nowhere, despite rampant threats of a drought.
The legislation met that fate because building and maintaining new nukes is no simple matter, if California's experience means anything. And if California's own experience with nuclear power doesn't matter in this state, something is wrong.
Take the very latest glitch, revealed last winter by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission after examining the record of the San Onofre nuclear generating station near San Clemente, whose reactors produce power for 2.75 million households served by Southern California Edison, San Diego Gas & Electric and the city of Riverside's municipal utility.
The NRC found numerous violations of rules and falsified records perpetrated by employees at San Onofre, including one worker who faked records for more than five years to show operators made hourly fire patrols when they had not.
There were also two unspecified security lapses, whose details were not unveiled publicly because of what they might reveal to possible terrorist attackers.
No one suggested these incidents represented a "serious threat" to the safety of San Onofre or its neighbors. But they might be. For if an uncontrolled fire broke out in a nuclear facility, one consequence could be radiation leaks. And security lapses could have all manner of unknown ill effects.
Then there was the "mirror image" problem during the construction of Diablo Canyon, which saw workers essentially build that plant backward and then have to do it over again, causing Pacific Gas & Electric Co. a cost overrun of more than $3 billion in 1970s-era currency. Make the same kind of mistake today, and the costs might be triple or more.
There's also the problem of nuclear waste, for which there is no answer in the offing. For decades, spent fuel from most American nuclear power plants went to points in South Carolina and Washington state. But those dumps are at or near capacity, and most waste both in this country and around the world is now stored at or near the places where it is produced.
So far, no country has built a deep geological repository for radioactive waste, and there is certainly no American site in prospect any time soon.
For a while, Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush eyed a space beneath southern Nevada's Yucca Mountain, but once California elected Barbara Boxer to the U.S. Senate, that was pretty much out. Boxer bought into the theory that radioactivity from Yucca Mountain might trickle into underground water supplies that eventually flow to the Colorado River, and thus pollute much of California and Arizona's water supply for generations to come.
Yucca Mountain is also highly unpopular in Nevada itself, and every Democratic presidential candidate this year pledged it would not be used for spent fuel. Republican John McCain was less definite about that, even though water earmarked for his home state of Arizona could be affected.
The upshot is that there can be no absolute guarantees of either environmental purity, protection from employee negligence or safety from terrorism at any new nuclear power plant. So far, none has ever produced a serious problem in this country, but that offers no guarantees for the future.
All of which means politicians like DeVore who seek simple ways to solve both energy and water problems need to look elsewhere. It is not yet time to give up the protections voters gave themselves via Proposition 15. Far better to look toward more emphasis on renewable energy sources like wind, sun and geothermal than to bank on the uncertainties of the atom and the people associated with it.
--Thomas D. Elias is a writer living in Southern California. Write to him by e-mail at tdelias@aol.com.
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Houston Chronicle
May 11, 2008
Costs may slow nuclear upswing
Despite greener energy, industry faces many hurdles
By Joshua Boak
Chicago Tribune
CHICAGO — As crude oil prices leapt last week to over $120 a barrel, and one analyst suggested the price might soon reach $200, America would seem poised for a nuclear power resurgence.
But enthusiasm for a nuclear future was muted at an industry conference last week in Chicago, as executives acknowledged that financial, regulatory and waste-storage hurdles have raised uncertainties about costs. Other factors increasing the expense of construction include high demand for nuclear plants among emerging countries, limited supplies of reactor parts and increased prices for iron, steel and concrete.
As a result, the estimated price of a nuclear reactor has more than doubled to upwards of $9 billion in less than a year, according to industry estimates.
"I am emotionally biased but economically objective about this," said John Rowe, chief executive of Chicago-based Exelon Corp., the country's largest nuclear operator. "Realistic expectations about the 'renaissance' of nuclear power suggest that it will unfold slowly over time."
Applications for 15 plants
There are 104 nuclear power plants in the United States, with construction beginning on the most recent one in 1977. And as concerns about global warming have displaced fears about a reactor meltdown, the industry and government are looking to update and expand a rapidly aging electric grid with an energy source that does not emit greenhouse gases.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has nine applications for 15 plants. "We knew this day was coming, and we do not intend to be a roadblock," said Dale Klein, chairman of the NRC. "But I have also said that our ability to review applications quickly depends directly on the quality and completeness of those applications."
The NRC is also laying groundwork to regulate the recycling of spent nuclear fuel, a crucial issue as lawsuits and political pressure have prevented producers from depositing radioactive waste in Nevada's Yucca Mountain.
Citing national security, President Ford banned reprocessing nuclear fuel in 1976, a policy formalized a year later by President Carter. But as more radioactive waste gets produced, the industry will eventually need to find a solution.
"If we had all this trouble over one Yucca Mountain, do we really want to have this problem over 10 (of them)?" Rowe asked.
Low operating costs
Each of those plants must also pass the scrutiny of governmental bureaucracies, environmentalists, inspectors and, perhaps most importantly, the bond-rating agencies that determine financial credit.
For each kilowatt-hour of electricity generated, nuclear power claims to be cheaper than coal or natural gas, which represents about 80 percent of the country's electric output. But, coal and natural gas also follow increases in crude oil prices.
The difficulty faced by the nuclear industry is that construction costs are comparatively high to other sources, while operating costs are lower, said Stephen Brown, director of energy economics at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.
To spur construction, the federal government set aside $18.5 billion in loan guarantees for the industry. But with Florida Power & Light Co. planning to open two new reactors by 2020 at a cost of $18 billion, those guarantees would fail to cover an entire industry that says it must complete as many as 30 plants within 20 years to limit carbon dioxide emissions.
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redOrbit
May 11, 2008
Kentucky Mulls Lifting Ban on Nuclear Plants
By Steve Blankinship
For longer than any monarch ever ruled a foreign nation, coal has been King in Kentucky. Today, about 90 percent of the state's electricity comes from coalfired power plants. So a proposal to end a moratorium on nuclear power plants in the heart of coal country is drawing more than a little attention. Kentucky legislators are considering lifting a state ban on nuclear plants imposed more than 20 years ago. The move would clear the way to potentially diversify the state'spower generation mix. Sponsors of a state senate bill to lift the ban cited improved ability to safely store nuclear waste on- site at nuclear plants as a reason why other states are receptive to allowing new nuclear construction. Kentucky's current stance, say backers of the proposed repeal measure, is keeping the state from competing for nuclear power projects.
Under the state's moratorium, no nuclear power plant can be built until a long-term federal disposal site has become operational. The ban has endured longer than many expected because development of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste facility in Nevada, which started in the 1980s, remains unsettled. Yucca Mountain is not expected to be operational until perhaps 2021.
The lack of a long-term disposal site shouldn't limit the opportunity to explore nuclear power projects in Kentucky, said State Senator Bob Leeper, who introduced the rollback bill.
Kentucky's coal association supports generation diversity, including nuclear.
Kentucky is also a domestic source of uranium in addition to coal. Rob Ervin of the United Steel Workers, which has hundreds of members working in the uranium enrichment field near Paducah, said the safety of nuclear power has come a long way. "Exploring our options and giving us a chance to capitalize on the rebirth of an industry is what this bill is all about," Ervin said. "Limiting our options based on a moratorium from a bygone era does not."
The Kentucky Coal Association is not taking a stand on the issue, but does support diversification in the state. Bill Caylor, association president, said he believes Kentucky needs a diverse energy portfolio and that nuclear power should be part of it. He called coal "the bridge to the future" saying it was the cheapest source, thereby giving it an edge. "But this country truly needs more energy resources," he said.-Steve Blankinship
--Copyright PennWell Publishing Company Apr 2008
Brattleboro Reformer
May 10, 2008
Talk to focus on Yucca Mountain
By Bob Audette
Reformer Staff
BRATTLEBORO -- Yucca Mountain in Nevada is a long ways away. Not just in distance, but also in the possibility that it will become a repository for the nuclear waste that has been accumulating at nuclear reactors since the Atomic Age began.
Citizen Awareness Network is bringing the Yucca Mountain issue closer to home Monday night by hosting Ian Zabarte, a member of the Western Shoshone Nation, who lives near the proposed facility.
"Poor, rural, Native Americans and people of color are being subjected to nuclear exploitation through the uranium mining practices and radioactive waste storage practices for which no environmentally sound alternatives exist," wrote Chris Williams, of Hancock, an organizer of the tour.
Zabarte and Lorraine Rekmans have been traveling Vermont as part of the "Vermont Yankee Truth Tour -- The reality behind the 'Clean and Green' Facade."
Rekmans, of Ojibway-French descent, is from Elliot Lake, Ontario, a former uranium mine boom town. She won't be speaking at the event, said Deb Katz, of CAN, because of a prior engagement, but a video from her previous appearances in the state might be shown.
The event, scheduled for Monday night from 7 to 9 p.m. at the Robert H. Gibson River Garden, will be competing with a hearing being held by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission at the Red Roof Inn on Putney Road, starting at 6 p.m.
The NRC is in town to discuss Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant's annual assessment.
Having the NRC and the CAN event in town on the same night is fortuitous, said Katz.
"There's the truth and there's the deception."
She didn't think the NRC's presence in town would keep people away from the River Garden.
"People have heard the dog and pony show of the NRC many times," she said. "They don't change their tune."
On the other hand, she said, listening to Zabarte "is a one-time opportunity to actually hear from people who have been impacted by the nuclear fuel cycle."
"Those most in favor of nuclear power should learn from the people who have lived near uranium mining and testing facilities what can happen to human health," said Diana Sidebotham, former president of the New England Coalition on Nuclear Pollution.
Both Rekmans and Zabarte have experienced cancer-related deaths among friends and family and environmental damage in their communities they claim results from exposure to the nuclear fuel cycle.
"Our culture and tradition dictate that we remain within our traditional homelands as caretakers," said Zabarte. "If these lands are uninhabitably destroyed, we have nowhere to go, no reason to go on. We plan to remain on our lands for the next 10,000 years, and we need them to be uncontaminated."
--Bob Audette can be reached at raudette@reformer.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 273.
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Portsmouth Herald News
May 10, 2008
Nuclear plant producing again
By Susan Morse
smorse@seacoastonline.com
SEABROOK — FPL Energy Seabrook Station is back online after completing its 12th refueling.
"We're not at 100 percent power yet," plant spokesman Al Griffith said on Friday. "We did connect back to the New England electrical grid on Thursday afternoon, officially ending the refueling outage, and we'll gradually come back to 100 percent power."
The plant was off the grid for 38 days for refueling. During the outage, workers replaced 84 of the 193 uranium fuel assemblies in the plant's reactor and conducted about 2,100 planned maintenance jobs. Approximately 900 additional contract workers provided specialty skills and services at the plant during that period.
The used fuel assemblies went from the reactor into the spent-fuel pool. This year, Seabrook Station built concrete dry fuel storage containers on site to hold the assemblies. The containers are expected to be used for the first time this fall.
"They're ready to go, we still have a process we have to follow," said Griffith. "We do expect to have first fuel loading campaign in 2008."
The oldest of the fuel assemblies will be taken out of the pool and transported to dry storage, said Griffith. The newer assemblies will sit in the pool for about five years, he said. The dry storage was necessitated by lawsuits holding up the opening of the federal nuclear waste site at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
--Material from The Associated Press was used in this report.
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Knoxville News Sentinel
May 09, 2008
Christensen on nuclear's future role
Dana Christensen, an associate lab director at ORNL who came to Oak Ridge a couple of years ago from Los Alamos, outlined the potential role of nuclear energy in a U.S. strategy for energy independence.
Here's the prepared text:
Thank you Senator and Congressmen for the opportunity to discuss the role of nuclear energy in the context of "clean energy independence."
Yucca Mountain was envisioned when our country had no plans for significant nuclear energy expansion. The volume of spent fuel was fixed, based on reactor lifetime.
Your "clean energy independence" vision requires a significant expansion of carbon free nuclear power, thereby forcing us to reevaluate our assumptions for deep geologic disposal. Therefore, my comments address the integrated goals of "Safely reprocessing and storing nuclear waste" as you have stated Senator, with the significant expansion goal stated by Dr. Mason.
In this context, a sustainable closed fuel cycle likely becomes essential. This is the decision that France arrived at decades ago. They have a sustained 80% nuclear electricity and reprocess their spent fuel in order to recover and reuse the energy value.
First, let me state that a significant expansion, such as to 300 GWe, is achievable by 2050 moving from today's 20% market share to greater than 30%. Between 1969 and 1989, we started up 101 reactors with a total installed capacity of ~100 GWe. Adding 200 GWe requires us to build six 1.1 GWe reactors each year beginning about 2020. But, achieving 300 GWe requires sustained commitment by the White House, Congress, industry, and the utilities.
There are a number of interrelated 5 year challenges to address in order to embark upon this goal.
First, we need new reactor orders if we are to stimulate industry. Everyone remembers long reactor licensing and construction delays, resulting in significant stranded capital. The financing and utility industries cannot commit to new construction without a predictable licensing process and risk protection. The government provides remedy by fully funding Risk Insurance and Loan Guarantee Programs authorized by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and supporting NRC in implementing its new Combined Design and Operating License process.
Second, the U.S. reactor design and construction industry is essentially non-existent. There is no domestic large steel forging capability for pressure vessels. N-stamp capability for valves, steam generators, pumps, and piping is for the most part moribund. A typical reactor will have two steam generators, 200 control rod drives, 20 large pumps, 11,000 valves, 2000 control components, tons of concrete and steel, and miles of piping and wiring. If the country were to build only a few reactors, these components would be purchased abroad, but given a 200+ reactors expansion, purchasing abroad would be tantamount to a wealth transfer program similar to our current oil dilemma. A sustained Government commitment to a significant expansion will motivate U.S. industry to build modern factories, positioning them to also compete internationally.
Third, reactors are designed to produce electricity but 63 sites double as storage sites to the nation's Spent Nuclear Fuel; ~50,000 metric tons growing at 2000 tons/year. Many utilities have successfully sued the Federal Government for not taking ownership, but their desire is to have the spent fuel removed as committed, not to collect litigation awards. The government remedies this situation by taking ownership of the fuel, perhaps consolidating it at a smaller number of locations, and take action for its disposition. A modification to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act will also be needed to allow for consolidated interim storage. Litigation costs and awards disappear.
The fourth issue is a renewed skilled workforce. Last year's NEI study indicated that over the next 5 years 46% of the existing 20,000 nuclear utility workers will need to be replaced. Each new reactor will require ~4000 construction workers and 3000-6000 operators. Related industries such as component manufacturing, transportation, fuel enrichment and fabrication, and waste management will also require a skilled workforce. A sustained Government commitment to a significant expansion will stimulate our universities and trade schools, leading to renewed education and training.
The fifth and last major issue has to do with research and research infrastructure. In order to reduce cost, improve efficiency, safety and security, and assure sustainability, including your specific request to "safely reprocess and store nuclear waste", we must invest in science and technology. Dennis Spurgeon, the DOE Asst. Secy. for Nuclear Energy, in his recent House testimony stated: "Our whole nuclear R&D infrastructure has atrophied. It's one thing to encourage the education of new scientists and engineers, which we desperately need, but we need a place for those people to work. We don't have advanced reactors in this country. We don't have an advanced fuel cycle R&D facility. These are desperately needed if we're going to rebuild the national capability." A commitment to clean nuclear power means that we need a sustainable closed fuel cycle. R&D is needed. Waste forms will be different meaning research is needed. Some reactors will be fast spectrum reactors used to produce electricity but also to destroy unwanted elements like plutonium. We know that increased reactor temperature, could result in as much as a doubling in electricity production with the same fuel quantities. Researching new reactor designs and power converters, new materials, and new fuels is needed.
There are many advances that we cannot even envision today. During the next 5 years Congress can commit to build a modern R&D infrastructure and thereby position the U.S. to reassert technical leadership and fully answer the question of closing the fuel cycle.
Thank you for the opportunity to address this issue and I look forward to working with Congress, the Department of Energy, U.S. industry, and our educational institutions to achieve the goals with which you challenged us today.
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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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