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ReviewJournal.com – Breaking News – Nevada files 229 challenges over nuclear waste project

Nevada files 229 challenges over nuclear waste project
Las Begas Review Journal 19 Dec 08 Nevada reached a milestone today in its 30-year war to defeat the federal Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project by filing 229 challenges to the Department of Energy’s license application for the planned repository 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.“Clearly this is a seminal day for us,” Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto said at the Sawyer Building with State Nuclear Projects Agency Director Bob Loux standing at her side. The state’s petition was filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is expected to take at least four years to review the application and contentions.

Loux declared the project dead.

“I do believe it’s truly over,” he said after explaining that the project’s pitfalls to entomb 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste and spent fuel in a porous, volcanic rock ridge flanked by earthquake faults can’t be fixed.

He said DOE’s reliance on protecting waste containers from corrosion with a system of relatively short-lived titanium drip shields that haven’t been invented and won’t be installed until 100 years after the waste is buried is a major flaw.

ReviewJournal.com – Breaking News – Nevada files 229 challenges over nuclear waste project

Tags: nuclear, antinuclear, urasium, radioactive

December 20, 2008 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | wastes