Here’s one bit of news I missed in all the hubbub about Obama’s proposed budget: apparently it kills Yucca Mountain dead, once and for all.
Here’s what Harry Reid says on the Senate website:
Dear Fellow Nevadan-
Today was an extremely important day in our fight against the proposed nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain. In his budget request for 2010, President Obama will announce plans to devise a new strategy to find another solution to deal with the nation’s nuclear waste that does not include storing it in Nevada.
As Nevadans know, I have been successfully fighting the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump since I began my career in the Senate. I have had tremendous help from our state’s leaders and thousands of Nevadans along the way. President Obama joined the fight against the nuclear waste dump in his Presidential campaign, and I am proud that now he will deliver on his promise.
President Obama has made a critical first step towards fulfilling his promise to end the Yucca Mountain project, and I could not be happier for the people of Nevada. Make no mistake: this represents a significant and lasting victory in our battle to protect Nevada from becoming the country’s toxic wasteland. I have worked for over two decades with help from our state’s leaders and thousands of Nevadans to stop Yucca Mountain. President Obama recognizes that the proposed dump threatens the health and safety of Nevadans and millions of Americans, and his commitment to stop this terrible project could not be more clear.
Stewart Brand’s nuclear enthusiasm falls short on facts and logic
Comments
View as Flat
amazingdrx Posted 11:35 pm
02 Mar 2009
Treat the waste onsite in the nuclear containment structures at each power plant. As James Hansen has proposed, with fast neutron waste recycling reactors. Move the modular reactors to the waste, not the reverse.
Time to clean up this titanic mess, but in a cost effective safe fashion. And generate some power as a side benefit, right through existing turbines and power systems.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
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Karen Street Posted 3:18 am
03 Mar 2009
Yucca Mountain accepts nuclear waste from all over the US, perhaps from outside the US, up to its technical limit, which is much higher than its legal limit, compared with
Nevada keeps the smallest of its coal plants open.
Obama has advanced the cause of science significantly, with impressive changes from the Bush times. However, he has decided to end the scientific evaluation of Yucca Mountain. (Actually, I don't understand this--if NRC's questions are going to be answered, does that mean the scientific process will continue, but the scientific evaluation will not be part of Obama's decision-making, or that Obama is ending the scientific process before it can produce a result not to his liking?)
A Musing Environment
Karen Street
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sindark Posted 5:20 am
03 Mar 2009
a sibilant intake of breath
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sindark Posted 5:51 am
03 Mar 2009
Dry cask storage and cooling ponds are temporary solutions, and they require regular maintenance.
a sibilant intake of breath
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BILL HANNAHAN Posted 6:40 am
03 Mar 2009
If all our electricity came from fission, today's reactors would produce about 10 pounds of spent fuel per person per 80 year lifetime. It would contain about 6 oz. of fission products. Advanced reactors could reduce that to just the six ounces of fission products dissolved in a few pounds of glass or rock.
Here is an interesting 1 hr video on a very promising family of reactor designs for the next generation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F0tUDJ35So&eurl=http: ...
Recommendation;
1 When fuel is removed from the reactor it goes into the spent fuel pool. Water is the ideal medium for fresh spent fuel because of water's excellent shielding characteristics, high heat capacity, and transparency.
2 After several years the heat rate is low. The fuel is transferred into dry cask storage, a hermetically sealed container, vacuumed to remove all trace of moisture, and then partially filled with helium, a non corrosive gas with good heat transfer properties. The cask is shielded by thick layers of concrete and steel.
3 Maintain a low level R&D program to incorporate advances in materials and technology into the development of a fully automated fuel recycling system.
4 Develop commercial applications for radioactive and non radioactive fission products.
5 As time goes by the value of the material in spent fuel increases while the cost of reprocessing decreases. When those two curves cross reprocessing becomes economically attractive and should begin.
6 Uranium and plutonium are recycled into advanced reactors, useful fission products are sold.
7 Unused waste is buried at sea.
http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/96oct/seabed/seabed.htm ...
Sea bed disposal is very inexpensive, unlimited, and nearly risk free.
Things Everybody Should Know About Energy
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GreyFlcn Posted 10:06 am
03 Mar 2009
http://www.norway.org.uk/policy/environment/thorp.htm
For all practical purposes,
Nuclear waste without the U238, is just as radioactive as Nuclear waste with it.
http://www.spectrum.ieee.org/print/4891
http://www.fissilematerials.org/ipfm/pages_us_en/document ...
Reprocessing isn't a "solution" for waste unless you plan on rolling out a whole fleet of breeder reactors, and running them for a few centuries.
And so far, we don't even have 1 commercial breeder reactor, and none are expected for many decades. If at all.
-David Ahlport
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GreyFlcn Posted 10:10 am
03 Mar 2009
Especially compared to the trouble conventional nuclear is having, where it can't even get private financing.
-David Ahlport
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amazingdrx Posted 2:12 pm
04 Mar 2009
The fast neutrons shake them loose producing heat, eventually all the loose neutrons are shaken out and the material becomes non-radioactive. The waste can't be transported safely and affordably. The only alternative to 10,000 year storage onsite, spread all over the planet, is treatment.
It lets the nuclear industry keep going, but in a safe and necessary direction. Enough of the newer executive and engineers taking over the industry could get this message and proceed, for the old line industry leaders who brought on this huge dangerous expensive mess? Retirement, with plain old social security, no golden parachutes on ratepayer's and taxpayer's dimes.
Enough is enough. The old guard in energy, auto, and banking industries that screwed up ought to be history. Not forgoten so their screwups are not repeated.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog John Schneider, Northern Wisconsin
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