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Senate panel set to mark up transmission, nuclear plans Wednesday

Senate panel set to mark up transmission, nuclear plans Wednesday

The New York Times By KATHERINE LING AND BEN GEMAN, Greenwire

May 4, 2009
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee meets Wednesday to mark up bills on federal transmission siting authority, financing of “clean” energy projects and managing the nation’s nuclear waste……………
……….A major pillar of the Democrats’ agenda is expanding the nation’s power transmission system, an issue that lawmakers have wrestled with over the past few years……………..
……….Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has emphasized the importance of using the lines primarily for renewable energy…………………..

……………..Republican Senators worry that the lack of a strategy for nuclear waste will dampen utilities’ enthusiasm to build the 26 reactors whose applications are currently being reviewed at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission………………..
…….And some senators may not be content with having reprocessing merely considered as one of the options for the commission……….

…………………..critics oppose such a move, citing proliferation concerns of the separated plutonium — which could be used for a dirty bomb or a nuclear weapon if considerably enhanced — and the example the United States would set for the rest of the world if it blessed such a policy. There are environmental concerns as well as the process generates considerably more intermediate nuclear waste.

The economic plan of such a facility — which would likely cost upward of $25 billion to construct — is also a point of contention, as a reprocessing facility would not eliminate the need for a permanent geologic repository so the cost is compared to the need to build a second or third repository, as opposed to just one repository.

Senate panel set to mark up transmission, nuclear plans Wednesday – NYTimes.com

May 6, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized