| Submit your comments on this article |
| Science & Technology |
| Yucca Mountain hangs in nuclear limbo |
| 2006-07-21 |
| SNIP...Snarky commentary first.NYE COUNTY, Nev.--"As you can see, Yucca Mountain isn't really a mountain," says our guide as we near the end of an hour-long bus ride, about 100 miles north from Las Vegas. "Those of you who know geology will recognize it's only a ridge." The Department of Energy gives monthly tours these days, anxious to prove--after almost 25 years--it still intends to open its Nuclear Waste Repository at Yucca Mountain someday. The trip, however, feels like an expedition into hostile territory. The whole state of Nevada is on the warpath over the project. "See those buildings off on the left there," says our guide as we pass through the sagebrush. "They're brothels. As you may know, prostitution is legal in certain Nevada counties. The state has no trouble supplying them with water, but for almost a year they wouldn't give us any. We used port-o-potties for quite a long time." As it turns out, though, the brothels have their upside. Anticipating a surge in business from the construction project, they are among the few locals supporting the project. "Supporting", is right! Now for the "meat" of the argument. The whole project is now tied down in environmental impact statements. The Environmental Protection Agency set a standard that radiation from the site should not exceed 15 millirems a year (about one chest x-ray) for 10,000 years. Seems reasonable to me. Environmentalists screamed that wasn't enough. They wanted a million years. A federal court, of course, agreed. (another reason for strong, Constitutional judges) So the EPA set a standard of 350 millirems for the next million years (about two-thirds of what people in Denver get from natural sources) and environmentalists are screaming that isn't good enough either. (of course, and I bet they screamed all the way from their super-huge homes or out on their mega-yachts off the coast of Martha's Vineyard. NIMBY to the extreme...I guess this matches the lib's "free speech" issues...."1,000 MW for me, but not for thee!")Nobody has suggested how these standards are to be monitored. "Well, that's summin' else we'll just scream about too," GreenPeace activists yelled. I can't believe someone like these gaia-worshippers can be so hypocritical. We must shut down coal-fired power plants, AND not allow nuclear power AND not allow windmills off the NE's coasts. Just where do these moonbats think energy comes from? |
| Posted by:BA |
| #4 Hallelujah Steve. Not only is the waste less radioactive, but the long lived radioactinides are burned in the breeder reactors. |
| Posted by: ed 2006-07-21 19:12 |
| #3 The father of one my best friends, a true JFK-style liberal, worked at one of the national nuclear labs. He's fairly left-progressive and dedicated green until you mention nuclear power. Then he goes ballistic -- what we needed, according to him, were fast breeder reactors, recycle all the fuel rods, incinerate the nuclear waste in the breeders, and have a closed loop for plutonium fuel. Why? Because it's the least polluting of all our options, according to him. I'd love to get him into the same room as the usual enviro-nnuts. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2006-07-21 19:07 |
| #2 This site is as good as it gets. We need it to have nuclear power in this country. We need nuclear power to reduce our geostrategic vulnerablity in the middle east and (at least according to some scientists though it is far from settled) to reduce carbon emissions. Interestingly, the activists who oppose Yucca Mountain are often the same folks who want us out of the middle east and to sign the Kyoto treaty. Their positions are self-contradictory unless we return to the stone age. For this reason I cannot take the Democrats (clearly the political party holding these positions) seriously on public policy. |
| Posted by: JAB 2006-07-21 16:40 |
| #1 Sometimes I think that any solution to the nuclear "waste" issue must be opposed by the environmental nutjobs. Because any solution makes nuclear seem a viable option. But even if all of the nuclear plants in the country were shut down today we still have the waste issue to deal with. It is not going to go away. |
| Posted by: Cheaderhead 2006-07-21 15:22 |