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Nuclear reprocessing is risky and impractical | GreenvilleOnline.com | The Greenville News

Nuclear reprocessing is risky and impractical
Greenvilleonline.com By Marcus Newberry and Dana Beach • September 13, 2008 A powerful bipartisan duo, Rep. James Clyburn and Sen. Lindsey Graham, recently joined forces to support “nuclear reprocessing.” We urge these gentlemen to temper their enthusiasm……………………..

Nuclear reprocessing separates plutonium from radioactive waste so that it can be reused to generate additional energy. However, reprocessing also has an unfortunate side effect: It dramatically increases the volume of radioactive waste.

According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, “After reprocessing … the total volume of nuclear waste will have been increased by a factor of twenty or more ….”

n addition, waste from nuclear reprocessing is prone to contaminate surrounding communities. A recent report by the Institute for Policy Studies stated: “Denmark, Norway, and Ireland have sought to close the French and English plants because of their radiological impacts. For instance, discharges of iodine-129, a very long-lived carcinogen, have contaminated the shores of Denmark and Norway at levels 1,000 times higher than nuclear weapons fallout. Health studies indicate that significant excess childhood cancers have occurred near French and English reprocessing plants.”

Finally, as South Carolina well knows, nuclear waste will stay right where it was produced, indefinitely. That is because the federal government has struggled for more than 20 years to develop a safe, permanent storage facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Optimists predict that Yucca Mountain will open in 2017; others say it will never open at all.

Nuclear reprocessing is risky and impractical | GreenvilleOnline.com | The Greenville News

Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, radioactive, uranium

September 13, 2008 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety