Funded by Nuclear Power

my2hands

i love when americans cry about nuclear energy while they consume more energy then 99% of the rest of the planet...


taking any option off the table energy wise right now is flat out insane and unrealistic. period.

Anon

my2hands wrote:

i love when americans cry about nuclear energy while they consume more energy then 99% of the rest of the planet...


taking any option off the table energy wise right now is flat out insane and unrealistic. period.

We're just five percent of the world's population, yet we consume 23% of its energy. Shame on us.

El_Kabong

mdg164 wrote:

While we need to explore many types of energy, Nuclear should be our main source. We have plenty of nuclear fuel sitting in the spent fuel pools and dry casks of every nuclear site. Jimmy Carter banned spent fuel reprocessing, so all that energy sits there. Breeder reactor technology actually creates more fuel than it uses, but is useless if we can't reprocess.

Which leads to long term storage of the spent fuel. If we could reprocess, there would be much less to store. Secondly, Yucca Mountain is the answer!!! Seismically stable, low water table, isolated, government owned land! Engineered to be safe for 10,000 years! But the NIMBY folks are holding it up. Democrats are out there playing on people's fear of what they don't understand. Instead they should be educating people on the subject.

I work in the nuclear industry, and have multiple degrees in the subject. farfromglorified seems to know what they are talking about. I haven't read everything he/she has posted, but what I have read looks spot on.

oh???

http://www.nirs.org/factsheets/yuccaitaly1.htm

In 1996, DOE found radioactive chlorine-36 at surprisingly elevated levels at the same depth within Yucca at which the waste would be buried. How did it get there? Atomic weapons testing in the South Pacific, which radioactively activated chlorine in seawater. This entered the atmosphere, blew with the wind, then fell as rain onto Yucca. In less than 50 years, that rainwater was able to percolate down through fissures and fractures caused by earthquakes at Yucca to the proposed repository rock. Such water infiltration could quickly corrode waste burial containers, releasing radiation into the underground drinking water supply in just centuries. In 1998, over 200 environmental organizations petitioned DOE to abide by its own guidelines and disqualify Yucca from further consideration. DOE ignored the petition for three years, then simply did away with the regulation that formed the basis for the petition.

DOE has admitted to the presidentially-appointed Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB) that Yucca’s geology would contribute only 0.008% of the radiation isolation at the repository. 99.7% would come from artificially engineered barriers such as the burial containers. The proposal had become simply engineered waste packages that happen to be located 1,000 feet underground. The concept of deep geologic disposal has been abandoned at Yucca.


Changing the rules in the middle of the game: weakening environmental protection standards when Yucca fails to meet the original ones

In 1984, DOE established repository site suitability guidelines that would disqualify potential repository sites at which water could pass through the geology and back out into the living environment in less than 1,000 years. The Cl-36 data mentioned above revealed in mere decades or centuries, water flow through Yucca could re-enter the environment. In mid-December 2001, less than a month before DOE officially announced that Yucca was “suitable,” DOE simply removed the groundwater flow time disqualifying condition from its regulations.

In the mid-1980’s, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established generic regulations for repositories. Just several years later, DOE’s studies clearly showed that Yucca could not live up to EPA’s limits for the releases of harmful radioactive gases such as carbon-14. Under pressure from the nuclear power industry and its allies in government, in 1992 Congress yet again amended the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. This time, EPA was ordered to write “site-specific regulations” that would apply only at Yucca but not other proposed repositories. Thus was the problem of gaseous releases taken care of!

Due to intense political pressure from all sides, EPA took nearly ten more years before publishing its Yucca-specific regulations. Its rules were so weak that the State of Nevada and a coalition of environmental groups immediately filed lawsuits against EPA. The regulations would apply for only 10,000 years, despite the fact that high-level radioactive waste remains hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years. EPA would allow for an 11 mile (18 km) buffer zone for radiation dilution in which the Safe Drinking Water Act would not have to be enforced. Just 20 miles downstream from Yucca is one of Nevada’s most productive farming areas, including its second largest dairy which exports milk to tens of millions in several western states. Those farmers are referred to as “[radiation] dose receptors” by DOE, but anyone consuming radioactively contaminated farm products would be a “dose receptor” too. Even if such contamination did not occur, those farm products would be stigmatized.

Politics trump science: corruption of the decision-making process

In 2001, it was revealed that the law firm – Winston and Strawn -- hired by DOE to help prepare its Yucca license application was simultaneously lobbying Congress on behalf of the pro-dump industry advocate Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI). A recent federal court decision reinforces the allegation of this conflict of interest, a finding that could delay Yucca licensing by at least several months as previous legal work must be reviewed and perhaps redone.

Just before the congressional votes in early 2002, GAO reported that 293 technical issues remained unresolved, so that a determination of Yucca site suitability would be premature and should be indefinitely postponed. The NWTRB reported to Congress that DOE’s scientific and technical performance at Yucca was “weak to moderate”.

Despite this, both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate in mid-2002 approved the override of the State of Nevada’s earlier veto of the Yucca proposal. George W. Bush sealed the Yucca approval with his rubberstamp in July 2002. Similar to the 1987 Screw Nevada bill, many members of Congress were happy to approve the transfer of waste from their own state to Nevada, even though Nevada has no reactors itself.

An evaluation by NEI and Exelon (the largest nuclear utility in the USA) entitled “Yucca Mountain: A multi-level campaign to win support,” revealed that a $15 million lobbying fund helped win congressional approval. Given such “Obstacles to Success” as a “Big Fat Ugly Issue, Very Bad Timing, and Serious Opposition,” how did the nuclear power industry and its allies in the Bush Administration win Yucca’s approval? Under “Why We Were Successful,” NEI and Exelon simply placed a huge dollar sign: “$”. U.S. Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada who led the Congressional fight against Yucca’s approval, has said that when Nevada went looking for lobbyists to argue its cause in D.C., all firms had already been hired by the nuclear power industry. In addition to this army of lobbyists, campaign contributions in the tens of millions of dollars to U.S. Representatives, Senators, and even the Bush Administration help explain how such a flawed proposal as the Yucca Mountain dump has won congressional and presidential approval. Industry PR ad campaigns across the country added to the pro-dump fervor.

More recently, revelations that whistleblowers at the Yucca Mountain Project have suffered severe harassment increase concerns about short cuts on safety. Whistleblower protections are under attack by the Bush Administration, meaning that Yucca Mountain workers concerned about public safety are even less likely to speak out than before, for fear of reprisals by DOE.

http://www.nirs.org/factsheets/whyyuccawillleak.htm

It’s Gonna Leak --- so they change the rules!

It has been known since the early analysis of this site that fractures in the rock of Yucca Mountain will allow the release of radioactive gases over time as nuclear waste decays. The primary gas will be carbon-14. It is estimated that the release of this radioactive gas will have a global impact over time that will result in 25,000 additional cancers. This fact would have prevented the site from being licensed under EPA’s nuclear waste repository standards coming into effect at that time. In 1992 Congress exempted Yucca Mountain from the EPA standard, telling them to write a special standard just for Yucca Mountain. The original standard (more or less) is on the books (though with a loop hole) for the embattled Waste Isolation Pilot Plant plutonium dump in New Mexico.

OOOOOPs! It’s Gonna Leak MORE!!! SO change the rules AGAIN!

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) own data as presented in the 1998 “Viability Assessment” shows that water moves quite rapidly through the rocks at Yucca Mountain. As soon as the containers begin to fail, radioactivity will also move rapidly – in centuries or less – to contaminate the ground water in the region. This is due to the same fractures in the rock that will allow the carbon-14 to escape.

Fingerprints demonstrating this fast flow pathway were left by fallout from the very industries that created the waste that would be sent to the site. Traces of chlorine-36 were found by DOE researchers deep in Yucca Mountain at the level where the waste would be dumped. This radionuclide is not found at these concentrations in nature.

In fact, there is only one bulk source of chlorine-36: atmospheric nuclear weapons tests conducted in the Pacific. Salt in the seawater was activated, forming the radioactive chlorine isotope. This “fell out” all over the Northern Hemisphere; it is not unique to Yucca Mountain. But its presence at repository depth proves that water has traveled there within the past 50 years, and proves a “fast flow” path for ground water travel.

Current DOE Site Suitability Guidelines state:

A site shall be disqualified if the pre-waste-emplacement ground-water travel time from the disturbed zone to the accessible environment is expected to be less than 1000 years along any pathway of likely and significant radionuclide travel.

(960.4-2-1 Post-Closure Disqualifying Condition for Hydrology )

In November 1998, more than 200 environmental and public interest organizations sent a petition to the Secretary of Energy to disqualify Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste dump since it clearly will fail to meet the Guidelines, and it will fail to isolate nuclear waste. Instead of acting on this petition, the DOE is currently actively attempting to change the Site Suitability Guidelines, to simply eliminate such disqualifying conditions.

A Whole Lot of Shaking Going On

Why will Yucca Mountain fail to isolate nuclear waste? Why is it fractured? The answer is very simple. This area is as seismically active as the California Bay Area. There have been more than 600 earthquakes within a 50-mile radius of the site within the last 20 years. A major jolt knocked windows out of a DOE facility in the early 1990’s. In 1998 and 1999 there have been a whole spate of tremblers, at greater frequencies than previously observed, one recently derailing a train on a proposed nuclear waste transport route.

All this shaking has fractured the relatively soft rock (tuff) that forms this low snaking ridge. There are 35 active fault lines in the area, including two that traverse the repository site itself, but the entire mass of Yucca is a sieve with tiny fractures that allow water and gas to flow.

Serpent Swimming West Among the Lava Cones

A striking feature of the Yucca landscape is a line of lava cones that extends to the west of the Mountain. The youngest cone is closest to Yucca Mountain. This is clear evidence of the possibility of a magma pocket which the earth’s crust is moving slowly across. Like the formation of the Hawaiian Islands, these lava cones are like the squirts from a subterranean pastry bag.

Further evidence supporting the presence of a magma pocket comes from research published in Science magazine under contract with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The use of global positioning satellites allows tracking of the movement of Earth’s crust. The crust at Yucca is expanding. It is also moving westward at an accelerating rate. The authors conclude that this evidence is “consistent with” the presence of a magma pocket under Yucca Mountain.

The Western Shoshone People who have rightful claim to the land at Yucca Mountain have a different name for this site. It translates: “Serpent Swimming West.” If we would listen to ancient wisdom, and pay attention to the earthquakes, we might be able to avert a major environmental catastrophe of burying nuclear waste where it will almost certainly leak.

More Evidence: HOT WATER….BOOOMMMM!?!

Analysis of gas in crystals that are abundant inside Yucca Mountain shows that these crystals were formed by HOT water welling up into the mountain from below. This is more evidence of geothermal activity. If the nuclear waste dump were to flood with hot water from below, there is a distinct possibility of explosion – either caused by steam, chemical interaction or nuclear chain reaction.

mdg164

And you believe anything your found on that site? I stopped reading your article when I saw the word "dump" in the title. I've taken undergrad and graduate level courses on rad waste. I think I will trust my education over some anti-nuke website.

Just to play devil's advocate though. Having studied all the alternative disposals, deep geological is the only viable option. If we do nothing, that fuel will sit scattered accross the country. If it's going to leak (Which I totally don't believe) at Yucca Mountain, it's going to leak anywhere. So would you rather have it spread throughout the country?

El_Kabong wrote:

oh???

http://www.nirs.org/factsheets/yuccaitaly1.htm

In 1996, DOE found radioactive chlorine-36 at surprisingly elevated levels at the same depth within Yucca at which the waste would be buried. How did it get there? Atomic weapons testing in the South Pacific, which radioactively activated chlorine in seawater. This entered the atmosphere, blew with the wind, then fell as rain onto Yucca. In less than 50 years, that rainwater was able to percolate down through fissures and fractures caused by earthquakes at Yucca to the proposed repository rock. Such water infiltration could quickly corrode waste burial containers, releasing radiation into the underground drinking water supply in just centuries. In 1998, over 200 environmental organizations petitioned DOE to abide by its own guidelines and disqualify Yucca from further consideration. DOE ignored the petition for three years, then simply did away with the regulation that formed the basis for the petition.

DOE has admitted to the presidentially-appointed Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB) that Yucca’s geology would contribute only 0.008% of the radiation isolation at the repository. 99.7% would come from artificially engineered barriers such as the burial containers. The proposal had become simply engineered waste packages that happen to be located 1,000 feet underground. The concept of deep geologic disposal has been abandoned at Yucca.


Changing the rules in the middle of the game: weakening environmental protection standards when Yucca fails to meet the original ones

In 1984, DOE established repository site suitability guidelines that would disqualify potential repository sites at which water could pass through the geology and back out into the living environment in less than 1,000 years. The Cl-36 data mentioned above revealed in mere decades or centuries, water flow through Yucca could re-enter the environment. In mid-December 2001, less than a month before DOE officially announced that Yucca was “suitable,” DOE simply removed the groundwater flow time disqualifying condition from its regulations.

In the mid-1980’s, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established generic regulations for repositories. Just several years later, DOE’s studies clearly showed that Yucca could not live up to EPA’s limits for the releases of harmful radioactive gases such as carbon-14. Under pressure from the nuclear power industry and its allies in government, in 1992 Congress yet again amended the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. This time, EPA was ordered to write “site-specific regulations” that would apply only at Yucca but not other proposed repositories. Thus was the problem of gaseous releases taken care of!

Due to intense political pressure from all sides, EPA took nearly ten more years before publishing its Yucca-specific regulations. Its rules were so weak that the State of Nevada and a coalition of environmental groups immediately filed lawsuits against EPA. The regulations would apply for only 10,000 years, despite the fact that high-level radioactive waste remains hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years. EPA would allow for an 11 mile (18 km) buffer zone for radiation dilution in which the Safe Drinking Water Act would not have to be enforced. Just 20 miles downstream from Yucca is one of Nevada’s most productive farming areas, including its second largest dairy which exports milk to tens of millions in several western states. Those farmers are referred to as “[radiation] dose receptors” by DOE, but anyone consuming radioactively contaminated farm products would be a “dose receptor” too. Even if such contamination did not occur, those farm products would be stigmatized.

Politics trump science: corruption of the decision-making process

In 2001, it was revealed that the law firm – Winston and Strawn -- hired by DOE to help prepare its Yucca license application was simultaneously lobbying Congress on behalf of the pro-dump industry advocate Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI). A recent federal court decision reinforces the allegation of this conflict of interest, a finding that could delay Yucca licensing by at least several months as previous legal work must be reviewed and perhaps redone.

Just before the congressional votes in early 2002, GAO reported that 293 technical issues remained unresolved, so that a determination of Yucca site suitability would be premature and should be indefinitely postponed. The NWTRB reported to Congress that DOE’s scientific and technical performance at Yucca was “weak to moderate”.

Despite this, both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate in mid-2002 approved the override of the State of Nevada’s earlier veto of the Yucca proposal. George W. Bush sealed the Yucca approval with his rubberstamp in July 2002. Similar to the 1987 Screw Nevada bill, many members of Congress were happy to approve the transfer of waste from their own state to Nevada, even though Nevada has no reactors itself.

An evaluation by NEI and Exelon (the largest nuclear utility in the USA) entitled “Yucca Mountain: A multi-level campaign to win support,” revealed that a $15 million lobbying fund helped win congressional approval. Given such “Obstacles to Success” as a “Big Fat Ugly Issue, Very Bad Timing, and Serious Opposition,” how did the nuclear power industry and its allies in the Bush Administration win Yucca’s approval? Under “Why We Were Successful,” NEI and Exelon simply placed a huge dollar sign: “$”. U.S. Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada who led the Congressional fight against Yucca’s approval, has said that when Nevada went looking for lobbyists to argue its cause in D.C., all firms had already been hired by the nuclear power industry. In addition to this army of lobbyists, campaign contributions in the tens of millions of dollars to U.S. Representatives, Senators, and even the Bush Administration help explain how such a flawed proposal as the Yucca Mountain dump has won congressional and presidential approval. Industry PR ad campaigns across the country added to the pro-dump fervor.

More recently, revelations that whistleblowers at the Yucca Mountain Project have suffered severe harassment increase concerns about short cuts on safety. Whistleblower protections are under attack by the Bush Administration, meaning that Yucca Mountain workers concerned about public safety are even less likely to speak out than before, for fear of reprisals by DOE.

http://www.nirs.org/factsheets/whyyuccawillleak.htm

It’s Gonna Leak --- so they change the rules!

It has been known since the early analysis of this site that fractures in the rock of Yucca Mountain will allow the release of radioactive gases over time as nuclear waste decays. The primary gas will be carbon-14. It is estimated that the release of this radioactive gas will have a global impact over time that will result in 25,000 additional cancers. This fact would have prevented the site from being licensed under EPA’s nuclear waste repository standards coming into effect at that time. In 1992 Congress exempted Yucca Mountain from the EPA standard, telling them to write a special standard just for Yucca Mountain. The original standard (more or less) is on the books (though with a loop hole) for the embattled Waste Isolation Pilot Plant plutonium dump in New Mexico.

OOOOOPs! It’s Gonna Leak MORE!!! SO change the rules AGAIN!

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) own data as presented in the 1998 “Viability Assessment” shows that water moves quite rapidly through the rocks at Yucca Mountain. As soon as the containers begin to fail, radioactivity will also move rapidly – in centuries or less – to contaminate the ground water in the region. This is due to the same fractures in the rock that will allow the carbon-14 to escape.

Fingerprints demonstrating this fast flow pathway were left by fallout from the very industries that created the waste that would be sent to the site. Traces of chlorine-36 were found by DOE researchers deep in Yucca Mountain at the level where the waste would be dumped. This radionuclide is not found at these concentrations in nature.

In fact, there is only one bulk source of chlorine-36: atmospheric nuclear weapons tests conducted in the Pacific. Salt in the seawater was activated, forming the radioactive chlorine isotope. This “fell out” all over the Northern Hemisphere; it is not unique to Yucca Mountain. But its presence at repository depth proves that water has traveled there within the past 50 years, and proves a “fast flow” path for ground water travel.

Current DOE Site Suitability Guidelines state:

A site shall be disqualified if the pre-waste-emplacement ground-water travel time from the disturbed zone to the accessible environment is expected to be less than 1000 years along any pathway of likely and significant radionuclide travel.

(960.4-2-1 Post-Closure Disqualifying Condition for Hydrology )

In November 1998, more than 200 environmental and public interest organizations sent a petition to the Secretary of Energy to disqualify Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste dump since it clearly will fail to meet the Guidelines, and it will fail to isolate nuclear waste. Instead of acting on this petition, the DOE is currently actively attempting to change the Site Suitability Guidelines, to simply eliminate such disqualifying conditions.

A Whole Lot of Shaking Going On

Why will Yucca Mountain fail to isolate nuclear waste? Why is it fractured? The answer is very simple. This area is as seismically active as the California Bay Area. There have been more than 600 earthquakes within a 50-mile radius of the site within the last 20 years. A major jolt knocked windows out of a DOE facility in the early 1990’s. In 1998 and 1999 there have been a whole spate of tremblers, at greater frequencies than previously observed, one recently derailing a train on a proposed nuclear waste transport route.

All this shaking has fractured the relatively soft rock (tuff) that forms this low snaking ridge. There are 35 active fault lines in the area, including two that traverse the repository site itself, but the entire mass of Yucca is a sieve with tiny fractures that allow water and gas to flow.

Serpent Swimming West Among the Lava Cones

A striking feature of the Yucca landscape is a line of lava cones that extends to the west of the Mountain. The youngest cone is closest to Yucca Mountain. This is clear evidence of the possibility of a magma pocket which the earth’s crust is moving slowly across. Like the formation of the Hawaiian Islands, these lava cones are like the squirts from a subterranean pastry bag.

Further evidence supporting the presence of a magma pocket comes from research published in Science magazine under contract with the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The use of global positioning satellites allows tracking of the movement of Earth’s crust. The crust at Yucca is expanding. It is also moving westward at an accelerating rate. The authors conclude that this evidence is “consistent with” the presence of a magma pocket under Yucca Mountain.

The Western Shoshone People who have rightful claim to the land at Yucca Mountain have a different name for this site. It translates: “Serpent Swimming West.” If we would listen to ancient wisdom, and pay attention to the earthquakes, we might be able to avert a major environmental catastrophe of burying nuclear waste where it will almost certainly leak.

More Evidence: HOT WATER….BOOOMMMM!?!

Analysis of gas in crystals that are abundant inside Yucca Mountain shows that these crystals were formed by HOT water welling up into the mountain from below. This is more evidence of geothermal activity. If the nuclear waste dump were to flood with hot water from below, there is a distinct possibility of explosion – either caused by steam, chemical interaction or nuclear chain reaction.

Abookamongstthemany

mdg164 wrote:

And you believe anything your found on that site? I stopped reading your article when I saw the word "dump" in the title. I've taken undergrad and graduate level courses on rad waste. I think I will trust my education over some anti-nuke website.

Just to play devil's advocate though. Having studied all the alternative disposals, deep geological is the only viable option. If we do nothing, that fuel will sit scattered accross the country. If it's going to leak (Which I totally don't believe) at Yucca Mountain, it's going to leak anywhere. So would you rather have it spread throughout the country?

You know there are other opinions to be had on this mateer other than just yours. If you want to truly discuss this issue then you shouldn't dismiss and not address the points brought up because of the word 'dump' and then ask your own questions. Why should anyone address your questions when you couldn't bother yourself with reading points posted by them? Your opinion could just as easily be dismissed because you work for the industry...so of course you've been told everything from the pro angle. If we really wish to further the discussion there has to be a tolerance of other's opinions at least to the point where you read their replies and address them before moving on to your own points.

El_Kabong

mdg164 wrote:

And you believe anything your found on that site? I stopped reading your article when I saw the word "dump" in the title. I've taken undergrad and graduate level courses on rad waste. I think I will trust my education over some anti-nuke website.

Just to play devil's advocate though. Having studied all the alternative disposals, deep geological is the only viable option. If we do nothing, that fuel will sit scattered accross the country. If it's going to leak (Which I totally don't believe) at Yucca Mountain, it's going to leak anywhere. So would you rather have it spread throughout the country?

well, here's some things you might've missed by not reading:

DOE has admitted to the presidentially-appointed Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB) that Yucca’s geology would contribute only 0.008% of the radiation isolation at the repository. 99.7% would come from artificially engineered barriers such as the burial containers. T



In the mid-1980’s, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established generic regulations for repositories. Just several years later, DOE’s studies clearly showed that Yucca could not live up to EPA’s limits for the releases of harmful radioactive gases such as carbon-14. Under pressure from the nuclear power industry and its allies in government, in 1992 Congress yet again amended the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. This time, EPA was ordered to write “site-specific regulations” that would apply only at Yucca but not other proposed repositories.

Due to intense political pressure from all sides, EPA took nearly ten more years before publishing its Yucca-specific regulations. Its rules were so weak that the State of Nevada and a coalition of environmental groups immediately filed lawsuits against EPA. The regulations would apply for only 10,000 years, despite the fact that high-level radioactive waste remains hazardous for hundreds of thousands of years. EPA would allow for an 11 mile (18 km) buffer zone for radiation dilution in which the Safe Drinking Water Act would not have to be enforced. Just 20 miles downstream from Yucca is one of Nevada’s most productive farming areas, including its second largest dairy which exports milk to tens of millions in several western states. Those farmers are referred to as “[radiation] dose receptors” by DOE





In 2001, it was revealed that the law firm – Winston and Strawn -- hired by DOE to help prepare its Yucca license application was simultaneously lobbying Congress on behalf of the pro-dump industry advocate Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI). A recent federal court decision reinforces the allegation of this conflict of interest, a finding that could delay Yucca licensing by at least several months as previous legal work must be reviewed and perhaps redone.

Just before the congressional votes in early 2002, GAO reported that 293 technical issues remained unresolved, so that a determination of Yucca site suitability would be premature and should be indefinitely postponed. The NWTRB reported to Congress that DOE’s scientific and technical performance at Yucca was “weak to moderate”.



An evaluation by NEI and Exelon (the largest nuclear utility in the USA) entitled “Yucca Mountain: A multi-level campaign to win support,” revealed that a $15 million lobbying fund helped win congressional approval. Given such “Obstacles to Success” as a “Big Fat Ugly Issue, Very Bad Timing, and Serious Opposition,” how did the nuclear power industry and its allies in the Bush Administration win Yucca’s approval? Under “Why We Were Successful,” NEI and Exelon simply placed a huge dollar sign: “$”. U.S. Senator Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada who led the Congressional fight against Yucca’s approval, has said that when Nevada went looking for lobbyists to argue its cause in D.C., all firms had already been hired by the nuclear power industry. In addition to this army of lobbyists, campaign contributions in the tens of millions of dollars to U.S. Representatives, Senators, and even the Bush Administration help explain how such a flawed proposal as the Yucca Mountain dump has won congressional and presidential approval. Industry PR ad campaigns across the country added to the pro-dump fervor.





The Department of Energy’s (DOE) own data as presented in the 1998 “Viability Assessment” shows that water moves quite rapidly through the rocks at Yucca Mountain. As soon as the containers begin to fail, radioactivity will also move rapidly – in centuries or less – to contaminate the ground water in the region. This is due to the same fractures in the rock that will allow the carbon-14 to escape.

mdg164

Abookamongstthemany wrote:

You know there are other opinions to be had on this mateer other than just yours. If you want to truly discuss this issue then you shouldn't dismiss and not address the points brought up because of the word 'dump' and then ask your own questions. Why should anyone address your questions when you couldn't bother yourself with reading points posted by them? Your opinion could just as easily be dismissed because you work for the industry...so of course you've been told everything from the pro angle. If we really wish to further the discussion there has to be a tolerance of other's opinions at least to the point where you read their replies and address them before moving on to your own points.

There may be other opinions, but they may not be correct. Many people used to think the world was flat, they were wrong.

I've spent 6 years studying the subject in school, and more than that working in the industry. I have truly discussed this issue many times over. You don't seem to understand that adding the word "dump" is an immediate negative sign. If they were truly unbiased, they would be discussing the "repository."

I don't care if anyone "answers my questions" because I didn't ask any questions. I did play devil's advocate for a while and technically I asked a question.... but I didn't expect an answer. I know the answer.

I was not forced in to this industry, I am not forced to stay, and I've never been "told" anything, but I have learned much. You act like we take our marching orders from the NRC! I could leave this industry today and make a very nice living doing something completely different. But I don't because I believe in the cause.

No offense, but I have nothing to gain from discussing this with anyone on a message board. I've debated this with the basket weaving majors many times back in college. What qualifies you or anyone to discuss this matter? I'm not trying to be "holier than thou," but what can you add to the discussion other than an "opinion," based on mis-information from the internet? Why should I waste my time? If you think I could change anyone's mind, you are fooling yourself. This board in particular is filled with people who blindly take their political views from their favorite band.... that is scary. I know better than to waste much of my time preaching.

El_Kabong wrote:

well, here's some things you might've missed by not reading:

I didn't miss anything

unsung

You know what the best thing about nuclear power is? The paychecks, I'm loving every minute these things run.

MattyJoe

mdg164 wrote:

There may be other opinions, but they may not be correct. Many people used to think the world was flat, they were wrong.

I've spent 6 years studying the subject in school, and more than that working in the industry. I have truly discussed this issue many times over. You don't seem to understand that adding the word "dump" is an immediate negative sign. If they were truly unbiased, they would be discussing the "repository."

I don't care if anyone "answers my questions" because I didn't ask any questions. I did play devil's advocate for a while and technically I asked a question.... but I didn't expect an answer. I know the answer.

I was not forced in to this industry, I am not forced to stay, and I've never been "told" anything, but I have learned much. You act like we take our marching orders from the NRC! I could leave this industry today and make a very nice living doing something completely different. But I don't because I believe in the cause.

No offense, but I have nothing to gain from discussing this with anyone on a message board. I've debated this with the basket weaving majors many times back in college. What qualifies you or anyone to discuss this matter? I'm not trying to be "holier than thou," but what can you add to the discussion other than an "opinion," based on mis-information from the internet? Why should I waste my time? If you think I could change anyone's mind, you are fooling yourself. This board in particular is filled with people who blindly take their political views from their favorite band.... that is scary. I know better than to waste much of my time preaching.


I didn't miss anything

Dude, you are the man!

Urban Hiker

mdg164 wrote:

There may be other opinions, but they may not be correct. Many people used to think the world was flat, they were wrong.

I've spent 6 years studying the subject in school, and more than that working in the industry. I have truly discussed this issue many times over. You don't seem to understand that adding the word "dump" is an immediate negative sign. If they were truly unbiased, they would be discussing the "repository."

I don't care if anyone "answers my questions" because I didn't ask any questions. I did play devil's advocate for a while and technically I asked a question.... but I didn't expect an answer. I know the answer.

I was not forced in to this industry, I am not forced to stay, and I've never been "told" anything, but I have learned much. You act like we take our marching orders from the NRC! I could leave this industry today and make a very nice living doing something completely different. But I don't because I believe in the cause.

No offense, but I have nothing to gain from discussing this with anyone on a message board. I've debated this with the basket weaving majors many times back in college. What qualifies you or anyone to discuss this matter? I'm not trying to be "holier than thou," but what can you add to the discussion other than an "opinion," based on mis-information from the internet? Why should I waste my time? If you think I could change anyone's mind, you are fooling yourself. This board in particular is filled with people who blindly take their political views from their favorite band.... that is scary. I know better than to waste much of my time preaching.


I didn't miss anything

Why not take the time to inform us? You have experience and knowledge, please, share it.

It's nice to balance some things out with personal experience.

I have huge concerns about the leaks from Hanford. Newspapers have reported "dead zones" near the areas of the leaks.

What does the industry do about that? I ask this earnestly.

unsung

Even though there is a power station at Hanford I don't see how the industry is responsible for the cleanup that was made from weapons production. The site started in the early 40's but the commercial reactor did not produce power until the early 80's. They did have another dual function reactor but it shut down in the 80's.


The feds, possibly the Dept of Defense or the Army Corp of Engineers, should be the ones responsible for the cleanup, not the utility who would eventually pass the costs on to the consumer.

El_Kabong

mdg164 wrote:

There may be other opinions, but they may not be correct. Many people used to think the world was flat, they were wrong.

I've spent 6 years studying the subject in school, and more than that working in the industry. I have truly discussed this issue many times over. You don't seem to understand that adding the word "dump" is an immediate negative sign. If they were truly unbiased, they would be discussing the "repository."

I don't care if anyone "answers my questions" because I didn't ask any questions. I did play devil's advocate for a while and technically I asked a question.... but I didn't expect an answer. I know the answer.

I was not forced in to this industry, I am not forced to stay, and I've never been "told" anything, but I have learned much. You act like we take our marching orders from the NRC! I could leave this industry today and make a very nice living doing something completely different. But I don't because I believe in the cause.

No offense, but I have nothing to gain from discussing this with anyone on a message board. I've debated this with the basket weaving majors many times back in college. What qualifies you or anyone to discuss this matter? I'm not trying to be "holier than thou," but what can you add to the discussion other than an "opinion," based on mis-information from the internet? Why should I waste my time? If you think I could change anyone's mind, you are fooling yourself. This board in particular is filled with people who blindly take their political views from their favorite band.... that is scary. I know better than to waste much of my time preaching.


I didn't miss anything

so.....we should just shut up???

and i posted things from the department of energy....are they lying for these anti nuke groups??

you don't need to preach, just back it up w/ something of substance