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News :: Miscellaneous |
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Big Power Wants Big Bailout |
Current rating: 0 |
by Reddy Kilowatt
(No verified email address) |
25 Jun 2002
Modified: 26 Jun 2002 |
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For two weeks running, Comed/Exelon has bought full page ads in the News-Gazette to urge citizens to write to Senator's Durbin and Fitzgerald in support of the seriously-troubled Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site. Here at IMC, we think that such advertising by large corporations subverts the political process. We offer here alternative opinions from the point of view of the Nuclear Information Resource Service and others. |
Why does any of this matter in Illinois, which is a long way from Nevada? There are lots of reasons, but of immediate concern is the fact that a large percentage of the nuclear waste that will be moved to Nevada will cross the state of Illinois on trucks and trains. Not only does the chance of an accident present itself to mind, but such shipments will be tempting targets for terrorists interested in shutting down a major transportation artery by turning these shipments into "dirty" bombs.
Here's what NIRS has up right now as the vote in the senate nears:
Calls Needed Now- Yucca Vote Anyday!
NIRS ALERT: YUCCA MOUNTAIN NUKE DUMP VOTE IN SENATE EXPECTED ANY TIME IN THE NEXT 4 WEEKS
Calls needed!!! Capitol Switchboard 202-224-3121 or toll free: 1-888-554-9256 (8 am to 5 pm cst)
(Washington June 11, 2002) Nevada Senator Harry Reid's office confirmed today that a vote on Yucca Mountain by the US Senate is now expected any day, but likely by early July. Senators will either support the sovereign right of the State of Nevada and the Western Shoshone Nation to keep U.S. commercial and military high-level nuclear waste from traveling to Yucca Mountain, or the Senate will override Nevada's veto.
Your help is needed! Please call and ask others to call your US Senators since the opposition of Nevadans and Shoshones is also on behalf of the vast majority of us -- folks in 43 other states through which MOBILE CHERNOBYL would travel if Yucca Mountain is the new dump.
PLEASE CALL BOTH YOUR SENATORS -- 202-224-3121 or toll free: 1-888-554-9256 (8 am to 5 pm central time zone)
Urge them to VOTE AGAINST THE YUCCA MOUNTAIN NUCLEAR DUMP, Senate Joint Resolution 34.
If you prefer to write, please get the fax number for your senator. US mail to the Hill is still subject to anthrax related delay. Hand written constituent letters remain the "gold standard" on The Hill, even when faxed!
GROUPS ARE INVITED TO SIGN THE STATEMENT AGAINST YUCCA MOUNTAIN -- visit http://www.yuccastatement.org
Links for More info -- (Talking Points against Yucca Below)
http://www.nirs.org
http://www.citizen.org/cmep/energy_enviro_nuclear/
http://www.nvantinuclear.org
http://www.ieer.org
To send a prepared fax against Yucca Mountain to your Senators visit Public Citizen's Take Action Center
http://www.citizen.org/action/index.cfm?sectionID=111
Talking Points:
The very best points to make have to do with your own specific concerns about the transport of nuclear waste through your state, your community, your neighborhood. Be specific about why you are worried -- hospitals, schools, your own travel routes, and the preparedness of your community to deal with an emergency.
If you are calling a conservative, you might point out that Nevada has the right under the Federalist portion of the Constitution to exercise its sovereign right to say no to a federal program.
Here are some broader points if you are looking for more....
*) It would be hard to find a geologically worse place to bury high-level nuclear waste -- evidence points to an active magma pocket below the site. The more than 600 earth quakes during the study period attest to this instability. Although DOE and NRC know this, they are promoting voodoo math instead of responsible decision making based on good science. We want a radioactive waste solution, Yucca is a formula for disaster.
*) Even if the Yucca Volcano never goes off, all the geologic activity at this site has cracked and fractured the volcanic rock inside the mountain. Yucca Mountain is a sieve and will leak. DOE agrees. This is not good enough. We want the poisons of the Atomic Age isolated so that future generations and their biosphere are not threatened by this waste.
*) High level nuclear waste is a major security hazard no matter where it is. Putting it on the roads, rails and rivers will not make it any safer! Instead our cities and commerce routes could become the biggest dirty bomb target range imaginable. Up to 100,000 shipments in huge containers over a 30 year period -- Stop Mobile Chernobyl. Say no to Yucca Mountain.
*) We are not ready. DOE does not require physical testing of nuclear waste transport containers--it is all simulation. The test parameters are softer than real world situations. Local firefighters and other emergency responders have not been trained and do not have equipment. This is a date with disaster!
*) Making a dump does not solve the nuclear waste problem. Only stopping the production of more nuclear waste will begin to be the basis for a solution. If the DOE spends 30 years moving the nuclear waste that we have today to Yucca Mountain in Nevada, by the time it is all there, there will be as much or MORE waiting to be dumped again.
*) Yucca Mountain is not one place for the waste it is ONE MORE place for waste. Every reactor that remains in operation will have at least 5 years of new waste on site...and likely more since the Bush Administration will use the opening of Yucca Mountain to help win NEW NUCLEAR POWER REACTORS....the current energy bill would remove all economic barriers by providing tax dollars to build them. SAY NO YUCCA!!!!
*) Creating a single site with the radiological equivalent of more than 2 million Hiroshima bombs worth of persistent radioactivity would be quite a target. If conventional explosives were used to blow up such a site most of the rest of the US is DOWNWIND, just as we are for nuclear weapons tests.
*) Waste should be secured better where it is for now and we should start over on a nuclear waste program based on sound science and isolation of nuclear waste from the environment.
Mary Olson
Nuclear Information and Resource Service
1424 16th St NW Suite 404
Washington, DC 20036
202-328-0002
http://www.nirs.org
Here are some links to earlier UCIMC reporting on Yucca Mountain and associated issues:
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=5923
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=5471
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=5262
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=5063
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=4465
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=4227
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=4093
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=3710
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=2219
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=1684
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=1613
http://www.ucimc.org/front.php3?article_id=508
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Comments
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Pretty odd stuff in this |
by CMB
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
26 Jun 2002
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The DOE has conducted extensive real tests of containers under much more stringent than real-world conditions.
You can't blow up the Yucca Mountain depository.
YM is not in danger of volcanic activity. Even so the nearest cone is 8 miles away.
The reason I think Yucca Mountain *is* a bad idea is that it removes the waste from possible future solutions like transmutation and glass embedment. That, plus the leaks. Secure it in place, I say. |
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Containers NOT Tested |
by ML
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
26 Jun 2002
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Charles,
The last I had heard, the transport containers that are being used had not been tested in a real-world accident scenario. All testing so far has been with scale models and simulations. I beleive I heard recently that the DOE had asked for the money to do actual full-scale testing, but I'm unsure about the status of this proposal. |
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Coming to a Town Near You (Like Sadorus, Tolono or Philo) |
by US PIRG
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
26 Jun 2002
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America's Towns Would See Thousands of Shipments Each Carrying 240 Times the Radioactive Material Released at Hiroshima
WASHINGTON - June 25 - Trucks and trains each carrying 240 times the radioactive material released at Hiroshima could rumble through hundreds of U.S. communities if the Senate votes in the next few weeks to allow the Yucca Mountain project to go ahead, according to a new report released today.
The U.S. PIRG report-- "Radioactive Roads and Rails: Hauling Nuclear Waste Through our Neighborhoods" --details the Department of Energy's proposal for more than 100,000 truck shipments of highly radioactive waste from all across the country to Yucca Mountain, Nevada.
In "Radioactive Roads and Rails," U.S. PIRG shows that 44 states could see 105,985 truck shipments or 18,243 rail shipments of highly radioactive waste over the course of 38 years. Shipments of nuclear waste would travel on interstate and local highways as well as mainline rail routes. Other waste shipments could be carried by barge over waterways like Lake Michigan, the Mississippi River, and the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
"Commuters on our highways could find themselves stuck in traffic behind three and a half tons of nuclear waste," said U.S. PIRG Staff Attorney Pierre Sadik. "Tens of thousands of shipments of highly radioactive waste over four decades is going to put too many people in harm's way."
Nuclear waste is recognized as the most dangerous substance known to humankind. When initially removed from the reactor core, it delivers a lethal dose of radiation within seconds. The Department of Energy intends to ship the waste in transportation casks, but size and weight limitations make it impossible to build a transportation cask that does not "leak" some radiation. The DOE acknowledges that a truck carrying a nuclear waste cask will emit the equivalent of one chest x-ray per hour of radiation to those who are caught in traffic nearby.
"In the best case scenario, these shipments are rolling x-ray machines," said Sadik. "In the worst case scenario, these shipments are mobile Chernobyls."
According to one DOE estimate, there will be as many as 310 accidents in the course of transporting this highly radioactive waste across the country. There have been at least eight reported nuclear waste transportation accidents in the U.S. involving radioactive contamination of transport vehicles, roads and rails. Emergency Medical Services officials have stated repeatedly that they do not have the training or equipment to properly respond to a severe nuclear waste accident - which could involve thousands of deaths and billions of dollars in property damage. Because of the potential for such horrendous accidents, several studies show that property values will decline for the millions of Americans who will live in the vicinity of the transportation routes.
The DOE currently has no plans to take into account the additional dangers of transporting nuclear waste post-September 11th. The Yucca Mountain project involves the movement of nuclear waste from 131 more securable locations, over thousands of miles of roadway and rail lines that cannot be secured from attacks, creating an opportunity for sabotage in communities across America.
"At the end of the road, under this ill-conceived plan, the waste will be dumped at Yucca Mountain - a volcano on an aquifer in an earthquake zone," said Sadik. "It's time for the Senate to say no to this dangerous transportation scheme and to stop the Yucca Mountain project."
U.S. PIRG is the national lobby office of the state Public Interest Research Groups. State PIRGs are non-profit, non-partisan public interest advocacy groups.
"Radioactive Roads and Rails" can be found online at www.uspirg.org. Americans can visit http://www.mapscience.org and see how closely nuclear waste shipments would pass by their home.
http://www.uspirg.org |
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A Good Time To Weaken Rules on Radioactive Waste Shipments? |
by Public Citizen
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
26 Jun 2002
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Proposed Changes to Nuclear Transportation Rule Reflect Dangerous Trend to Weaken Role of U.S. Regulators
WASHINGTON - June 26 - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) proposed changes to safety standards for transporting radioactive material would endanger public health and safety, groups opposing nuclear waste shipments to Nevada's Yucca Mountain repository said today. The NRC held a public meeting on proposed changes to 10 CFR 71 at its Rockville, Md., headquarters this week. The changes are an attempt to "harmonize" U.S. regulations with weaker international standards. The Department of Transportation (DOT) also is proposing a parallel harmonization rulemaking.
"This is nuclear shipment safety as written by nuclear industry lobbyists - not government safety officials," said Ken Cook, president of the Environmental Working Group.
While the proposed rollback threatens protections for many types of radioactive shipments, it could have a spillover effect on standards for transporting high-level nuclear waste and irradiated fuel from commercial nuclear power plants - just as the nuclear industry is pushing a shipment plant of unprecedented magnitude to the Yucca Mountain repository in Nevada. In particular, proposed changes would weaken reporting requirements of events involving defective or shoddy high-level nuclear waste transport containers, and allow the nuclear industry to make design changes to licensed containers without prior NRC approval.
"The NRC admits that there is no quantitative data which would conclusively show that harmonization improves public safety," said Bob Halstead, transportation advisor to the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects. "We are particularly concerned about NRC's proposal to weaken the containment standards for plutonium waste shipments to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) facility in New Mexico."
International standards also feature more lenient submersion test requirements for high-level nuclear waste shipping canisters and specify allowable levels of contamination on shipments - although the NRC is not currently proposing to adopt these changes.
"This proposed rulemaking fails to address any of our longstanding concerns about the inadequacies of regulatory standards governing irradiated fuel shipments," said Lisa Gue, policy analyst with Public Citizen. "It does not even consider the specific implications of this administration's plan to ship an unprecedented 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste on the roads, rails and waterways of 44 states and the District of Columbia."
.The International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA), established in 1957 to promote nuclear technology internationally, has encouraged its 130 member countries - including the United States - to adopt its international standards for nuclear waste transportation, disposal and release into commerce.
"This trend of invoking international standards as a justification for undermining more stringent domestic requirements does not bode well for NRC and DOT regulation of proposed nuclear waste repository shipments," Gue said.
* Agency for Nuclear Projects * American Public Health Association * Environmental Working Group * National Environmental Trust * Physicians for Social Responsibility * Public Citizen * U.S. PIRG * Chair - Jim Hall
http://www.citizen.org |
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