Yucca Mountain News Clips
Friday, February 19, 2010
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Victorville Daily Press
February 18, 2010

Letter: Sleight of tongue

A magician uses slight of hand to deceive his audience into thinking what they saw happen was real. With a flourish he would have you look at one hand while the other was actually preparing to deceive you.

President Obama with great flourish announced $8 billion in guaranteed loans for a safe nuclear power plant and a blue ribbon panel to insure safe nuclear power.

The President’s use of the word “safe” is the slight of hand. Safe not only includes the construction and operation of any plant, but also the storage of its radioactive waste. A panel of experts had already determined that Yucca Mountain in Nevada would be the safest location for radioactive waste and $36 billion was spent on the construction of the Radioactive Waste Repository at Yucca. One of the first actions Barack Obama took as president was to decree that Yucca Mountain would never open, and shut the project down. Such an act of deception is the mark of a Master Magician. Perhaps we should start calling our president “Barack the Magnifcent.”

Thomas Whittington
Apple Valley

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Adobe Press
February 18, 2010

Letter: Finding place for nuclear waste

I was arrested in front of Diablo in 1978 because PG&E did not know what they would do with their nuclear waste.

I was told the problem would be taken care of after it was created. I assume that meant the Yucca Mountain storage site.

Here we are, 32 years later, with no functioning storage site and the waste building up at Diablo.

I suggest the large casks of nuclear waste be stored in the backyards of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission members, rather than upwind of where I live.

Bill Denneen
Nipomo

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Denver Post
February 18, 2010

Editorial: Nuclear power must be part of energy strategy

Though there are political and technological hurdles, we're glad to see the Obama administration embracing nuclear generation.

If the United States is going to get serious about reducing carbon emissions, nuclear power must play a significant role in our long- term strategy.

We're heartened to see the Obama administration pledge $8.3 billion in loan guarantees to back construction of two nuclear reactors in Georgia. It is a solid first step. The administration says this will be the first in a slew of commitments to future nuclear projects, which is even better news.

Let's remember that when finally completed, these two reactors would be the first nuclear plants to go online in this country in more than 30 years. For far too long we've ignored the most viable and efficient clean energy technology available to us.

For example, the administration says one plant alone will cut carbon pollution by the equivalent of taking 3.5 million cars off the road. Imagine the good even more reactors would do for the nation and the environment.

Nuclear energy is a growing component of portfolios across the globe — the Chinese are preparing to build 21 new reactors — and we are being left behind. But before we take back the lead, there are three major obstacles that must be addressed by Washington.

The first is perception. Most polls show Americans warming to nuclear energy, but still many remain reluctant to embrace nuclear energy due to fears surrounding safety. The most infamous incident was at the Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania. The national trauma still remains. Yet, despite worries, not only did no one die in the accident, studies confirm that little real damage occurred after the accident.

Obviously, we don't want any accidents, and technology has improved drastically since the 1970s. In fact, in many ways nuclear energy production is safer than coal or oil. So Obama must help allay fears.

The second concern is the regulatory process. We're concerned nuclear energy can't exist without a large taxpayer backstop. The process to build a plant can take up to 20 years and is prohibitively expensive. We hope Washington begins to streamline the process, making nuclear energy more affordable and the industry more competitive, much like it does for solar and wind energy.

Finally, there is the important issue of waste disposal. The president has been caught in a bit of a contradiction. On the one hand, he has rallied for more nuclear energy, but on the other he pulled the plug on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal facility in Nevada. The government spent years studying the location and safety. While we understand the concerns, we believe they are overblown.

The Obama administration, struggling politically at the moment, might have found a bipartisan issue worth fighting for. That, in itself, is welcome news.

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Augusta Chronicle
February 18, 2010

Editorial: Finally, a good nuclear option

Vogtle expansion is huge news for CSRA and for U.S. energy policy

Pouring money into a huge hole usually implies something bad.

Not at Plant Vogtle.

It's actually two holes -- both 90 feet deep and spanning about two city blocks. They will house the base mats for two new reactors at the nuclear power plant in Burke County. These are the first new nuclear reactors to be built in America since the 1970s.

This is big stuff, folks.

How big? As many as 3,500 construction jobs, according to Southern Co. And 800 permanent jobs must be filled when the job is done.

Big stuff. It's $14.5 billion big. In terms of cost, according to Scott Peterson of the Nuclear Energy Institute, it's the largest construction project in Georgia history.

And the project got even more big news Tuesday: The Obama administration has approved $8.33 billion in loan guarantees for the construction and operation of the new reactors.

All of this is right in Augusta's back yard.

And a lot of people are going to be peering over the fence into that back yard in coming months and years. The Vogtle expansion will be watched closely to gauge its success. It will be held up as an example that will influence future nuclear projects nationwide as America looks for cleaner, alternative energy sources.

That's one initiative of the president's that we can stand firmly behind -- a renewed commitment toward nuclear power.

President Obama touched on his support for nuclear power before, in a speech in New Orleans last November. But his big push came during last month's State of the Union address, when he called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants."

We welcome the exploration of alternative energy. But many types -- solar power, wind power -- are still approaching the cusp of commercial viability. The president recognizes that nuclear is the way to go, and for that he should be applauded.

There's still the matter of Yucca Mountain, though.

For years we have been led to believe that subterranean tunnels in Nevada's Mojave Desert were being groomed as a permanent repository for the nation's nuclear waste. The waste is being stored instead at 121 locations in 39 states, including South Carolina -- at Savannah River Site -- and Georgia.

But the Obama administration has said flatly for almost a year now that Yucca Mountain is off the table. Not coincidentally, it's in the home state of Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry "Not in My Back Yard" Reid, who is seeking re-election.

Now the government is keeping these states on the hook even longer to store nuclear waste? Preposterous.

Utility ratepayers have sunk billions into the idea that Yucca Mountain would store nuclear waste. No other site in the country has proved a better, safer place to put it. It shouldn't be abandoned.

And if it takes legal action to keep Yucca open -- as Gov. Mark Sanford and other state and national politicians are threatening -- so be it. Yucca mustn't be a stop sign on America's path to energy independence.

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BusinessWeek
February 18, 2010

SC legislators want nuclear waste payments halted

By Jim Davenport
Columbia, S.C.

South Carolina lawmakers said Thursday they have to do something about the Obama Administration ditching plans to open the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage site in Nevada.

State senators on Wednesday unanimously signed onto a bill that would require the state's electric utilities put money earmarked for a national nuclear waste repository instead into a state fund until the federal site begins operating. The state would use interest from that to get its own long-term storage plan operating by 2012.

The bill was introduced a day after Gov. Mark Sanford said the state may have to take legal action to keep the Yucca Mountain open as an option, claiming political deals were made and 25 years of promises were being broken after South Carolinians had put $1.2 billion into the project.

But poking the Department of Energy in the wallet creates problems. By Thursday the state's utilities weighed in with warnings that they could lose federal nuclear power operating permits. And that's a big deal in a state where about half the power generated comes from nuclear plants and utilities are seeking permits for more reactors.

"We want to make sure that the legislation being proposed here doesn't compromise what we are doing or what we are planning to do to move forward for any reason," Scana Corp. spokesman Eric Boomhower said.

The Department of Energy didn't immediately respond to questions Thursday.

The power companies' concerns prompted a slowdown from senators who expected to send their bill to the House by this weekend.

"Everybody in here supports keeping Yucca Mountain open for disposal of spent hazardous material," said state Sen. Paul Campbell, R-Goose Creek. "But we want to make sure unintended consequences doesn't impact South Carolina businesses."

The impact could be huge in South Carolina, where legislators have rushed to provide tax breaks and training programs for the nuclear reactors. Meanwhile, utilities want to keep the option of federal loan guarantees that could keep their construction costs lower.

"We don't want to do anything that would block our access to potential expansion -- whether it be loans or permits or whatever goes with it," Campbell said.

"Haste can make waste here," said Senate President Pro Tem Glenn McConnell, who left the statehouse on Thursday saying he'd review the bill before lawmakers return Tuesday.

"I think it's atrocious what the federal government is doing. It's in my opinion irresponsible," said McConnell, a Charleston Republican.

Utilities and their customers have "paid this money for permanent storage. Now they're being charged for something they're not going to get," McConnell said.

Utilities expect the federal government to deliver.

"We have a contract with the Department of Energy to manage that waste. We still expect the federal government to honor that contract," Boomhower said. "We are still supportive of a central, federal-type repository situation whether it is Yucca Mountain or some other option."

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News & Observer
February 18, 2010

Going green and nuclear

By Rick Martinez

These must be gut-wrenching times for environmentalists. Two of their heroes - President Barack Obama, hailed as our greenest president, and Dr. James Hansen, a father of the global warming movement - have gone nuclear.

Tuesday, Obama announced $8 billion in loan guarantees for the construction of two new nuclear reactors at a Southern Company power plant in Georgia. The feds have set aside $18 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear projects, a total the president and Energy Secretary Steve Chu want to bump up to $54 billion. The administration is banking that these guarantees - enough to construct at least seven units - will provide the security investors need to finance new nuclear plants. Chu also wants to streamline the permitting process so nukes can get on line quicker.

With the Obama administration providing the financial and regulatory muscle to get the nuclear ball rolling, Hansen, head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, is providing the intellectual credibility.

Hansen sees climate catastrophe in every carbon molecule burned. He quickly saw through the environmental fraud of cap and trade polices, which merely put a price on carbon and do little to reduce emissions. Unlike Obama, Hansen was delighted the U.N. Climate Summit in Copenhagen, with its laughable emission targets, was a bust.

Environmentalists who came to hear Hansen during his recent visit to UNC-Chapel Hill (he lobbied the university to stop burning coal at its cogeneration plant) swallowed hard when he listed nuclear power as an environmentally friendly alternative to fossil fuels. Not only is nuclear virtually carbon free, it doesn't deserve the disaster-in-waiting image environmentalists have hoisted on the industry. In fact, Hansen said, a look at the data reveals it's the safest form of power being generated today.

"If you look at the damage that has been done to humans and the environment by nuclear power and compare that to what's been done by coal, you're talking several orders of magnitude," Hansen told UNC students and environmentalists who stood in the snow to hear him. "The safest large industry in the United States has been nuclear power. The number of people killed from nuclear power is negligible."

Had a nuclear energy lobbyist uttered those words, students would have jeered the profit monger off the campus. But Hansen's embrace of state-of-the-art nuclear power has some lifelong opponents - including NC WARN - at least reconsidering the nuclear option, although not the current version of it.

I still don't like nukes. Like all green energy, nuclear power is awfully expensive. And the feds still haven't figured out what to do with radioactive waste. While Obama touts nuclear energy on the front end with loan guarantees, he's hobbled it on the back end by withdrawing financial support for the Yucca Mountain depository in Nevada. Get that little detail worked out and commercial nuclear energy could become more viable, assuming all of its true costs are known and transparent.

Like most consumers, I don't care where the electrons that power my life come from. I do care about the true economic, social and environmental cost. I like the economics of clean coal, but mining is dangerous and environmentally costly. I'm willing to pay a higher price for the safety of emission-free nuclear power. But if utilities bear the true cost of nuclear energy, I may not get the chance. Shareholders could discover it's more profitable to weatherize a home and outfit it with energy-efficient appliances than to power it with a nuclear plant.

Sooner or later we'll come to understand that no one source can solve the competing economic, environmental and social demands we'll place on future consumption. To arrive at the most beneficial mix will require concrete action, such as the loan guarantees Obama provided and the intellectual honesty of Hansen, who tells his constituency the whole truth as he sees it, not just the truth they want to hear.

--Contributing columnist Rick Martinez (rickjmartinez2@verizon.net) is news director at WPTF, NC News Network and StateGovernmentRadio.com.

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Southern Political Report
February 18, 2010

South Carolina to sue over Yucca Mountain nuclear dump

By Gary Reese
Florida Insider

The first of the suits over President Barack Obama’s new nuclear energy policies is already simmering. South Carolina Republican Gov. Mark Sanford says his state will sue to force Obama to reverse his decision this week to abandon plans to permanently store nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Sanford said the White House’s new policy will cost South Carolina taxpayers $1.2 billion. State residents continue to pay utility bill ad-on fees to help finance Yucca Mountain. About 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste are being “temporarily” stored in the state. Sanford accused Obama of making this new policy as a way to appease Nevada voters so that they will re-elect Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

--The political gridlock that comes from excessive partisanship in Washington was one of the topics addressed in Naples, Fla. by someone who ought to know – former President George W. Bush. He and his brother Jeb, the former governor of Florida, made a rare public appearance together before a friendly audience at the Naples Town Hall Distinguished Speakers Series. President Bush said the best solution to the partisan rancor now paralyzing Congress is more competitive congressional elections. That would force congressmen and –women and their challengers to focus more on pragmatic solutions to problems, he said. The Bush brothers won some laughs from the crowd. Gov. Bush said after he’d left office, a woman encountered him in public and said, “You used to be Jeb Bush.”

--Everything’s bigger in Texas, they say, and the current state budget is no exception. States from coast to coast are sucking wind fiscally, but the Lone Star State now expects its deficit to reach at least $15 billion. And like their counterparts in many states, Texas legislators are having an increasingly hard time coming up with ideas that would make significant dents in the shortfall. State agencies have disclosed their cost-savings proposals, but their offerings of five percent cuts would make little significant difference. Even candidates in the high-profile governor’s race seem to be dodging the issue.

--Virginia has joined the climate wars. The state’s attorney general is asking the US Environmental Protection Agency to rescind its December 2008 policy position that says global warming is a threat to people. The AG also filed a court petition in Washington, asking the federal appeals court to review the EPA’s finding. Details of the Virginia action are still sketchy.

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Charleston Post Courier
February 18, 2010

What about nuclear waste?

President Obama's decision to support more nuclear power production is welcome, except that it fails to acknowledge the associated problems with nuclear waste. Worse, the administration has pulled the plug on the Yucca Mountain waste repository, despite billions in public dollars spent on study and production.

Already, the federal government's failure to open the national waste site has resulted in high-level nuclear waste piling up at 80 sites across the nation. That's unacceptable.

The federal government is legally committed to provide a safe, secure storage site for high-level waste.

Rate payers across the nation have been contributing to a fund for decades, through a surcharge on their electrical power bills, to provide such a site.

The remote Yucca Mountain site in Nevada has undergone extensive study and development at a cost of some $10 billion. You could fairly characterize the level of review as excruciating.

The development of Yucca Mountain as a permanent repository for high level commercial and federal nuclear waste has been supported by the previous four administrations.

But that was before Harry Reid, D-Nev., became Senate majority leader and Barack Obama became president. The administration's decision to kill Yucca Mountain as a waste repository fulfills one of Sen. Reid's fondest wishes.

Gov. Mark Sanford says the decision will mean continued storage of 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste in South Carolina -- the third highest volume in the nation, with more to come.

"With four additional nuclear reactors proposed in South Carolina, storage of spent nuclear fuel will likely increase considerably with no path out in sight, given the administration's decision," the governor wrote in a letter to Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.

Mr. Sanford is particularly concerned about the massive quantities of high level waste stored at Savannah River Site, related to its national defense role.

But his complaints about the potential security threat created by dozens of temporary waste sites around the nation should have broad resonance.

About half of the American population lives within 75 miles of one of those sites. That ought to create a constituency in Congress to put the Yucca Mountain project back on track.

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StarNewsOnline
February 18, 2010

Kanawha County Senator Tries to Lift Nuclear Ban

Sen. Brooks McCabe, D-Kanawha, says it is time to strike the law that makes nuclear power plants illegal in West Virginia.

Story by Walt Williams

CHARLESTON -- A state senator is once again asking his colleagues to lift a statewide ban on the construction of nuclear power plants, saying it needs to be done if West Virginia is going to be taken seriously as a leader in energy development.

Sen. Brooks McCabe, D-Kanawha, is the lead sponsor of a bill that would strike out a provision in state law banning nuclear power plants. It is a repeat of similar legislation he introduced last year that passed the Senate but was shot down in the House of Delegates.

No companies have proposed building a nuclear plant in West Virginia in the near future. But McCabe and other supporters of lifting the ban say all generation sources need to be considered as the nation's energy future.

"We shouldn't have an artificial barrier to an alternative that makes sense to a lot of people in a lot of places," he told the Senate Energy and Infrastructure Committee Feb. 17.

The West Virginia Legislature banned the development of nuclear power in the state in 1996, declaring at the time there was no safe place to store the radioactive waste left over from the process.

The ban largely was a symbolic gesture. The state's large coal supplies provided most of the energy generated in the state in 1996, as they do today.

Also, no new nuclear power plants have been built in the United States in more than two decades, mainly as a result of vocal opposition and public fears stemming from the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl incidents.

Now, policymakers and even a few environmentalists are seriously talking about building new nuclear power plants to cut back on greenhouse gas emissions responsible for global warming. They point to new technologies they say makes the plants much safer in the past. They also note that nuclear power has been used safely in France and the U.S. for decades.

President Barack Obama has publicly endorsed building more nuclear power plants, although he has sent out mixed policy signals on the topic. He recently approved $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees for plant construction but zeroed out funding for the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

Opposition to nuclear power remains strong in West Virginia. Denise Poole of the West Virginia Environmental Council said currently no place exists to safely store radioactive nuclear waste. She also questioned claims that power plants were "carbon neutral," saying the construction of the plant emit greenhouse gases.

At the other end, Sen. Frank Deem, R-Wood, questioned what effect nuclear power would have on coal and natural gas production. He directed a barrage of skeptical questions at McCabe, twice cutting off his colleague as McCabe tried to answer.

McCabe said he didn't view nuclear power as becoming a major energy source for the state anytime soon.

"Our resources are coal and natural gas and I think we need to focus on that," he said.

Representatives from both American Electric Power and Dominion spoke in favor of lifting the ban, not because they planed to build any nuclear power plants in West Virginia, but because they believed all options should be on the table for utilities as they figure out how to meet energy demand.

It was an argument that won over committee member Sen. Jeff Kessler, D-Marshall.

The committee passed the bill with only Deem objecting. It next will head to the Senate Judiciary Committee for further review.

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Post-Bulletin
February 18, 2010

Special Section

Xcel awaits decision on Prairie Island storage

By Dawn Schuett

The Prairie Island Nuclear Generating Plant will play a growing role in the state's energy generation in 2010 and beyond, and Xcel Energy hopes to increase its output.

With the nation seeking a greener sources of energy, some think the solution may lie in nuclear generation, which doesn't create greenhouse gasses. However, getting rid of the radioactive waste remains a persistent problem.

In November, the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission approved Xcel Energy's plans to increase the generating capacity and add up to 35 dry casks to store nuclear waste at the Prairie Island plant in Red Wing. The decision on the dry cask storage is stayed until June 1 to allow for a possible legislative review during the 2010 session.

The proposal by Xcel would expand the capacity of each of the plant's two reactors by 82 megawatts, bringing the total generating capacity of the facility to 1,264 megawatts.

Xcel intends to seek approval for the project from the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission at the end of the year, after the commission rules on Xcel's application to extend the operating license for each reactor by 20 years. The current operating licenses for the reactors will expire in 2013 and 2014. Once Xcel receives federal approval, it expects to start work on the power uprates in 2014 and 2015.

Xcel estimates the ongoing investments in the plant to operate it through 2034 would total more than $1 billion, including $330 million to expand the generating capacity and $156 million for additional dry cask storage of spent nuclear fuel.

Prairie Island and Xcel's other nuclear facility in Minnesota, the Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant, northwest of the Twin Cities, provide about 30 percent of the energy used by Xcel's customers in Minnesota, Wisconsin and the Dakotas. The state utilities commission also has approved a proposal by Xcel to increase the generating capacity of the 600-megawatt Monticello plant by 71 megawatts. If approved by the NRC, the power uprate at Monticello could be completed in 2011.

The Prairie Island and Monticello plants "are a critical part of our energy portfolio," said Laura McCarten, regional vice president for the utility. Xcel can continue to supply customers with carbon-free electricity by keeping the plants running safely, efficiently and cost-effectively, she said.

As Xcel's plans move forward, some in Minnesota are calling for the repeal of a law that prohibits more nuclear plants from being built in the state.

Nuclear waste storage

Xcel would add up to 35 dry casks on site to store spent fuel from the plant's reactors if they are allowed to operate another 20 years. The plant has 25 casks on site today although it is currently authorized by the state for 29.

Without a permanent site for the nation's nuclear waste, the dry casks are providing interim storage for used nuclear fuel.

In 2009, the Obama administration cut Energy Department funding for the nuclear waste storage program at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, and called for the appointment of a blue ribbon commission to look at options for storing the waste. Yucca Mountain had long been considered as a site for the permanent storage of spent nuclear fuel.

The federal government's inability to establish a permanent site for nuclear waste, argues Red Wing Mayor John Howe, puts a greater burden on communities like Red Wing and Monticello that have nuclear waste stored nearby and have to be well prepared in the event of a local nuclear crisis.

Xcel's customers pay for interim storage and permanent used fuel storage disposal through the current rate structure. Through March 2009, Xcel's Minnesota customers paid $386 million toward a permanent repository with another $309 million accrued in interest.

The amount that Xcel sends each year to the federal government for a national nuclear waste disposal site is $13 million.

The cities of Red Wing and Monticello want that money to stay in Minnesota to fund emergency response planning. If that's not allowed, Howe said, the city of Red Wing will ask legislators to establish new state fees to cover related costs.

'It's our responsibility'

The federal government's "failure" to start accepting nuclear waste from the generating facilities has led to this, Howe said.

"Our effort is designed to help the state come up with a plan without any additional costs to Xcel or the consumers," he said. "We need to generate interest at the state level to hold the federal government accountable and come up with a stable funding source to deal with it."

Howe said he's a supporter of nuclear energy, but the nuclear waste storage issue and the costs that come with it can't be ignored by the state while the plants continue to operate and in the future when they're decommissioned.

"It's our consumption that has created this waste and it's our responsibility," he said. "The city of Red Wing has absolutely zero funds to deal with it. The state of Minnesota has absolutely zero funds to deal with it. We need a better plan than that."

Xcel's response

While Xcel appreciates what the city of Red Wing does, McCarten said, expanding the capacity at the nuclear generating facility does not create new or different needs when it comes to emergency response planning by the city.

Xcel would be in breach of contract if it stopped sending that $13 million each year to the federal government, McCarten said.

"It's not good for our customers," she said. "It's not good for the state of Minnesota."

And Xcel is required to set aside funds to decommission the Prairie Island and Monticello plants, McCarten said. As of June 2008, the funds for decommissioning totaled $951 million. Xcel estimates that $2.38 billion will be needed to decommission both plants.

McCarten said it's disappointing that the federal government isn't further along in developing a permanent storage site.

Xcel supports geologic disposal, burying the waste deep underground. The utility also backs the establishment of the blue ribbon commission to find a permanent site and is pushing for an interim storage site for the nation's nuclear waste.

There will eventually be a national nuclear waste storage site, McCarten said, and "ultimately, I'm sure nuclear waste will be removed at Prairie Island."

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Canada Free Press
February 18, 2010

Yet another really big, really bad idea out of the White House

The Yucca Mountain Blues

By Alan Caruba

Are you worried about your “carbon footprint”?

Still think “global warming” is real despite the fact that one of its leading advocates, a climatologist, recently said that there’s no significant data to demonstrate any warming since 1995?

Can’t figure out why the White House is still trying desperately to pass the “Cap-and-Trade” bill based on the totally discredited claim that carbon dioxide and other gases in the atmosphere are “causing” the non-existent “global warming”?

Do you increasingly think that you are Alice in Wonderland and now living in a nation where the White House and Congress keep telling you things that are totally absurd?

Let’s put aside the claim that we have to borrow and borrow in order to keep on spending and spending to save the economy when common sense says that is the worst way to end the economic death spiral they have created.

The latest ploy by the White House was a move in the direction of nuclear power to generate the electricity the nation needs for its current and future needs. Since the 1970s, for reasons that defy understanding, several administrations, Democrat and Republican, have done little to encourage nuclear power despite the fact that a nation like France derives most of its electricity from it.

Even so, nuclear provides about twenty percent of the electricity we use while coal provides just over fifty percent. In both cases, neither has anything to do with “greenhouse gases” because the gases play no role in climate change. Indeed, more carbon dioxide, being plant food, would greatly enhance the growth of crops and forests.

“Cap-and-Trade” is nothing more than a tax on energy use

“Cap-and-Trade” is nothing more than a tax on energy use. Simple put, it has been cheap, abundant energy that has fueled the economy of the United States since it was founded. The discovery of oil in 1859 also played a major role and, despite the lies, the U.S. has an abundance of oil.

Like nuclear power, however, successive administrations since the 1970s have ensured that U.S. oil companies were kept from exploring for it, extracting it, refining it and selling it to us at affordable prices.

This is in sharp contrast to the endless babble about the need to be “energy independent.”

The talk about support for the nuclear energy industry is welcome, but what the White House is not saying is that his proposed budget has no funding for the nuclear waste facility in Nevada’s Yucca Mountain.

Congress passed a Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1982 and amended it in 1987. Yucca Mountain is the only permanent nuclear waste repository in the nation. I repeat, the only one. Why isn’t it in operation? Glad you asked. Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, has blocked its completion and use.

So we could build two or a dozen new nuclear plants—a very good idea—but there would still be no place to put the waste despite the fact that the U.S. has spent $9 billion on the first phase to build the Yucca Mountain site. A $13 million tunnel boring machine sits idle at the site.

That has not stopped the White House from wanting to put U.S. taxpayers on the hook for $8 billion in loan guarantees for two new reactors in Georgia.

Cap-and-Trade is a fraud

The purpose of all this is to get a few senators to sign on to the passage of Cap-and-Trade, a bill based on a non-existent threat from “greenhouse gases” in order to avoid a non-existent “global warming.” There are two fears; one that the Senate might pass the bill and, two, that the White House might impose it by executive order.

What we are witnessing is yet another really big, really bad idea out of the White House that continues to lie to everyone and anyone who thinks the problem is “global warming” when the problem really is a mad desire to destroy of the nation’s economy.

This has always been the single goal of the environmental movement when the global warming fraud began in the late 1980s. It accelerated with the UN Kyoto Protocol in 1997. The U.S. has never accepted the Protocol and those nations that did have since discovered that it’s been a very costly fraud.

Cap-and-Trade is a fraud. Let your senators know you oppose their vote for it. Any senator that does vote for it should be replaced if they are running for reelection in the November midterm elections.

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Capital Times
February 18, 2010

Amy Goodman: Obama's nuclear power dream is a nightmare

President Barack Obama is going nuclear. He announced the initial $8 billion in loan guarantees for construction of the first new nuclear power plants in the United States in close to three decades.

Obama is making good on a campaign pledge, like his promises to escalate the war in Afghanistan and to unilaterally attack in Pakistan. And like his “Af-Pak” war strategy, Obama’s publicly financed resuscitation of the nuclear power industry in the U.S. is bound to fail, another taxpayer bailout waiting to happen.

Opponents of the plan, which includes a tripling of the existing nuclear plant construction-loan guarantees to $54.5 billion, span the ideological spectrum. On its most basic level, the economics of nuclear power generation simply don’t make sense. The cost to construct these behemoths is so huge, and the risks are so great, that no sensible investor, no banks, no hedge funds will invest in their construction.

No one will loan a power company the money to build a power plant, and the power companies refuse to spend their own money. Obama himself professes a passion for the free market, telling Bloomberg BusinessWeek, “We are fierce advocates for a thriving, dynamic free market.”

Well, the free market long ago abandoned nuclear power. The right-wing think tank Heritage Foundation remarked, “Expansive loan guarantee programs ... are wrought with problems. At a minimum, they create taxpayer liabilities, give recipients preferential treatment, and distort capital markets.”

Amory Lovins of the Rocky Mountain Institute, a longtime critic of the nuclear power industry, told me, “If you buy more nuclear plants, you’re going to get about two to 10 times less climate solution per dollar, and you’ll get it about 20 to 40 times slower, than if you buy instead the cheaper, faster stuff that is walloping nuclear and coal and gas.” In his 2008 report “The Nuclear Illusion,” Lovins writes, “Nuclear power is continuing its decades-long collapse in the global marketplace because it’s grossly uncompetitive, unneeded, and obsolete — so hopelessly uneconomic that one needn’t debate whether it’s clean and safe; it weakens electric reliability and national security; and it worsens climate change compared with devoting the same money and time to more effective options.”

The White House Office of Management and Budget, in the same statement announcing the $54.5 billion for nuclear power, also listed a “credit subsidy funding of $500 million to support $3 (billion) to $5 billion of loan guarantees for energy efficiency and renewable energy projects.” Thus, just one-tenth the amount for nuclear is being dedicated to energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies.

At the same time, the Obama administration plans to cancel funding for the hugely unpopular Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage facility. Edwin Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists told The Christian Science Monitor: “(The Obama administration) doesn’t have a plan for (storing) radioactive waste from a new generation of nuclear power plants. That is irresponsible.”

The waste from nuclear power plants is not only an ecological nightmare, but also increases the threats of nuclear proliferation. Obama said in his recent State of the Union address: “We’re also confronting perhaps the greatest danger to the American people — the threat of nuclear weapons.” Despite this, plans that accompany what Obama has proposed, his “new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants,” include increased commercial “nuclear fuel reprocessing,” which the Union of Concerned Scientists calls “dangerous, dirty and expensive,” and which they say would increase the global risks of both nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism.

Both Lovins and the Union of Concerned Scientists debunk the myth that nuclear energy is essential to combat global warming. Lovins writes, “Every dollar invested in nuclear expansion will worsen climate change by buying less solution per dollar.” Obama said that this first tranche of public funding, which will benefit the energy giant Southern Company, “will create thousands of construction jobs in the next few years, and some 800 permanent jobs.” Yet investment in solar, wind and cogeneration technologies could do the same thing, quickly creating industries here in the U.S. that are thriving in Europe. What’s more, the risks of failure of a windmill or a solar panel are minute when compared with nuclear power plant disasters like Three Mile Island and Chernobyl.

From economics, to the environment, to the prevention of nuclear threats, Obama’s nuclear loan guarantees fail on all counts.

--Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on 800 stations, including WYOU cable access TV and WORT/FM 89.9 radio here. Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.

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Der Spiegel
February 18, 2010

The World from Berlin

'Obama's Nuclear Calculation Not Likely to Bear Fruit'

Charles Hawley

US President Barack Obama has announced billions of dollars in loan guarantees for two new nuclear power plants in Georgia. Many see the move as an attempt to gain Republican support for his climate change bill. But German commentators argue that Obama has made a mistake.

The United States hasn't built a new nuclear power plant in three decades. But if President Barack Obama has his way, that will soon change. On Tuesday, Obama announced a federal loan guarantee worth $8.3 billion (€6.11 billion) for the construction of two new nuclear power plants in the state of Georgia.

"Whether it is nuclear energy or solar or wind energy, if we fail to invest in these technologies today, we'll be importing them tomorrow," Obama said in his speech.

The announcement has been widely criticized by environmental groups in the US, many of whom do not view nuclear energy as a clean energy solution. So far, no permanent storage site for nuclear waste has been found, with the Obama administration saying in 2009 that the Yucca Mountain Repository, once touted as a potential solution to the problem, is no longer an option. Currently, waste is stored on site at nuclear facilities.

"The loan guarantees announced today may ease the politics around comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation, but we do not believe that they are the best policy," Carl Pope, head of the Sierra Club, an influential environmental organization, told the New York Times on Tuesday.

Currently, there are just over 100 nuclear power plants in the US, supplying some 19.6 percent of American energy needs. With many of those reactors scheduled to go offline in coming years, there have been calls for a nuclear renaissance in the US. Indeed, the Obama administration has requested $54 billion in the 2011 budget for loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors.

Nuclear Industry Bailout

Obama's lifting of the 30-year moratorium on new reactor construction is seen in part as an effort to gain bipartisan support for his energy package, which includes the goal of establishing an emissions cap-and-trade system in the US and reducing American CO2 emissions by 4 percent by 2020 relative to 1990 levels.

Critics, though, point to the fact that costs for new reactors have skyrocketed in recent years, from $3 billion a decade ago to $9 billion today. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the chance of energy companies defaulting on nuclear reactor loan guarantees is "very high -- well above 50 percent." Of 26 applications for new reactors sent to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the last three years, 19 of them have been cancelled or substantially delayed, often due to concerns about budget overruns and excessive costs.

"This is a massive effort to engage in risk shifting so the construction can go forward," Ellen Vancko, an analyst with the Union of Concerned Scientists, told MSNBC. "It's no different than the Wall Street bailout or the GM bailout. The nuclear industry just wants it in advance."

German papers on Thursday take a look at Obama's decision.

The center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung writes:

"Critics of atomic energy are convinced that campaign donations from the nuclear industry influenced Obama's decision. No less than $63 million have flowed into the campaign budgets of various candidates in the last 10 years. Obama too has profited from this generosity. But there are two other factors that likely influenced him more. First, Obama never experienced firsthand the anti-atomic movement as did many left-leaning politicians of his generation in Europe. He really does see ... atomic energy as a viable option to reduce US CO2 emissions. He feels the risks are manageable."

"Secondly, as with all of Obama's decisions, the pro-nuclear stance stems from domestic political calculations: For years, Republicans have thrown their weight behind a nuclear renaissance. They fantasized about 100 new reactors. By making concessions to the conservatives on the issue of atomic energy, the president hopes for quid pro quo when it comes to his climate protection package."

"It is a calculation that is not likely to bear fruit. As he has done in the health care debate, Obama has shown indecisiveness recently in the climate debate as well. His climate alliance, which included support from the energy sector, is disintegrating. The first companies are turning their backs on him. Republicans have taken notice, making it unlikely that they will give Obama the satisfaction of supporting one of his key reforms in an election year. Some Democrats have likewise gotten cold feet. A climate protection law complete with a European-style emissions cap-and-trade regime won't become a reality in the US in the near future. Instead, the country will only get a few more nuclear power plants."

The left-leaning daily Die Tageszeitung writes:

"Even if the US begins constructing new nuclear reactors, that hardly means that a new atomic renaissance is approaching in free-market democracies. On the contrary. The fact that Obama had to rubber stamp federal loan guarantees worth over $8 billion for two atomic power plants clearly shows that nuclear energy is only economical with massive state help."

"For new atomic power plants to be economical on their own, they must provide electricity for eight cents per kilowatt hour. The cost of electricity from both wind generators and solar-thermal power plants will soon fall to that level. It may be that state money can reanimate atomic technology on the short term. But given such numbers, the industry won't survive for long."

The Financial Times Deutschland writes:

"In contrast to the debate in Germany, atomic power and environmentalism are not necessarily mutually exclusive in the US. Even some environmental activists in America define green policies as anything which reduces CO2 emissions. People are more concerned with global warming and America's dependence on oil from countries that sponsor terrorism than they are with the safety of nuclear energy and the problems posed by waste storage. The mood is similar in countries like Britain."

"In Germany, the situation is a different one. Given the relatively young age of existing reactors, constructing new ones is unnecessary. And it would be a political impossibility (...) ."

"The degree of emotion and ideology in Germany's discussion of atomic energy is likely unmatched anywhere in the world. Opponents undeniably have good arguments on their side, particularly when it comes to the challenges of long-term storage of nuclear waste. But Germany, in contrast to its position in the renewable energy debate, is not likely to take a leadership role when it comes to phasing out nuclear energy. Internationally, the focus is on cutting carbon emissions. Wherever older power plants are to be found, atomic power will experience a renaissance."

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Huffington Post
February 18, 2010

President Obama's Nuclear Reversal

Erich Pica

President Obama announced Tuesday that the Department of Energy is awarding $8 billion in taxpayer dollars towards loan guarantees to build the United States' first nuclear reactors in nearly thirty years. This move may be politically expedient, but for the public, it's a raw deal.

As a candidate, Obama expressed openness to new reactors, but said, "Before an expansion... is considered, key issues must be addressed including: security of nuclear fuel and waste, waste storage, and proliferation."

President Obama should heed candidate Obama's advice. These issues have not been addressed. If anything, the challenges facing the nuclear industry have grown worse.

With Yucca Mountain a no-go, there is still nowhere to put the radioactive waste piling up across the country. New reactors would only add to the waste problem and could increase pressure to reprocess spent fuel, a dangerous and costly scheme that would increase waste streams.

There's also still no way to ensure reactors' safety. Reports of Homer Simpson-like lapses by staff at reactor sites abound, and the FBI has called nuclear facilities "target rich" environments for terrorists. More reactors also mean more weapons-usable material, increasing the risk of proliferation.

The fiscal implications of President Obama's position are alarming. For decades, the industry has depended on taxpayer support. Investing in emerging technologies that can eventually thrive on their own makes sense, but the nuclear industry doesn't fit the bill. After more than 50 years as one of the biggest recipients of federal subsidies, the industry should sink or swim on its own.

Many on Capitol Hill complain that within the climate debate, the nuclear industry isn't getting its fair share of attention. Some, like Senators Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Jim Webb (D-Va.) propose to remedy this with a new, hundred-billion dollar subsidy plan.

But the premise that the industry has been given short-shrift is false. Nuclear reactors have received more preferential treatment than any other source of electricity. Even today, the industry is slated to receive more federal loan guarantees, a host of tax credits for nuclear power production, and insurance subsidized through the Price Anderson Act, which was renewed for 20 years in 2005.

Investments in nuclear plants are deemed too risky by private industry (even before the financial crisis, Wall Street banks refused to grant loans for reactors, which tells you something), so the nuclear industry relies on loan guarantees from the federal government for new construction. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the risk of default on such loans is "very high -- well above 50 percent." President Obama's new budget dedicates more than $50 billion to nuclear loan guarantees. Taxpayers could be left on the hook for a massive bailout.

The firms angling to profit from new reactors, including Westinghouse, General Electric and Exelon, as well as electric utilities, are some of the wealthiest corporations in the country. Especially now, with deficits running so high, they should not become the beneficiaries of new government largess.

Nuclear industry lobbyists love to point to France to argue that having lots of reactors can work. But France has not solved its waste problem, and it faces a host of challenges from its nuclear facilities, such as a radioactive leak that recently forced the closure of two rivers. In the U.S., three times the legally safe amount of radioactive tritium, a cancer-causing carcinogen, has been detected in the groundwater along the Connecticut River in Vermont, leaking from pipes in the Vermont Yankee reactor. This news comes on the heels of the admission by the owner of the reactor that it willfully deceived lawmakers about its safety. And when it comes to the laudable goal of reducing carbon emissions, there are speedier and more affordable options. Truly clean options, including efficiency and wind and solar power, should be the focus.

In his remarks in Maryland on Tuesday, President Obama appealed to an international "race to... command growing energy industries" and invest in new technologies. But nuclear power is as old as the hula hoop, and is just as technologically advanced. President Obama should ditch this failed industry and take the lead on investing in truly clean, safe, and financially viable solutions to our energy crisis, rejecting the industry's rhetoric and abandoning this false solution.

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PhysOrg
February 18, 2010

GE and Hitachi want to use nuclear waste as a fuel

by Lin Edwards

(PhysOrg.com) -- One of the world's biggest providers of nuclear reactors, GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (a joint venture of General Electric and Hitachi), wants to reprocess nuclear waste for use as a fuel in advanced nuclear power plants, instead of burying it in waste repositories such as that proposed at Nevada's Yucca Mountain.

Conventional nuclear power plants in the US only harness around five percent of the energy of nuclear fuels. The reprocessing technique would separate nuclear waste into different types of fuels, some of which can be used in conventional nuclear power plants, and some of which can only be used in advanced fast neutron reactors. Reprocessing of nuclear waste to extract more useable fuel has been criticized in the US because it produces pure plutonium, which could be stolen and used to make nuclear weapons. To get around this difficulty, GE Hitachi’s proposed method produces a fuel that is much harder to steal.

The GE Hitachi process separates wastes from conventional nuclear power plants into three streams, by applying voltage to a molten salt. The first waste material consists of the products of fission, which cannot be further used as fuel and will need to be stored, but the storage time required is reduced from tens of thousands of years to a few hundred years (although a small fraction of the material will still need to be stored for over 10,000 years). The second material is uranium that does not have enough fissile material to be used in the light water uranium reactors in the US, which need enriched uranium, but it can be used by deuterium (heavy water) uranium reactors, which are used in Canada.

The final group of waste products is a mixture of transuranic elements including plutonium and neptunium. The plutonium is not separated from the other elements, and the mixture releases 1,000 times more heat and 10,000 times more neutrons than pure plutonium. This makes it much harder to steal, and therefore less of a security risk, and it is also much easier to detect. The mixture of transuranic elements can be used in nuclear reactors that use molten sodium as the coolant rather than water, and this type is used in Japan and a few other countries. GE Hitachi has designed a reactor known as the PRISM reactor that would be able to use the mixed fuel, but sodium cooled reactors have not been approved for use in the US.

A GE Hitachi spokesman said previous US administrations had little interest in re-using spent nuclear fuel, but the Obama administration is increasing support for nuclear power and looking at possibilities such as reprocessing. If adopted, the proposal would significantly decrease the amount of dangerous nuclear waste that needs to be stored.

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TIME
February 18, 2010

Why Obama's Nuclear Bet Won't Pay Off

By Michael Grunwald

If you want to understand why the U.S. hasn't built a nuclear reactor in three decades, the Vogtle power plant outside Atlanta is an excellent reminder of the insanity of nuclear economics. The plant's original cost estimate was less than $1 billion for four reactors. Its eventual price tag in 1989 was nearly $9 billion, for only two reactors. But now there's widespread chatter about a nuclear renaissance, so the Southern Co. is finally trying to build the other two reactors at Vogtle. The estimated cost: $14 billion. And you can be sure that number is way too low, because nuclear cost estimates are always way too low.

That's why no Wall Street moneyman in his right mind would finance a new reactor. But President Obama has located an alternative financier: you. On Tuesday he announced an $8.33 billion loan guarantee for the new Vogtle reactors, the first step in the Administration's push to jump-start the nuclear construction industry. Obama also urged Congress to set aside political differences and triple the budget for nuclear loan guarantees. "On an issue that affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we can't keep on being mired in the same old stale debates between the left and the right, between environmentalists and entrepreneurs," Obama said.

But the President is ignoring a much fresher debate: between theory and reality. Even if Obama were correct that a nuclear rebirth is needed to address the climate crisis — and he isn't correct — the fact is that the rebirth isn't happening. Despite the prospect of new taxpayer guarantees — and the cradle-to-grave subsidies that already support this 50-year-old industry at the federal and state level — utilities keep scrapping or delaying plans for new reactors.

In January, for example, after a Florida commission denied requests for dramatic electricity-rate hikes, plans for two new reactors in the Keys were suspended, and plans for two more reactors outside St. Petersburg were delayed. Last August, the Tennessee Valley Authority scrapped plans for three new reactors in Alabama and delayed a fourth by at least four years. Other reactors have been canceled in Texas, Missouri and Idaho; license applications have been suspended in Mississippi, Louisiana and New York. Peter Bradford, a former member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), has calculated that of the 26 new applications submitted to the NRC since 2007, nine have been canceled or suspended indefinitely, and 10 more have been delayed by one to five years. Utilities like Exelon, Duke Energy and FPL have ditched or scaled back their nuclear ambitions.

In his speech Tuesday, Obama acknowledged "some serious drawbacks with respect to nuclear energy," but the drawbacks he mentioned — waste disposal and reactor safety — are not the real obstacles to a rebirth. It would be nice to have a permanent Yucca Mountain–style repository for spent nuclear fuel, but for now plants have been storing their waste on-site without major problems. And the nuclear industry's safety record has improved dramatically in the 30 years since the Three Mile Island meltdown, although there are still occasional blips like the recent radioactive leak at a Vermont plant. The NRC is not exactly a hostile regulator, but sometimes it shows teeth: in October, it identified problems with the Westinghouse AP1000 reactor design, which could create additional delays for nearly half of the proposed new reactors, including the ones at Vogtle.

But waste-disposal problems, safety issues and regulatory delays create a much more serious obstacle to a nuclear comeback: they jack up the already exorbitant cost of construction. That is the truly serious drawback of nuclear energy. Recent studies have priced new nuclear power at 25 to 30 cents per kilowatt-hour, about four times the cost of producing juice with new wind or coal plants, or 10 times the cost of reducing the need for electricity through investments in efficiency. Nuclear energy is much cleaner than coal, and it provides baseload power when the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining, so it sounds like a sensible way to accommodate increasing electricity demand. But it's not nearly as sensible or feasible or affordable as decreasing electricity demand altogether.

Meanwhile, nuclear costs keep spiraling out of control. Last year, the estimates for several reactors doubled, and for one Pennsylvania reactor more than tripled. This is why credit-rating agencies keep downgrading utilities with nuclear ambitions, which increases their borrowing costs and makes their projects even more expensive. Even with the federal guarantees, the new reactors at Vogtle are expected to boost local electricity bills by 9% — and like most nuke-friendly states, Georgia has enacted a law ensuring that ratepayers won't get their money back if the utility fails to complete the plant.

Nuclear power really is emissions-free, so we're fortunate that 20% of our electricity comes from existing nuclear plants. But even if they weren't spectacularly expensive, additional nukes couldn't come on line quickly enough to solve our climate problems; the industry dream of 45 new plants by 2030 would barely replace aging plants scheduled for decommissioning. And nuclear energy may be the least cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gases, which is why private investors are pouring billions into efficiency as well as wind, solar and other renewables instead. Taxpayers would get more bang for their energy bucks if their elected representatives made similar choices.

But nuclear energy is popular with the public and wildly popular on Capitol Hill. Obama's push to expand the loan guarantees was one of the only bipartisan applause lines in his State of the Union address. New nukes are a priority for unions as well as for utilities; the Vogtle project, while not exactly shovel-ready, is expected to create 3,500 well-paying jobs if dirt starts moving next year. Meanwhile, Republican politicians who don't believe in global warming and didn't even want the word French in their fries can't stop talking about French nuclear plants that slash French emissions and produce 80% of French electricity. They tend not to mention that those plants were financed by the French government.

Ultimately, the U.S. may be heading toward a similar brand of nuclear socialism. Obama talks about massive nuclear subsidies as just one part of his larger clean-energy agenda, but he hasn't made them contingent on GOP support for that larger agenda. So the nuclear subsidies are sure to pass, while the larger agenda is likely to stall. Eventually, extravagant government largesse might create a nuclear rebirth of sorts — but it might end up strangling better solutions in their cribs or prevent them from ever being born.

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KXNT
February 17, 2010

Yucca Mountain License Hearings Stopped

Another step has been taken to shut down the Yucca Mountain nuclear repository. On Wednesday, a panel of judges accepted the Department of Energy's request to stop most license hearings for the dump site. The DOE's next step is to withdraw its license application for Yucca Mountain altogether. That action could come as early as next month. While Nevada officials hailed the government's latest move, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford is urging work on Yucca Mountain to resume. At a news conference Wednesday, Sanford urged the Obama administration to quote, "recommit" to the project quote, "for environmental and financial reasons."

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Las Vegas SUN
February 17, 2010

SC leaders may sue if Nev. nuke waste dump ditched

The Associated Press

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford accused the president of playing politics with nuclear waste Tuesday, urging the Obama administration to follow through on plans to send thousands of tons of radioactive material to Nevada and urging legal action if it does not.

Sanford, surrounded by state, local and federal officials, accused the Obama administration of allowing "old-style Chicago politics" to dictate the fate of a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The governor said the president was trying to protect Nevada Democratic Sen. Harry Reid's seat while ripping off companies in South Carolina that have paid $1.2 billion to create the dump.

A Reid spokesman denied the charge, but the Republican governor called Obama's plan "a detour from basically a 25-year compact based on simple old-style Chicago politics that are the antithesis of the change that he himself had promised" during his campaign.

"This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington, D.C.," Sanford said.

The proposed site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas has been targeted for 20 years to house the nation's high level nuclear waste. As a candidate, Obama promised to close the facility, and his latest budget calls for eliminating funding for the site. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has said Yucca Mountain is not an option and his department will withdraw its license application by the end of this month, essentially nixing the project as a commission studies where the waste should go.

"As we move to expand nuclear power, the President is fully committed to ensuring that the nation meets our long term storage obligations for nuclear waste," Moira Mack, a White House spokeswoman, said in an e-mailed statement.

For now, high-level nuclear waste is stored at 80 sites around the nation, typically at nuclear power plants or places such as the federal Savannah River Site in Aiken County, where more than 3,600 tons of nuclear waste is stored. County officials there plan to discuss litigation themselves, said Councilman Chuck Smith.

"We'd hope the administration would re-look at this issue, but we don't think they will and so we're certainly trying identify what our alternatives are from a legal standpoint," he said.

State Attorney General Henry McMaster said he is working on the legal questions. He said that includes talking with attorneys general in other states as well as the utility industry and nuclear industry legal experts.

The issue has been swirling for years here and in Nevada, where political careers can be lost based support of Yucca Mountain.

Sanford said the plans for Yucca Mountain span decades and numerous administrations and that $10 billion has spent on the underground site. "I mean, I think we all get it that Harry Reid is in a tough race out in Nevada and giving him this would give him a win in a tough race in Nevada but it would come at great expense to the rest of us as Americans," he said.

Jon Summers, communications director for Reid, said the senator consistently has opposed Yucca and the only reason that location was chosen was because Nevada lacked clout in Washington 25 years ago. "We now have an administration that is listening to Senator Reid and the people of Nevada," Summers said.

"It's interesting that the only people that are complaining about this are Republicans," he said, noting they're "the only people that want to bring nuclear waste to Nevada."

In December the federal Government Accountability Office said it is cheaper to store nuclear waste in the short term in concrete casks at the nation's nuclear power plants but that that method would be more costly over time.

The report said that approach would cost up to $34 billion during the next 100 years while the Yucca Mountain facility would cost at least $41 billion. It noted costs would rise when that waste has to be repackaged in the next century or a permanent repository is opened.

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Las Vegas SUN
February 17, 2010

Fed loan guarantees may boost nuclear power return

The Associated Press

More than $8 billion in new federal loan guarantees to build two nuclear reactors in Georgia could be the first step toward a nuclear renaissance in the United States, three decades after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident halted all new reactor orders.

With the nuclear industry poised to begin construction of at least a half dozen plants over the next decade, President Barack Obama announced the first loan guarantees Tuesday, casting them as both economically essential and politically attractive. He called nuclear power a key part of comprehensive energy legislation that assigns a cost to the carbon pollution of fossil fuels, giving utility companies more incentive to turn to cleaner nuclear fuel.

"This is only the beginning," Obama said in designating the new federal financial backing for a pair of reactors in Burke County, Ga., to be built by Atlanta-based Southern Co. Obama's budget would triple _ to $54.5 billion _ loan guarantees available for new nuclear construction.

The federal guarantees, authorized by Congress in 2005, are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the huge expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults. Reports by Congressional Budget Office and Government Accountability Office have estimated that the risk of default for new nuclear reactors could be as high as 50 percent.

"This is a pre-emptive bailout where the government has already guaranteed to saddle taxpayers with any failure that the (nuclear) industry might run into," said Allison Fisher, an energy organizer at Public Citizen, a Washington-based consumer advocacy group.

Critics also note that the loan guarantees come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Senate committee this month that for the foreseeable future nuclear plants likely will store spent fuel rods on site.

Environmentalists say renewable energy such as wind and solar are more cost-effective than nuclear power and do not come with side effects such as radioactive waste.

But Marvin Fertel, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, a policy organization for the nuclear industry, said the loan guarantees will spur construction of nuclear plants all over the country, reducing greenhouse gases blamed for global warming and creating thousands of high-paying jobs.

The Georgia project is expected to create about 3,500 construction jobs and permanently employ 850 people, and Obama coupled the loan guarantee announcement with a visit to a job training center in Lanham, Md., at the headquarters of Local 26 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The union represents electrical and telecommunications workers, and it offers training for energy jobs, including the construction of nuclear power plants.

Obama said the new reactors would reduce carbon pollution by 16 million tons a year, compared with a similar coal-fired power plant.

Although Chu called Tuesday's announcement a significant step to restart the domestic nuclear industry, actual construction of the first reactor is still years away. Southern Co.'s application for a license to build and operate the reactors is pending with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. The earliest any could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012, the NRC said.

Southern Chief Executive David Ratcliffe and Chu both said the new generation of nuclear reactors will be significantly safer than those built during the 1970s because of improvements in technology. This time around, the industry and regulators have streamlined licensing and are planning to use a standard design. The Three Mile Island accident in 1979 forced numerous power plants to be redesigned during construction.

"I have a lot of confidence that our approach this time will yield much better results," Ratcliffe said.

--Associated Press writers Julie Pace and Tim Huber in Charleston, W.Va., contributed to this report.

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Las Vegas SUN
February 17, 2010

Obama nuke plant loan reflects new energy strategy

The Associated Press

The Obama administration's planned loan guarantee to build the first nuclear power plant in the U.S in almost three decades is part of a broad shift in energy strategy to lessen dependence on foreign oil and reduce the use of other fossil fuels blamed for global warming.

President Barack Obama called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his Jan. 27 State of the Union speech and followed that by proposing to triple loan guarantees for new nuclear plants. He wants to use nuclear power and other alternative sources of energy in his effort to shift energy policy.

Obama in the coming week will announce the loan guarantee to build the nuclear power plant, an administration official said Friday. The two new Southern Co. reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., are part of a White House energy plan that administration officials hope will draw Republican support.

Loan guarantees for other sites are expected to be announced in the coming months, the official said, who would speak only on condition of anonymity ahead of Obama's announcement. The federal guarantees are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

"The last thing Americans want is another government bailout for a failing industry, but that's exactly what they're getting from the Obama administration," said Ben Schreiber, an analyst for the environmental group Friends of the Earth. "This is great news for Wall Street but a bad deal for Main Street."

Even with next week's announcement, construction of the first reactor is still years away. The Southern Co. has applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a construction and operating license for the plant, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. NRC spokesman Eliot Brenner said the earliest any of those could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012.

The Southern Co. has begun site preparation in Burke but cannot begin construction without NRC approval.

Obama's budget for the coming year would add $36 billion in new federal loan guarantees on top of $18.5 billion already budgeted _ but not spent _ for a total of $54.5 billion. That's enough to help build six or seven new nuclear plants, which can cost $8 billion to $10 billion each.

The proposed new reactors would generate power for some 1.4 million people and employ about 850 people, the administration official said, adding that the Georgia project would create about 3,000 construction jobs.

Spiraling costs, safety concerns and opposition from environmentalists have kept utilities from building any new nuclear power plants in the U.S. since the early 1980s. The 104 nuclear reactors now in operation in 31 states provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams that Obama has championed as a way to save the environment and economy at the same time.

Environmentalists and fiscal hawks oppose new nuclear plants and note that they come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Republicans like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham welcome the shift, but some pro-nuclear Republicans remain nervous about the heart of the Obama-backed climate bill _ a plan to limit heat-trapping pollution, which would raise energy costs.

--Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

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Reno Gazette-Journal
February 17, 2010

Bill Gordon: Recycling is the best scenario for nuclear waste

In response to the Feb. 3 Reno Gazette-Journal editorial, "Now a nation can begin search for a solution for nuke waste":

Recycling nuclear fuel is the best scenario.

Many Americans likely don't understand the distinctive difference between weapons-grade nuclear waste and used fuel from our nation's 104 nuclear energy facilities.

Weapons program nuclear waste is 95 percent-enriched uranium and governed by regulatory requirements unique to the defense industry. Fuel pellets from commercial nuclear energy facilities are only enriched between 3 and 5 percent. Once in the reactor for six years, commercial used fuel can also be recycled for re-use, as Japan, France and Russia currently doing. Canada will soon join their ranks.

There also seems to be some confusion about the Yucca Mountain storage facility for spent -- or used (because it can be recycled) -- nuclear fuel. President Obama did not "eliminate" Yucca Mountain. Congress instructed the Energy Department to collect funds from each nuclear generating plant (read this as ratepayers) for deposit in the U.S. general fund. When the Energy Department wants to use this money for the Yucca Mountain project or any similar project, it has to get permission from Congress by including these funds as a line item in the budget. This is the same scenario that exists with our Social Security program.

So far, $13 billion of ratepayer cash has been spent on Yucca Mountain, and today there is nearly $30 billion left in the fund. The president simply did not include a line item for Yucca Mountain in the fiscal 2011 budget. And, yes, the ratepayers are still paying into the U.S. general fund though there isn't clear direction for the money.

As for transport, used fuel can be safely transported across the nation to Yucca Mountain or any other location. Each 280-ton storage cask is designed and tested to ensure they prevent the release of radioactivity, even under the most extreme conditions -- earthquakes, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods and even sabotage.

These casks completely contain all radiation and are safe to touch, inspect or lean on. The casks will not contaminate ships, trucks, trailers or loading docks. Neither the environment nor animals nor people can be contaminated by these storage cases, as the editorial would lead one to believe. Currently they are stored on-site at each of our nation's nuclear power plants and can remain there securely and safely for the next several decades.

Your editorial nailed this one: The United States needs to find a solution for our used nuclear fuel. France safely recycles 95 percent of its used fuel, plus used fuel from other nations, at its La Hague facility. The 5 percent remaining after recycling is vitrified and safely stored underground. I walked this underground storage room and did not receive a measurable dose of radiation. This room has a 60-foot chamber below a 6-foot-thick concrete floor. In this country, such vitrified nuclear fuel could be safely transported to a national storage facility and safely stored as well.

Recycling used nuclear fuel and storing only the 5 percent remaining, in concert with renewable power development, is the best scenario to support the future energy needs of our nation.

--Bill Gordon lives in Reno.

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Ely Daily Times
February 17, 2010

As We See It

Gibbons should block attempt to bypass Supreme Court ruling

One of the major flaws in the plan to place the nation’s civilian, high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain was how Congress toyed with the law.

Originally, there were to be three proposed sites for a repository. The governor in whatever state a site was proposed was to have the power to veto it.

Of course, the law became fluid once Nevada didn’t cooperate. There never were alternative sites. Only Yucca Mountain was studied.

Then Nevada’s governor proposed to veto that. So Congress simply changed the law, catering to the 49 states that didn’t want the dump in their back yards.

Now, a state agency plans on taking a similar tact with last months’ Nevada Supreme Court ruling, that overturned a Seventh Judicial District Court decision. That ruling by a visiting judge, allowed the state engineer to grant the Southern Nevada Water Authority groundwater rights in Spring Valley years after the public comment period had ended, and without accepting more comments from protestors before the final hearings.

The High Court bounced the case back to Ely District Court with the direction for the court to decide if more public comment should be received at new hearings before the state engineer ruled again, or if the permits needed to be canceled and re-filed. That first option likely wouldn’t delay the actual pipeline project, as it will be a few more years before the SNWA board decides to start construction. The second option could derail the project, requiring it to start over from the beginning.

SNWA is unhappy with the decision, as is the Nevada Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.

The law at the time of the initial filings in 1989 required the state engineer to rule on water applications within a year of the close of the protest period. The Legislature amended the law in 2003 concerning water rights for residential use by deleting the one-year requirement.

But the Nevada Justices unanimously ruled that the 2003 amendment did not apply to the 1989 filings.

Instead of waiting for a new hearing and the possibility of the court ruling against the pipeline project, the state and SNWA are taking a page from the national nuclear waste dump playbook. They want to toy with the law.

The Department of Conservation and Natural Resources is drafting a bill to be introduced at the Feb. 23 special session of the Legislature. That special session is to focus on Nevada’s $881 million budget deficit. But the state (and SNWA) wants the Legislature to revisit the 2003 amendment and make it retroactive, overriding the Supreme Court’s ruling.

SNWA had the law on its side in this lengthy debate. Groundwater doesn’t belong to the county; it belongs to the state. And the state, through its water engineer, can decide where that resource is to be used. But then the state violated its own law in the rush to get SNWA almost everything it wanted.

That violation curbed the First Amendment rights of everyone who wanted to protest the project as it reached the final hearing stages. The state engineer refused to accept their comments, and the presiding judge went along with gagging the protestors. The Nevada Supreme Court, however, deemed the law and the protesters’ rights, more important than the cries of foul from Southern Nevada.

But it’s up to Gov. Gibbons to set the agenda for the special session. At the moment he wants to limit it to the budget crisis, although he wants to include education reform because of its budgetary impact.

We understand the angst in Clark County and the State Engineer’s office. But we believe no one should support changing a law to make it retroactive. What’s next?

Will the Legislature increase all state fees and taxes from 2000 through 2009 to fill today’s budget gap and ask us to pony up?

That would be ridiculous. But so is this effort to change the 2003 law, to negate the Supreme Court’s ruling. We also find it a threat to our cherished Separation of Powers.

The governor should block the bill from being introduced. And the state engineer should be preparing his case to be heard again in Ely.

SNWA railed against the "Not One Drop" effort in White Pine County because the law was on its side. The law still is on its side.

But it should be willing to abide by the law as interpreted by the Nevada Supreme Court and let the judicial process proceed.

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CNN
February 17, 2010

Obama's nuclear power push faces obstacle: Waste

From Dugald McConnell

Washington (CNN) -- President Obama's announcement Tuesday of loan guarantees for nuclear power plants may encourage new construction, but a problem still remains that has plagued atomic energy for decades: what to do with nuclear waste?

On the left, opponents of nuclear power say the president should not be using taxpayer money to help build more power plants that will produce even more radioactive material, so long as the government has not figured out where to put it all.

"We haven't found a solution for the 100 nuclear power plants operating," said Stephen Smith of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. "And waste is building up on-site, with no solution."

On the right, critics fault the president for leaving the country without a plan for disposing of the waste, when he decided to pull the plug on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump in Nevada. The government spent billions of dollars studying the location.

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, a Republican, said the president's decision was "spectacularly misguided, and breaks a promise" made "decades ago" by the federal government to handle the waste.

Sanford accused Obama of making a "Chicago-style" political play to help Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nevada, who faces a tough re-election bid in a state where the Yucca Mountain plan was unpopular. But the White House points out that the president opposed the site since he was campaigning as a candidate, on the grounds of scientific and security questions.

Reid echoed those security concerns, saying any transportation of nuclear materials across the country could open a vulnerability.

"Leave it on-site where it is," he said last year. "You don't have to worry about transporting it. Saves the country billions and billions of dollars."

Currently, 70,000 tons of radioactive waste are stored at more than 100 nuclear sites around the country, and 2,000 tons are added every year.

After uranium has been used in a reactor, the spent fuel remains radioactive for thousands of years. It is taken out and put into a pool of water, or above ground in canisters made of concrete, steel, and lead. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says the canisters are currently certified for up to 90 years of use, but that term may be extended.

During a visit to the Dresden nuclear plant in Illinois a few years ago, Christopher Crane of Exelon Nuclear stood next to a storage cask and showed CNN how little radiation escapes.

"If you stood here for an hour," he said, "you would pick up the same amount of radiation as you did by flying from Washington to Chicago to visit us today."

But both supporters and opponents of nuclear power largely agree that storing the material in casks at nuclear plants is no long-term solution.

"This generation was responsible for creating the waste," says Jack Edlow, whose Washington-based company transports nuclear material, "and this generation should make the decision to focus on it."

In January, the Obama administration announced a blue-ribbon panel would take a new look at the problem, headed by former Democratic congressman Lee Hamilton and former Republican National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft.

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St. Augustine Record
February 17, 2010

Letter: No taxpayer bailouts for nuclear plants overruns

By Robin Nadeau

Editor: The author of a Letter to the Editor in The St. Augustine Record on Jan. 31, after claiming that solar- and wind-generated energy "would not work," stated that nuclear energy has a "proven" record.

Nuclear energy has a proven record, but not the one that the writer inferred. We have 103 nuclear plants in America. They have proven to be dirty, dangerous and expensive.

In America and other nations, nuclear energy has a record of huge cost overruns, in some cases up to seven times the initial estimated cost, and a high likelihood of defaulting on loans. Private banks will not finance the construction of the projected new plants. Instead, an army of lobbyists are convincing our president and many legislators, that taxpayers must bear the burden of insuring the cost overruns or the expenses incurred by accidents at these plants (such as the damage done to Florida's Turkey Point

Plant by Hurricane Andrew in 1991). Initially, the U.S. Senate wanted to subsidize construction costs for new nuclear plants with $50 billion from our taxes; but after public outrage, they have, so far, whittled the amount to $18.5 billion.

Fiscal conservatives from the Heritage Foundation and National Taxpayers Union disapprove of this taxpayer bail out, and have beaten such loan guarantees three times.

A new plant under construction in Finland, has incurred such large cost overruns that the Finnish government is suing the contracted French company.

Meanwhile, there is no solution for disposal of the toxic waste produced by these plants. Much of it is stored in a cave in Nevada's Yucca Mountain, sitting in an earthquake-prone area, despite the objections of the governor and many residents.

While 43 states suffer from chronic or periodic droughts, these plants require 762,000 gallons of water per minute to cool the nuclear core, returning only 70 percent of this water to the source body of water, with massive fish kills in its wake.

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Aiken Standard
February 17, 2010

URS head: No reason to halt Yucca

By Mike Gellatly

The day after politicians threatened legal action to stop the termination of the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository, the man at the head of the company in charge of the project spoke out.

David Pethick, general manager of URS Corp., spoke Wednesday to the Senior Men's Club of Aiken and, in a question-and-answer session, directly addressed the facility's future and the political furor surrounding its fate.

Pethick lauded the Yucca project, saying there was no technical reason that the project could not go ahead

"Yucca Mountain has obviously been studied and studied, there are no technical reasons for why you would not use Yucca as a site," he said. "You've come through all of that to the point where a license was submitted... to the NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission)."

Pethick has reason to believe in Yucca - his company was awarded the contract to manage the site that has a maximum value of up to $2.5 billion.

"We won the Yucca Mountain contract. But we're still trying to figure out what we won," he joked.

He told the crowd that his company's role at the moment was responding to questions from the government as the license application process continues.

He added that whatever the long-term solution to the nuclear waste problem, there would be some need for a repository that would have to be located somewhere akin to Yucca Mountain.

That process might end soon, if not blocked by legal challenges. On Tuesday, while politicians threatened lawsuits, a panel of administrative judges halted most license hearings for the nuclear waste site.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board granted the request by the Department of Energy as part of a process for the Obama administration to seek a final withdrawal of the plan to build Yucca.

URS Corp. operates the Yucca Mountain facility and is the liquid waste contractor at the Savannah River Site.

--Contact Mike Gellatly at mgellatly@aikenstandard.com.

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WRDW-TV
February 17, 2010

Aiken County moves to sue over Yucca Mountain

For years Savannah River Site or SRS has been used to treat millions of pounds of radioactive waste in hopes of one day sending it to Nevada's Yucca mountain.

Reporter: Ashley Jeffery

AIKEN COUNTY, S.C. ---For years Savannah River Site or SRS has been used to treat millions of pounds of radioactive waste in hopes of one day sending it to Nevada's Yucca mountain. But President Obama's plan to shut down the Nevada repository sparks controversy all the way down to Aiken County.

"Billions of dollars have been spent on this initiative and in one six month period, they're going to wipe that out? I don't think so," said Aiken County councilman Chuck Smith. He says they council is filing suit to stop the president's actions because if Yucca mountain never opens, millions of pounds of waste will continue to sit at the Aiken County site.

"I think if we don't get rid of the waste, as time goes on, we're more and more likely to be exposed to things we shouldn't be exposed to," said Joan Greene who lives near the site. "It scares me. It scares me because I don't think the public always knows what's going on," said Greene.

Since the late 80's Yucca mountain cost taxpayers across the country more than $10 billion and cost South Carolina at least $1.2 billion. And it's all that money and all the extra waste that's pushing Aiken county to take legal action.

"The taxpayers are paying for it with nothing to gain from it. We feel like we've got to do something about to look out for the interest of the people in Aiken County," said Councilman Smith.

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NBC Augusta
February 17, 2010

Aiken County takes legal action against White House

By Christine O’Donnell codonnell@nbcaugusta.com

AIKEN, S.C. - Aiken County is taking legal action against the White House for not relocating nuclear waste housed at the Savannah River Site (SRS), according to Council Administrator Clay Killian.

The Aiken County Council made the decision to go after the federal government and the Department of Energy during the executive session of Tuesday night’s meeting.

The U.S. government made a promise 28 years ago to move all the nation's nuclear waste to a permanent storage facility at Yucca Mountain, a nuclear waste site in Nevada. Now the Obama administration is going against that promise.

The promise is part of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act that Congress passed in 1982 during Ronald Reagan’s presidency.

Monday, President Barack Obama made a statement saying that he plans to "zero out" that funding in order to keep a campaign promise he made to the people of Nevada.

Killian says Aiken County is going to use a law firm out of Columbia, Haynesworth Sinkler Boyd, to draw up a restraining order against the federal government to keep the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain from closing.

"We've been a bit dismayed by the government," Killian said.

Tuesday afternoon, Killian along with some council members met with South Carolina's Attorney General Henry McMaster and Gov. Mark Sanford to discuss the lawsuit.

"The planned closure of Yucca Mountain is causing a real concern for people,” Killian said, "The stuff that can't be stored safely here, can be stored safely there."

Since 1982, South Carolina taxpayers have spent more than $1.2 billion to prepare the storage site in Nevada.

A New Ellenton woman, who asked not to be identified, lives about a mile from the site, and she says she is not happy with the current situation.

"It makes me feel uncomfortable that we have to pay money out of our pocket for it to go somewhere and then for it not even to go there and it's still surrounding us,” the anonymous woman said.

The woman has one child, and she will soon be a mother of two.

“[I feel] not safe especially with one kid here and one kid on the way,”

During Tuesday night's meeting, a representative from SRS referred to the nuclear waste facility as the “biggest health hazard to the people in the state of South Carolina."

The Savannah River Site is a nearly 200,000-acre nuclear waste facility that spans three counties in South Carolina.

Killian says the reason for the legal action is to keep the local community safe.

"Is [storing waste] without risk anywhere, no,” Killian stated, “ I think the risk is much lower with all the technology that's gone into Yucca instead of the old technology we have here.”

No violations were reported at SRS from last week’s inspection by the federal government.

For the time being, the representatives from the site say they’re doing the best they can to keep the nuclear waste stored as safely as possible.

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Charleston Post Courier
February 17, 2010

Governor challenges Yucca Mountain call

Sanford threatens legal action if Obama's decision stands

By Yvonne Wenger

COLUMBIA -- Gov. Mark Sanford said Tuesday that President Barack Obama's decision to abandon a decades-old plan for Nevada's Yucca Mountain could cost South Carolina $1.2 billion and leave the permanent storage of thousands of tons of nuclear waste in question, and the governor is prepared to sue over it.

Sanford urged Obama to back off his Feb. 1 decision and stick to the 23-year bipartisan compact to use the Nevada facility as a resting ground for the country's nuclear waste, including 4,000 metric tons temporarily housed at the Savannah River Site and elsewhere in South Carolina.

The two-term Republican governor said Obama was motivated to reverse course as a way to ensure U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's re-election in Nevada.

The president decided to eliminate all funding for the facility and withdraw its license application with the U.S. Department of Energy.

The decision will cost the country its $10 billion investment in the Yucca Mountain facility, including $1.2 billion from South Carolinians, Sanford said. State residents continue to pay money for the storage facility through monthly utility bills.

If Obama does not change his mind before the end of the month, Sanford said he will pursue legal action.

"This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington, D.C.," said Sanford, a former congressman.

White House regional communications director Moira Mack defended the president's position. To meet storage demands, Obama established a bipartisan Blue Ribbon Commission to review policies for managing nuclear waste, including all alternatives for the storage, processing and disposal, she said.

"President Obama believes that nuclear power is a vital part of our energy mix which can create jobs and fuel our economy," Mack said in a statement. "As we move to expand nuclear power, the president is fully committed to ensuring that the nation meets our long term storage obligations for nuclear waste."

Reid's spokesman Jon Summers said Democrats won't be deterred from doing what's best for the country. Reid is awaiting recommendations from the U.S. Department of Energy on how to best proceed, Summers said.

"It's clear whether they're in Nevada or out of state, Republicans are united in their effort to bring nuclear waste to Nevada. That won't happen," Summers said in a statement. "Working with Senator Reid, President Obama's administration has decided to let science determine how best to dispose of the nation's nuclear waste."

S.C. Attorney General Henry McMaster, a Republican running for governor, said his office has been researching possible legal remedies available to South Carolina.

"This includes consultation and collaborative discussions with attorneys general in similarly situated states, utility executives, nuclear industry legal experts, former (Energy Department) officials, and state and local officials from the Aiken, Savannah River Plant community," McMaster said in a statement.

Other efforts to derail Obama's decision also are under way.

U.S. 3rd District Rep. Gresham Barrett, also a GOP candidate for governor, said he is drafting legislation to urge the president to reverse his decision.

On the state level, Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken, said he will file a resolution to set in place a process for South Carolina to recoup the money it invested in Yucca Mountain and lay plans for a permanent storage facility for the nuclear waste currently at the Savannah River Site.

Ryberg said his legislation would look to protect the state in the event Obama does not reverse his decision and legal action doesn't prevail.

--Reach Yvonne Wenger at 803-926-7855 or ywenger@postandcourier.com.

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Daily Caller
February 17, 2010

America’s nuclear option at home

By Mark McIntosh

In the president’s State of the Union speech and subsequent 2011 proposed budget, he threw his environmental community supporters a significant curve ball by proposing a significant increase in financial incentives to build more nuclear power plants. The mere mention of nuclear power during the speech was a thinly veiled attempt to bring Republicans on board to support his presently unpopular cap-and-trade proposal languishing in the Senate. The question is whether Republicans can and should trust that the president is sincere on this issue.

The president supported the idea of expanded nuclear power in this country during the campaign, albeit with the caveat that any new plants be clean, safe and cheap. For all his supportive talk on new nuclear power, he and his administration did not move slowly in declaring Yucca Mountain closed for business as the nation’s depository of nuclear waste. In fact, the administration’s proposed 2011 budget includes no funding of the Yucca depository. The administration’s political calculation behind the Yucca decision is a two-headed beast. First, they are doing everything in their power to keep Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid afloat in the state of Nevada. Second, they are also pandering to the environmental community who essentially theorize that, by killing Yucca, you successfully kill nuclear power as an option. The question Republicans should be asking is how are we to safely store all the existing and future radio active waste that will be produced by a significant expansion of nuclear power in this country.

The Yucca Mountain Depository has been a political hot potato for decades. In 1982, the United States Congress established a national policy to solve the problem of nuclear waste disposal. This policy is a federal law called the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which made the U.S. Department of Energy responsible for finding a site, building, and operating an underground disposal facility called a geologic repository. The recommendation to use a geologic repository dates back to 1957 when the National Academy of Sciences recommended that the best means of protecting the environment and public health and safety would be to dispose of the waste in rock deep underground. DOE began studying Yucca Mountain in 1978 to determine whether it would be suitable for the nation’s first long-term geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste currently stored at 121 above-ground sites around the nation. In 1987, Congress amended the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and directed DOE to study only Yucca Mountain, which is already located within a former nuclear test site. With over 30 years of time invested and roughly $13.5 billion spent on the project to date, it has made Yucca Mountain one of the most studied pieces of geology in the world.

In May 2009, Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu stated:

“Yucca Mountain as a repository is off the table. What we’re going to be doing is saying, let’s step back. We realize that we know a lot more today than we did 25 or 30 years ago. The NRC is saying that the dry cask storage at current sites would be safe for many decades, so that gives us time to figure out what we should do for a long-term strategy. We will be assembling a blue-ribbon panel to look at the issue.”

Although that “bipartisan” blue-ribbon panel has been anticipated for months, it was surprisingly announced the Friday after the State of the Union speech. With so much time, money and effort already invested on this issue, one has to question both the politics and the rationale behind yet another review of the storage issue plus the “safety” of the existing 121 storage sites.

While Nevada politicians and local communities have been opposed to the project for various reasons (although it supported nearly 1,000 local jobs as of 2007) and environmental groups are philosophically opposed to nuclear power as an intermediate solution, Yucca Mountain addresses some critical safety issues that can’t be ignored:

• Federal court-mandated radiation dose limits from Yucca Mountain apply for up to 1,000,000 years. Above ground concrete/steal cask storage are not being held to anywhere near the same standard despite the fact that associated risks are greater, companies can go out of business and essentially abandon sites, and casks constantly need to be maintained to ensure integrity.

• A centralized isolated depository significantly reduces the risk of accidental exposure, or worse, a terrorist act that would potentially expose local communities in close proximity to the 121 storage facilities around the country.

An argument that opponents continually use to generate national opposition is the risks associated with transporting nuclear waste to a centralized site. While there is inherent risk in moving anything from one place to another, the U.S. has safely conducted more than 3,000 shipments of spent nuclear fuel without any harmful release of radioactive material since 1970. Spent nuclear fuel is just one of thousands of potentially harmful materials that can be found on U.S. roads and railways every day.

Instead, Republicans should consider insisting that the Yucca Mountain project be reinstated and acknowledge the sacrifice all Nevadans are making to insure the safety and the availability of clean energy to all Americans. The rest of America could return the favor by rerouting a portion of the waste fees already found on everyone’s energy bills for the benefit of a Nevada permanent fund akin to Alaska’s. With only one “shovel-ready” solution that has already cost the American taxpayer $13.5 billion and studied to death (with yet another commission tasked with finding a solution—as long as it is not Yucca), Republicans would be wise to take a pass on the president’s offer until the White House stops playing politics with the American people’s safety.

Mark McIntosh is an environmental law attorney and policy consultant providing expertise in natural resources, air and energy strategies. He most recently served the George W. Bush administration as Deputy General Counsel of the White House Council on Environmental Quality after having worked as an environmental lawyer and policy counsel in the private sector and for some of the country’s largest and most respected NGOs, including The Pew Charitable Trusts.

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Spartanburg Herald Journal
February 17, 2010

Ultimate waste

Refusal to use $10 billion Yucca Mountain waste facility should trigger suit

Earlier this month, President Barack Obama officially left 39 states holding a bag the federal government has been agreeing to take possession of for the past two decades.

The Obama administration made official its abandonment of a facility in Yucca Mountain, Nev., designed to accommodate the radioactive material currently stored at 121 sites in those 39 states, including the Savannah River Site. Yucca Mountain would also have stored waste from the 104 nuclear reactors currently generating electricity in this country.

Tuesday, Gov. Mark Sanford, two U.S. congressmen and numerous state legislators protested Obama's decision, demanded a change and threatened legal action.

"This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington," Sanford said in Columbia, adding that Obama's move would "undo a 25-year solution that's been in place during Republican and Democratic presidential administrations."

Sanford's close. It was actually the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1987 that set Yucca Mountain's role as our nation's storehouse of nuclear waste, so it's only been agreed upon for 23 years, fewer than four presidents.

It was agreed upon for so long and by so many because it is the best, safest solution to our nuclear waste storage woes. It is also the only viable option the nation has developed, and the facility we have spent $10 billion to create. That money has come largely from the utility bills of people whose electricity is generated by nuclear power, with South Carolinians contributing $1.2 billion of the money.

The partisan politics Sanford referred to are very specific: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has called in his markers with Obama and put the kibosh on storing nuclear waste in his home state.

Sanford and other S.C. politicians pledged Tuesday to file a lawsuit to force Yucca Mountain to open. That and all other possible avenues should be employed in making this facility serve its purpose.

Because Yucca Mountain has never opened, hundreds of facilities have been storing highly radioactive material they were never designed to house. This is particularly true at the Savannah River Site, which has been receiving plutonium from weapons facilities across the nation for the past decade.

The material was supposed to be here only temporarily before some of it was shipped off to be turned into fuel for nuclear reactors and the rest was transported to Yucca Mountain. As of now, neither of those plans is moving forward and all of the waste is sitting near the banks of a major river at a facility that was never designed to hold it.

It's likely that all of the 39 states and hundreds of sites forced by a political power grab to store this dangerous waste have similar stories. They need to make their voices heard, as do we.

The only way to handle this waste safely and avoid the waste of $10 billion is to use Yucca Mountain, and every possible way to force the opening of that facility should be employed.

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The State
February 17, 2010

GOP assails Obama on nuke waste

S.C. Republicans want work to go forward on disposal site in Nevada

By Sammy Fretwell
sfretwell@thestate.com

Gov. Mark Sanford and top Republicans pledged Tuesday to fight President Barack Obama's plan not to open a Nevada disposal site that would take South Carolina's deadliest atomic garbage.

Obama should reconsider his proposal to abandon the Yucca Mountain site - or be prepared to slug it out in court, GOP leaders said at a politically charged news conference in Columbia. Attorney General Henry McMaster, a candidate for governor, said he's weighing legal action that could force the site to open.

Sanford, flanked by Republican U.S. Reps. Joe Wilson and Gresham Barrett, said the federal government should make good on its promise to open Yucca Mountain for nuclear waste disposal. The plan has been in the works since 1987 and has cost the country some $10 billion, Sanford said. The government was to begin moving waste to Yucca in 1998, but environmental concerns in Nevada delayed the project.

Sanford, Wilson and Barrett, who also is a candidate for governor, challenged S.C. Democrats to support them.

"This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington, D.C.," Sanford said, noting that the administration's proposal will "undo a 25-year solution that's been in place during Republican and Democratic presidential administrations."

U.S. Rep. John Spratt, a Democrat from York County who chairs the House Budget Committee, said after the news conference that the Yucca Mountain site should open.

"I disagree with the administration's decision on Yucca Mountain," Spratt said in a statement. "Last year I chaired a budget hearing highlighting the impact and liability should Yucca not be completed. I will do all I can to make sure some funding goes to the project next year."

Without Yucca Mountain, South Carolina could be stuck with 7,200 containers of deadly high-level nuclear waste at the 60-year-old Savannah River Site weapons complex near Aiken. The waste material, the result of Cold War nuclear weapons production, is being turned into glass and stored in two systems of underground vaults, awaiting transport to Nevada. One set of vaults is full, U.S. Department of Energy spokesman Jim Giusti said.

South Carolina's commercial nuclear reactors also need a place to dispose of high-level waste created during power production.

Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles from Las Vegas, was to take nuclear waste from the nation's atomic power plants, as well as nuclear weapons complexes. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nevada, has been fighting the plan, saying it threatens the environment. The plan is to bury the waste in the hollowed-out mountain.

Earlier this month, the Obama administration decided against funding Yucca Mountain in next year's budget and has signaled its intent not to pursue a license for the facility.

The Department of Energy issued a statement late Tuesday saying Obama had appointed a special commission to study managing nuclear waste and was "fully committed to ensuring that the nation meets our long-term storage obligations."

U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said Obama made good on a campaign promise not to turn Nevada into a "nuclear waste dump."

"Maybe Gov. Sanford hatched this dream to save Yucca Mountain during a hike along the Appalachian Trail or on one of his trips overseas," she said Tuesday night.

But Bob Alvarez, a former DOE adviser under President Bill Clinton, said Obama's nuclear policies have sent mixed signals. On one hand, Obama supports loan guarantees for more nuclear power plants - the first of which he announced Tuesday - but has taken away the place utilities counted on to take their waste, Alvarez said.

"The reality is that spent fuel is going to be building up at these sites for decades to come and we need to be looking at safe and secure storage," Alvarez said.

Sanford, a former congressman, was also joined Tuesday by a host of Republicans seeking political office. Some, including gubernatorial candidate state Rep. Nikki Haley, R-Lexington, blasted the Obama administration on a number of fronts, including Yucca Mountain.

With the issue unresolved, state Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken, said he planned to introduce legislation in the General Assembly to end any more payments by power customers who are being charged for the Yucca Mountain site.

Utilities already are suing the government over its failure to open Yucca Mountain. South Carolinians have spent some $1.2 billion to help prepare the site. Overall, the site has cost more than $10 billion to prepare, Sanford's office said.

McMaster said he has spoken with the attorney general's office in Washington state about legal action, but said he's still researching the matter. Washington state also has a huge volume of high-level nuclear waste at the Hanford weapons complex.

"The law says Yucca Mountain is the best place to put" waste, McMaster said. "It was decided on, everybody had their say and it was determined that this was thing to do."

--Reach Fretwell at (803) 771-8537.

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Albany Times Union blog
February 17, 2010

Three things to consider about nuclear power

by Christopher Marcisz

It is interesting that President Barack Obama would unveil his plan for the future expansion of the nuclear power industry yesterday, precisely when it seems the worm has turned for the Vermont Yankee plant. The unfolding revelations about tritium popping up in monitoring wells and pipe systems that weren’t reported to regulators all makes it very uncertain the plant will get a permit extension for another 20 years past when the current one expires in 2012. So while the national debate is jumping ahead, there remains this undigested piece of incomplete business. And it is just one of several.

The role of nuclear power is a complicated issue, and one people tend to be passionately myopic about. To supporters, it is a clean, carbon-free source of massive amounts of energy. To opponents, it is a dangerous, expensive boondoggle. Both sides are right. I know, because I spent several years working as a reporter covering national energy policy for an industry newsletter in Washington, and nuclear was a big part of my beat. (In fact, probably the biggest “scoop” of my career came in the first few weeks of the Bush administration, when I got a nuclear lobbyist on the record as saying they expected new nuclear plants would be built in a few years. Keep in mind from Three Mile Island up until then, you couldn’t have said something like that with a straight face. It was only when the Bush administration arrived, with its posse of old energy business bigwigs, that they found the confidence to go on the offensive).

There were three key things that I spent a ton of time writing about, which I don’t think a lot of people realize but are key to the debate. I want to mention them as things to keep in mind, and I’ll try to do so in an evenhanded way.

For starters, it is undeniable that nuclear produces a lot of power with very little fuel. It is certainly not a renewable source — getting the uranium out of the ground and processed is a major industrial operation, which is hardly carbon-neutral. But the power generation itself releases little more than warm water, and does not involve removing the tops of mountains or trading with sometimes unfriendly nations. It uses so little fuel that almost all the fuel ever used in the 31 years that the Yankee Atomic plant in Rowe, Massachusetts, is still being stored on site, 18 years after the plant closed. That said… almost all the fuel ever used in the 31 years that the Yankee Atomic plant is still being stored on site, 18 years after the plant closed! The 266,000 pounds of waste sit in 15 concrete casks, under round the clock guard paid for by New England electricity ratepayers.

Which brings us to the first of three points: 1) Yucca Mountain. You’ve certainly heard of it, but may not realize what a hot topic of study, reporting, debate, and controversy it has been. In short, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 requires that the federal government take possession of spent nuclear fuel, and put it somewhere safe. The government began to circle around the idea of placing it under a mountain near Las Vegas at a place called Yucca Mountain in 1987. Of course, Nevadans freaked out, serious questions kept popping up about the safety of the site, and legal back and forth held everything up. The idea has been definitely abandoned now, and there is nothing else in the pipeline. Which means there will be 15 concrete casks of waste sitting in a field in Rowe for… who knows?

The second point is a company, 2) USEC. The only uranium fuel enrichment facility in the country, which produces most of the fuel used in American reactors, is run by the U.S. Enrichment Corporation, which was a federal agency until 1992. It was fully privatized, and is now just a regular publicly traded company. (it is also worth noting that the raw material, uranium, is subject to market price fluctuations like any other fuel). I wrote about USEC often when it was in the process of consolidating its operations at its plant in Paducah, Kentucky, in 2001. But since then but has held out the possibility of resuming some operations for a new centrifuge processing plant at a plant in Piketon, Ohio, where it is a major source of jobs in a struggling part of the state. House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio is a big fan, and recently applauded a $45 million grant to the company for research and development. ” This funding will allow USEC to continue its work on a project that promises to create thousands of new Ohio jobs and play a key role in the production of safe, affordable, emissions-free energy,” Boehner said. Truly, one man’s pork is another man’s critical job creation program.

The last thing is 3) the Price Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act, one of the most astonishing pieces of legislation you’ll ever hear about. The thinking behind this is that the odds of a major nuclear catastrophe are very small, but the potential impact of one is so great, that it is impossible to insure for it. So, in comes the federal government. Try to imagine if Three Mile Island had been as bad as Chernobyl: imagine the lawsuits, the damages, the vast tracts of central Pennsylvania made completely uninhabitable. The way the law works is that nuclear owners pay for their own insurance up to $10 billion, but the federal taxpayer is on the hook for everything beyond that. The industry says this is just a sensible, absolute emergency measure. Opponents call it corporate welfare.

What I’m trying to say here is that there are a lot of unanswered questions about nuclear power, and that we should proceed carefully. And that we should acknowledge that this is not a case of private business being allowed to do or not do something: the federal government and taxpayers are already neck-deep into this.

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CounterPunch
February 17, 2010

An Atomic Credibility Gap

Obama Goes Nuclear

By Karl Grossman

Is there any chance that President Barack Obama can return to his long-held stand critical of nuclear power? Is he open to hearing from scientists and energy experts, such as Amory Lovins, who can refute the pro-nuclear arguments that have apparently influenced him?

Obama’s declaration in his State of the Union speech on January 27 about “building a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in this country” marked a significant change for him. His announcement Tuesday on moving ahead on $8.3 billion in federal government loan guarantees to build new nuclear plants and increasing the loan guarantee fund to $54.5 billion was a further major step. Wall Street is reluctant to invest money in the dangerous and extremely expensive technology.

Before taking office, including as a candidate for president, Obama not only was negative about atomic energy but—unusual for a politician—indicated a detailed knowledge of its threat to life.

“I start off with the premise that nuclear energy is not optimal and so I am not a nuclear energy proponent,” Obama said at a campaign stop in Newton, Iowa on December 30, 2007. “My general view is that until we can make certain that nuclear power plants are safe, that they have solved the storage problem—because I’m opposed to Yucca Mountain and just dumping…in one state, in Nevada particularly, since there’s potentially an earthquake line there—until we solve those problems and the whole nuclear industry can show that they can produce clean, safe energy without enormous subsidies from the U.S. government, I don’t think that’s the best option. I am much more interested in solar and wind and bio-diesel and strategies [for] alternative fuels.”

As he told the editorial board of the Keene Sentinel in New Hampshire on November 25, 2007: “I don’t think there’s anything that we inevitably dislike about nuclear power. We just dislike the fact that it might blow up…and irradiate us…and kill us. That’s the problem.”

Yes, that’s the big problem with splitting the atom—one that has existed since the start  of nuclear power and will always be inherent in the technology. Using the perilous process of fission to generate electricity with its capacity for catastrophic accidents and its production of highly toxic radioactive poisons called nuclear waste will always be unsafe. And it is unnecessary considering the safe energy technologies now available, from solar, wind and other clean sources.

Just how dangerous it is has been underlined in a book just published by the New York Academy of Sciences, Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment. Written by a team of scientists led by noted Russian biologist Dr. Alexey Yablokov, using health data that have become available since the 1986 accident, it concludes that the fatality total “from April 1986 to the end of 2004 from the Chernobyl catastrophe was estimated at 985,000 additional [cancer] deaths.” This is in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and other countries where Chernobyl’s poisons fell. The toll, they relate, continues to rise.

Chernobyl was a different design from the nuclear plants which the U.S., France and Japan seek now to build but disasters can also happen involving these plants and they, too, produce the highly toxic nuclear waste poisons. The problem is fission itself. It’s no way to produce electricity.

Obama has been aware of this. As he stated at a Londonderry, New Hampshire town meeting on October 7, 2007: “Nuclear power has a host of problems that have not been solved. We haven’t solved the storage situation effectively. We have not dealt with all of the security aspects of our nuclear plants and nuclear power is very expensive.”

He still left the door open to it. His Energy Plan as a candidate stated: “It is unlikely that we can meet our aggressive climate goals if we eliminate nuclear power from the table. However, there is no future for expanded nuclear without first addressing four key issues: public right-to-know, security of nuclear fuel and waste, waste storage, and [nuclear weapons] proliferation.”

In his first year as president, nuclear power proponents worked to influence him. Among nuclear opponents, there has been anxiety regarding Obama’s two top aides, both of whom have been involved with what is now the utility operating more nuclear power plants than any other in the United States, Exelon.

Rahm Emanuel, now Obama’s chief of staff, as an investment banker was in the middle of the $8.2 billion merger in 1999 of Unicom, the parent company of Commonwealth Edison of Chicago, and Peco Energy to put together Exelon. David Axelrod, now a senior Obama advisor and formerly chief campaign strategist, was an Exelon consultant. Candidate Obama received sizeable contributions from Exelon executives including from John Rowe, its president and chief executive officer who in 2007 also became chairman of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the U.S. nuclear industry’s main trade group.

It’s not only been nuclear opponents who have seen a link between Exelon and the Obama administration. Forbes magazine, in its January 18th issue, in an article on John Rowe and how he has “focused the company on nuclear,” displayed a sidebar headlined, “The President’s Utility.”  It read: “Ties are tight between Exelon and the Obama administration,” noting Exelon political contributions and featuring Emanuel and Axelrod with photos and descriptions of their Exelon connections.

The Forbes article spoke of how last year “Emanuel e-mailed Rowe on the eve of the House vote on global warming legislation and asked that he reach out to some uncommitted Democrats. ‘We are proud to be the President’s utility,’ says Elizabeth Moler, Exelon’s chief lobbyist,” the article went on. “It’s nice for John to be able to go to the White House and they know his name.’”

Chicago-based Exelon’s website boasts of its operating “the largest nuclear fleet in the nation and the third largest in the world.” It owns 17 nuclear power plants which “represent approximately 20 percent of the U.S. nuclear industry’s power capacity.”

The climate change or global warming issue is another factor in Obama’s change on nuclear power. An Associated Press article of January 31 on Obama’s having “singled out nuclear power in his State of the Union address and his spending plan for the next budget,” began: “President Barack Obama is endorsing nuclear energy like never before, trying to win over Republicans and moderate Democrats on climate and energy legislation.”

MSNBC’s Mike Stuckey on February 9 reported about “Obama’s new support for nuclear power, which some feel may be a down payment for Republican backing on a climate change bill.”

After the “safe, clean nuclear power” claim, Michael Mariotte, executive director of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, declared: “Politically, Obama likely was simply parroting the effort being led by Senators John Kerry, Joe Lieberman and Lindsay Graham to gain support for a climate bill by adding massive subsidies for nuclear power, offshore oil and ‘clean’ coal. But recycling George W. Bush energy talking points is no way to solve the climate crisis or develop a sustainable energy policy…Indeed, Obama knows better. Candidate Obama understood that nuclear power is neither safe nor clean.”

Climate change has been used by those promoting a “revival” of nuclear power—there hasn’t been a new nuclear plant ordered and built in the U.S. in 37 years—as a new argument. In fact, nuclear power makes a substantial contribution to global warming considering the overall “nuclear cycle”—uranium mining and milling, conversion, enrichment, fuel fabrication and the disposition of radioactive waste, and so on.

Climate change is also one argument for pushing atomic energy of  another major influence on Obama on nuclear power, Steven Chu, his Department of Energy secretary. Chu typifies the religious-like zeal for nuclear power emanating for decades from scientists in the U.S. government’s string of national nuclear laboratories. Chu was director of one of these, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, before becoming head of DOE.

First established during World War II’s Manhattan Project to build atomic weapons, the laboratories after the war began promoting civilian nuclear technology—and have been pushing it unceasingly ever since. It has been a way to perpetuate the vested interest created during World War II.  The number of nuclear weapons that could be built was limited because atomic bombs don’t lend themselves to commercial distribution, but in pushing food irradiation, nuclear-powered airplanes and rockets, atomic devices for excavation and, of course, nuclear power, the budgets and staffs of the national nuclear laboratories could be maintained, indeed increase.

That was the analysis of David Lilienthal, first chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, which preceded the Department of Energy. Lilienthal in his 1963 book Change, Hope, and the Bomb wrote: “The classic picture of the scientist as a creative individual, a man obsessed, working alone through the night, a man in a laboratory pushing an idea—this has changed. Now scientists are ranked in platoons. They are organization men. In many cases the independent and humble search for new truths about nature has been confused with the bureaucratic impulse to justify expenditure and see that next year’s budget is bigger than last’s.”

Lilienthal wrote about the “elaborate and even luxurious [national nuclear] laboratories that have grown up at Oak Ridge, Argonne, Brookhaven” and the push to use nuclear devices for “blowing out harbors, making explosions underground to produce steam, and so on” which show “how far scientists and administrators will go to try to establish a nonmilitary use” for nuclear technology.

Chu, like so many of the national nuclear laboratory scientists and administrators, minimizes the dangers of radioactivity. If they didn’t, if they acknowledged how life-threatening the radiation produced by nuclear technology is, their favorite technology would crumble.

A major theme of Chu, too, is a return to the notion promoted by the national nuclear laboratories in the 1950s and 60s of “recycling” and “reusing” nuclear waste. This way, they have hoped, it might not be seen as waste at all. The concept was to use radioactive Cesium-137 (the main poison discharged in the Chernobyl disaster) to irradiate food, to use depleted uranium to harden bullets and shells, and so on. In recent weeks, with Obama carrying out his pledge not  to allow Yucca Mountain to become a nuclear waste dump, Chu set up a “blue-ribbon” panel on radioactive  waste—stacked with nuclear power advocates including Exelon’s John Rowe—that is expected to stress the “recycling” theory.

“We are aggressively pursuing nuclear energy,” declared Chu in January as he announced DOE’s budget plan—which included an increase in the 2011 federal budget in monies for nuclear loan guarantees to build new nuclear plants cited by Obama Tuesday. “We are, as we have repeatedly said, working hard to restart the American nuclear power industry.”

The $8.3 billion in loan guarantees Obama announced Tuesday is to come from $18.5 billion in guarantees proposed by the George W. Bush administration and authorized by Congress in 2005. “My budget proposes tripling the loan guarantees we provide to help finance safe, clean nuclear facilities,” said Obama Tuesday, referring to the DOE plan which would add $36 billion and bring the loan guarantee fund to $54.5. And this despite candidate Obama warning about “enormous subsidies from the U.S. government” to the nuclear industry.

The $8.3 billion in loan guarantees is to go toward the Southern Company of Atlanta constructing two nuclear power reactors in Burke, Georgia. These are to be AP1000 nuclear power plants designed by the Westinghouse nuclear division (now owned by Toshiba) although in October the designs were rejected by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission as likely being unable to withstand events like tornadoes and earthquakes.

Obama’s change of stance on nuclear power has led to an earthquake of its own politically. MoveOn, the nonprofit advocacy group that has raised millions of dollars for Democratic candidates including Obama, gauged sentiment of his State of the Union speech by having10,000 MoveOn members record their views. Every few seconds they pressed a button signaling their reactions—ranging from “great” to “awful.” When Obama got his line on energy, the overwhelming judgment was awful. “The most definitive drop in enthusiasm is when President Obama talked about nuclear power and offshore drilling,” said Ilyse Hogue, MoveOn’s director of political advocacy. “They’re looking for clean energy sources that prioritize wind and solar.”

“Safe, clean nuclear power—it’s an oxymoron,” said Jim Riccio, nuclear policy analyst for Greenpeace USA. “The president knows better. Just because radiation is invisible doesn’t mean it’s clean.”

“From a health perspective, the proposal of the Obama administration to increase federal loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors poses a serious risk to Americans,” said Joseph Mangano, executive director of the Radiation and Public Health Project. “Adding new reactors will raise the chance for a catastrophic meltdown. It will also increase the amount of radioactive chemicals routinely emitted from reactors into the environment—and human bodies. New reactors will raise rates of cancer—which are already unacceptably high—especially to infants and children. Public policies affecting America's energy future should reduce, rather than raise, hazards to our citizens."

As to government loan guarantees, “The last thing Americans want is another government bailout for a failing industry, but that’s exactly what they’re getting from the Obama administration,” said Ben Schreiber, the climate and energy tax analyst of Friends of the Earth.

“It would be not only good policy but good politics for Obama to abandon the nuclear loan guarantee program,” said Mariotte of NIRS.

After Obama’s Tuesday declaration on loan guarantees, Paul Gunter, director of the Reactor Oversight Project of the organization Beyond Nuclear, said: “Unfortunately, the president’s decision is fuel for opposition to costly and dangerous nuclear power. It signals a widening of a divide as the administration steps back from its promise for a change in energy policy and those of us who are committed to a change.”

“We are deeply disturbed by President Obama’s decision,” said Peter Wilk, executive director of Physicians for Social Responsibility. “Not only does this put taxpayers on the hook for billions, it prioritizes a dirty, dangerous, and expensive technology over public health.  From the beginning to the end of the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear reactors remain a serious threat to public health and safety.  From uranium mining waste to operating reactors leaking radioactivity to the lack of radioactive waste solutions, nuclear power continues to pose serious public health threats.”

Nuclear opponents have been disappointed in a lack of access to the Obama White House of those with a critical view on nuclear power—who could counteract the pro-nuclear arguments that Obama has been fed. Will President Obama open himself to hearing from those who question nuclear power?

Obama has credibility trouble already. New York Times columnist Bob Herbert wrote on January 26:

“Who is Barack Obama? Americans are still looking for the answer…Mr. Obama may be personally very appealing, but he has positioned himself all over the political map…Mr. Obama is in danger of being perceived as someone whose rhetoric, however skillful, cannot always be trusted. He is creating a credibility gap for himself, and if it widens much more he won’t be able to close it.”

--Karl Grossman is professor of journalism at the State University of New York/College at Old Westbury. He is author of Cover Up: What You Are Not Supposed to Know About Nuclear Power, Power Crazy and The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program’s Nuclear Threat To Our Planet and writer and narrator of television programs among them Nukes In Space: The Nuclearization and Weaponization of the Heavens (www.envirovideo.com).

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MIT Technology Review
February 17, 2010

GE Hitachi's Answer to Nuclear Waste

The maker of nuclear power plants is promoting a process to use the waste as fuel.

By Kevin Bullis

GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, one of the world's biggest providers of nuclear reactors, says it has an alternative to burying nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, the proposed waste repository that the Obama administration has said is now "off the table." Based in Wilmington, NC, GE Hitachi wants to use nuclear waste as a fuel for advanced nuclear power plants, significantly reducing the volume of waste and the length of time that most of the waste needs to be stored.

National labs in the United States and GE have been developing the technology over the course of a few decades, but in recent years the company "put it on the shelf" because of a lack of U.S. interest in reusing nuclear waste, says Eric Loewen, chief consulting engineer for advanced plants at GE Hitachi. The technology involves separating nuclear waste into different types of useable fuel, some of which can power conventional nuclear power plants, and some of which require advanced "fast neutron" reactors, which are being used in power plants elsewhere but not in the United States.

The company hopes a new blue-ribbon panel appointed by the Obama administration to find a new nuclear-waste solution will recommend the use of their system. Steven Chu, U.S. Secretary of Energy, has expressed support for different kinds of nuclear reactors, and for considering the possibility of reprocessing nuclear waste. In recent weeks, the Obama administration has signaled increased support for nuclear power, including the announcement yesterday of the first loan guarantee for new nuclear reactors in the United States.

Current U.S. nuclear power plants are only able to harness as little as 5 percent of the energy in nuclear fuel. Some countries, such as France, use other processes to extract useable nuclear fuel from nuclear waste, but these processes have been criticized, in part because they produce pure plutonium, which could be stolen and used to make nuclear weapons.

GE Hitachi's proposed process would produce fuel that would be more difficult to steal. It separates nuclear waste into three basic groups of materials. The first group consists of the products of fission that can't be used as fuel in nuclear reactors--these will need to be stored, but only for a few hundred years, rather than the tens of thousands of years that other nuclear-waste materials need to be stored. The second group is uranium, which contains too little fissile material to be used in U.S. nuclear reactors, but does contain enough for a type of reactor used in Canada. (Canada's deuterium uranium reactors use deuterium oxide, or heavy water, instead of the light water used in the U.S. as a neutron absorber. Light-water reactors require enriched uranium.)

The last group contains transuranic elements such as neptunium and plutonium. The pure plutonium produced in other processes is relatively easy to handle--it produces little heat and little dangerous radiation. It's also hard to detect, because it doesn't emit many neutrons. These qualities make it a dangerous security risk. But the system that GE Hitachi has designed, which sorts materials by applying a voltage to a molten salt, doesn't separate plutonium from the other transuranic elements. Combined with these other elements, the fuel would release 1,000 times more heat and 10,000 times more gamma rays, so it would be much more difficult to steal, Loewen says.

Indeed, the combination of transuranic elements would likely eventually kill anyone who attempted to take it, he says. Although this wouldn't stop terrorists willing to die to get it, the material also releases 1,000 times more neutrons than pure plutonium, making it far easier to detect.

Charles Forsberg, executive director of the MIT Nuclear Fuel Cycle Project, agrees that these materials would likely be more difficult to steal than plutonium, but he notes that the processing technology could be dangerous in the hands of a nation wanting to repurpose the materials for weapons rather than power plants.

The plutonium and other elements separated from nuclear waste in the GE Hitachi process can be used in a type of nuclear power plant that has been used in Japan, and that is being built in a few other countries, that uses molten sodium as the coolant, instead of the water used in U.S. nuclear power plants. Sodium-cooled reactors allow neutrons emitted during fission to maintain the high energy levels required to use this fuel. The particular type of reactor GE Hitachi has designed--called PRISM--would be compatible with the mix of elements produced by its separation technology. The technology has not yet been approved for use in the United States. One reason is that sodium metal is highly reactive and requires special safety precautions.

Although it could reduce nuclear waste and provide a valuable fuel source for nuclear power plants, the GE Hitachi technology would not completely eliminate the need for long-term storage, Forsberg says, because perfect separation of the components of nuclear waste isn't possible--there will always be some fraction of the material that needs to be stored for more than 10,000 years.

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National Review Online
February 17, 2010

Nuclear Makes it Out of the Cellar   [William Tucker]

I couldn’t help but feel a warm glow of satisfaction over the news that the Obama administration has embraced nuclear power. I know conservatives are going to carp — it doesn’t mean anything, there are still lots of obstacles, the government shouldn’t be funding reactors anyway. All true, all true. But I think this is a big step forward. In the end, it’s going to make an enormous difference for the future of the country.

Just to see how important this is, take a look at the full-page ad on the inside cover of the current issue of The Weekly Standard. There’s a photo of a giant crane setting the bottom portion of the containment vessel in place at a Chinese reactor under construction at Sanmen. “Westinghouse AP1000 on schedule for 2013” says the headline. “In China, four new AP1000s are currently under construction and they are being built in an on-time and on-budget manner,” continues the text.

The Chinese started stepping up their nuclear construction program only four years ago. We’ve been at it since 1955. I happened to be at the Idaho National Laboratory in January 2006 researching my book, Terrestrial Energy, when the Chinese nuclear delegation — including their equivalent of our secretary of energy — came through asking for advice on which reactor to select. I asked Kathryn McCarthy, deputy director of the laboratory, “Do the Chinese still look to us for advice? We haven’t licensed a new reactor here in 30 years.”

“They’re a society that’s still feels more comfortable letting others take the lead,” she responded. “They like us to be on the cutting edge.”

Well that may have been true in 2006, but it’s not anymore. The Chinese went on to buy both the Westinghouse AP1000 and Areva’s European Pressurized Reactor. (Westinghouse is now a Japanese company, Areva is French.)  More important, they insisted on getting the specs so they could reverse-engineer the reactors and come up with their own design. They’ve already done that. The Chinese are now building four AP1000s, two EPRs, and 15 more reactors of their own design — 21 in all.

Just to compare, our Nuclear Regulatory Commission hasn’t yet approved the design of the AP1000.  (The Vogtle reactors, planned by Southern Electric of Georgia, will be AP1000s.) The NRC granted preliminary approval several years ago, but then asked Westinghouse to elevate a protective shield to guard against attacks by hijacked airplanes. (To see how ludicrous this concern is, take a look at this video. Last week I asked a couple of airline pilots what would happen if they crashed their plane into a reactor. “Planes are built on the beer-can principle,” they said. “The shell is very thin and they maintain their structure because the air is pressurized inside. Once that pressure is released, they’re very fragile. Trying to knock down a nuclear containment with one of these planes would be like trying to knock it down with empty beer cans.”)

Westinghouse returned two years later with an elevated shield. The NRC took one look and said, “Hey, that thing might fall down in an earthquake.” So it’s back to the drawing boards once again.

We’re now years behind the rest of the world in nuclear technology. South Korea entered the field only recently and has already won a $20 billion contract to build four new reactors for the United Arab Emirates. The Koreans get 45 percent of their electricity from nuclear, more than double our 20 percent. Now China is following the same path. Once they get their footing and start selling abroad, all bets are off. In 20 years, they’ll probably be selling mini-reactors in Wal-Mart. But no matter — democracies move slowly. This is the same way we entered World War II. The Germans and Japanese started way ahead of us but once the mighty American industrial machine geared up, we were able to push to the forefront again.

There are still problems, no doubt. Like NRO’s editorial today, Jack Spencer at Heritage argues that loan guarantees will only continue a pattern of “too much government dependence.” True. The best thing to do would be to repeal all government subsidies of energy and let nuclear’s inherent advantage emerge in the marketplace. But that isn’t going to happen. Windmills now get 17 times the operating subsidies of any other form of energy. Half the states are already mandating renewable-energy projects and the Democrats’ climate bill may end up as nothing more than a renewable mandate, as well.  At this point, a little pump-priming for nuclear isn’t going to hurt. If Westinghouse and Areva are allowed to build reactors on time and on budget in this country, the loan guarantees will never cost the government a dime.

“But the loan guarantees won’t mean anything without a construction-and-operating license and the NRC can’t issue a license until there has been a ‘waste confidence’ determination,” says C. J. Milmoe, at North Carolina consultant familiar with the workings of Washington. “The Obama administration has already defunded Yucca Mountain, so it’s just taking back with one hand what it’s given with the other. Loan guarantees are desirable, even necessary, but they will not be sufficient to get a new reactor built.”

True enough. But one of these days people are going to realize that basically there is no such thing as nuclear waste. After reprocessing spent nuclear fuel, the resulting “high-level waste” could fit inside a basketball gymnasium.  (The French, who have been reprocessing for years, store all their waste from 30 years of producing 70 percent of its electricity beneath the floor of one room that looks very much like a basketball gymnasium.)  Given the opportunity, I have no doubt environmental groups will spend decades in court trying to hinder reprocessing as a way of stopping nuclear construction. (It’s known as the “clog the toilet” strategy.)  But at some point the public — and maybe even some environmentalists — will wake up to realize that dealing with a few canisters of spent fuel rods is a lot easier and more environmentally benign than trying to fill whole geological formations with liquefied carbon exhaust or covering tens of thousands of square miles with solar collectors or 40-story windmills.

So let’s celebrate the progress that has been made. Nuclear power is the technology of the 21st century.  Those countries that embrace it will prosper while those who fear it will find themselves in the position of 18th century Spain when it decided not to embrace the industrial revolution. President Obama has defied his environmental supporters to support nuclear power. The advantages of the technology are so overwhelming, it may take no more than that to get the ball rolling.

--William Tucker is the author of Terrestrial Energy: How Nuclear Power Will Lead the Green Revolution and End America’s Energy Odyssey.

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Wall Street Journal
February 17, 2010

Budget Wielded to Cut Greenhouse Gases

By Stephen Power

WASHINGTON—President Barack Obama's 2011 budget calls for an array of regulations, subsidies and taxes aimed at cutting emissions of greenhouse gases, even as a sweeping climate bill sits on ice in the Senate.

Mr. Obama's budget calls for $39 billion in tax increases on fossil-fuel producers over 10 years. It also includes an estimated $1.4 billion to help developing countries address the impacts of climate change, reduce deforestation and shift to low-carbon energy sources. And it proposes tripling federal support for nuclear energy, by adding $36 billion in new loan authority for an Energy Department program aimed at speeding the construction of new reactors.

On Tuesday, Mr. Obama sought to underscore his support for nuclear power by announcing that the Department of Energy had offered conditional commitments for $8.33 billion in loan guarantees for the construction and operation of two new nuclear reactors at a plant in Burke, Ga. Administration officials said it would be the first U.S. nuclear power plant to break ground in nearly three decades.

The loan guarantees went to Southern Co., but other utilities say they are concerned that the government's fee for securing credit might be too costly. Utilities say that in some discussions, the fee proposed by the government has been as high as 10%. Mike Wallace, chairman of Unistar Nuclear Energy LLC in Baltimore, Md.said Tuesday his team has told the Energy Department that if a fee of 7% to 10% is imposed, his group will walk away. An Energy Department spokesperson didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.

Mr. Obama's budget, unveiled earlier this month, would scale back tax breaks and other incentives for domestic production of oil, natural gas and coal. The moves are opposed by fossil-fuel producers.

The administration's budget cites a 2009 study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development that said the world's 20 biggest economies could reduce global greenhouse-gas emissions 10% by phasing out fossil-fuel subsidies.

A White House spokesman says the administration hasn't totaled up the cost of all the proposals in the fiscal 2011 budget related to climate policy.

Mr. Obama has called on Congress to pass legislation that would require industries to pay for their emissions of heat-trapping gases linked to climate change. But Senate leaders have repeatedly pushed back their timetable for action, amid objections from many Republicans and some Democrats that such legislation would drive up energy costs and lead to job losses in fossil-fuel and manufacturing industries.

Environmental groups have largely applauded Mr. Obama's budget, though some have criticized his support for nuclear power, citing saying the growing cost of building reactors. makes it unlikely that many new reactors will be constructed on time or within budgets.

The budget proposal also contains what Republicans say is a setback for nuclear-power interests: a proposal to cut off funding for the proposed nuclear-waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The move was backed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.).

Republicans say killing Yucca Mountain leaves the U.S. without a clearly defined strategy for managing nuclear waste. The administration says the U.S. has time to find alternatives, and has appointed a blue-ribbon panel to identify options.

The climate pieces of the president's budget are controversial. For example, a proposal to fund the Environmental Protection Agency's regulation of carbon dioxide and the measures to step up taxes on fossil-fuel producers are drawing fire.

Opponents say EPA action to curb greenhouse gases would lead to job losses. The EPA relies on state and local agencies to administer air-quality permits, but some state regulators have said new EPA rules could overwhelm them with paperwork and delay construction projects.

A spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute, an industry group, said the administration's requested funding for EPA greenhouse-gas regulation would be "woefully inadequate for the states to implement any type" of greenhouse-gas regulatory program.

But William Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, says the group, which represents air-pollution control agencies across the U.S., supports Mr. Obama's request, which "reflects clearly the premium he and his administration place on clean air."

Oil and natural-gas producers say the tax proposals would discourage domestic production of energy and frustrate Mr. Obama's goals of creating jobs and reducing U.S. dependence on foreign oil. The administration disputes the industry's claims. Lawmakers from coal states are challenging Mr. Obama's budget proposal, too. At a hearing earlier this month, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D., W.Va.) warned that the administration's budget would discourage production of coal, the source of half the U.S. electricity supply and a significant source of jobs in Mr. Rockefeller's state.

"People are going to reduce their production because they feel, uh-oh, here comes the Obama administration, they're going to cut out coal," Mr. Rockefeller said.

Administration officials say Mr. Obama's budget offers support for the coal industry, such as roughly half a billion dollars to fund research and development of technology to capture and sequester carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants. Mr. Obama's aides estimate that eliminating various tax breaks for coal production would generate $2.3 billion of additional revenue over the next 10 years, an amount that represents about 1% of annual domestic coal revenue.

"It's the policy of the administration to move as aggressively as we can towards a clean energy future, not only by investing in R&D into those clean energy sources, but also in cutting back on the subsidies that we currently provide…to fossil fuels," Mr. Obama's budget director, Peter Orszag, testified before Congress earlier this month.

--Rebecca Smith contributed to this article.

--Write to Stephen Power at stephen.power@wsj.com

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Institute for Energy Research
February 17, 2010

President Obama’s Nuclear Sleight of Hand: More Taxpayer Giveaways; No Place for the Waste

IER president: “As is the case with the rest of this Administration’s energy proposals, there is a complete and daunting lack of consistency on the issue of nuclear waste and nuclear loan guarantees.”

Washington, DC – In a perceived attempt to lure wary senators toward support of a job-killing cap-and-trade bill that will increase energy costs across the board, today President Obama committed $8 billion in taxpayer-backed loans to construct two new reactors in Georgia. The president made the announcement in Lanham, Maryland, where he also spoke about “clean” and “green” energy jobs.

However, President Obama did not mention that his budget eliminates funding for the nuclear waste repository at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain. Pursuant to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as amended in 1987, Yucca Mountain is the only permanent nuclear waste repository in the United States.

“As is the case with the rest of this Administration’s energy proposals, there is a complete and daunting lack of consistency on the issue of nuclear waste and nuclear loan guarantees,” said Thomas J. Pyle, president of the non-partisan Institute for Energy Research (IER). “Putting American taxpayers on the hook for $8 billion in an attempt to garner support for a job-killing cap-and-trade package is a purely political ploy, especially when measured against the closure of Yucca Mountain.

“Nuclear energy is an important component towards securing our nation’s long-term energy needs. But without a plan for spent fuel rods, this administration is simply using taxpayer-backed loan guarantees as an effort to curry favor with a few senators,” continued Pyle. “This announcement has nothing to do with securing America’s energy future and everything to do with the business-as-usual Washington horse-trading that the American people are tired of.”

For additional information, please contact Patrick Creighton, 202-621-2947, or Laura Henderson, 202-621-2951.

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Manila Bulletin
February 17, 2010

Where to dump nuclear waste?

By Atty. Romeo V. Pefianco

(Editor's note: Dumping nuclear waste has been a serious problem in the US since 1970 as noted by the author.)

There are well-meaning suggestions from various quarters that one lasting solution to the energy problem, especially power outages in thge long dry months - December to June - is to develop nuclear power stations in lieu of hydro-electric plants and petroleum-fed turbines.

Cheap and efficient but...

There is no question that nuclear energy, in the long run, will prove inexpensive and totally efficient.

Nuclear power plants in the US, Japan, France, and most progressive countries in Europe contribute substantially to both commercial and industrial energy requirements.

There’s a move to rehabilitate the Bataan Nuclear Plant, now viewed as a colossal waste. Its closure was recommended by a commission years ago for reasons of safety. The cost of making it useful to the economy may run to tens of million dollars.

Long study

But the more serious factors against its rehabilitation or the putting up of new nuclear plants need long and thorough study. This is the subject of a previous article by the author.

Nuclear power plants leave residues or waste containing radioactive substances.

After uranium, plutonium and other useful fission products have been removed some long-lived radioactive elements remain.

Waste disposal

The storage of nuclear waste is a major environmental issue. In the US nuclear waste comes from: 1) nuclear weapons production facilities, 2) nuclear power plants, 3) medical equipment (primarily used in radiation treatments), 4) industrial sources of radioactivity used as a more powerful alternative to X-rays, and 5) residues from uranium mining.

Low/high-level waste

Nuclear waste is often classified into two categories: “low-level” and “high-level” waste. Slightly radioactive, after exposure to high-level source, is low but spent fuel from nuclear reactors, or military, waste produced in the manufacture of nuclear weapons is clearly high-level.

Nuclear waste is radioactive and can remain that way for years – in some cases, thousands of years. Dumping them at sea was one of the early methods of disposal. Others included suspending them in a liquid or cement and injecting the radioactive combination into wells.

Banned methods

In 1976, the US signed an international convention banning ocean dumping. In 1984, deep-well injection was stopped.

Current plans require a consortium of states to develop sites for low-level wastes. One “temporary” site was in Barnwell Country, South Carolina, which has handled low-level waste since 1970 for 36 states.

But the federal government continues to search for suitable sites for storage of high-level wastes from nuclear power plants and for very long-lived radioactive materials from weapons production.

For the time being high-level waste remain on the sites where they were generated.

640 meters underground In 1998, the Environmental Protection Agency (E.P.A) certified the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in Carlsbad, New Mexico as the nation’s first deep-underground for disposal of transuranic waste generated from defense activities – sludges, tools, rags, glassware and protective clothing that has been contaminated with radioactive elements from weapons production. The facility is approximately 2,100 feet (640 meters) underground in excavated natural salt formations.

Large land area

New Mexico has a land area of 121,589 sq. mi (5th largest in area and a pop. of 1.7 M) against RP’s 115,000 sq. mi consisting of 7,000 islands, which is clearly not safe and adequate for deep-underground nuclear waste disposal on Luzon Island (40,420 sq. mi) or smaller islands and provinces in Luzon and Mindanao.

The facility received its first shipment of transuranic waste in March 1999. By 2010 shipments from 23 military waste sites from across the nation to this site will reduce the number of Americans living within 50 miles of the nuclear waste from 61 million to four million.

The agency charged with monitoring the disposal of waste is the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The saga of Yucca Mountain, Nevada (area 110,561 sq. mi, 7th largest; pop. 2.6M) shows the difficulty of regulating nuclear waste disposal, which was approved by the US Congress in 2002 as the nation’s first long-term geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste.

$96 B saga

If the Nuclear Regulatory Commission grants the site a license Yucca Mountain could begin accepting waste in 2025, with closure and decommissioning slated to begin in 2125. The site (about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas) has been the subject of fierce opposition, not only in Nevada but also in states along the proposed transportation routes for nuclear waste. The cost of the program is projected to be $96 billion dollars, a tenth of which had been spent by July 2009.

If there’s a nuclear power plant in one Central Luzon province serious consultation will involve Pangasinan, Tarlac, Pampanga, Bulacan, Bataan, Zambales, Nueva Ecija, La Union, etc. (Summary from a publication of The New York Times). (Comments are welcome at roming@pefianco.com)

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Utne Reader
February 17, 2010

Finland’s Nuclear Waste Gamble

by Keith Goetzman

On an island in the Baltic Sea, Finland is building what it calls a permanent underground repository for spent nuclear fuel—but that depends on your definition of permanent. IEEE Spectrum writer Sandra Upson takes a trip to Olkiluoto Island to report on the construction of the Onkalo facility, bringing a science-literate but smartly skeptical view to her topic:

Posiva, the Finnish company building an underground repository here, says it knows how to imprison nuclear waste for 100,000 years. These multimillennial thinkers are confident that copper canisters of Scandinavian design, tucked into that bedrock, will isolate the waste in an underground cavern impervious to whatever the future brings: sinking permafrost, rising water, earthquakes, copper-eating microbes, or oblivious land developers in the year 25,000. If the Finnish government agrees—a decision is expected by 2012—this site will become the world’s first deep, permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel.

But as Upson notes:

The arrangement is far from ideal. The waste will emit harmful levels of radioactivity for thousands of years to come, and the casks are expected to last for a couple of hundred years, at most. The lack of a more permanent option is one of the biggest problems facing the global nuclear-power industry, which has been stalled for decades.

The United States, Upson points out, has finally canceled funding for a storage facility at Yucca Mountain, Nevada (even as it hands out new nuclear plant loan guarantees), and Sweden is building a “less advanced” facility—leaving the Finnish site as a leader and a bellwether for the success of such repositiories worldwide. The $4.5 billion project, she writes, will either demonstrate that the technical, social, and political challenges of nuclear waste disposal can be met in a democratic society, or it will scare other such countries away from the repository idea for decades to come.

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Senator Harry Reid
February 16, 2010

Reid Statement On Decision To Halt Yucca Mountain License Application Proceedings

Washington, DC – Nevada Senator Harry Reid today made the following statement regarding the order from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC) Atomic Safety and Licensing Board to grant the Department of Energy’s stay on the Yucca Mountain license application proceedings.  This is an important step towards withdrawing the license application from NRC’s review.

“Today’s news that the license application proceedings have been stopped is further evidence of the Administration’s position that Yucca Mountain is no longer an option for the storage of nuclear waste in this country.  I applaud the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board on their decision and for placing the safety and security of Nevadans above all else.”

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
February 16, 2010

Utility panel wants reasons for planned Yucca shutdown

By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - A board of state utility commissioners came out Tuesday against the planned Yucca Mountain Project shutdown, while calling for the Obama administration to explain in more detail why it wants to abandon the Nevada nuclear waste site.

The resolution adopted by a panel of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners would put the group on record against the administration's nuclear waste policy if it gets final approval by a board of directors later this week.

Commissioners conceded that the resolution probably would not change minds at the White House or Department of Energy, where administration officials are moving to shelve the Nevada waste storage site and have established a blue ribbon panel to start looking for alternatives.

The utility group's resolution expresses "disappointment" that the government "took 25 years and expended more than $10 billion on Yucca Mountain" only to want it closed before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission could determine whether it would be safe.

"If Yucca Mountain is not an option, they certainly need to explain why that is," said Dusty Johnson, chairman of the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission.

Johnson also said he was troubled that the blue ribbon commission is being told not to consider Yucca Mountain in its new study.

"I just think when you have a blue ribbon panel that is supposed to find the best option and you tell them before they get started there are certain options they are not allowed to consider, that clearly is more about politics and not about policy," he said.

"Some part of me says we really need to ask, even if we are just tilting at windmills, that options not be taken off the table. Let's allow the blue ribbon panel to really look at what the right answer is."

--Contact Stephens Washington Bureau Chief Steve Tetreault at stetreault@stephensmedia.com or 202-783-1760.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
February 16, 2010

Yucca Mountain: NRC judges halt Yucca license hearings

Nuclear waste site takes another hit

By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON - The government took another step toward a shutdown of the Yucca Mountain Project on Tuesday when a panel of administrative judges halted most license hearings for the nuclear waste site.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board granted the request by the Department of Energy as part of a process for the Obama administration to seek a final withdrawal of the plan to build a Nevada repository for spent nuclear fuel.

The board's move was applauded by Nevada leaders as taking a step closer to ending the nuclear waste program.

"This latest development is another encouraging sign in the effort to put an end to Yucca Mountain," said Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev.

But the most significant step lies ahead: The Department of Energy is expected to seek permission from the licensing board to withdraw its license application, which could end the 28-year Yucca Mountain effort once and for all.

Tuesday's halt to license proceedings "is really a holding pattern," said Joe Strolin, planning adviser to the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects.

Attorneys expect the Department of Energy to file a motion to withdraw the application by the first week of March .

Indications are it will be controversial as department officials will propose that the license application be withdrawn "with prejudice," which means it could not be resubmitted in the future.

The Nuclear Energy Institute, the nuclear power industry's trade group, is expected to challenge the Energy Department motion, perhaps joined by one or more rural Nevada counties.

Also, states where nuclear waste is stored at reactor sites, and where it could remain for the foreseeable future, are watching the proceedings with growing interest.

In South Carolina, officials led by Gov. Mark Sanford and Attorney General Henry McMaster urged the Obama administration to move forward on the repository and hinted at legal action if it does not.

"We'd hope the administration would relook at this issue, but we don't think they will, and so we're certainly trying to identify what our alternatives are from a legal standpoint," Aiken County Councilman Chuck Smith said.

McMaster said he is working on the legal questions. He said that includes talking with attorneys general in other states and the utility industry and nuclear industry legal experts.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board is a branch of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that is studying the Yucca license application.

The judges noted in their order that none of the parties that are taking part in license hearings objected to setting aside the license proceedings.

The board decided to suspend the hearings "to avoid potentially unnecessary expenditures of resources" while everyone awaits the Energy Department's motion to withdraw the application.

One part of the license proceeding was kept alive: The judges said it must be determined how millions of pages of Yucca Mountain documents would be preserved and archived if the project ends.

--The Associated Press contributed to this report. Contact Stephens Washington Bureau Chief Steve Tetreault at stetreault@stephensmedia.com or 202-783-1760.

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KXNT
February 16, 2010

Federal Panel Halts Yucca License Hearings

A three-judge panel for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved a suspension in the hearings on a license application for the Yucca Mountain nuclear repository. The decision Tuesday comes as part of the Obama Administration's plans to withdraw the application to store nuclear waste at the Nevada facility. Nevada Senator Harry Reid called the NRC ruling "further evidence...that Yucca Mountain is no longer an option for the storage of nuclear waste in this country." President Obama has called for "zeroing out" all funding for Yucca Mountain in his budget proposal, but Congress will have the final say over the project's fate. Earlier this week, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford threatened legal action if the government does not restore funding for Yucca Mountain.

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Las Vegas SUN
February 16, 2010

Gov. Sanford to Obama, Congress: Don’t cry for Yucca Mountain — keep your promise!

By Jon Ralston

through a letter to South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and an announcement of a presser Tuesday to try to bring the Nevada site back into play.

I have posted both at right.

I suppose no chance he would suggest the Appalachian Trial or Argentina as alternative dump sites.

(Hat tip: CNN's Mark Preston )

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Yakima Herald-Republic blog
February 16, 2010

Strange but true - Hastings applauds Obama

A little bipartisanship was forthcoming from Rep. Doc Hastings today. The Pasco Republican released a statement applauding the Obama administration for offering a conditional loan guarantee for two new nuclear power plants in Georgia.

“I voted for these tools to expand nuclear power back in 2005,” Hastings said. “Today’s announcement marks an encouraging step forward by the Obama Administration.”

But Hastings cautioned the administration that it better mean business, not politics.

“I am hopeful that this does not become merely a partisan political tool used by those who control Congress to try and win votes for a misguided cap and trade national energy tax. Expanding nuclear power need not and should not require a new national energy tax on all Americans.”

Hastings also said the administration is wrongly trying to shut down Yucca Mountain, the nuclear waste site in Nevada. Democratic Senate Leader Harry Reid of Nevada has been a consistent opponent of the site.

Hastings is the ranking Republican on the House Natural Resources Committee.

— Leah Beth Ward

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Tri-City Herald
February 16, 2010

Study: Imported waste would further harm Hanford ground water

By Annette Cary
Herald staff writer

A new draft study shows importing radioactive waste for disposal at Hanford would significantly increase pollution in ground water beneath the nuclear reservation, according to the Washington State Department of Ecology.

The state long has opposed the Department of Energy sending radioactive waste to Hanford for disposal. But the draft Hanford Tank Closure and Waste Management Environmental Impact Statement that's open for public comment puts some numbers to that assertion.

"We're cleaning up Hanford of some of the constituents we care most about and then recontaminating it with off-site waste to above the acceptable level from a cancer risk standpoint or a safe drinking water standpoint," said Suzanne Dahl, tank waste treatment section manager for the Department of Ecology.

Under some scenarios that appear likely, the amount of certain long-lived radioactive isotopes that would be imported and buried at Hanford would account for as much as 90 percent of the releases of that isotope to the environment, according to the state. Some of the worst contamination could occur 1,000 or more years from now.

The draft study prepared by DOE looks at sending 107,000 cubic yards of radioactive waste, some mixed with hazardous chemicals, to Hanford for disposal. However, DOE officials agreed as part of a settlement agreement of a state lawsuit not to import that waste until the Hanford vitrification plant is fully operational to treat the waste. That's scheduled for 2022.

But importing waste could then again become an option.

In the summary of the 6,000-page draft study, DOE writes that "receipt of off-site waste streams that contain specific amounts of certain isotopes, specifically iodine 129 and technetium 99, could have an adverse impact on the environment."

It suggests two alternatives: Robust treatment of the waste such as turning it into glass before burying it at Hanford, or limiting or restricting disposal of waste with those isotopes.

Iodine 129 and technetium 99 are of concern because both spread readily in ground water rather than clinging to soil and also are long-lived. Isotopes of cesium and strontium are more prevalent in the waste proposed to come to Hanford, but half of the radioactivity of those isotopes decays in about 30 years.

In contrast, 212,000 years are required for half of the radioactivity of technetium 99 to decay and 15.7 million years are required for half of the radioactivity of iodine 129 to decay.

Under current proposals, imported waste would not be processed at Hanford. It could go straight to a lined landfill in central Hanford, such as the Integrated Disposal Facility which also is planned to hold some Hanford tank waste.

The 53 million gallons of waste now held in Hanford's underground tanks will be separated into low-activity radioactive waste and high-level radioactive waste to be turned into a stable glass form at the vitrification plant for long-term disposal.

National law requires high-level waste to be disposed of at a national repository deep underground, such as the one previously proposed for Yucca Mountain, Nev., but glassified low-activity waste would be buried in a central Hanford landfill.

Tank waste from Hanford would have 48.2 curies of iodine that would be immobilized in glass primarily from the low-activity waste. The proposed imported waste would add an additional 15 curies of iodine, which under current plans would not be immobilized in glass.

About 1,800 curies of technetium 99 would be expected from off-site sources, compared with 29,700 curies of technetium from Hanford tanks that would be immobilized primarily in the low-activity waste glass.

Radioactive iodine releases from the Integrated Disposal Facility would peak 1,000 or 2,000 years in the future at 18 picocuries per liter. The drinking water standard is 1 picocurie per liter.

"When you look at the ground water releases from the Integrated Disposal Facility, it goes up significantly when you have off-site waste," Dahl said.

About 90 percent of the radioactive iodine that would be released from the landfill would come from waste imported to Hanford, and about 75 percent of the radioactive technetium released from the landfill would come from waste imported to Hanford, according to the state.

That's assuming of all the low-activity tank waste is treated at the vitrification plant, rather than through alternate methods the state does not support, such as bulk vitrification.

"It is so significant it is hard to imagine it would be acceptable to be disposed of at Hanford," Dahl said. "Certainly it would have to be significantly mitigated, and they may not be able to mitigate that far."

Washington voters in 2004 approved Initiative 297, which would have blocked sending more radioactive waste to Hanford until waste already there had been cleaned up. It was found unconstitutional, however, and never became law.

--Annette Cary: 582-1533; acary@tricityherald.com; More Hanford news at hanfordnews.com.

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Austin American-Statesman
February 16, 2010

Obama touts bipartisanship along with nuclear energy

President announces $8 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear plants and seeks GOP support.

By Ben Feller
Associated Press

WASHINGTON — Prodding Republicans, President Barack Obama on Tuesday championed nuclear energy expansion as the latest way that feuding parties can move beyond the "broken politics" that have imperiled his agenda and soured voters.

His call came as he dispatched Vice President Joe Biden and Cabinet secretaries nationwide to tout the economic stimulus plan against Republican criticism, reflecting that, until bipartisanship comes, the White House will remain aggressive in selling its own case to the public.

Since a January election in Massachusetts, when Democrats lost the 60th vote they need in the Senate to overcome Republican delays on legislation, Obama has recalibrated his strategy to advance his agenda.

His plan includes reaching out to Republicans on tax breaks, on health care and on energy, but also putting them on the spot for any refusal to help.

With a host of new goals — rebuilding public confidence, keeping Obama in charge of the debate, halting deep Democratic losses in this year's elections — the White House is now shifting its communications strategy.

The president cast his push for more nuclear energy as both economically vital and politically attractive to the opposition party. He announced more than $8 billion in loan guarantees to build the first nuclear power plant in nearly three decades, part of a nuclear initiative that could draw essential backing from Republicans.

The loan guarantees would go toward building two nuclear reactors in Georgia, three decades after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident halted all new reactor orders in the United States.

Nuclear plan criticized

The federal guarantees, authorized by Congress in 2005, are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the huge expense involved.

Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults. The Congressional Budget Office and Government Accountability Office have estimated that the risk of default for new nuclear reactors may be as high as 50 percent.

Critics also note that the loan guarantees come as Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. He has appointed a commission to find a safer solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

But Obama said the new reactors would reduce greenhouse gas pollution by 16 million tons a year, compared with similar coal-fired power plants.

Bipartisan appeal

At the same time, he asked Republicans to get behind a comprehensive energy bill that expands clean energy sources, assigns a cost to the polluting emissions of fossil fuels so that nuclear energy becomes more affordable, and gives both parties a rare chance to claim common ground.

"The fact is, changing the ways we produce and use energy requires us to think anew," Obama said during a stop at a job training center outside Washington. "And it demands of us a willingness to extend our hand across some of the old divides, to act in good faith, and to move beyond the broken politics of the past. That's what we must do."

That goal, however, remains in doubt.

Stimulus defense

This week, senior administration officials are scheduled to visit 35 communities to counter GOP claims that the massive economic stimulus program has failed. In Saginaw, Mich., on Tuesday, Biden insisted the stimulus is working even as he acknowledged "it's gonna take us a while to get us out of this ditch."

Michigan's unemployment rate is among the highest in the country. Chronic joblessness is driving an anti-incumbency fever, even as the economy by most other measures appears to be rebounding.

Democrats, as members of the party in power, are most likely to feel that anti-incumbency heat at the polls in November when House and Senate seats are on the ballot. Obama will head west later this week to raise money for two vulnerable Democrats, Sen. Michael Bennet of Colorado and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.

Bayh speaks out

On Tuesday, an Obama ally and moderate Democrat, two-term Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana, said the frustrations of gridlock drove his decision not to run for re-election. "There's just too much brain-dead partisanship," Bayh said.

His resignation gives Republicans a chance to pick up another Senate seat.

Obama says he still hopes to break that gridlock.

The president made his pitch for nuclear energy by saying nothing less than the economy, the security of the United States and the planet's future were at stake, and political divisions won't help.

"We can't continue to be mired in the same old stale debates between left and right, between environmentalists and entrepreneurs," he said.

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Augusta Chronicle
February 16, 2010

Ryberg, Sanford outline strategy to fight Yucca Mountain decision

By Sarita Chourey

COLUMBIA -- Republicans today criticized the Obama administration's decision to halt plans to make Yucca Mountain in Nevada a permanent nuclear waste storage facility, and outlined legal and legislative options to fight the administration's decision.

Gov. Mark Sanford threatened to take legal action against the federal government if the White House does not reverse its position by the end of the month. And Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken, said he plans to introduce legislation to divert payments flowing from the state to the federal government so that South Carolina can create a fund for its own waste-storage purposes.

"We have 30 years of science and probably millions of man hours and woman hours that have gone into the science of Yucca Mountain as a permanent depository," said Ryberg.

"We probably have 10 minutes in a poll that decided it wasn't good for the sitting (U.S. Senate) majority leader for Yucca Mountain to be pursued," he said, referring to Democratic Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada.

"The people of Aiken and neighboring counties have worked for decades at the Savannah River Site to assist the federal government while it developed Yucca Mountain," said Ryberg, adding that his resolution will end any future payments toward a permanent repository for the federal government, directing part of the money to a new state fund "to pay for a different permanent storage solution that we must obviously find for ourselves."

The press conference Tuesday included Republican U.S. Reps. Joe Wilson of the 2nd congressional district and Gresham Barrett of the 3rd district. Barrett was one of a handful of Republican candidates running for governor and other offices who attended the Tuesday press conference.

--Reach Sarita Chourey at sarita.chourey@morris.com or (803) 727-4257

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Business Week
February 16, 2010

SC leaders may sue if Nev. nuke waste dump ditched

By Jim Davenport

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford accused the president of playing politics with nuclear waste Tuesday, urging the Obama administration to follow through on plans to send thousands of tons of radioactive material to Nevada and urging legal action if it does not.

Sanford, surrounded by state, local and federal officials, accused the Obama administration of allowing "old-style Chicago politics" to dictate the fate of a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The governor said the president was trying to protect Nevada Democratic Sen. Harry Reid's seat while ripping off companies in South Carolina that have paid $1.2 billion to create the dump.

A Reid spokesman denied the charge, but the Republican governor called Obama's plan "a detour from basically a 25-year compact based on simple old-style Chicago politics that are the antithesis of the change that he himself had promised" during his campaign.

"This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington, D.C.," Sanford said.

The proposed site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas has been targeted for 20 years to house the nation's high level nuclear waste. As a candidate, Obama promised to close the facility, and his latest budget calls for eliminating funding for the site. Energy Secretary Stephen Chu has said Yucca Mountain is not an option and his department will withdraw its license application by the end of this month, essentially nixing the project as a commission studies where the waste should go.

"As we move to expand nuclear power, the President is fully committed to ensuring that the nation meets our long term storage obligations for nuclear waste," Moira Mack, a White House spokeswoman, said in an e-mailed statement.

For now, high-level nuclear waste is stored at 80 sites around the nation, typically at nuclear power plants or places such as the federal Savannah River Site in Aiken County, where more than 3,600 tons of nuclear waste is stored. County officials there plan to discuss litigation themselves, said Councilman Chuck Smith.

"We'd hope the administration would re-look at this issue, but we don't think they will and so we're certainly trying identify what our alternatives are from a legal standpoint," he said.

State Attorney General Henry McMaster said he is working on the legal questions. He said that includes talking with attorneys general in other states as well as the utility industry and nuclear industry legal experts.

The issue has been swirling for years here and in Nevada, where political careers can be lost based support of Yucca Mountain.

Sanford said the plans for Yucca Mountain span decades and numerous administrations and that $10 billion has spent on the underground site. "I mean, I think we all get it that Harry Reid is in a tough race out in Nevada and giving him this would give him a win in a tough race in Nevada but it would come at great expense to the rest of us as Americans," he said.

Jon Summers, communications director for Reid, said the senator consistently has opposed Yucca and the only reason that location was chosen was because Nevada lacked clout in Washington 25 years ago. "We now have an administration that is listening to Senator Reid and the people of Nevada," Summers said.

"It's interesting that the only people that are complaining about this are Republicans," he said, noting they're "the only people that want to bring nuclear waste to Nevada."

In December the federal Government Accountability Office said it is cheaper to store nuclear waste in the short term in concrete casks at the nation's nuclear power plants but that that method would be more costly over time.

The report said that approach would cost up to $34 billion during the next 100 years while the Yucca Mountain facility would cost at least $41 billion. It noted costs would rise when that waste has to be repackaged in the next century or a permanent repository is opened.

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Charleston Regional Business
February 16, 2010

Gov. Sanford joins call to keep Yucca Mountain open to SRS nuclear waste

A coalition of Republican leaders called Tuesday on President Barack Obama to press forward with nuclear waste storage in Nevada’s Yucca Mountain despite political roadblocks.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, Gov. Mark Sanford and Attorney General Henry McMaster are urging that the long-planned nuclear waste repository be opened. The site faces considerable political opposition in Nevada, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D.-Nev., has said repeatedly that he will block effort to force it upon his home state.

“The Yucca Mountain project provides a path out for the roughly 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste temporarily housed at the Savannah River Site and other environmentally-sensitive areas across South Carolina today,” Sanford said in a statement. “Over the last 18 years, South Carolina ratepayers have contributed over $1.2 billion to the Yucca Mountain project, and the Obama administration’s recent decision means we will get nothing -- literally nothing -- in return.”

McMaster’s office issued a statement saying the attorney general’s office would scrutinize the law in hopes of overturning Obama administration Feb. 1 action to abandon Yucca.

Overall, U.S. taxpayers have spent $10 billion to prepare the site, the governor’s office said. The Yucca repository has been on the drawing boards for more than two decades. Sanford and others argue that nuclear waste currently stored at SRS would be more safely contained buried deep in a mountain at Yucca.

The call to keep Yucca open comes as the president is set to announce loan guarantees to build two new nuclear reactors in Georgia at the Vogtle site to be built by the Southern Co. Obama has included more than $54 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear plants in his fiscal year 2011 budget proposal, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. New reactors planned in South Carolina by SCE&G and Duke Energy are in line to receive such grants

Obama has supported the industry in the key player to provide power without the emission of climate-damaging greenhouse gases. As a candidate, he did not support the opening of Yucca, saying that waste storage on site is the best short-term solution to grow the nuclear power industry.

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Orangeburg Times and Democrat
February 16, 2010

Nuclear waste storage plan should stand

THE ISSUE: Permanent storage of nuclear waste

OUR OPINION: Yucca Mountain plan should not be abandoned

Ironic it is that on the same day President Barack Obama announced the administration is approving a loan guarantee to construct the first nuclear plant in the United States in three decades that South Carolina’s governor protested the administration’s plan to abandon a long-standing plan for disposal of nuclear waste.

A Tuesday statement from the White House reinforced Obama’s stated belief that nuclear energy should be part of the country’s energy mix. In as much as we agree, there must be a plan for disposal of nuclear waste in the future — and the waste that is presently on hand.

When Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1982, it set the stage for a permanent nuclear waste repository. In 1987, Congress designated Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a deep geologic repository for the waste and as the only option for a long-term storage site. As recently as 2002, Congress reaffirmed its commitment to permanent storage at Yucca Mountain.

But politics and court battles have meant something quite different. Nuclear waste is stored at more than 120 locations across the country, with 160 million Americans living within 75 miles of one of the sites. In South Carolina, large amounts of nuclear waste are currently stored at the Savannah River Site. This presents a potential environmental risk given SRS is within the Savannah River watershed — home to millions of people.

In this era of terrorist threats — particularly the fear that terrorists could use nuclear weapons — the presence of so many storage facilities throughout the United States presents a national security threat because each site could be a target.

As Gov. Mark Sanford pointed out in urging the Obama administration and Congress on Tuesday to retain the commitment to permanent storage, Yucca Mountain would help alleviate many concerns by consolidating nuclear waste storage in a single, secure location. Sanford has been joined by members of the S.C. congressional delegation and others in the General Assembly in supporting the permanent storage plan.

“The Yucca Mountain project provides a path out for the roughly 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste temporarily housed at the Savannah River Site and other environmentally sensitive areas across South Carolina today. Over the last 18 years, South Carolina ratepayers have contributed over $1.2 billion to the Yucca Mountain project, and the Obama administration’s recent decision means we will get nothing — literally nothing — in return,” Sanford said.

The money to which the governor referred comes from ratepayers, who have been since 1982 assessed fees for nuclear waste disposal to the tune of $7 billion — $1.2 billion from South Carolinians alone. Meanwhile, the total spent for the preparation and construction of a permanent storage site at Yucca Mountain has been more than $10 billion.

“So for environmental and financial reasons — and to honor the promises made to this state and others — we’re asking the Obama administration and Congress to recommit to the Yucca Mountain project,” Sanford said in asking South Carolinians to contact their representatives at every level of government about the issue. “Urge them to use the billions of dollars provided by South Carolinians and others to finish the Yucca Mountain facility and finally provide a secure, permanent storage site for our nation’s nuclear waste.”

Failure to do so is continuing a policy of temporary storage of waste that poses risks and is not sustainable as the nation ramps up a nuclear program.

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The State
February 16, 2010

S.C. gov, officials blast Obama on Yucca Mtn. decision

By Sammy Fretwell
sfretwell@thestate.com

Gov. Mark Sanford, two U.S. congressman and other Republicans blasted President Barack Obama this morning for abandoning a plan to send highly radioactive nuclear waste to a disposal site in Nevada — a move they said will leave the Palmetto State holding tons of high-level nuclear waste.

And if Obama doesn’t reconsider the decision, they pledged to support a lawsuit to force the atomic waste disposal site in Nevada to open. Although few Democrats were at Tuesday’s press conference, Sanford and others said the issue of whether to open Yucca Mountain cuts across party lines.

“This issue is too big to be driven by partisan politics in Washington, D.C.,” Sanford said, noting that the administration’s proposal will “undo a 25-year solution that’s been in place during Republican and Democratic presidential administrations.”

The federal government has been working to open the Yucca Mountain project since the early 1980s and Republicans said has spent some $10 billion since that time. The Obama administration has decided to zero out funding next year for the Yucca Mountain site. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nevada, has fought against the project, citing environmental concerns in his state.

If it doesn’t open, South Carolina’s Savannah River Site nuclear weapons complex could be left with multiple thousands of cans of high-level atomic waste produced mostly during the Cold War. The state’s commercial nuclear plants also would not have a place to send high-level waste generated from power production, which would force them to continue storing it on site.

Sanford, a former congressman, was flanked Tuesday by Republican U.S. Reps. Joe Wilson and Gresham Barrett, a GOP candidate to succeed Sanford as governor. Others attending the news conference at the State House included GOP gubernatorial candidate Nikki Haley, R-Lexington, state Rep. Jeff Duncan, a congressional candidate from Laurens; state Sen. Greg Ryberg, R-Aiken; and members of the Aiken County Council.

Attorney General Henry McMaster, also a GOP candidate for governor, did not attend the news conference, but said in a statement he’s weighing legal action to challenge Obama’s decision.

“Following President Obama's announcement, my office immediately began researching what legal avenues and remedies are available to South Carolina,’’ McMaster said. “This includes consultation and collaborative discussions with attorneys general in similarly situated states, utility executives, nuclear industry legal experts, former DOE officials, and state and local officials from the Aiken-Savannah River (Site) community.’’

Sanford said Democrats had been invited to the news conference, but few showed up. One of those was Lawana McKenzie, an Aiken County Council member. She said the issue is whether South Carolina should continue to hold tons of high-level nuclear waste at Savannah River.

If South Carolina leaders “aren’t supporting our stand on this, then they’re not representing the citizens of South Carolina,’’ she said. “SRS was never built to be a repository. We’re not prepared for this. What we’ve been holding at that site has always been in preparation for moving it.’’

Ryberg said he will introduce legislation to divert any more payments by power customers that are being charged for the Yucca Mountain site. South Carolina has spent some $1.2 billion toward the site, according to Sanford’s office.

--Reach Fretwell at (803) 771-8537.

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WIS
February 16, 2010

SC leaders may sue if Nev. nuke waste dump ditched

COLUMBIA, SC (AP) - South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and other state officials are considering a lawsuit if President Barack Obama ditches plans to use Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a storage site for the nation's nuclear waste.

Sanford said Tuesday Obama would break a promise and would be playing politics if he didn't use the Nevada site to permanently store commercial nuclear waste currently being kept at the Savannah River Site near Aiken.

State Attorney General Henry McMaster says he started researching the legal issues involved when Obama's administration said it wanted to end the 30-year effort to open the Yucca Mountain site.

Members of the Aiken County Council said they will consider a lawsuit at their Tuesday meeting.

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WLTX
February 16, 2010

SC Leaders Could Sue Over Nuclear Waste Site

James Gilbert

Columbia, SC (WLTX, AP) -- Gov. Mark Sanford and other state officials are considering a lawsuit if President Barack Obama cancels plans to use Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a storage site for the nation's nuclear waste.

Sanford said Tuesday Obama would be playing politics if he didn't use the Nevada site to permanently store commercial nuclear waste currently being kept at the Savannah River Site near Aiken.

"The Yucca Mountain project provides a path out for the roughly 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste temporarily housed at the Savannah River Site and other environmentally-sensitive areas across South Carolina today," Sanford said in a Tuesday news release. "Over the last 18 years, South Carolina ratepayers have contributed over $1.2 billion to the Yucca Mountain project, and the Obama Administration's recent decision means we will get nothing - literally nothing - in return."

State Attorney General Henry McMaster says he started researching the legal issues involved when Obama's administration said it wanted to end the 30-year effort to open the Yucca Mountain site. State GOP Chairman Karen Floyd issued a statement that expressed Republian disapproval for the measure.

Members of the Aiken County Council said they will consider a lawsuit at their Tuesday meeting.

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AP Google
February 16, 2010

Fed loan guarantees may boost nuclear power return

By Matthew Daly (AP)

WASHINGTON — More than $8 billion in new federal loan guarantees to build two nuclear reactors in Georgia could be the first step toward a nuclear renaissance in the United States, three decades after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident halted all new reactor orders.

With the nuclear industry poised to begin construction of at least a half dozen plants over the next decade, President Barack Obama announced the first loan guarantees Tuesday, casting them as both economically essential and politically attractive. He called nuclear power a key part of comprehensive energy legislation that assigns a cost to the carbon pollution of fossil fuels, giving utility companies more incentive to turn to cleaner nuclear fuel.

"This is only the beginning," Obama said in designating the new federal financial backing for a pair of reactors in Burke County, Ga., to be built by Atlanta-based Southern Co. Obama's budget would triple — to $54.5 billion — loan guarantees available for new nuclear construction.

The federal guarantees, authorized by Congress in 2005, are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the huge expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults. Reports by Congressional Budget Office and Government Accountability Office have estimated that the risk of default for new nuclear reactors could be as high as 50 percent.

"This is a pre-emptive bailout where the government has already guaranteed to saddle taxpayers with any failure that the (nuclear) industry might run into," said Allison Fisher, an energy organizer at Public Citizen, a Washington-based consumer advocacy group.

Critics also note that the loan guarantees come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Senate committee this month that for the foreseeable future nuclear plants likely will store spent fuel rods on site.

Environmentalists say renewable energy such as wind and solar are more cost-effective than nuclear power and do not come with side effects such as radioactive waste.

But Marvin Fertel, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, a policy organization for the nuclear industry, said the loan guarantees will spur construction of nuclear plants all over the country, reducing greenhouse gases blamed for global warming and creating thousands of high-paying jobs.

The Georgia project is expected to create about 3,500 construction jobs and permanently employ 850 people, and Obama coupled the loan guarantee announcement with a visit to a job training center in Lanham, Md., at the headquarters of Local 26 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. The union represents electrical and telecommunications workers, and it offers training for energy jobs, including the construction of nuclear power plants.

Obama said the new reactors would reduce carbon pollution by 16 million tons a year, compared with a similar coal-fired power plant.

Although Chu called Tuesday's announcement a significant step to restart the domestic nuclear industry, actual construction of the first reactor is still years away. Southern Co.'s application for a license to build and operate the reactors is pending with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. The earliest any could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012, the NRC said.

Southern Chief Executive David Ratcliffe and Chu both said the new generation of nuclear reactors will be significantly safer than those built during the 1970s because of improvements in technology. This time around, the industry and regulators have streamlined licensing and are planning to use a standard design. The Three Mile Island accident in 1979 forced numerous power plants to be redesigned during construction.

"I have a lot of confidence that our approach this time will yield much better results," Ratcliffe said.

--Associated Press writers Julie Pace and Tim Huber in Charleston, W.Va., contributed to this report.

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AP Google
February 16, 2010

Obama to announce loan guarantee for nuclear plant

By Darlene Superville (AP)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama is highlighting a new investment in energy jobs with an announcement that the government will guarantee more than $8 billion in loans needed to build the first U.S. nuclear power plant in nearly three decades.

Obama was to make remarks Tuesday after touring a job training center at the headquarters of Local 26 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers in nearby Lanham, Md. The union represents electrical and telecommunications workers, and it offers training useful for energy jobs, including the construction of nuclear power plants.

Obama was expected to announce a total of $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees to build and operate a pair of reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., by Southern Co., an administration official said Monday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of Obama's announcement.

Federal loan guarantees are seen as essential to spurring construction of new reactors because of the huge expense. Critics say the guarantees are a form of subsidy that will put taxpayers at risk given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

The reactors, to be built by the Atlanta-based energy company, are part of a White House plan the administration hopes will win Republican support at a time when the public is expressing a desire for lawmakers to work together to solve problems.

Having Obama make the announcement also underscores the political weight the White House is putting behind the effort to use nuclear power and other alternative energy sources to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and other fossil fuels, and create jobs at home.

But construction of the reactors — and the jobs the project is expected to create — are years away.

Southern Co.'s application for a license to build and operate the reactors is pending with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. The earliest any could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012, an NRC spokesman said.

Southern Co. says the Georgia project would create about 3,000 construction jobs, while the new reactors would generate power for about 1.4 million people and permanently employ 850 people.

Obama called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his State of the Union address last month, and followed that by proposing to triple new federal loan guarantees for new nuclear plants. The president's budget proposal for 2011 would add $36 billion in new federal loan guarantees to $18.5 billion already budgeted but not spent — for a total of $54.5 billion.

That sum is enough to help build six or seven new nuclear plants, which can cost at least $8 billion apiece.

Rising costs, safety issues and opposition from environmentalists have kept utility companies from building new nuclear power plants since the early 1980s. The 104 nuclear reactors currently operating in 31 states provide about one-fifth of the nation's electricity.

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CNN
February 16, 2010

Obama's nuclear power push faces obstacle: Waste

From Dugald McConnell

Washington (CNN) -- President Obama's announcement Tuesday of loan guarantees for nuclear power plants may encourage new construction, but a problem still remains that has plagued atomic energy for decades: what to do with nuclear waste?

On the left, opponents of nuclear power say the president should not be using taxpayer money to help build more power plants that will produce even more radioactive material, so long as the government has not figured out where to put it all.

"We haven't found a solution for the 100 nuclear power plants operating," said Stephen Smith of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. "And waste is building up on-site, with no solution."

On the right, critics fault the president for leaving the country without a plan for disposing of the waste, when he decided to pull the plug on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump in Nevada. The government spent billions of dollars studying the location.

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, a Republican, said the president's decision was "spectacularly misguided, and breaks a promise" made "decades ago" by the federal government to handle the waste.

Sanford accused Obama of making a "Chicago-style" political play to help Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nevada, who faces a tough re-election bid in a state where the Yucca Mountain plan was unpopular. But the White House points out that the president opposed the site since he was campaigning as a candidate, on the grounds of scientific and security questions.

Reid echoed those security concerns, saying any transportation of nuclear materials across the country could open a vulnerability.

"Leave it on-site where it is," he said last year. "You don't have to worry about transporting it. Saves the country billions and billions of dollars."

Currently, 70,000 tons of radioactive waste are stored at more than 100 nuclear sites around the country, and 2,000 tons are added every year.

After uranium has been used in a reactor, the spent fuel remains radioactive for thousands of years. It is taken out and put into a pool of water, or above ground in canisters made of concrete, steel, and lead. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says the canisters are currently certified for up to 90 years of use, but that term may be extended.

During a visit to the Dresden nuclear plant in Illinois a few years ago, Christopher Crane of Exelon Nuclear stood next to a storage cask and showed CNN how little radiation escapes.

"If you stood here for an hour," he said, "you would pick up the same amount of radiation as you did by flying from Washington to Chicago to visit us today."

But both supporters and opponents of nuclear power largely agree that storing the material in casks at nuclear plants is no long-term solution.

"This generation was responsible for creating the waste," says Jack Edlow, whose Washington-based company transports nuclear material, "and this generation should make the decision to focus on it."

In January, the Obama administration announced a blue-ribbon panel would take a new look at the problem, headed by former Democratic congressman Lee Hamilton and former Republican National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft.

--CNN's Brian Todd contributed to this report.

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CNNMoney
February 16, 2010

Obama gives $8 billion to new nuke plants

By Steve Hargreaves, staff writer

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- President Obama announced Tuesday over $8 billion in federal support for two new nuclear power plants in Georgia, setting the stage for what could be the first completed reactor in this country in over three decades.

The money, coming in the form of loan guarantees, is going to build two new reactors at Southern Company's Vogtle plant facility, located some 170 miles east of Atlanta.

In announcing the grant at an electrical worker's union hall in Maryland, Obama used to occasion to tout the benefits of nuclear power.

"Nuclear energy remains our largest source of fuel that produces no carbon emissions," said the president. "To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst the worst consequences of climate change, we'll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It's that simple."

But Obama's speech made clear the move is also deeply political.

The money is part of $18.5 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear power approved under the 2005 energy bill. This grant is the first slice of money to be awarded.

Nuclear renaissance -- not dead yet

President Obama has increased the amount of money available for nuclear loan guarantees to over $54 billion in his 2011 budget.

The increased funding is part of an effort to win Republican support for the president's overall energy plan, which includes building more nuclear plants as well as making fossil fuels more expensive in an effort to cut greenhouse gases and make renewable energy more competitive.

"Those who have long advocated for nuclear power, including many Republicans, have to recognize that we will not achieve a big boost in nuclear capacity unless we also create a system of incentives to make clean energy profitable," Obama said. "As long as producing carbon pollution carries no cost, traditional plants that use fossil fuels will be more cost-effective than plants that use nuclear fuel."

Passing legislation to make fossil fuels more expensive and clean energy more profitable is a centerpiece of the Obama administration's domestic agenda.

A bill designed to do just that narrowly passed the House last summer, but faces stiff opposition in the Senate from lawmakers that are concerned about its cost to the economy, or don't believe in global warming. The Senate is expected to take up the matter sometime this year.

The Georgia plant

Southern Company is one of a handful of power producers that has been vying for this federal funding over the last few years.

Preliminary construction work on new reactors has already begun at a few sites around the country, including the Georgia plant. But the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission hasn't issued a final permit at any of the facilities.

Winning the government loan backing is a major breakthrough for Southern, and underscores just how expensive and risky building a new nuclear facility is.

Nuclear plants have been subject to massive cost overruns in the past, and without government support even those in the industry recognize a new plant would not be built.

The Georgia expansion is estimated to cost $14 billion, and is scheduled to be completed in 2017.

When originally built late 1980s, the plant was expected to have four reactors and cost $975 million, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. The final price tag for two reactors was $9 billion.

The new construction in Georgia is expected to create 3,500 jobs building the plant and 800 permanent jobs once the facility is complete, according to a Southern Company press release.

Each new reactor is expected to produce 1,100 megawatts of electricity, enough to power over 800,000 homes.

Too expensive?

Opponents of nuclear power claim the plants are too expensive to build, and fear government support will distort the power market in this country for years to come.

They also fear the plants will be the target of a terrorist attack, and say there is still no plan for what to do with the waste.

Supports contend the plants will get far cheaper after the first few are built, and will be a good source for clean, domestic power.

The Energy Department has stopped building a permanent waste disposal site at Nevada's Yucca mountain, but says the waste can be safety stored on-site in pools or concrete bunkers for many decades until another site is found.

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CounterPunch
February 16, 2010

Of Weapons and Reactors

Nukes Aren't the Answer

By Robert Alvarez

When President Obama rolled out his proposed budget to Congress for the coming year, he said it would build “on the largest investment in clean energy in history.” But Obama’s definition of “clean energy” includes a commitment to help companies garner billions of dollars in loans for nuclear reactor construction. And, unfortunately, nuclear energy isn't safe or clean and it's too costly for the nation.

The government’s role in the energy marketplace is clear in its loan-guarantee programs. This year, the Energy Department proposes to provide $166 billion in federal energy loan guarantees to aid the ailing auto industry and help finance nuclear, coal, and renewable energy projects. Sadly, the nuclear industry is slated to get the largest and riskiest share of that support.

Wall Street has refused to finance nuclear power for more than 30 years, rendering new construction impossible. The Obama administration, in a move to placate Senate Republicans, proposes to fund new power reactors with some $54.5 billion in federal loan guarantees. Because of the way the guarantees are structured, the actual loans will be made by the Federal Financing Bank out of the U.S. Treasury. Last year, the Government Accountability Office estimated that these loans have more than a 50-50 chance of failing. Because of skyrocketing costs, these loans might pay for five reactors and merely expand the nation’s electrical supply by less than 1 percent.

Meanwhile, the Obama administration is moving to terminate funds for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal site in Nevada. After nearly 30 years of trying, disposal of high-level radioactive waste is proving to be extremely difficult, so Obama has convened a “blue ribbon” panel of experts to recommend what to do with it. The accumulation of spent power-reactor fuel poses new safety issues, which will be the reality for several decades to come. Spent fuel pools which currently contain about four times what their original designs envisioned are more vulnerable to terrorist attacks than reactors.

In 2004, a National Academy of Sciences panel concluded that drainage of water from a spent fuel pond by an act of malice could lead to a catastrophic radiological fire. A year earlier, my colleagues and I pointed out these risks could be greatly reduced by putting most of the spent reactor fuel into dry, hardened concrete and steel containers as nations like Germany have already done.

Meanwhile, despite Obama’s rhetoric about reshaping America's energy future, he’s asking for a budget that would have the Energy Department continue to spend 10 times more on nuclear weapons than energy conservation.

Even with economic stimulus funding, the department’s actual energy functions comprise only 15 percent of its total budget and continue to take a backseat to propping up the nations’ large and antiquated nuclear weapons infrastructure. In fact, the Energy Department’s proposed budget for the 2011 fiscal year, minus stimulus money, looks a whole lot like it did in the Bush administration, and as it has during several presidents’ tenures.

More than 65 percent of our energy budget covers military nuclear activities and the cleanup of weapons sites. Its single largest expenditure maintains some 9,200 intact nuclear warheads. Even though the department hasn’t built a new nuclear weapon for 20 years, its weapons complex is spending at rates comparable to that during the height of the nuclear arms race in the 1950s.

There’s currently a 15-year backlog of discarded nuclear warheads. Yet, Obama’s proposed budget would halve spending on weapons dismantlement over the next five years. The physical elimination of nuclear weapons continues to have a low priority in Obama administration because it competes for funds to build a new weapons production complex a “holy grail” of the nuclear weapons establishment.

The Energy Department faces a brave new world in which, for the first time, it is being called on to employ millions of Americans to create a new energy future for the United States. It doesn’t appear that the Obama administration will meet this challenge. Instead, more of the nation’s tapped-out treasure is going for costly nuclear power, and nuclear weapons we don’t need and could never use.

--Robert Alvarez, an Institute for Policy Studies senior scholar, served as senior policy adviser to the Energy Department's secretary and deputy assistant secretary for national security and the environment from 1993 to 1999.

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Financial Times
February 16, 2010

Obama in nuclear energy push

By Anna Fifield and Kevin Sieff in Washington

President Barack Obama redoubled his efforts to promote nuclear power as a clean energy source on Tuesday, saying that $8bn in loan guarantees for the first nuclear power plant to be built in three decades was “only the beginning”.

Portraying nuclear energy as a key part of cutting carbon emissions at the same time as creating new, high-tech jobs, the president appealed for bi-partisan support to build more reactors. The push for nuclear power is part of the Obama administration’s efforts to pass climate change legislation.

“On an issue that affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we can’t continue to be mired in the same old stale debates between left and right, between environmentalists and entrepreneurs,” Mr Obama said at job training centre in Maryland.

“See, our competitors are racing to create jobs and command growing energy industries. And nuclear energy is no exception,” he said, pointing to investments in Japan, France, China and South Korea.

Mr Obama’s administration on Tuesday announced it would give $8.3bn in loan guarantees to help Southern Co build two reactors at a plant in Burke, Georgia.

Southern was among four companies named last year as being considered to share $18.5bn in federal loan guarantees to build new nuclear power facilities.

The White House said the Burke project would entail about 3,500 onsite construction jobs and 800 permanent operations jobs. Power generated at the facility would serve about 1.4m people in 550,000 homes, it said.

As his administration struggles with a stubbornly high unemployment rate and endeavours to keep climate change on the political front-burner, Mr Obama has suggested he can kill two birds with one stone by investing in clean energy sources.

After championing nuclear energy in his State of the Union address last month, Mr Obama included in his 2011 budget request a total of $54bn in loan guarantees — tripling the size of the existing guarantee programme — to encourage the construction of as many as 10 nuclear power plants.

There are now 104 nuclear power plants supplying 20 per cent of the US’s energy, but no nuclear projects have been started since 1977.

Mr Obama said that nuclear energy was nevertheless the US’s largest source of fuel that produced no carbon emissions.

“To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we’ll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It’s that simple,” he said. “This one plant, for example, will cut carbon pollution by 16m tonnes each year when compared to a similar coal plant. That’s like taking 3.5m cars off the road.”

Some Republicans, such as senators John McCain of Arizona and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, have previously expressed support for more nuclear power plants. But the increasing partisan divide in Washington and pressure from right-wing groups has made it more politically difficult for Republicans to support any Obama administration initiatives.

Building more nuclear power plants is a key part of the climate change legislation that has stalled in the Senate, where Democrats do not have the votes to pass a bill without some Republican support.

Mr Obama called on Republicans to support comprehensive energy and climate legislation.

“I believe there’s real common ground here. And my administration will be working to build on areas of agreement so that we can pass a bipartisan energy and climate bill through the Senate,” he said.

But since Mr Obama made his budget request, there have been objections from across the political spectrum.

Many critics claim that high risk ratings of nuclear reactor construction have long deterred Wall Street investment. In 2003, the Congressional Budget Office rated the risk of default on a nuclear loan guarantee to be above 50 percent.

Nuclear advocates claim that mistakes made in the 1970s that led to billions of dollars of losses and hampered the construction of new reactors have been fixed. They claim that a streamlined permitting process and standardised plant designs will lower construction costs and prevent delays.

“Our plants are currently the cheapest source of energy in the country,” said Leslie Kass, senior director for business policy and programs at the Nuclear Energy Institute. “Yes, they are capital intensive and there are large upfront costs . . . but we have companies putting up considerable investment here, and they’re doing their due diligence.”

The mounting logistical challenges facing Mr Obama’s nuclear power ambitions are further complicated by the administration’s plans, announced last week, to close Yucca Mountain, the country’s controversial proposed nuclear waste repository.

With Yucca no longer an option, the administration has announced a 15-member commission to consider the future of nuclear waste storage, headed by former congressman Lee Hamilton and former National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft.

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Forbes
February 16, 2010

GE's Nuclear Waste Plan

Jonathan Fahey

The company wants to use radioactive waste as fuel in a next-generation reactor.

Eric Loewen won't even utter the words "spent nuclear fuel." That's the industry term of art for the nuclear fuel bundles that are pulled out of today's reactors after they're done making electricity.

Loewen, a nuclear engineer at General Electric ( GE - news - people ), doesn't see them as "spent" at all. He sees them as raw material for a new type of nuclear reactor. "It's used, but it's an energy asset," he says.

GE's joint venture with Hitachi ( HIT - news - people ), called GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, would like to build both the reactor and facility that creates the new fuel at a single site, which GE calls an advanced recycling center, or an ARC.

Loewen and GE suddenly have a captive audience. The Obama administration plans to offer $54 billion in loan guarantees to help the country start building new nuclear reactors again. (See "New Boost for Nukes") But the country's old plan of storing it deep underneath Yucca Mountain in Nevada, which taxpayers spent $9 billion thinking about, is dead. (Harry Reid, remember, is from Nevada.)

So, at the same time the administration announced expansion of the loan guarantee program, it revealed that it was commissioning a blue ribbon panel to study and make recommendations on how the country can deal with its nuclear waste.

GE has not been shy about promoting its plan, but it does have its appeal, in large part because the other options are so far from perfect.

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The Guardian
February 16, 2010

Big firms drop support for US climate bill

• BP America, Caterpillar and Conoco end support

• Opponents claim climate law is dead in the water

Suzanne Goldenberg

Barack Obama suffered a setback to his green energy agendatoday when three major corporations – including BP America – dropped out of a coalition of business groups and environmental organisations that had been pressing Congress to pass climate change legislation.

The defections by ConocoPhillips, America's third largest oil company, Caterpillar, which makes heavy equipment, and BP rob the US Climate Action Partnership of three powerful voices for lobbying Congress to pass climate change law.

They also undercut Obama's efforts to cast his climate and energy agenda as a pro-business, job-creation plan.

Only hours earlier, Obama and other cabinet officials had made a high-profile announcement that $8.3bn (£5.3bn) was being awarded in loan guarantees for a company building the first new nuclear reactors in America in nearly 30 years.

But the loan decision in favour of Southern Company, which was framed by the White House as a kick-start for new nuclear plants, was upstaged by the departure of the big three firms from the climate partnership.

Officials from BP and ConocoPhillips said that the proposals before Congress for curbing greenhouse gas emissions did not do enough to recognise the importance of natural gas, and were too favourable to the coal industry.

The house of representatives passed a climate change bill last June, but the effort has stalled in the Senate.

"House climate legislation and Senate proposals to date have disadvantaged the transportation sector and its consumers, left domestic refineries unfairly penalised versus international competition, and ignored the critical role that natural gas can play in reducing GHG emissions," said the ConocoPhillips chairman and chief executive, Jim Mulva, in a statement. "We believe greater attention and resources need to be dedicated to reversing these missed opportunities, and our actions today are part of that effort."

Opponents of climate change legislation said the departure of the big three companies had all but killed off Obama's last chances of pushing his agenda through Congress.

"Cap-and-trade legislation is dead in the US Congress and that global warming alarmism is collapsing rapidly," said Myron Ebell, director of global warming for the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Obama this week is stepping up White House pressure on Congress with a series of events intended to show the job-creating potential of his green energy agenda.

His announcement at a Maryland job training centre of the new nuclear loan guarantees was a key part of the strategy.

"Even though we haven't broken ground on a new nuclear plant in nearly 30 years, nuclear energy remains our largest source of fuel that produces no carbon emissions," he said. "To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we'll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It's that simple." The guarantees would commit the US government to repaying Southern's loans if the company defaulted. They cover some 70% of the estimated $8.8bn cost of building two reactors at the company's Vogtle plant, east of Atlanta.

White House officials said today'syesterday's announcement reinforced Obama's pledge in his state of the union address last month to expand America's use of nuclear energy and to open up offshore drilling.

Obama has also asked Congress to triple loan guarantees for the nuclear industry, to $54bn from the current $18.5bn.

The pledge to the nuclear industry was seen as part of a strategy to win Republican support for the climate and energy bill. Expanding nuclear power, which supplies about 20% of the country's electricity, is one of the few elements of Obama's energy and climate agenda to win broad-based support. A number of Republican senators have demanded Obama help fund the construction of 100 new nuclear plants over the next decade.

Lindsey Graham, the Republican who is working closely with Democrats to draft a compromise cap and trade bill, is also on board with a greater role for nuclear power. His state, South Carolina, gets nearly half of its electricity from nuclear power.

But the subsidies have made some senators as well as environmental organisations uneasy. "It's a heck of a lot of money," said the Vermont senator, Bernie Sanders, who is an independent. "The construction of new nuclear plants may well be the most expensive way to go."The administration is also stuck on a solution for nuclear waste, after shutting down plans to bury the waste in the Yucca Mountain range in Nevada. The administration last month set up a panel to recommend new waste disposal solution.

Obama acknowledged those controversies , saying: "There will be those who welcome this announcement, and those who strongly disagree with it. The same has been true in other areas of our energy debate, from offshore drilling to putting a price on carbon pollution. But what I want to emphasise is this: even when we have differences, we cannot allow those differences to prevent us from making progress. On an issue which affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we cannot continue to be mired in the same old debates between left and right; between environmentalists and entrepreneurs."

The Southern projects must still win licensing approval.

White House officials said the new reactors could come on line by 2016 or 2017, and would generate 2.2GW. Construction alone would create 3,500 jobs, and the plant itself would create 800 operations jobs.

The loan guarantees are the first of some $18.5bn in funding originally approved by Congress in 2005.

Steven Chu, the energy secretary, said the loans were the first of "at least half a dozen, probably more" loans for new nuclear reactor construction. "We have a lot of projects in the pipeline", he told reporters, but did not indicate a time for further announcements.

The Southern reactors are to be built with the new Westinghouse AP1000 design, which Chu said was safer and more economical than the older generation of reactors. "If you lose control, it will not melt down," he said. "Three Mile Island was a partial melt down. It was serious, but on the other hand the containment vessel held."

Chu also disputed a report from the Congressional Budget Office that put the risk of default on loans to the nuclear industry as high as 50%. "We are looking at ways to increase ways of building these projects on time and on budget," he said.

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The Guardian
February 16, 2010

Barack Obama gives green light to new wave of nuclear reactorsUS president announces $8.3bn in loan guarantees for construction of first nuclear reactors in almost 30 years

Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent

Barack Obama pressed the start button on the first new construction of nuclear reactors in a generation today, announcing $8.3bn in loan guarantees for the company building two.

Obama, in a visit to a job training centre in Maryland, said the loan guarantees to the energy giant, Southern Company, would help launch the first wave of construction of new reactors in nearly 30 years as well as advance his energy and climate agenda.

"Even though we have not broken ground on a new nuclear plant in nearly 30 years, nuclear energy remains our largest source of fuel that produces no carbon emissions," he said. "To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we'll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It's that simple."

The loans would commit the US government to repaying Southern's loans if the company defaults. The guarantees cover some 70% of the estimated $8.8bn cost of building the two new reactors at the company's Vogtle plant, which is east of Atlanta.

White House officials said today's announcement reinforced Obama's pledge in his state of the union address last month to expand America's use of nuclear energy and to open up offshore drilling.

Obama has also asked Congress in his budget request to triple loan guarantees for the nuclear industry to $54bn from the current $18.5bn.

Obama's pledge to the nuclear industry was seen as part of a strategy to win Republican support for a climate and energy bill that has stalled in the Senate. Expanding America's reliance on nuclear power – which currently supplies about 20% of electricity – is one of the few elements of Obama's energy and climate agenda to win broad-based support.

A number of Republican senators have demanded Obama help fund the construction of 100 new nuclear plants over the next decade.

Lindsey Graham, the Republican who is working closely with Democrats to draft a compromise cap and trade bill, is also on board with a greater role for nuclear power. His state, South Carolina, gets nearly half of its electricity from nuclear power.

But the subsidies for the nuclear industry have made some senators as well as environmental organisations uneasy. "It's a heck of a lot of money," said the Vermont senator, Bernie Sanders, who is an independent. "The construction of new nuclear plants may well be the most expensive way to go."

The administration is also stuck on a solution for nuclear waste, after shutting down plans to bury the waste in the Yucca Mountain range in Nevada. The administration last month set up a panel to recommend new waste disposal solution.

Obama acknowledged those controversies today, saying: "There will be those who welcome this announcement, and those who strongly disagree with it. The same has been true in other areas of our energy debate, from offshore drilling to putting a price on carbon pollution. But what I want to emphasise is this: even when we have differences, we cannot allow those differences to prevent us from making progress. On an issue which affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we cannot continue to be mired in the same old debates between left and right; between environmentalists and entrepreneurs."

The Southern projects must still win licensing approval.

White House officials said the new reactors could come on line by 2016 or 2017, and would generate 2.2GW. Construction alone would create 3,500 jobs, and the plant itself would create 800 operations jobs.

The loan guarantees announced today are the first of some $18.5bn in funding originally approved by Congress in 2005.

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Heritage Foundation blog
February 16, 2010

Obama’s Nuclear Push Good but Not Enough

Author: Nick Loris

President Obama announced $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees today to commence projection construction on two nuclear reactors in Burke County, Georgia. This is good news. Congress has authorized $18.5 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear energy projects under the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which also provided other subsidies for nuclear power to help mitigate the effect of decades of regulatory risk for approximately the first six nuclear reactors built in the U.S. While the administration should be applauded for finally getting this program off the ground and getting the remaining $10.2 billion issued should be a priority, loan guarantees are not enough to recreate a robust nuclear industry in the United States. Indeed, an expansion of the program could do much more to stifle the industry’s growth than to help it.

Reuters reports that “A spokesman for Southern [Company] said the loan guarantee would cover up to 70 percent of the company’s portion of the project’s costs.” The money would be paid back if Southern Co. earns back its costs. Loan guarantees can help overcome some near-term financing obstacles, but they are subsidies and should not be expanded. Heritage nuclear expert Jack Spencer writes:

Expansive loan guarantee programs are wrought with problems. At a minimum, they create taxpayer liabilities, give recipients preferential treatment, and distort capital markets. Further, depending on how they are structured, they can remove incentives to decrease costs, stifle innovation, suppress private-sector financing solutions, perpetuate regulatory inefficiency, and encourage government dependence.”

Spencer lays out the problems with energy loan guarantees here.

Instead of expanding the loan guarantee program, the government should focus its attention on implementing policies that create a sustainable nuclear industry and reduce the taxpayer liability of the existing loan guarantees. New nuclear policy should address the problem and create a solution for waste management. The government should not take the geologic repository for nuclear waste, Yucca Mountain, off the table but instead allow the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to come to an objective, scientific conclusion on Yucca’s usability.

It is equally important for Congress to make the regulatory process for permitting new nuclear reactors more efficient, and to equip the NRC for regulating different reactor technologies. Establishing a predictable and effective regulatory structure for the nuclear industry, without compromising safety and security, will do much more to drive a nuclear renaissance than perpetuating the status quo with nuclear subsidies.

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The Hill
February 16, 2010

Obama's hot air on energy

By Ron Christie

At first blush, President Barack Obama's announcement earlier today to set aside $8 billion in loan guarantees to break ground on the nation's first nuclear power plant in more than 30 years was highly encouraging.

And then I remembered that this is the same president and same administration that have vowed to close Yucca Mountain in rural Nevada — the facility chosen by the Congress after spending tens of millions of dollars to find the safest location in the United States to place spent rods and other waste associated with nuclear power generation.

More change you can't believe in from the Obama administration — hailing the creation of a new nuclear facility while closing down the one spot in the nation to place spent nuclear materials. Unreal.

Source:
http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/energy-a-environment/81197-obamas-hot-air-on-energy

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Inter Press Service
February 16, 2010

U.S.: Nuke Plants Back in Vogue, as Climate Bill Stalls

By Matthew Berger

WASHINGTON, Feb 16, 2010 (IPS) - After decades of debate, the United States is poised to build its first new nuclear reactors since the early 1970s.

Speaking at a job training centre northeast of Washington Tuesday, President Barack Obama announced the federal government would underwrite the construction of two new reactors to be built in Georgia.

The loan guarantee will be for 8.3 billion dollars, meaning a sizable percentage of the reactors' 8.8 billion price tag will be put up by the government – and absorbed by it, were Southern Company, the energy firm building the plants, to default.

This investment in nuclear power is not unexpected and has two main objectives in addition to addressing the omnipresent objective of job creation. Obama hopes recharging the country's nuclear industry will help usher in an era of cleaner energy and help build a bridge between those, including the president, who want Congress to pass significant climate change legislation and those, mainly Republicans, who do not.

"Even though we’ve not broken ground on a new power plant – new nuclear plant – in 30 years, nuclear energy remains our largest source of fuel that produces no carbon emissions. To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we'll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It's that simple," Obama said Tuesday.

He said that one of the new plants would produce 16 million fewer tonnes of carbon pollution a year when compared to a similar coal plant. "That's like taking 3.5 million cars off the road," he said.

Obama admitted, however, that the environmental benefits of nuclear power were not that clear cut. But he seemed willing to accept the scepticism of environmentalists for what he saw as the clean energy advantages of nuclear – both emissions-wise and politically.

"There are also going to be those who strongly disagree with this announcement. The same has been true in other areas of our energy debate, from offshore drilling to putting a price on carbon pollution," Obama said.

"But what I want to emphasise is this: Even when we have differences, we cannot allow those differences to prevent us from making progress. On an issue that affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we can’t keep on being mired in the same old stale debates between the left and the right, between environmentalists and entrepreneurs," he said.

This action comes as no surprise following the several nuclear-related proposals Obama has put forward over the past couple weeks. Obama announced his intention to pursue "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his State of the Union speech last month. The following week, his administration proposed a budget that would triple the amount of loans available to energy utilities with plans to build new nuclear plants.

This tripling raises the amount available to the industry to 54 billion dollars, up from the 18.5 billion Congress authorised for such loan guarantees under the 2005 Energy Policy Act. The 8.8 billion announced for the Georgia reactors Tuesday is part of the Congressional allotment.

A major reason for these moves has been that in the bitter fight over climate legislation that has been ongoing on Capitol Hill, nuclear power has been one of the few issues that seems to have the ability to draw Republican support.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican who is working with Democrats on crafting a bipartisan proposal, has said nuclear will have to be part of any successful bill.

Even the right-wing pundit and one-time vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin has spoken favourably of Obama's nuclear agenda.

"I was thankful that the president at least mentioned nuclear power in the State of the Union. But again, we need more than words, we need a plan to turn that goal into a reality, and that way we can pave the way for projects that will create jobs," she told a crowd of supporters Feb. 6.

Tuesday's announcement will work to pave the way toward a nuclear reality that Palin and other conservatives want, and so Obama hopes it will also pave the way toward bipartisan agreement on a climate bill.

"My administration will be working to build on areas of agreement so that we can pass a bipartisan energy and climate bill through the Senate," Obama said Tuesday, explaining he sees "real common ground" between the two political sides.

He also pointed out to those who have opposed a bill capping greenhouse gas emissions – but are in favour of new nuclear plants – that "we're not going to achieve a big boost in nuclear capacity unless we also create a system of incentives to make clean energy profitable."

The U.S. currently has 104 nuclear reactors, which together provide 20 percent of the country's electricity. The new plants whose funding was announced Tuesday are expected to be able to produce 2.2 gigawatts of electricity once they come online in 2016 or 2017.

The U.S.'s nuclear production is dwarfed by other countries. France, for instance, has 59 plants, which provide nearly 80 percent of its power. Japan is a much distant second.

Obama noted Tuesday how these two countries "have long invested heavily in this industry. Meanwhile, there are 56 nuclear reactors under construction around the world: 21 in China alone; six in South Korea; five in India."

He drew parallels between the U.S. lagging behind other countries in nuclear power and its lagging behind in renewable power sources.

"Whether it’s nuclear energy, or solar or wind energy, if we fail to invest in the technologies of tomorrow, then we’re going to be importing those technologies instead of exporting them. We will fall behind," he said.

The last time a nuclear power plant was completed in the U.S. was in the early 1970s. Plans for reactors that had been approved after 1973 were subsequently cancelled and many partly-built facilities were abandoned following the 1979 accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear facility outside Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, which released radioactive gases into the air after a partial core meltdown.

Tuesday, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu explained that nuclear technology has come a long way since then and that the new reactors were part of a new, safer generation. "If you lose control, it will not melt down," he said.

Regulators must still approve the proposed plants for licensing before construction can go forward.

Most environmental groups were not pleased by the news. Nuclear, they felt, is hardly clean.

"We need to prioritise the cleanest, cheapest, safest, and fastest ways to reduce emissions and nuclear power is neither clean, cheap, nor fast, nor safe," said Sierra Club executive director Carl Pope.

He was particularly critical of the way the loans put "taxpayers on the hook for billions, particularly when the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office puts the risk of default at over 50 percent."

Chu disputed the 50 percent number.

The biggest environmental problem regarding nuclear power is the safe storage of the waste the reactors produce. The Obama administration has shut down longstanding plans to bury such waste in Nevada's Yucca Mountain. Last month, they set up a "blue-ribbon commission" to look into possible storage solutions.

Obama recognises the problems. "Now, none of this is to say that there aren't some serious drawbacks with respect to nuclear energy that have to be addressed. As the CEOs standing behind me will tell you, nuclear power generates waste, and we need to accelerate our efforts to find ways of storing this waste safely and disposing of it," he said.

Without a plan for dealing with the highly contentious problem of radioactive waste, though, Obama's loan plan only addresses the very first of many hurdles to his proposed new generation of nuclear.

---------------------------

Minneapolis Star Tribune
February 16, 2010

At job training center, Obama to announce loan guarantee to build 1st nuclear plant in decades

By Darlene Superville

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama is highlighting a new investment in energy jobs with an announcement that the government will guarantee more than $8 billion in loans needed to build the first U.S. nuclear power plant in nearly three decades.

Obama was to make remarks Tuesday after touring a job training center at the headquarters of Local 26 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers in nearby Lanham, Md. The union represents electrical and telecommunications workers, and it offers training useful for energy jobs, including the construction of nuclear power plants.

Obama was expected to announce a total of $8.3 billion in federal loan guarantees to build and operate a pair of reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., by Southern Co., an administration official said Monday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity ahead of Obama's announcement.

Federal loan guarantees are seen as essential to spurring construction of new reactors because of the huge expense. Critics say the guarantees are a form of subsidy that will put taxpayers at risk given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

The reactors, to be built by the Atlanta-based energy company, are part of a White House plan the administration hopes will win Republican support at a time when the public is expressing a desire for lawmakers to work together to solve problems.

Having Obama make the announcement also underscores the political weight the White House is putting behind the effort to use nuclear power and other alternative energy sources to reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and other fossil fuels, and create jobs at home.

But construction of the reactors — and the jobs the project is expected to create — are years away.

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Politico
February 16, 2010

Nuclear plants prompt negative reaction

President Barack Obama’s efforts to lure climate change votes by embracing nuclear power are drawing fire from both the left and the right.

Environmental groups are leery of using federal funds to subsidize nuclear power plants, arguing that they can be risky investments.

“Increasing loan guarantees for nuclear power beyond what Congress already has authorized would shift unacceptable risks from the nuclear industry to U.S. taxpayers,” said Ellen Vancko, nuclear energy and climate change project manager at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “This is a prime example of pork-barrel politics on behalf of special interests.”

Nuclear reactors generate electricity without emitting global warming-causing greenhouse gases. But the plants cost billions of dollars to build, struggle to find investors and frequently face opposition from community residents who don’t want nuclear facilities anywhere near them.

The Congressional Budget Office and the Government Accountability Office have estimated the risk of default for nuclear reactors to be as high as 50 percent. And in 2007, six large Wall Street investment banks told the Energy Department they were unwilling to accept any more financial risk for nuclear power.

Instead, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who argues federally backed expensive new nuclear plants would be a waste of taxpayer money, believes cheaper renewable fuels, such as solar and wind, are a far better investment.

“It’s a heck of a lot of money,” he said. “The construction of new nuclear plants may well be the most expensive way to go.”

Democrats are making an unprecedented push for nuclear power — a strategic shift designed to win Republican support for their climate change initiatives.

At the same time, Republicans argue that the White House isn’t doing enough to support the industry. They want to see greater capacity and investment in the storage and recycling of nuclear waste.

Arizona Sen. John McCain said he’s had many conversations with administration officials — and remains unconvinced that they are serious about handling storage and waste recycling.

“We won’t store, we won’t recycle — but we want to work with you,” he said. “It’s a great routine. It really is.”

McCain and other Republicans also object to the administration’s opposition to using Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a nuclear waste repository. Energy Secretary Steven Chu says the administration will withdraw the facility’s license application at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission over the next month.

“Both the president and I have made clear that Yucca Mountain is not an option,” he said.

Instead, the administration has formed a 15-member commission to study alternatives to the site and report back within the next two years. The panel is headed by former Rep. Lee Hamilton (D-Ind.), now president and director of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and retired Lt. Gen. Brent Scowcroft, who was national security adviser to Presidents Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush.

Meanwhile, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the ranking Republican on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, contends the decision on Yucca conflicts with the president’s State of the Union rhetoric.

“There’s a real inconsistency between what he says and what is actually transmitted in his budget just a few days later,” she said.

The decision to formally abandon the Yucca Mountain site is also opposed by the nuclear industry.

“The industry does not support the termination of this program but believes that, if it is going to happen, it should occur in an orderly manner to permit the licensing process to be restarted if ever warranted,” said Marvin Fertel, president and chief executive officer of the Nuclear Energy Institute.

The president and his administration have emerged as champions of nuclear power, with Obama even mentioning it in his State of the Union address last month to a joint session of Congress.

“Nuclear energy must also be a part of our clean energy mix,” Chu said at a budget hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) are working on a climate bill that’s expected to include expansive nuclear provisions, including tax incentives, loan guarantees and provisions streamlining the regulatory approval process for the nuclear industry.

“Secretary Chu has been incredibly helpful on the nuclear side,” Graham said. “He’s a very pro-nuclear guy.”

The initiatives are designed to attract support from moderate Democrats and Republicans, who’ve proposed building 100 new nuclear plants in the next 20 years.

The administration’s budget for the 2011 fiscal year includes $54 billion in loan guarantees for the nuclear industry, along with an additional $485 million for nuclear research and development. The new guarantees are in addition to the $18.5 billion already allocated to the Energy Department.

Liberal Democrats in the Senate also appear more willing to compromise on nuclear power, as long as they get a strong climate bill that includes a cap on greenhouse gas emissions.

“If it’s part of a comprehensive climate change bill, I could support it,” Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse said of the nuclear provisions. “I would want to see as much standardization as possible for both safety and efficiency reasons.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0210/32993_Page2.html#ixzz0fpgMfwgo

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PR Newswire
February 16, 2010

40 New Nuclear Power Plants Will Need To Be Built by 2035 to Help Meet Anticipated U.S. Electrical Energy Demand While Reducing CO2 Emissions

U.S. energy policy must focus attention and invest in many electrical power generation sources - including Nuclear, Solar, and Wind power - to meet future demand while reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

BOSTON, Feb. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- A Founding Principal of GEI Consultants, Inc. asserts that as many as forty nuclear power plants will need to be constructed by 2035 to help support a one percent annual increase in U.S. electrical power demand. According to Daniel LaGatta, Ph.D., a one percent annual growth rate for electrical power demand would increase U.S. generation requirements by approximately 303,000 Mw in 2035. A host of electrical power sources – including wind, solar, clean fossil and nuclear - will be needed to help meet demand. He concludes that the best approach to establishing a rational national energy plan as it relates to America's future electric power generation demands is to include in the discussion all potential power sources, from clean coal and natural gas, to biomass, geothermal, hydro, nuclear, solar, and wind.  Permitting, licensing, and construction of a new nuclear plant can take as long as 10 years. The fact that no new nuclear power plants are currently under construction should be a cause of major concern to government, industry and citizens alike.

Currently, barriers exist that limit the production of adequate levels of wind, hydro and solar energy supplies to meet the expected 2035 demand. Over the next 25 years all clean energy sources including nuclear power will be necessary to keep up with U.S. demand.

While it can be demonstrated that the renewable energy sources such as wind, hydro and solar cannot satisfy all of our new demand needs, it is important that the U.S. diversify our energy supply portfolio. We must continue to support wind and solar energy sources to improve our renewable energy portfolio and provide diversity to our energy supply.

Nuclear power currently supplies the United States with approximately 20 percent of its electric energy needs and 68 percent of all carbon-free electricity. If one is reasonable in assuming the contributions of renewable energy sources, it will become clear that to meet expected energy demand in 2035 with carbon-free electric energy, nuclear power must be a portion of our new generation. With only 10 percent of our installed capacity, nuclear power has consistently and safely contributed approximately 20 percent of the electric power used in the United States. Because of its high reliability and low production cost, nuclear power has been and will continue to be a major means of carbon-free generation.

A strong, viable U.S. nuclear industry would have a positive influence on the U.S. economy as well. Each nuclear plant creates about 4,000 construction jobs and 400 permanent jobs when in operation. These are high-paying jobs that cannot be sent overseas. Supporting industries also create thousands of additional U.S. manufacturing jobs and are a boost to our manufacturing capabilities.

The initial development of a new generation of nuclear power plants will result in significant dividends that include the reduction of CO2 emissions and the development of a major renewable energy industrial program that will create thousands of new U.S. manufacturing jobs. Aggressively developing a nuclear energy program can be one of the United States' most viable options for conquering climate change, overcoming economic duress, and paving the way for a sustainable future.

Excerpted from "Nuclear Power: A Green Technology" by Dr. Daniel LaGatta, founding principal of GEI Consultants, Inc. For a more in-depth discussion of alternative energy solutions and nuclear energy as a viable green technology, please visit GEI Consultants website to read the full article.

About GEI Consultants, Inc.

GEI's multi-disciplined team of engineers and scientists deliver integrated geotechnical, environmental, water resources and ecological solutions to diverse clientele nationwide. The firm has provided a broad range of consulting and engineering services on over 25,000 projects in 50 states and 22 countries. For more information, please visit the firm's web site at www.geiconsultants.com.

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USA Today
February 16, 2010

Obama urges new round of nuclear power plants

Posted by Richard Wolf

Risking a confrontation with anti-nuclear activists, President Obama just announced his administration will provide more than $8 billion in loan guarantees to help build a nuclear power plant in Georgia.

The anticipated announcement, made to union electricians and others at a job training facility in Lanham, Maryland, begins to fulfill a pledge the president made in his State of the Union address, his budget and in a meeting with the nation's governors this month to recharge the nuclear energy industry after a 30-year hiatus.

"We're going to have to build a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants in America," Obama said. "This is only the beginning. My budget proposes tripling the loan guarantees we provide to help finance safe, clean nuclear facilities."

The budget would add $36 billion to an existing $18.5 billion in available loan guarantees, for a total of $54.5 billion. Federal regulators are reviewing applications for 22 plants to be built in the next two decades.

Oval colleague Julie Schmit reported earlier this month that bigger loan guarantees could be a "tremendously positive development for our nation," according to Marvin Fertel, CEO of the Nuclear Energy Institute. But Kert Davies, research director for Greenpeace, calls it "a dangerous way to solve global warming."

Another Oval colleage at USA TODAY, Eugene Kiely, notes that money for the loan guarantees was stripped from the $862 billion stimulus bill that Obama signed almost exactly one year ago following objections from liberals and environmentalists.

Obama acknowledged the objections in his remarks this morning. "What I want to emphasize is this: even when we have differences, we cannot allow those differences to prevent us from making progress," he said. "On an issue which affects our economy, our security, and the future of our planet, we can't keep on being mired in the same old stale debates between the left and the right."

Here's another sampling of the president's remarks:

I know it has long been assumed that those who champion the environment are opposed to nuclear power. But the fact is, even though we have not broken ground on a new nuclear plant in thirty years, nuclear energy remains our largest source of fuel that produces no carbon emissions. To meet our growing energy needs and prevent the worst consequences of climate change, we'll need to increase our supply of nuclear power. It's that simple. This one plant, for example, will cut carbon pollution by 16 million tons each year when compared to a similar coal plant. That's like taking 3.5 million cars off the road.

But what about nuclear waste? In his budget, Obama also proposed eliminating funds for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste facility in Nevada, home of embattled Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid. His solution now? Create a bipartisan commission to figure out what to do -- similar to his prescription for solving the federal budget deficit.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
February 15, 2010

South Carolina governor protests Yucca termination

Legal options sought to force go-ahead of project

By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- South Carolina's governor is protesting the Obama administration's planned termination of the Yucca Mountain Project, including asking the state's attorney general to "pursue every legal action possible" to stop the shutdown.

Gov. Mark Sanford is scheduled to hold a news conference today in Columbia, S.C., alongside two members of the state's congressional delegation, where they are expected to broadcast their unhappiness with steps the White House is taking to end development of a Nevada nuclear waste repository.

"The governor will not be announcing any specific legal action tomorrow, at least as of right now," said Sanford's spokesman, Ben Fox.

Sanford, a Republican, will call for President Barack Obama "to recommit to Yucca Mountain, to put it bluntly," Fox said.

It was unclear what options South Carolina could pursue. But Sanford's reaction reflects what is being described as a mixture of bafflement, anger and resignation to the planned Yucca termination in several of the 38 states where radioactive spent fuel figures to remain stored at reactor sites for decades longer while the government considers alternatives to underground storage in Nevada.

"They are frustrated obviously," said David Wright, a South Carolina public service commissioner.

Wright predicted that within a month, one or more states will seek to intervene with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to protest the administration's plan. "And once something like that is filed, there is no telling who else would get involved," he said.

Sanford, whose state is home to an estimated 4,000 metric tons of nuclear waste from seven commercial nuclear reactors and defense nuclear waste stored at the Savannah River processing center, asked Attorney General Henry McMaster in a letter Thursday to start researching options for the state to pursue.

In his letter, Sanford said the decision to end funding for the repository and withdraw a pending license application at the NRC "is spectacularly misguided" and "breaks a promise" the government made almost three decades ago to dispose of the radioactive material produced by 104 commercial reactors.

He said the decision to terminate Yucca Mountain was "nothing more than what many would see as a Chicago-style political payoff" to Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., who secured such a pledge from Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Sanford sent a similar letter to Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and other members of his state's congressional delegation last week. He asked them to do what they could "in pushing the Obama administration and Congress to complete the permanent repository."

A Reid spokesman said Obama was right to shelve the Yucca Mountain repository because Nevada did not have the clout to prevent its selection years ago and now has the power in Reid, the Senate majority leader, to force a new direction. "Because of Harry Reid, a scientific panel is going to determine how best to dispose of nuclear waste," spokesman Jon Summers said, referring to a commission established by the Obama administration.

Reps. Joe Wilson and Gresham Barrett, both Republicans, are scheduled to join Sanford at the news conference today, along with other state officials and residents near the Savannah River complex, Fox said.

At a conference of state utility regulators in Washington on Monday, officials debated but could not agree on how states holding nuclear waste should respond to the Obama administration's decision.

"What do we really want? We want the waste moved," said Brian O'Connell, nuclear waste adviser to the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.

Department of Energy officials met over the weekend with utility regulators and staff but could not answer why DOE wanted to withdraw the Yucca license application "with prejudice," a legal term that signifies the application cannot be refiled at a later date. The decision was made at the White House, the regulators were told.

"It was interesting to watch them squirm," Sarah Hofmann, a public utilities staff member from Vermont, said in a presentation. Regardless, Hofmann said, "the ground has shifted beneath us, and we need to readjust."

A National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners subcommittee considered an official resolution that expressed frustration with the proposed ending of the repository program but pledged to work with the commission to study alternatives.

Lauren McDonald, chairman of the Georgia Public Service Commission, called for something stronger. He said states should demand that DOE produce all of the documents that supported its decision to find the Yucca site unsatisfactory and to have them examined in congressional hearings.

McDonald said the association of utility regulators should formally oppose the withdrawal of the repository license application and call for the NRC to complete its evaluation of the project.

Dusty Johnson, chairman of the South Dakota Public Utilities Commission, said the Yucca Mountain issue "is a lot more about politics and always has been, than it has been about good policy."

"Leadership is not dithering and delaying until you can pass the buck onto the next generation," Johnson said. "While we may have 40 years to deal with this problem, 25 years has gone by, and we are not a whole lot closer. Forty years might as well be tomorrow."

But Greg Jergerson, chairman of the Montana Public Service Commission, said states should be "constructively engaged" with the administration, rather than critical of it.

--Contact Stephens Washington Bureau Chief Steve Tetreault at stetreault@stephensmedia.com or 202-783-1760.

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WCSC
February 15, 2010

Sanford blasts Obama for Yucca decision

COLUMBIA, SC (WMBF/WCSC) - South Carolina governor Mark Sanford, flanked by other Republican officials, blasted the Obama administration Tuesday morning for abandoning a decades-long plan to send nuclear waste to a Nevada-based dump site. Sanford said Obama's plan would leave South Carolina without a place to dispose of the tons of nuclear waste generated at the Savannah River Site near Aiken.

The state's Attorney General Henry McMaster said he was seeking legal recourse to force the administration to keep the Yucca Mountain site open.

"Following President Obama's announcement, my office immediately began researching what legal avenues and remedies are available to South Carolina. This includes consultation and collaborative discussions with attorneys general in similarly situated states, utility executives, nuclear industry legal experts, former DOE officials, and state and local officials from the Aiken - Savannah River Plant community," he said in a release.

In a Tuesday press conference, Sanford reiterated the bi-partisan nature of the 23-year-long plan to make the Nevada facility the primary permanent storage site for nuclear waste generated in the U.S., saying it would "undo a 25-year solution that's been in place during Republican and Democratic presidential administration."

Sanford said the federal government has spent more than 20 years and $10 billion to open the Yucca Mountain site. The Obama administration, amid a flurry of budget cuts, opted to zero out funding for the site in the next fiscal year. Sen. Harry Reid has fought against the placement of the site, citing concerns for the environment and the people that live in and around Las Vegas.

Reid is the senior Senator from Nevada and the Majority Leader in that body.

If the Yucca Mountain site is scrubbed, it leaves the state of South Carolina and the Savannah River Site in a precarious position when considering long-term disposal of its nuclear waste, much of which was generated when the facility's five nuclear reactors were in operation between the 1950s and 1980s.

State and municipal legislators were on hand during Tuesday's press conference, including state Sen. Greg Ryberg (R-Aiken) and members of the Aiken County Council, who have a greater-than-political interest in the administration's decision.

According to the 2000 Census, more than 75,000 people live within ten miles of the SRS, many of whom are represented by Ryberg.

Congressman Gresham Barrett used the most pointed language in a release about the Obama administration's decision, calling it another broken promise.

"If I seem a little angry, it's because I am. We all should be outraged. In the real world, if you pay for something and don't get it, then there are real consequences. For too long, the same hasn't held true in Washington and it's time that changed," said Barrett in the release.

He, along with Rep. Joe Wilson, said they were drafting legislation to urge the President to reconsider his decision.

President Barack Obama has said he doesn't see Yucca Mountain as a workable option. Obama energy adviser Carol Browner says the White House is "done with Yucca" and wants to find alternatives.

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Keene Sentinel
February 15, 2010

Lessons from north?

Maine Yankee has been shut since 1996

By Daniel Barlow
Vermont Press Bureau

WISCASSET, Maine — All that remains of Maine Yankee now is a series of large concrete structures in the middle of a grassy field — 64 giant dry cask storage units holding the radioactive waste from the plant’s 24 years of operation. Signs along the rural road in Wiscasset notify travelers of serious security ahead and issue stern warnings: Guards can use force to stop you if you go any further down the road.

Other than those details, the road looks like any other in small towns across New England.

“That’s it,” said Eric Howes, the public relations official for Maine Yankee, pointing at the dry cask storage units more than 100 yards away. “There’s not really much to see.”

Thirteen years ago there was a whole lot more to see than a grassy field. Maine Yankee was a pressurized water reactor built along the shore of the Bailey Point peninsula in 1972 and for two and a half decades produced electricity for the state, totaling nearly 120,000 gigawatt-hours of power.

Maine didn’t exactly welcome the nuclear plant with open arms.

But the plant — owned by a corporation formed by 10 utilities, including one from Vermont — won strong political support over the years, notably for the property taxes it paid to the tiny town of Wiscasset and the more than 500 people it employed.

The future of Maine Yankee all came crashing down in late 1995 when an anonymous whistleblower in the company alleged that it falsified safety information to the federal government that allowed the plant to boost its power production by 10 percent.

“That was just devastating for the company,” said Ray Shadis, an anti-nuclear activist who lives in Maine. “They never recovered from that.”

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission stepped in during the following summer, citing Maine Yankee on 16 safety violations. The owners shut down the plant but had ambitious plans to fix the problems — which included cracks in the steam generator tubes — and reopen soon.

When Maine Yankee powered down on Dec. 6, 1996, it would be the last day the plant operated.

First wave of reactors

As Vermonters ponder the future of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon, which is seeking to extend its license to operate past 2012 as it faces a wave of controversy over the plant’s age, management and a leak of radioactive tritium, it is instructive to look at what happened to nuclear power in neighboring Maine.

While there are similarities between Maine Yankee and Vermont Yankee, there are also many differences.

Both were in the first wave of reactors built in the United States during the early 1970s, and both began producing electricity in 1972.

The two plants are different types of nuclear reactors, however. Maine Yankee, which produced about 900 megawatts of power, is what is known as a pressurized water reactor; Vermont Yankee is the slightly less common boiling water reactor. The major difference between those two types of plants is how the reactor is cooled.

Maine residents tried three times to shut down the nuclear plant in their state. Unlike Vermont, Maine has a law allowing for binding statewide referendums. The votes to close Maine Yankee always failed — but the margins were slim, including one year when 44.5 percent of voters wanted to shut it down.

“We won all the surrounding towns in the evacuation area except for Wiscasset,” remembered Shadis, a resident of Edgecomb, who worked with Maine’s Friends of the Coast and Vermont’s New England Coalition, two anti-nuclear groups.

Shadis wasn’t always an anti-nuclear activist. He grew up in a family of engineers who helped design missiles for the federal government. Even when he moved to Maine, he only casually knew about Maine Yankee.

Then came the near-meltdown at the Three Mile Island reactor in New York state in 1979.

“The danger of nuclear power became clear to me and a whole lotta other people then,” Shadis said.

Shadis began organizing other locals worried about nuclear power. A meeting in April 1979 at the local town hall attracted nearly 1,500 people.

“What had begun to happen would consume my life for the next 30 years,” Shadis said.

Prompt dismantlement

Maine Yankee was scheduled to reopen in August 1997.

But in May of that year, the company’s board of directors announced that it would instead remain shut down and begin working toward decommissioning because the problems at the plant were too costly too fix.

“It was an economic decision,” said Howes, the public relations official. “But it still came as a shock to the community.”

At the time, no other nuclear power plants of Maine Yankee’s size had begun decommissioning, making this a test case for the rest of the industry. Several research papers were written about the process and still help inform proper decommissioning at other plants.

Decommissioning a nuclear power plant is not a step-by-step process, Howes said. Instead, months of planning led into a process where the plant was disassembled in stages, waste and other radioactive materials were shipped out by rail, and the spent nuclear fuel was stored in dry cask containment units.

Howes said Maine Yankee went with what is known in the industry as the “cold and dark” approach to decommissioning: draining the liquids in all the systems and disconnecting any electricity to those buildings.

To protect the spent fuel — which must have a regulated temperature — the company built what it called a “spent fuel pool island,” meaning all the systems needed for that were separated from the rest of the facility.

In all, about 400 million pounds of waste was removed from the Maine Yankee site.

“The whole process, from our perspective, was a success,” he said.

Closing Maine Yankee meant people lost their jobs. Before shutdown, it had about 600 employees. By the end of 1997, that number was cut in half. In December 1998, there were only about 135 people working at the plant.

The closure also had a dramatic effect on Wiscasset. When it was up and running, Maine Yankee represented more than 90 percent of the community’s tax base, paying about $12 million each year. Now the company pays the town about $1 million in lieu of taxes for storing the radioactive waste.

The plant’s owners elected to begin decommissioning soon after the shutdown, even though Maine Yankee’s decommissioning fund couldn’t meet the projected cost. Every year of delay was expected to add to the total expense, according to Howes.

Shutting down and cleaning up the site was expected to cost $380 million, and an additional $128 million was projected for storing the radioactive waste. Those estimates have proven fairly accurate.

Maine Yankee, being owned by electric utilities, turned to the state’s ratepayers to make up the difference. Under a deal reached in early 1999, Maine residents began paying $33.6 million annually to boost the fund.

No place to put it

During the ride back from the dry cask storage units, Maine Public Radio broadcasts a noontime report on the poor prospects for a plan to collect all the nation’s radioactive nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

Earlier that week, President Barack Obama announced new federal guarantees to build a new generation of nuclear power. His administration also submitted a budget allocating zero dollars for the national repository, effectively ending that effort.

“Well, what it means is that Maine Yankee down in Wiscasset now becomes sort of a de facto storage site for high-level waste,” said Paul Dostie, Maine’s nuclear safety inspector, on the radio show.

No matter where Maine residents stand on nuclear power, the lack of a national solution to the problem of spent fuel unites many causes. Owners of nuclear power plants want the federal government held to its earlier promise to take the waste; anti-nuclear activists don’t want that waste sitting in their backyards for decades.

Maine Yankee is essentially out of business, with the exception of its responsibility to watch over the spent fuel. Howes could not say how many employees the company still has on the payroll, but he agreed that it was “less than 20.” Most of them are security workers to monitor the storage site.

“We’re disappointed that this is the direction the Obama administration is taking,” said Howes. “Yucca Mountain is still a viable option. This seems premature.”

All six New England governors wrote to Steven Chu, the secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, in mid-December saying there is a “growing consensus that the expedited removal and consolidation of spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste ... is sound public policy.”

New England is home to three decommissioned nuclear power plants. Each stores its nuclear waste on site, and, in Maine, the cost of that storage is continually passed on to ratepayers via their monthly electrical bills.

Hudson, a graduate of the University of Vermont with a strong background in working with “green” groups, said his view on nuclear power has shifted a bit in recent years, noting that he now sees it as having “some role in our energy future.”

But the lack of a solution for the highly radioactive waste gives him pause. His ideal neighbor is not a collection of radioactive canisters.

“It’s foolish to believe that this is clean energy,” he said. “The outcome of nuclear power is waste that won’t be safe for long after I’m gone. There simply needs to be a national solution to the waste issue.”

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Mother Nature Network
February 15, 2010

Obama nuke plant loan reflects new strategy

Two new Southern Co. reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., are part of a White House energy plan that officials hope will draw Republican support.

By Ben Feller
AP

The Obama administration's planned loan guarantee to build the first nuclear power plant in the U.S in almost three decades is part of a broad shift in energy strategy to lessen dependence on foreign oil and reduce the use of other fossil fuels blamed for global warming.

President Barack Obama called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his Jan. 27 State of the Union speech and followed that by proposing to triple loan guarantees for new nuclear plants. He wants to use nuclear power and other alternative sources of energy in his effort to shift energy policy.

Obama in the coming week will announce the loan guarantee to build the nuclear power plant, an administration official said Friday. The two new Southern Co. reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., are part of a White House energy plan that administration officials hope will draw Republican support.

Loan guarantees for other sites are expected to be announced in the coming months, the official said, who would speak only on condition of anonymity ahead of Obama's announcement. The federal guarantees are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

"The last thing Americans want is another government bailout for a failing industry, but that's exactly what they're getting from the Obama administration," said Ben Schreiber, an analyst for the environmental group Friends of the Earth. "This is great news for Wall Street but a bad deal for Main Street."

Even with next week's announcement, construction of the first reactor is still years away. The Southern Co. has applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a construction and operating license for the plant, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. NRC spokesman Eliot Brenner said the earliest any of those could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012.

The Southern Co. has begun site preparation in Burke but cannot begin construction without NRC approval.

Obama's budget for the coming year would add $36 billion in new federal loan guarantees on top of $18.5 billion already budgeted — but not spent — for a total of $54.5 billion. That's enough to help build six or seven new nuclear plants, which can cost $8 billion to $10 billion each.

The proposed new reactors would generate power for some 1.4 million people and employ about 850 people, the administration official said, adding that the Georgia project would create about 3,000 construction jobs.

Spiraling costs, safety concerns and opposition from environmentalists have kept utilities from building any new nuclear power plants in the U.S. since the early 1980s. The 104 nuclear reactors now in operation in 31 states provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams that Obama has championed as a way to save the environment and economy at the same time.

Environmentalists and fiscal hawks oppose new nuclear plants and note that they come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Republicans like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham welcome the shift, but some pro-nuclear Republicans remain nervous about the heart of the Obama-backed climate bill — a plan to limit heat-trapping pollution, which would raise energy costs.

Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
February 14, 2010

From Our Readers: Forget talk about reprocessing

To the editor:

Some people have suggested that Yucca Mountain should be used as an interim storage site for reprocessing the nation's spent nuclear fuel and high-level nuclear waste. Some of those quoted in a Feb. 8 Review-Journal story claim that billions of dollars could flow into the state from such a far-fetched idea.

First, it violates federal law (Nuclear Waste Policy Act) for Nevada to be an interim storage site while still designated in the act for a permanent repository. Second, our nation tried and made quite a mess of reprocessing. It creates a by-product of weapons-grade plutonium and changes the solid waste into a nasty liquid waste stream.

The current cost of cleaning up the reprocessed mess in Hanford, Wash., is estimated at $205 billion to $260 billion.

France and England reprocess. As part of that process, they pump millions of gallons of liquid radioactive waste annually into the sea. The French also store weapons-grade plutonium on site with anti-aircraft batteries next to their plant in Normandy.

The process is heavily subsidized by their governments.

At a 2009 U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board meeting in Maryland, the topic was "Closing the Nuclear Fuel Cycle." The top reprocessing firms in the world -- AREVA, Energy Solutions and GE-Hitachi -- were invited to explain what they could do in the United States. After their presentations, one thing was clear: No one has the technology to close the fuel cycle and eliminate the waste.

All three companies suggest they can reduce the volume of high-level waste by a factor of four. But the overall volume of waste actually increases by four to six times. It produces less high-level waste, converted to liquid form, but literally tons more mixed waste, transuranic waste and low-level nuclear waste. Unlike in Europe, we do not allow pumping such liquid waste into the ocean.

Those firms also would have problems meeting EPA standards for krypton gas, iodine 129 and tritium.

Reprocessing is water-intensive and would require a nuclear power plant. The desert surrounding Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has no unallocated groundwater, especially the massive quantity of water needed for reprocessing (upwards of 35,000 to 50,000 acre feet). The state engineer reports that the five water basins around Yucca Mountain are already over-appropriated. The chance of licensing a nuclear plant in a volcanic field prone to earthquakes is slim.

Even with reprocessing, all three firms said they'd still need a permanent deep geologic repository for high-level waste.

The firms would need ratepayers or taxpayers to pay the billions required to reprocess, unless they use the money in the federal nuclear waste fund. (Of course, if they use that money for reprocessing, there won't be any left for a $96 billion repository somewhere.)

No one has offered a financial model that is acceptable to the U.S. financial markets. The U.S. nuclear industry stated it is "against paying one more dime for reprocessed fuel," which is six times more expensive than new uranium fuel, which is cheap and plentiful.

As for billions flowing into Nevada, no one has offered Nevada anything in the past 27 years of fighting the Yucca Mountain Project. There is no money outside of what's in the 1987 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Nevada could sign an agreement to accept $10 million for "mitigation" until nuclear waste is in Yucca Mountain, and $20 million a year thereafter if we were willing to give up our independent oversight role and legal rights established by the act. No general fund dollars. No national laboratory. No improvement to our transportation infrastructure.

In fact, Yucca Mountain may be the worst possible site in the nation for reprocessing.

Bruce H. Breslow
Carson City

--The writer is Executive Director of The Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects.

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Las Vegas SUN
February 14, 2010

Letter from Washington:

McCain, Reid find political currency in mutual attacks

By Lisa Mascaro

Washington — Tonight is the final performance of “The Rivalry,” a play that takes audiences at the historic Ford’s Theater on an itinerant journey through the Lincoln-Douglas senatorial debates that defined national politics in the 1858 midterm election.

The Presidents Day weekend show is a clever and timely reminder that politics is about choices that shape history. Then, as now, divisive politics polarized the nation, and men faced one another with the politician’s arsenal of wit, facts and barbs.

Take the fiery relationship between two neighboring senators, Republican John McCain of Arizona and Democrat Harry Reid of Nevada.

Flinty personalities both, the 70-somethings easily hurl arrows at each other between periods of apparent peace.

Their politics differ, no doubt — McCain the former Republican nominee for president; Reid, the majority leader who is working to usher President Barack Obama’s agenda through the Senate.

But as both face difficult re-elections this year, they can find currency in attacking each other as they make the case to keep their jobs.

Here is Reid recently on McCain’s return to senatorial life after the 2008 campaign: “John is a great name-caller. The election’s over. He should leave Barack Obama alone and join with us to do good things for the country.”

McCain shot back by taunting Reid over his unpopularity at home: “I think the people of Nevada are giving him their response.”

McCain can clearly cash in politically on any jabs at Reid. Establishment Washington is unpopular these days. What Republican incumbent would shy from badgering the party in power?

“It’s not just McCain, it’s every Republican going after Reid,” one GOP aide said.

McCain faces a likely primary challenge from J.D. Hayworth, a former Republican congressman who was a conservative radio commentator until recently.

McCain has always had an uneasy relationship with the right, which has never been convinced he was one of them. And the regular attacks on Reid could shore up McCain’s conservative credentials.

McCain routinely targets Reid on the Senate floor, hitting close to home: He called the president’s decision to zero out funding for a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain while supporting the development of new nuclear power plants “really an insult to one’s intelligence.” McCain personally encouraged Nevada’s Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki to enter the race to unseat Reid. (Krolicki declined.)

What Reid gets from these exchanges, aside from sharpening his sparring skills, is less clear.

Reid has made no secret of his disdain for McCain’s brusque style and the Arizonan’s stances on Yucca, sports betting and other issues that run counter to what Reid thinks are in Nevada’s interests. “I can’t stand John McCain,” he said in 2008.

It may seem an odd complaint from the Nevadan also known for impolitic frankness. But Reid is not seen as hotheaded. During the presidential campaign, Reid said McCain “doesn’t have the temperament to be president.”

After the election, Reid called McCain to bury the hatchet. It didn’t stay buried.

Attacking McCain could help rally Democrats to Reid’s re-election. McCain lost to Obama in a sweep unseen by a Democrat in Nevada since FDR. Yet independent voters are moving away from the party.

“I don’t know what good it does Reid,” the Republican aide said.

As far as rivalries go, this one seems more about disdain than competition. Neither man is trying to best the other for a new crown. Neither wants to be in the other’s place. Both are just old adversaries, fighting to keep their jobs.

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Santa Maria Times
February 14, 2010

Letter: Finding place for N-waste

I was arrested in front of Diablo in 1978 because PG&E did not know what they would do with their nuclear waste.

I was told the problem would be taken care of after it was created. I assume that meant the Yucca Mountain storage site.

Here we are, 32 years later, with no functioning storage site and the waste building up at Diablo.

I suggest the large casks of nuclear waste be stored in the backyards of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, rather than upwind to where I live.

Bill Denneen
Nipomo

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Worcester Telegram
February 14, 2010

Nuclear confusion

Washington must forge clear policies

One year into his presidency, Barack Obama’s stance on nuclear energy is fast becoming a study in contradictions. The fiscal 2011 budget he recently unveiled calls for an additional $36 billion in loan guarantees designed to support what he referred to in his State of the Union address as “a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants.” But that same budget would eliminate funding for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, a project that the nation has already spent some $38 billion to develop, and which remains the only viable, long-term storage option in sight.

Whatever one thinks of global warming, it is clear that nuclear energy offers Americans an emissions-free means of easing our dependence on foreign oil. With 104 operational nuclear plants, the U.S. obtains nearly 20 percent of its electricity from nuclear power. That number could be much higher, but only if government commits itself to a clear and consistent political and regulatory framework that includes sensible options for waste storage.

While seeking to end the Yucca Mountain project, the administration promises to convene a blue-ribbon panel to find a long-term waste storage solution. But the Yucca Mountain project was that solution, and would have begun accepting waste more than a decade ago had Washington been willing to place science ahead of politics. Launching another study group is no solution, but simply continues a cycle of governmental inaction and delay that could eventually prove fatal to the nation’s nuclear program.

Already, Americans are grappling with the effects of aging nuclear plants, such as the Vermont Yankee plant, which was recently found to be leaking tritium. While experts disagree over the severity and environmental impact of such leaks, there is no question that aging facilities have problems that require prompt attention, and decommissioning of reactors, when necessary, can be done most effectively with a long-term waste solution in view. At the same time, new reactor designs and projects must be encouraged.

Meeting those twin goals can only happen when Washington puts together a comprehensive nuclear policy free of internal contradictions.

Investors must be able to proceed with confidence if the nation is to reap the full benefits of nuclear energy. Mere talk and the promise of more loans won’t get the job done.

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Rutland Herald
February 14, 2010

In Maine, a different nuclear path

By Daniel Barlow

WISCASSET, Maine – All that remains of Maine Yankee now is a series of large concrete structures in the middle of a grassy field – 64 giant dry cask storage units holding the radioactive waste from the plant's 24 years of operation.

Signs along the rural road in Wiscasset notify travelers of serious security ahead and issue stern warnings: Guards can use force to stop you if you go any further down the road.

Other than those details, the road looks like any other in small towns across New England.

"That's it," said Eric Howes, the public relations official for Maine Yankee, pointing at the dry cask storage units more than 100 yards away. "There's not really much to see."

Thirteen years ago there was a whole lot more to see than a grassy field. Maine Yankee was a pressurized water reactor built along the shore of the Bailey Point peninsula in 1972 and for two and a half decades produced electricity for the state, totaling nearly 120,000 gigawatt-hours of power.

Maine didn't exactly welcome the nuclear plant with open arms.

But the plant – owned by a corporation formed by 10 utilities, including one from Vermont – won strong political support over the years, notably for the property taxes it paid to the tiny town of Wiscasset and the more than 500 people it employed.

The future of Maine Yankee all came crashing down in late 1995 when an anonymous whistleblower in the company alleged that it falsified safety information to the federal government that allowed the plant to boost its power production by 10 percent.

"That was just devastating for the company," said Ray Shadis, an anti-nuclear activist who lives in Maine. "They never recovered from that."

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission stepped in during the following summer, citing Maine Yankee on 16 safety violations. The owners shut down the plant but had ambitious plans to fix the problems – which included cracks in the steam generator tubes – and reopen soon.

When Maine Yankee powered down on Dec. 6, 1996, it would be the last day the plant operated.

First wave of reactors

As Vermonters ponder the future of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon, which is seeking to extend its license to operate past 2012 as it faces a wave of controversy over the plant's age, management and a leak of radioactive tritium, it is instructive to look at what happened to nuclear power in neighboring Maine.

While there are similarities between Maine Yankee and Vermont Yankee, there are also many differences.

Both were in the first wave of reactors built in the United States during the early 1970s, and both began producing electricity in 1972.

The two plants are different types of nuclear reactors, however. Maine Yankee, which produced about 900 megawatts of power, is what is known as a pressurized water reactor; Vermont Yankee is the slightly less common boiling water reactor. The major difference between those two types of plants is how the reactor is cooled.

Maine residents tried three times to shut down the nuclear plant in their state. Unlike Vermont, Maine has a law allowing for binding statewide referendums. The votes to close Maine Yankee always failed – but the margins were slim, including one year when 44.5 percent of voters wanted to shut it down.

"We won all the surrounding towns in the evacuation area except for Wiscasset," remembered Shadis, a resident of Edgecomb, who worked with Maine's Friends of the Coast and Vermont's New England Coalition, two anti-nuclear groups.

Shadis wasn't always an anti-nuclear activist. He grew up in a family of engineers who helped design missiles for the federal government. Even when he moved to Maine, he only casually knew about Maine Yankee.

Then came the near-meltdown at the Three Mile Island reactor in New York state in 1979.

"The danger of nuclear power became clear to me and a whole lotta other people then," Shadis said.

Shadis began organizing other locals worried about nuclear power. A meeting in April 1979 at the local town hall attracted nearly 1,500 people.

"What had begun to happen would consume my life for the next 30 years," Shadis said.

Unlikely neighbors

When Maine Yankee was fully operating, it owned about 800 acres of land – much of it untouched forests and fields.

One of its closest neighbors was the Chewonki Foundation, a nonprofit environmental group that started as a summer camp for boys in 1915. The organization is named after Chewonki Neck, a 400-acre peninsula on Montsweag Bay.

Today, the Chewonki Foundation is known more for its environmental education programs and wilderness trips.

"We were one of the interveners in the licensing process," said Don Hudson, who has been the president of the foundation since 1991 (he plans to retire this year). "But for the most part, we didn't have a lot to do with each other for a very long time."

Ospreys – those fish-eating birds of prey – were the catalyst to bring Maine Yankee and the Chewonki Foundation together.

Hudson said he got a call from Maine Yankee in the early 1990s seeking help with its "osprey problem." The birds, attracted to a wealth of fish in the nearby waters, had begun nesting on sensitive equipment at the nuclear power plant, including a yard crane, which prevented workers from removing nuclear fuel from the reactor core.

"Workers wouldn't go up there because they were being dive-bombed by ospreys," Hudson said.

The Chewonki Foundation worked with Maine Yankee to remove the nests safely. Several years later, when the plant was poised to close, Hudson was named to the Community Advisory Panel, a commission set up by the plant to ensure strong communication with the public about decommissioning.

During that multiyear process, he found himself on a flight with one of the lawyers from Maine Yankee. When the question was raised of what to do with Maine Yankee's property once decommissioning was finished, Hudson suggested that it would be great if some of the property was preserved as wilderness.

Turns out they liked that idea. Maine Yankee gave 200 acres to Chewonki, property that is now being developed for a 15-mile hiking trail.

"I didn't expect they would give it to us," Hudson said.

Prompt dismantlement

Maine Yankee was scheduled to reopen in August 1997.

But in May of that year, the company's board of directors announced that it would instead remain shut down and begin working toward decommissioning because the problems at the plant were too costly too fix.

"It was an economic decision," said Howes, the public relations official. "But it still came as a shock to the community."

At the time, no other nuclear power plants of Maine Yankee's size had begun decommissioning, making this a test case for the rest of the industry. Several research papers were written about the process and still help inform proper decommissioning at other plants.

Decommissioning a nuclear power plant is not a step-by-step process, Howes said. Instead, months of planning led into a process where the plant was disassembled in stages, waste and other radioactive materials were shipped out by rail, and the spent nuclear fuel was stored in dry cask containment units.

Howes said Maine Yankee went with what is known in the industry as the "cold and dark" approach to decommissioning: draining the liquids in all the systems and disconnecting any electricity to those buildings.

To protect the spent fuel – which must have a regulated temperature – the company built what it called a "spent fuel pool island," meaning all the systems needed for that were separated from the rest of the facility.

In all, about 400 million pounds of waste was removed from the Maine Yankee site.

"The whole process, from our perspective, was a success," he said.

Closing Maine Yankee meant people lost their jobs. Before shutdown, it had about 600 employees. By the end of 1997, that number was cut in half. In December 1998, there were only about 135 people working at the plant.

The closure also had a dramatic effect on Wiscasset. When it was up and running, Maine Yankee represented more than 90 percent of the community's tax base, paying about $12 million each year. Now the company pays the town about $1 million in lieu of taxes for storing the radioactive waste.

The plant's owners elected to begin decommissioning soon after the shutdown, even though Maine Yankee's decommissioning fund couldn't meet the projected cost. Every year of delay was expected to add to the total expense, according to Howes.

Shutting down and cleaning up the site was expected to cost $380 million, and an additional $128 million was projected for storing the radioactive waste. Those estimates have proven fairly accurate.

Maine Yankee, being owned by electric utilities, turned to the state's ratepayers to make up the difference. Under a deal reached in early 1999, Maine residents began paying $33.6 million annually to boost the fund.

No place to put it

During the ride back from the dry cask storage units, Maine Public Radio broadcasts a noontime report on the poor prospects for a plan to collect all the nation's radioactive nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

Earlier that week, President Barack Obama announced new federal guarantees to build a new generation of nuclear power. His administration also submitted a budget allocating zero dollars for the national repository, effectively ending that effort.

"Well, what it means is that Maine Yankee down in Wiscasset now becomes sort of a de facto storage site for high-level waste," said Paul Dostie, Maine's nuclear safety inspector, on the radio show.

No matter where Maine residents stand on nuclear power, the lack of a national solution to the problem of spent fuel unites many causes. Owners of nuclear power plants want the federal government held to its earlier promise to take the waste; anti-nuclear activists don't want that waste sitting in their backyards for decades.

Maine Yankee is essentially out of business, with the exception of its responsibility to watch over the spent fuel. Howes could not say how many employees the company still has on the payroll, but he agreed that it was "less than 20." Most of them are security workers to monitor the storage site.

"We're disappointed that this is the direction the Obama administration is taking," said Howes. "Yucca Mountain is still a viable option. This seems premature."

All six New England governors wrote to Steven Chu, the secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy, in mid-December saying there is a "growing consensus that the expedited removal and consolidation of spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste … is sound public policy."

New England is home to three decommissioned nuclear power plants. Each stores its nuclear waste on site, and, in Maine, the cost of that storage is continually passed on to ratepayers via their monthly electrical bills.

Hudson, a graduate of the University of Vermont with a strong background in working with "green" groups, said his view on nuclear power has shifted a bit in recent years, noting that he now sees it as having "some role in our energy future."

But the lack of a solution for the highly radioactive waste gives him pause. His ideal neighbor is not a collection of radioactive canisters.

"It's foolish to believe that this is clean energy," he said. "The outcome of nuclear power is waste that won't be safe for long after I'm gone. There simply needs to be a national solution to the waste issue."

--Daniel.Barlow@timesargus.com

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AP Google
February 13, 2010

Obama nuke plant loan reflects new energy strategy

By Ben Feller

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration's planned loan guarantee to build the first nuclear power plant in the United States in almost three decades is part of a broad shift in energy strategy to lessen dependence on foreign oil and reduce the use of other fossil fuels blamed for global warming.

President Barack Obama called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his Jan. 27 State of the Union speech and followed that by proposing to triple loan guarantees for new nuclear plants. He wants to use nuclear power and other alternative sources of energy in his effort to shift energy policy.

Obama next week will announce the loan guarantee to build the nuclear power plant, an administration official said Friday. The two new Southern Co. reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., are part of a White House energy plan that administration officials hope will draw Republican support.

Loan guarantees for other sites are expected to be announced in the coming months, the official said, who would speak only on condition of anonymity ahead of Obama's announcement. The federal guarantees are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

Even with next week's announcement, actual construction of the first reactor is still years away. The Southern Co. has applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a construction and operating license for the plant, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. NRC spokesman Eliott Brenner said the earliest any of those could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012.

The Southern Co. has begun site preparation in Burke but cannot begin construction without NRC approval.

Obama's budget for the coming year would add $36 billion in new federal loan guarantees on top of $18.5 billion already budgeted — but not spent — for a total of $54.5 billion. That's enough to help build six or seven new nuclear plants, which can cost $8 billion to $10 billion each.

The proposed new reactors would generate power for some 1.4 million people and employ about 850 people, the official said, adding that the Georgia project would create about 3,000 construction jobs.

Spiraling costs, safety concerns and opposition from environmentalists have kept utilities from building any new nuclear power plants in the U.S. since the early 1980s. The 104 nuclear reactors now in operation in 31 states provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams that Obama has championed as a way to save the environment and economy at the same time.

Environmentalists and fiscal hawks oppose new nuclear plants and note that they come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Republicans like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham welcome the shift, but some pro-nuclear Republicans remain nervous about the heart of the Obama-backed climate bill — a plan to limit heat-trapping pollution, which would raise energy costs.

--Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

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Las Vegas Review-Journal
February 12, 2010

NRC nominees won't stand in way of Yucca Mountain shutdown

By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Three officials nominated to fill seats on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission indicated this week that they would not stand in the way of a shutdown of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste program.

But one suggested that because it now looks as if radioactive spent fuel will remain at power plants for the foreseeable future, their steel-and-concrete storage canisters should be checked for safety.

"When we first started storing spent fuel at reactor sites, nobody was thinking it was going to be there for 100 years," said William Magwood, a former Department of Energy official. "I think we have to go back and take a look at what we have in place now and assure ourselves it is able to stay in place another 50 years if necessary."

The NRC has indicated that nuclear waste can remain on site for decades at least. But if there are places where it might not stay safe that long, Magwood said, he would call for "corrective action as soon as possible."

At a Senate hearing Tuesday, Magwood and two other NRC nominees said they would not "second-guess" a decision by the Obama administration to withdraw a license application for the Yucca Mountain waste repository that is pending at the commission. The administration has created a blue-ribbon commission to recommend alternatives for waste management.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, posed the question. She said it came from Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., who is engineering the Nevada project shutdown with administration officials.

"You can just answer yes or no: If confirmed, would you second-guess the Department of Energy's decision to withdraw the license application for Yucca Mountain from the NRC's review?" Boxer asked.

Magwood, former director of the Office of Nuclear Energy at the Department of Energy: "No."

George Apostolakis, nuclear science and engineering professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology: "No."

William Ostendorff, former principal deputy administrator at the National Nuclear Security Administration: "No."

Boxer said she expected a speedy confirmation for Apostolakis, Magwood and Ostendorff, who were nominated by President Barack Obama to fill three seats on the five-member NRC board.

The exchange at the hearing means that, if confirmed, a majority of the NRC board will be on record that they will not intervene to keep the Yucca project alive.

Reid wanted to get the nominees on record saying just that, spokesman Jon Summers said. Reid sought acknowledgement "that as regulators they are in no position to question DOE's decision to withdraw the license application for Yucca," Summers said.

A fourth member of the NRC board, Chairman Gregory Jaczko, may also be expected not to intervene. Jaczko worked as Reid's science adviser before being sworn onto the commission in January 2005.

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Lincoln County Record
February 12, 2010

Nuclear Waste Confidence Plan

By Dave Maxwell

Speaking to members of the Joint City/County Impact Alleviation Committee in Caliente February 8, Paul Seidler, of the Las Vegas consulting firm Robison/Seidler talked about something he called Waste Confidence.

"It is basically the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) having to decide whether or not the we have enough confidence that the country has a game plan for dealing with waste (nuclear waste) so that we can build new plants and relicense the whole fleet of existing plants."

He said a lot of people believe that, "with what's happened with Yucca Mountain, we're in a state of not having waste confidence. We just don't have enough information now to say we have it under control. Soon parties will start calling for the NRC to deny licenses for extending licenses to plants. Maybe they'll be successful, and that would be a major blow to the industry."

However, Seidler said he is confident the Natural Resource Defense Council, the major pool for the anti-nuclear community, will take action on waste confidence. "I think attorney general's from around the country will take action."

The thinking is, Seidler said, "we are going to see a lot of administrative law action and a lot of litigation, maybe from some less traditional parties that are going to be protesting."

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Lincoln County Record
February 12, 2010

Why is Yucca Mountain Not Suitable?

By Dave Maxwell

A motion by the Department of Energy, to file a formal request to have their application for licensing the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository and suspend the proceedings, may come with a demand to show cause as to why it is not suitable.

Dr. Mike Baughman of Intertech Services, made those comments to members of the Joint City/County Impact Alleviation Committee February 8 in Caliente as he gave an update on monitoring the progress of the Yucca Mountain licensing. He said also watch for the Atomic Safety Licensing Board to issue a ruling granting or denying the Department of Energy's (DOE) motion.

When the motion is filed, Baughman said, "I think you will see folks applying along the lines of forcing DOE to come up with a technical justification for withdrawing this application."

"Once the request if filed," he said, "it will afford an opportunity for parties to reply and argue that DOE has not justifiably provided any reason for terminating this process, and under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, they are in fact required to do that. They are required to notify Congress if they are going to withdraw their application and give their technical reasons why."

Baughman continued by saying, "The President represented to the Congress that the site was suitable and should go forward for licensing. The law says if the President elects to withdraw the application, he has to inform the Congress that the site is no longer suitable and tell them why it's not suitable. And that's not happened yet."

He said, "The Lincoln County Commission, in its reply to the DOE motion, may also ask what are the reasons for this decision, so we can understand."

If the motion is granted, it will be granted with conditions, Baughman explained. "Those conditions will spell out how the DOE is to deal with all the information they have compiled over the many, many years, so that the material is archived and not lost."  The reason for doing that, is in case someone in the future seeks to use the information for another round of licensing, it would be available.  However, Baughman noted, if in the future someone else does want to license the project, "they will have to start all over again, at ground zero."

On a related matter, Baughman said the Office of Nuclear Energy, particularly its Used Nuclear Fuel Disposition branch, has been granted a budget for 2011 of $45 million, up from $9.1 in 2010.

Baughman said that technical branch of the Office of Nuclear Energy, is vested, with undertaking DOE's role and activities in regard to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.

One of the specific activities that is planned for the nuclear fuel disposition branch, Baughman explained, "is very telling as to where this thing may or may not be going. They will conduct research and development advance model of disposal options to evaluate the variety of used nuclear fuel and high level waste forms, and placed in a variety of geologic disposal media, such as granite, tough deep bore holes, clay, shale, and basalt."  "Tough", Baughman said, "is Yucca Mountain."

He added, "And don't lose sight of the fact that Congress plays shell games with money, moving money around here and there."   He said the 2011 budget of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for transportation of spent nuclear fuel, storage and disposal, is $29.6 million plus another $11 million from other sources.

"There is going to be a lot of work going on apart from the deliberations by the Blue Ribbon Panel. If one considers a possible shell game being played, there's been money moved around to other areas, and there's a lot of work still going to go into what we do about disposal of high-level waste. When you plug that "Tough" formation into the equation, they are saying they are going to look at, somebody's still playing around with Yucca Mountain or a geologic setting much like Yucca Mountain. It doesn't make a lot of sense to go to another "Tough" site, when you got one you've already spent $13 billion on."

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Lincoln County Record
February 12, 2010

Yucca Mt, Not Dead Yet?

By Dave Maxwell

Paul Seidler, of Robison/Seidler, a Las Vegas consulting firm, spoke to members of the Joint City/County Impact Alleviation Committee (JCCIAC) in Caliente February 8.

He said although there has been considerable amount of activity on Yucca Mountain in the past month or so, does not mean the project is dead.

In the 25 years he has been involved with the project, he said, "This is certainly the most difficult period ever. But I don't think it's dead yet, and I don't think it's going to die."  Although he added, he wouldn't want to bet on that thought either.

With the President's budget funding for Yucca Mountain being cut off in 2011, Seidler said the Department of Energy will soon request to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), the licensing related activity for Yucca Mountain be "withdrawn with prejudice." Seidler said he felt this was an unprecedented move in nuclear facility licensing, and means the application is to be withdrawn with the clause it cannot be resubmitted at some future date. "I've never seen the case where the applicant has asked to have the application withdrawn in such a way they can't come back at a later date and try to license the facility."

However, he said Congress still has to approve the budget, and the Nuclear Waste Policy Act has not been changed either. "It is still the law of the land."

Seidler said he would declare the program dead, except for legal action. "I expect legal action, and it will slow down the activity to kill the program." He said there are a couple of places it can come from. One might be from closed nuclear utilities that still have spent nuclear waste on site, and the other group is Attorney Generals. "I expect some attorney generals around the country to take action. Most likely from states that have Department of Energy (DOE) defensive facilities, that have clean up waste, large quantities of high-level radioactive waste from the defense commission, specifically the states of South Carolina and Washington."

He told JCCIAC members he thought Public Utility Commissions for various states would also get involved. "They contributed billions of dollars of rate payer's funds, and $13 billion of those dollars have already been spent on this project and they got nothing in return. They are going to want to see something in return, they are not just going to walk away quietly."

Seidler said some individuals would also file legal action in the "regulatory arena."

He stated the request to pull the application is a political decision, spurred on primarily, by Senator Reid.  "But because it's a political decision, the DOE isn't really prepared to deal with it. They were given no direction, no plan, as to how to kill the program."

He said a Blue Ribbon Commission has been announced to spend 18 -24 months on looking at developing a policy on used fuel management. "Generally, the people on the Commission are favorable to nuclear power and know quite a bit about nuclear energy, nuclear technology, and reprocessing.  Seidler said the Commission has specifically been told not to consider Yucca Mountain. However, he thought the commission could do it anyway, if they wanted. "Some pretty strong minded people there," he said.

"Given how things usually work in government," Seidler noted, "I expect that two years might be three years or four years of uncertainty about the national policy. Right now, the administration is satisfied with storing it at reactor sites."

"It makes me believe the politics around those sites is going to change pretty quickly, if Yucca goes away. Any kind of an accident at a reactor, even unrelated to used fuel management, guaranteed that will get the political dialogue focused on central storage again."

He commented further on the move to pull the license application being so unprecedented. "The staff at the NRC has never dealt with this situation, the judges at the NRC have never dealt with that situation, the Commissioners at the NRC have never dealt with that situation. So there is no predicting how they are going to deal with that. The idea that they are going to throw away billions of dollars worth of information; I can see resistance from the staff and Commissioners."

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UNLV Rebel Yell
February 12, 2010

A nuclear future for Nevada

by Afan Tarar

Accept Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste storage site: Use it to our advantage.

I am stunned by the meekness of Nevada’s leaders. It is a shame that powerful men like Sen. Harry Reid give in to the whims and desires of the big and poweful companies.

But I am not just stunned by the leaders. I am also amazed that Nevadans are buying into the propaganda thrown at them by these ignorant leaders.

Nevadans must approve and accept the Yucca Mountain site and we must also push for our own nuclear power plants. It would be one of the biggest mistakes in this state’s history to let this opportunity pass us by.

I guess while Reid was learning to be an ineffective majority leader, he missed out on his science classes. Nuclear energy is one of the cleanest and easiest ways to help power America and this state into the future.

Thirteen new licenses have been given out to develop nuclear plants in America and none of those plants will be here in Nevada.

No, most of them will be going out East, and Texas will be getting more than the other states. Since when is Texas more progressive than Nevada?

A utility company in South Carolina is switching to nuclear energy and away from natural gas because “its cheaper.” And this trend will start to catch on. Even the Obama administration agrees that nuclear energy is important for our energy future.

Where does that leave Nevada? We get most of our energy from the dirtiest of sources – coal.

It seems like Reid, whose party champions green technology, wants us to stick to coal. Here is the paradox – Democrats claim to lead the efforts against global warming, but here in Nevada, their leaders are resisting the shift from coal to nuclear. If the left thinks that the world is in peril, does it not make sense to shift to cleaner energy and stop burning finite fossil fuels?

Nevada is being forced to stay behind while the rest of the country moves forward, all because some special interest has bought out the minds and the votes of our senators (again).

Nevada was paid millions of dollars so that the country could store its nuclear waste here. We were getting paid millions, if not more, for one site! Considering the extreme budget shortfall in the state, it seems foolish to have turned down the money.

If our state hadn’t been tied up in the battles of special interest groups, we could have done much with the waste here. For one, we could have tried to convince the federal government that if it wanted to store the country’s waste here, then it must reconsider its policy of not reusing nuclear waste.

But what does building a nuclear power plant have to do with Yucca Mountain? We could have asked to own all waste stored at Yucca Mountain, which could then be sold to local nuclear power plants for additional revenue for the state and energy benefits.

We love to copy our European counterparts often, but did you know that European nations also recycle and use nuclear energy? By shutting down the Yucca Mountain project, we have given up free money, jobs, energy independence and future revenue from incoming businesses.

All in a day’s work I guess.

We must break free of propaganda and we must look past the “facts” people tell us.

I am calling upon the Harry Reid center and the fine people that work there to hold seminars and lectures so that people can learn about nuclear energy. Yes, the Harry Reid center does research on nuclear power – the irony here is ridiculous.

Now that we also have the Brookings Institute at UNLV, a forum of discussion is something that will help start the conversation here on campus. We need to become more educated about this issue because this is something that will help Nevada and the country in the long run.

Let people from both sides come to UNLV and talk it out. The people of Nevada need the real facts from people with doctorates, not from our esteemed senator or the coal companies. Nuclear energy can generate new jobs and help keep our environment clean. Let’s join the rest of the developed world, and become leaders of the nuclear industry.

It is true that America’s energy future does not rest on just one resource. We need solar, wind and hydrogen technologies, but nuclear energy is going to play a big role. Let’s get this state and the country back on the right track.

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UC Los Angeles
February 12, 2010

Carnesale joins high-level commission exploring storage of nuclear waste

By Cynthia Lee

Chancellor Emeritus Albert Carnesale has been selected to serve on a high-level national commission that will study and make recommendations for developing a safe, long-term solution to the serious problem of managing the nation's nuclear waste.

President Obama directed the U.S. Department of Energy to form the 15-member Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to conduct a comprehensive review of policies for managing the country’s current and future stockpile of nuclear waste after the administration decided not to proceed with the Yucca Mountain (Nevada) nuclear waste repository.

“The decision to pursue the Yucca Mountain plan was made 20 years ago,” Carnesale said. “From a scientific and technological perspective, much has been learned since then about radioactive waste and how spent nuclear fuel can be treated. And much has also been learned about the Yucca Mountain site itself.” The residents of Nevada also vehemently opposed the plan for a number of reasons.

The question of what to do with the country’s nuclear waste has grown in urgency because of climate change and the nation’s search for a cleaner source of fuel.

Currently, spent nuclear fuel is being stored at more than 100 nuclear power plants throughout the United States. These plants provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity.

“I don’t think there are many people who think that is a very good long-term solution to the waste problem,” Carnesale said.

“The commission is not being asked to identify an alternative site to replace Yucca Mountain,” Carnesale said. "There are many other avenues of inquiry to pursue. For example, are there new designs for nuclear rectors that might mitigate the problem? Should the spent fuel be processed differently? How might the spent fuel or processed waste be stored to minimize the risk to current and future generations?"

The solution won’t be found in science and technology alone, Carnesale said.

“If you look at the commission, these are not simply experts on nuclear power or nuclear waste,” he said. “They are primarily strategic thinkers, people who understand issues that have substantial technological dimensions, but cross many high-priority areas for the country, everything from climate change to reducing American dependence on foreign sources of fuel. It’s clear that the commission has been asked to take a strategic look at this problem.”

The commission is co-chaired by former Indiana Congressman Lee Hamilton and Brent Scowcroft. Hamilton is a member of the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board and the President’s Homeland Security Advisory Council, and he previously served as vice chairman of the 9/11 Commission (National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States). Scowcroft, a retired lieutenant general in the U.S. Air Force, served as National Security Advisor to both Presidents Gerald Ford and George H.W. Bush.

Carnesale, who has a Ph.D. in nuclear engineering, holds professorial appointments in UCLA's School of Public Affairs and Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science. Earlier in his career, he represented the United States in high-level negotiations on defense and energy issues, including the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, SALT I. He has been increasingly called upon by the government for his expertise on public policy issues that have scientific and technological dimensions.

Since leaving Murphy Hall as chancellor, he has led committees formed by the National Academies, the nation’s science advisors, to analyze, make recommendations and brief policymakers and Congress on vital issues. In 2008, he chaired a committee that looked at whether the nation needs a non-nuclear weapon with the ability to strike a target anywhere in the world within one hour after the president gives the order.

Recently, he has been holding classified briefings with representatives from the departments of Energy, Defense and Homeland Security as well as others on Capitol Hill on the findings of a committee he chairs on nuclear forensics.

Carnesale is also chair of the Committee on America’s Climate Choices, a nationwide project launched by the National Academies at Congress’ request for policy-relevant advice, based on scientific evidence, to help guide the nation’s response to climate change. That project, which involves some of the country’s leading researchers on climate change, is scheduled to release its report in September.

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Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
February 12, 2010

Alaska's senators offer support, criticism of Obama's energy plan

by Chris Freiberg

FAIRBANKS — President Obama’s comments about energy earlier this week have split Alaska’s senators.

Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Obama said the U.S. “can’t overnight convert to an all-solar, all-wind economy,” but he said investment in clean energy will be key to economic growth in the 21st century.

Sen. Mark Begich, a Democrat, took the opportunity to write the president a letter emphasizing the importance of an Alaska natural gas pipeline in producing cleaner energy for the country.

“I know your administration already is strongly supportive of this project, and I commend your appointment of a new federal coordinator of the Alaska natural gas pipeline project,” Begich wrote. “I urge your support for provisions in the Senate energy bill to underscore the importance of this project to America’s energy independence.”

The senator also reminded the president of Alaska’s important place in further drilling on the outer continental shelf.

“For Alaska, where we know how to responsibly develop and produce oil and gas in extreme conditions, OCS development is necessary to the long-term health of the current trans-Alaska oil pipeline which currently carries 16 percent of the U.S. domestic oil production,” Begich wrote.

Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, speaking on the Senate floor Thursday, said that she was “pleasantly surprised” by Obama’s calls on energy during his State of the Union address, during which he called for new oil and gas development and building new nuclear power plants.

However, the senator said the president’s words don’t seem to match up to the budget proposal sent to Congress this week.

“This disconnect is both disappointing and difficult to explain,” Murkowski said. “At the very least, it’s apparent that the vision the president presented to Congress does not match up with what some of his agencies have in mind.”

Murkowski took particular aim at the president’s remarks about nuclear energy, noting that the Obama administration has not yet helped finance a nuclear project and abandoned the Yucca Mountain Project, a storage facility for spent nuclear reactor fuel in the Nevada desert.

The senator also was critical of proposed tax increases for oil, natural gas and coal producers.

“Collectively, those increases would raise producers’ cost of business by an estimated $80 billion,” Murkowski said. “That would translate to higher energy prices for consumers.”

Begich also asked the president to reconsider repealing tax incentives for the energy industry.

“These important incentives have been part of our tax code for decades, and their repeal threatens American jobs and domestic energy production at a time when we need them both,” he wrote in his letter to Obama.

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AP Yahoo!
February 12, 2010

AP source: Obama to announce loan guarantee for 1st nuclear plant in US in nearly 3 decades

By Ben Feller
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama next week will announce a loan guarantee to build the first nuclear power plant in the United States in almost three decades, an administration official said Friday.

The two new Southern Co. reactors to be built in Burke, Ga., are part of a White House energy plan administration officials hope will draw Republican support. Obama's direct involvement in announcing the award underscores the political weight the White House is putting behind its effort to use nuclear power and alternative energy sources to lessen American dependence on foreign oil and reduce the use of other fossil fuels blamed for global warming.

Loan guarantees for other sites are expected to be announced in the coming months, the official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the decision had not yet been made public. The federal guarantees are seen as essential for construction of any new reactor because of the huge expense involved. Critics call the guarantees a form of subsidy and say taxpayers will assume a huge risk, given the industry's record of cost overruns and loan defaults.

Even with next week's announcement, actual construction of the first reactor is still years away. The Southern Co. has applied to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a construction and operating license for the plant, one of 13 such applications the agency is considering. NRC spokesman Eliot Brenner said the earliest any of those could be approved would be late 2011 or early 2012.

The Southern Co. has begun site preparation in Burke, but cannot begin construction without NRC approval.

Obama called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear power plants" in his Jan. 27 State of the Union speech, and followed that by proposing to triple loan guarantees for new nuclear plants. Obama's budget for the coming year would add $36 billion in new federal loan guarantees on top of $18.5 billion already budgeted -- but not spent -- for a total of $54.5 billion. That's enough to help build six or seven new nuclear plants, which can cost $8 billion to $10 billion each.

The proposed new reactors would generate power for some 1.4 million people and employ about 850 people, the official said, adding that the Georgia project would create about 3,000 construction jobs.

Spiraling costs, safety concerns and opposition from environmentalists have kept utilities from building any new nuclear power plants since the early 1980s. The 104 nuclear reactors now in operation in 31 states provide about 20 percent of the nation's electricity. But they are responsible for 70 percent of the power from pollution-free sources, including wind, solar and hydroelectric dams that Obama has championed as a way to save the environment and economy at the same time.

During the campaign, Obama said he would support nuclear power with caveats. He was concerned about how to deal with radioactive waste and how much federal money was needed to support construction costs. Those concerns remain; some say they've gotten worse.

Environmentalists and fiscal hawks oppose new nuclear plants and note that they come at the same time Obama has proposed eliminating a long-planned nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Obama has appointed a commission to find a safe solution for dealing with nuclear waste, but in the meantime the government has no long-term plan to store commercial radioactive waste.

Energy has served as a major plank of the president's domestic agenda, but his focus on building a green energy economy has broadened in the past month to include nuclear power, offshore oil drilling and development of clean-coal technology, all energy sources championed by Republicans. The shift came after Republican Scott Brown won a special election in Massachusetts to replace the late Democratic Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, depriving Democrats of the votes needed to keep Senate Republicans from blocking their agenda.

Republicans like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham welcome the shift, but some pro-nuclear Republicans remain nervous about the heart of the Obama-backed climate bill -- a plan to limit heat-trapping pollution, which will raise energy costs.

Environmentalists, who once saw Obama as a friend of renewable energy, have said they feel betrayed by his shift. They said renewable energy such as wind and solar are more cost-effective than nuclear power and do not come with side effects such as radioactive waste.

--Associated Press writers Matthew Daly and Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

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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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