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USA: Nuclear Free Movement Has Made Progress in 2012

Nuclear Information and Resource Center, 20 Nov 12 Sometimes it’s important to step back and reflect on our movement’s accomplishments…. Think about how far we’ve come this year:
*The license for the proposed Calvert Cliffs-3 reactor was denied by the NRC! We couldn’t afford a lawyer so we did this legal intervention ourselves and won a stunning victory. We’re now defending that victory before the NRC Commissioners. We’re confident we’ll win there too.

*The NRC was forced to stop issuing licenses for new reactors and license renewals for the next two years. This was because of a lawsuit brought by our allies at NRDC, BREDL, and others. But two years isn’t enough to fix the problems caused by the NRC’s failed “waste confidence” rule. In fact, we have no confidence in our radioactive waste policy: the NRC should just make the licensing moratorium permanent.

*In October, Wisconsin’s Kewaunee reactor announced its permanent shutdown at the end of the year. Aging reactors can’t compete with the alternatives. The Exelon Corporation announced a few days later that it may close New Jersey’s Oyster Creek reactor before its scheduled 2019 date because of competition from “cheap renewables” and possible new capital costs to address post-Fukushima safety issues. Oyster Creek and other Fukushima-clone reactors (think Vermont Yankee, Pilgrim, Dresden, and more) are on their last legs. It’s our job to push these dangerous aging reactors, along with time bombs like San Onofre, Crystal River and Indian Point, over the edge.

*For the first time since 2010, President Obama’s budget this year did not include any new money for taxpayer loans for new reactors. And the President did not even mention nuclear power during his State of the Union speech, nor in any of the election debates (unlike his opponent). Nor has the $8.3 Billion taxpayer loan for the new Vogtle reactors, first announced in February 2010, gone out the door. This follows the successful efforts of NIRS and other DC-based groups over the past four years (and the 250,000+ e-mails and thousands of phone calls you have done) to block any and every effort to increase taxpayer support for new reactors.

November 21, 2012 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | general