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Gulfnews: Cleaner solutions lead to murky problems

Cleaner solutions lead to murky problems By Leah Bower, Special to Gulf News  February 09, 2009, 23:11Everybody is going nuclear – or at least everyone seems to be thinking about it as a shortcut to cheap plentiful electricity.I don’t know that I buy into it being an alternative energy source. ……………it certainly isn’t green………………………..everyone is going to have to find storage facilities for the radioactive waste produced by these plants.

Already it is almost impossible to build a waste site in the US or Europe without encountering incredibly hostile opposition from nearby residents. While China might not have that problem, most other nations are going to be hard-pressed to find dump sites inside their borders.

If everyone starts building reactors, who’s going to take the waste from nations desperate for safe storage?

Here in lies the problem with a band-aid energy solution like nuclear power: Everyone could end up with enough energy, but also with a load of radioactive waste that no one will touch.

Gulfnews: Cleaner solutions lead to murky problems

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February 10, 2009 Posted by | MIDDLE EAST, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear’s Nemesis

Nuclear’s Nemesis Baltimore Examiner

A Senate committee in Kentucky just passed a bill that could potentially allow for the new construction of nuclear power plants in the Bluegrass State.
Essentially, the bill would repeal a 1984 law that placed a moratorium on nuclear power plant construction until the federal government can figure out how to dispose of the waste.
So has the federal government figured out how to dispose of this waste?
Not a chance.
One of the biggest problems with nuclear is that there is still no safe way to dispose of the waste. And no matter how hard they try, there’s simply no way to spin this one. Sure, there have been attempts.

If you have to put something in a highly-engineered container, capable of withstanding enormous impact…then it ain’t safe!
Still, nuclear power plants have been sending massive amounts of juice to the grid for years. And as a result, we now have tons of nuclear waste – and no safe, centralized place to put it………………………That $96.2 billion (right now) will be enough to develop a repository large enough to handle 77,000 metric tons. Here’s the problem – more than 56,000 tons are already stored at more than 77 reactor sites across the country. And this number increases by about 2,000 tons each year. So by 2036 (when Yucca would be filled to capacity), we’ll be looking at about 110,000 tons – or 33,000 tons above what Yucca can store. Translation – problem NOT solved!……………………………..

Today, nuclear provides us with about 20 percent of our electricity. But between energy efficiency and conservation, and the large-scale integration of renewables, that 20 percent could easily be replaced – and without contributing to the safety and environmental issues that are undoubtedly associated with nuclear power.

Baltimore Renewable Energy Examiner: Nuclear’s Nemesis

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February 7, 2009 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Experts say Vt. Yankee’s nuke waste is here to stay: Times Argus Online

Experts say Vt. Yankee’s nuke waste is here to stay

Times Argus By Daniel Barlow Vermont Press Bureau – Published: January 30, 2009

MONTPELIER – Don’t count on Yucca Mountain or any other national solution for the long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel, a consulting group told lawmakers Thursday.

As the Vermont Legislature considers Vermont Yankee’s proposal to continue operating past its 2012 expiration date, lawmakers should assume that all the radioactive spent fuel left will be stored on-site in Vernon, nuclear consultants said.

Bruce Lacy, the founder of Iowa’s Lacy Consulting Group, told members of several House and Senate committees that dry cask storage of this waste material at nuclear power plants has become the default United States policy……………………..Here in Vermont, lawmakers are considering a request by the owners of Vermont Yankee to extend the Vernon plant’s operating license for another 20 years beyond its 2012 end date. Storage of the nuclear waste – the byproduct of creating nuclear power – is one of the chief concerns lawmakers are struggling with………………………Rep. Sarah Edwards… said she worried about the long-term storage of the waste at the Vernon facility, especially if there is a natural disaster there, such as flooding.

She was surprised Thursday to learn that federal regulators did not consider the possible implications of global warming in their flooding predictions for the facility.

Experts say Vt. Yankee’s nuke waste is here to stay: Times Argus Online

February 2, 2009 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear waste bound for U.S. | www.tennessean.com | The Tennessean

Nuclear waste bound for U.S. Tennessean.com 2 Feb 09 c: U.S. should just say no to imported hazard

For a nation that still hasn’t found a sure-fire way of storing its own nuclear waste without worry, it certainly shouldn’t be taking waste from other nations.

U.S. Rep. Bart Gordon, a Democrat, and Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Republican, have teamed on legislation that would ban foreign nuclear waste. The legislation follows efforts by a Utah company, EnergySolutions, to import up to 20,000 tons of nuclear waste from Italy that would go through ports at Charleston, S.C., or New Orleans, and through Tennessee on its way to the EnergySolutions site in Utah………………….. for each load that goes through a community, there could be a problem. Alexander says he agrees with Gordon that the U.S. shouldn’t become “the world’s nuclear garbage dump.”The bill offered by Gordon and Alexander should be a no-brainer. Foreign nuclear waste should be prohibited from being brought into this country…………………………..The fact is no one is in position to guarantee the safety of domestic nuclear energy, and no amount of trouble from coal-fired power plants completely erases nuclear concerns. The fight against foreign waste is hard to square with a gung-ho cry for more domestic power generated from nuclear technology.

Nuclear waste bound for U.S. | www.tennessean.com | The Tennessean

February 2, 2009 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Rebound of nuclear plants raising worries over waste

Rebound of nuclear plants raising worries over waste International Herald Tribune (New York times with Reuters) by James Kanter and Matthew Wald


January 30, 2009 As France presses ahead with building more next-generation nuclear reactors, new evidence emerged Friday to suggest that industry and governments may be unprepared to handle the increasingly toxic waste that will result.Highlighting the importance of the technology in France, both as its main source of electricity and as a major export industry, President Nicolas Sarkozy of France announced late Thursday that Électricité de France, Europe’s biggest power producer, was awarded the contract to develop a second atomic reactor using next-generation technology……………………………an anti-nuclear group said that information it gleaned from industry reports – publicly available but which have received little attention so far – show that waste from the EPR will be more radioactive by a factor of seven because more uranium is burned up. That will make it more expensive to handle and store safely, according to Greenpeace, which provided the details on Friday to the International Herald Tribune.

“Despite the French government’s global marketing of the EPR as cheap and safe, the evidence proves otherwise,” said Rianne Teule, an international nuclear campaigner for Greenpeace who is based in Amsterdam.

The next wave of reactors “poses an ever-increasing burden on people’s budgets and danger to their health, now and far into the future,” Teule said……………………..here are no EPRs in operation anywhere in the world, but the first is under construction at Olkiluoto, an island in the West of Finland, and the second in Flamanville, in northern France.

Teule said the evidence about the radioactivity of the waste was drawn from a report by Posiva, a waste disposal company owned by Finnish nuclear operators, and from the Swiss organization Nagra, which oversees management of nuclear waste.

Teule said the waste would pose greater dangers to workers from higher radiation doses during transfer and storage than current waste. She also said the waste would need to be stored for longer in areas above ground, where it is potentially exposed to terrorists.

Those factors, among others, would increase the overall cost of nuclear energy – costs that Teule said were not properly accounted for by industry and governments.

There are no long-term facilities for disposing or burying high-level nuclear waste anywhere in the world,…………………………….Hans Riotte, the head of the Radiological Protection and Radioactive Waste Management Division at the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency in Paris, said waste from the EPR, although smaller in volume, would be more radioactive than existing forms of high-level waste because it would be denser……………………….ny reports about the cost, or safety, of its EPR model still are a sensitive matter for the company, which is competing to become the designer of reactors for the next generation of nuclear plants in the United States and elsewhere………………………………

Problems at the EPR site in Finland mean the reactor already is badly overdue and vastly over budget, even though it was designed to have a shorter construction period than previous models.

The site has been plagued by water-logged concrete, faulty welds and flawed pipes, delaying the reactor start date by at least three years and raising costs by roughly 50 percent…………………………………Areva also is vying sell the technology to the United Arab Emirates as part of a project led by Total and GDF Suez.

Rebound of nuclear plants raising worries over waste – International Herald Tribune

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January 31, 2009 Posted by | 2 WORLD, business and costs, wastes | Leave a comment

Selling out Nevada

Selling out Nevada Las vegas Sun 25 Jan 09

Gibbons plans to cut fight against Yucca Mountain, and some in GOP want blood money  Gov. Jim Gibbons. proposed budget guts the state’s Agency for Nuclear Projects, which is responsible for pressing Nevada’s case. He cut the staff from seven to two. He also slashed funding for the state’s legal challenges.

………………..Nevada is at a critical juncture in its fight. The Energy Department last year asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for permission to build the dump 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, and Nevada needs to put on a strong case to the commission. Nevada also has a series of legal challenges against the Energy Department and has put the department on its heels. Nevada has continually shown the department’s work to support the project is shoddy and incomplete. The momentum has turned against a dump at Yucca Mountain.

President Barack Obama has said he is against the project, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who has led the congressional delegation’s effort to stop a Yucca Mountain repository, is preparing for a knockout.

Gibbons is undermining that, and some of his Republican colleagues, particularly state party Chairwoman Sue Lowden, say Nevada should negotiate a deal to drop its opposition in exchange for money……………………..Disgraceful. They should be ashamed. The Legislature should reject Gibbons’ plan.

Selling out Nevada – Las Vegas Sun

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January 26, 2009 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear Waste Is National Shame

 Nuclear Waste Is National Shame Daily Record Jan 20 2009 T. Bradley  MILITARY experts – a field marshal and a couple of generals – stated that the Trident missiles are a total waste of money and are in no sense a deterrent against the present terrorist danger.Despite that, Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Dumbarton Labour MSP Jackie Baillie and other so-called officials intend to spend £20billion of taxpayers’ money replacing these nuclear weapons to safeguard us from future attacks.The fact that to cancel these plans would cost millions of jobs – and, perhaps, votes and ultimately some MPs’ positions – has nothing to do with their decisions, of course.I prefer to believe the experts.

Letter: Your View – Nuclear Waste Is National Shame – The Daily Record

January 21, 2009 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Lawmakers act against waste movements

Lawmakers act against waste movements World Nuclear News 15 January 2009Legislation has been filed to stop the disposal of any foreign origin radioactive waste in the USA. It is a reaction to Energy Solutions’ contract to recycle metals from decommissioned power plants in Italy. The move comes after a long battle between Energy Solutions and various local officials and lawmakers unhappy about the recycling contract…………………………

Bart Gordon, Jim Matheson and Lee Terry submitted the legislation, entitled the Radioactive Import Deterrence Act, to Congress yesterday. The bill was also put to the Senate by Lamar Alexander.

 

If enacted under president-elect Barack Obama, the bill would prohibit the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from authorising the entrance of foreign-origin radioactive wastes when a portion of the waste would be disposed of in America, “unless the President deems the importation meets certain national and international goals,” Alexander said…………………………………….In public statements yesterday, Congressman Bart Gordon’s description of Energy Solutions’ plans was notably short on detail: “A company is currently trying to import 20,000 tons of Italian nuclear waste in the USA, where it would be reprocessed in Tennessee and then shipped to Utah for disposal.”

January 16, 2009 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Matheson poised to reintroduce foreign waste ban

Matheson poised to reintroduce foreign waste ban

EnergySolutions » Company ‘fully expected’ return of bill.Judy FahysThe Salt Lake Tribune 01/10/2009  MSTU.S. Rep. Jim Matheson and a bipartisan group of members of Congress are reviving their bill to stop imports of foreign nuclear waste to the United States.Reps. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn., and Lee Terry, R-Neb., have called a news conference for next week with the Utah Democrat to reintroduce the measure, now dubbed the Radioactive Import Deterrence Act of 2009, or the “RID Act.”

The bill would slam the door shut on most foreign-generated radioactive waste seeking disposal in U.S. landfills, including the low-level radioactive waste site owned and operated by Salt Lake City-based EnergySolutions Inc. in Tooele County.

“Utah is not the place for the world’s radioactive junk,” said Matheson……………………………… Several thousand people objected to the EnergySolutions Italian waste import request during a public comment period.

Matheson poised to reintroduce foreign waste ban – Salt Lake Tribune

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January 12, 2009 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear Waste Disposal System: Great Idea?

Nuclear Waste Disposal System: Great Idea?
INVENTOR SPOT by Cosetta 31 Dec 08 The nuclear waste disposal system known surreptitiously as Patent US 6846967 provides a means for disposing of nuclear waste which includes filling steel containers   with nuclear waste and then dropping the containers into the sea in the path of an undersea volcano. The volcano in turn pours lava onto the sea bed with the toxic substances, which the inventor swears are safe to put in the ocean and will not harm the environment   The question is: What if he is wrong?…………………The attempt to challenge this important problem is noble and important. Nuclear wastes are fast becoming a growing menace to humanity and the environment and this idea is not the first to address it nor will it be the last. (It is, however, probably the silliest to come along.)

The process begins with mixing the nuclear waste with a molten substance (lead). But alas, where does it end? What if the radioactive containers are dumped according to the inventor’s instructions and there’s not quite enough lava to hide the evidence? There’s no way to control that, ut the inventor says that in that event:

“If the lava flow is deemed inadequate, high explosives may be used to increase the lava flow by breaking the volcano walls.”

I don’t know about you, but to my ebbing and flowing sense of paranoia, it seems that one disaster is causing another that has already started and needs no additional help

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December 31, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

LegalNewsline | Nevada AG makes case against Yucca Mountain project

Nevada AG makes case against Yucca Mountain project

BY CHRIS RIZO CARSON CITY, Nev. (Legal Newsline) 22 Dec 08 -The Nevada attorney general has filed 229 challenges to a proposal to build a nuclear waste depository in the remote Nevada desert.

State Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto, who has fought the controversial project at every juncture, said Friday in a petition to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that the Yucca Mountain application is flawed.

Among other things, the attorney general said the project application fails to take into consideration such things as greenhouse gas-induced climate change and the lowering of the topography of Yucca Mountain by erosion.

She also said the U.S. Department of Energy’s application contains an inadequate plan for shipping high-level radioactive waste across the country to the site.

“We needed hundreds of pages just to document the most blatant problems with DOE’s application,” she said. “Although Nevada has known for years about many of these problems, we are approaching a real time of reckoning.”

LegalNewsline | Nevada AG makes case against Yucca Mountain project

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December 24, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Editorial – Where Does It All Go? – NYTimes.com

Where Does It All Go?
New York Times Editorial December 20, 2008 The Energy Department has recommended expanding the amount of nuclear waste that could be stored in an underground repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada to avoid the need for a second dump. It is a sensible proposal that also is an urgent reminder of how little progress has been made in solving one of the most vexing problems of the nuclear age. Tens of thousands of tons of spent fuel and military waste have been piling up at temporary storage sites around the country while the federal government has struggled, unsuccessfully, to find a long-term solution.

Editorial – Where Does It All Go? – NYTimes.com

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December 22, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

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

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December 20, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Goin’ nukular : Sonoma Valley Sun

Goin’ nukular
– Sonoma Valley Sun December 12, 2008 “……………..The use of nuclear power in Europe and other parts of the world is used as reassurance that this form of energy production is safe, reliable and nonpolluting; this in spite of the toxicity of some of the most dangerous substances in the history of mankind.
Plutonium isotopes (the stuff of nuclear weapons), are a common byproduct of nuclear power reactors, as are many other toxic radioactive isotopes. The half-life of plutonium-239 is 24,000 years, which means that in that amount of time, half of the radioactive plutonium concerned would remain. In another 24,000 years, half of that remaining amount would remain, and so forth. In other words, it takes over 200,000 years for plutonium-239 to become fully non-radioactive. Plutonium-242 has a half-life of 376,000 years.
The toxicity of plutonium is enormous. If inhaled into the body, it remains in the lung, liver, bone and bone marrow tissue, where it generates cancerous mutations. Inhalation of as little as a few milligrams is inevitably fatal. Moreover, plutonium is a fissile material, which means it can be used to create a nuclear fission explosion. In the hands of people intent upon making a weapon, it constitutes a major threat to life, and an explosion used to incite terror would likely ignite dire unforeseen circumstances.
At present, the storage and security of fissile materials like plutonium is unresolved. Most “spent” reactor-grade radioactive materials are stored in deep pools of water at the nuclear power stations themselves. Their movement by rail or truck is so controversial and dangerous that protocols for their safe transport and storage remain undeveloped.
A recent EPA report indicates that any nuclear storage facility must be able to provide a secure and inviolable repository for one million years……………….Producing penetrable depositories of deadly substances therefore constitutes a moral failing of the highest order, and accordingly, “goin’ nukular” should be shelved forever.

Goin’ nukular : Sonoma Valley Sun

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December 13, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

Not a done deal – Las Vegas Sun

Not a done deal
Application for rail line in Nevada to haul nuclear waste is, at the least, premature Las Vegas Sun, Dec 7, 2008

An application for a rail line to carry high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain presumes far too much, as Nevada officials made clear at a Thursday hearing.

The application was filed by the Energy Department, which for more than 20 years has been working toward opening a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Even after that amount of time, the department admits that its planned opening of the dump in 2020 is an “extreme stretch.” In our view, that is mainly because of all the legitimate safety issues that Nevada has raised not only with the dump itself, but also with the transportation of the deadly waste………………Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Rep. Shelley Berkley, both D-Nev., submitted prepared statements blistering the board over safety issues. Nevada has long said that moving high-level nuclear waste long distances by rail is dangerous.

Not a done deal – Las Vegas Sun

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December 8, 2008 Posted by | wastes | Leave a comment

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