nuclear-news

America keeps building up nuclear trash

What is to be done with the country’s 70,000 tons of commercial spent nuclear fuel and the 3,000 additional tons per year that the nation will produce?

What to do with United States’ nuclear trash? – This Just In – CNN.com Blogs 13 April 11″……The Japan incident has American politicians advocating to move the United States’ nuclear waste, often stored in pools and casks on the grounds of nuclear power plants, away from highly populated areas. And it exposes the fact that the country hasn’t come up with a more permanent storage solution.

“Basically, we right now do not really have a long-term strategy” for nuclear waste storage, said UCLA professor Albert Carnesale.

What is to be done with the country’s 70,000 tons of commercial spent nuclear fuel and the 3,000 additional tons per year that the nation will produce? In 2002, Congress approved Nevada’s Yucca Mountain as a site where nuclear fuel would be stored. But after taking office in 2009, President Barack Obama told the Energy Department not to use it.Obama then created the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future. The panel, with 15 experts including Carnesale, is studying what to do with spent nuclear fuel.
What to do with United States’ nuclear trash? – This Just In – CNN.com Blogs

April 13, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general