nuclear-news

No progress in USA’s dilemma about nuclear wastes

U.S. making little progress on nuclear waste issue,  Battle Creek Enquirer 17 June 11 When Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, most Americans thought the nation was on its way toward dealing with the spent radioactive fuel from nuclear power plants.

But nearly 30 years and about $15 billion later, little progress has been made.

Michigan Public Service Commissioner Greg White, speaking on behalf of the National Association of Regulatory Utility Comm-issioners, told a U.S. House subcommittee earlier this month that the nation is no closer to creating a central repository for nuclear waste than it was in the early 1980s…….

Yucca Mountain has been a political hot potato from the start – as probably any nuclear waste repository would be. A decade ago, Energy Department officials estimated it would cost $57.5 billion over its expected 150-year lifetime. Now estimates exceed $100 billion. In addition, although designed to house as much as 122,000 tons of waste, Congress mandated that it be limited to 77,000 tons.

And while the project appears to be dead, consumers continue to pay one-tenth of a cent per kilowatt hour of electricity to get rid of used nuclear fuel safely. In the absence of a central facility such as Yucca Mountain, approximately 65,000 metric tons of commercial spent nuclear fuel is housed temporarily at nuclear reactor sites throughout the United States.

The alternatives at this point? Above-ground “interim” storage sites? Constructing dry, stainless steel casks would take years and probably prompt the same kind of protests as Yucca Mountain. Recycling of used nuclear fuel like France, Great Britain, Germany and other countries do?…..

http://www.battlecreekenquirer.com/article/20110617/OPINION01/106170301/U-S-making-little-progress-nuclear-waste-issue?odyssey=mod|newswell|text|Frontpage|s

June 19, 2011 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes