Toxic legacy: Scientists ponder task of labelling nuclear waste

How will "DANGER!" be written 5,000 years from now? How will it be written in 50,000 years?

Finding an answer to these questions may not seem like a Code Red emergency to most people.

But for a growing cadre of scientists, figuring out how to alert our distant descendants to perilous nuclear waste entombed hundreds of metres (feet) below ground has become a fascinating task.

After more than six decades, high-level nuclear detritus is piling up above ground, and governments are starting to spend billions on underground facilities intended to survive tens of thousands and hopefully hundreds of thousands of years.

That means there is an emerging interest in choosing the right signs and language to warn people of a stockpile that could be deadly, as well as a potential source of military nuclear proliferation -- or even a source of fuel, if future technology can recycle it.

Energy Daily

Nuclear Agency Weighs Attack Threat at Plants

Dragged by a federal appeals court into a rare public discussion of the risks that terrorists could attack a nuclear plant, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission heard arguments on Tuesday from a California group that the commission’s staff had overlooked one category of potentially serious attacks.

...

The commission’s ruling could be important because the spent fuel storage system proposed for the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant, near Avila Beach, Calif., is being adopted at scores of other reactor sites around the country because of the Energy Department’s failure to establish a national burial site for used fuel. At issue was whether storage casks that the Pacific Gas and Electric Company wants to build at the Diablo Canyon plant could be hit with incendiary missiles, piercing the steel and concrete shell and lighting the metal cladding of the fuel. If that happened, plant opponents contend, the fire could turn radioactive cesium into a gas, which would float widely with the wind and then resolidify.

New York Times

Loan Helps Philadelphia Dentist Purchase Digital X-Ray System That Cuts Energy Use, Waste

The Small Business Pollution Prevention Assistance Account (PPAA) loan program will help South Philadelphia Orthodontic Associates save money and improve the environment by upgrading to a digital x-ray system.

The practice received $38,250 from the state loan program to install a new digital radiographic x-ray system. The system will help the business save money by reducing water consumption and waste disposal costs as well as reducing labor/maintenance costs and dental supplies. In addition, the business projects a reduction in its hazardous waste stream, wastewater and a 96 percent reduction in the amount of radiation emitted. Combined, these savings are projected to save the company approximately $7,845 annually. The company has projected that the payback will be approximately 6.5 years.

Department of Environmental Protection

Epstein's comments on behalf of TMIA

Eric Joseph Epstein’s Comments on Behalf of
Three Mile Island Alert, Inc.
Re: Draft Environmental Report for Susquehanna
Nuclear Plant License Renewal Applications
from PPL Susquehanna, LLC

Download here.

CBO Testimony

Statement of Peter R. Orszag, Director

Costs of Reprocessing Versus Directly Disposing of Spent Nuclear Fuel

before the
Committee on Energy and Natural Resources
United States Senate

November 14, 2007

Download here.

McCain Sets Goal of 45 New Nuclear Reactors by 2030

Senator John McCain said Wednesday that he wanted 45 new nuclear reactors built in the United States by 2030, a course he called “as difficult as it is necessary.”

In his third straight day of campaign speechmaking about energy and $4-a-gallon gasoline, Mr. McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, told the crowd at a town-hall-style meeting at Missouri State University that he saw nuclear power as a clean, safe alternative to traditional sources of energy that emit greenhouse gases. He said his ultimate goal was 100 new nuclear plants.

New York Times

Nuclear Plant Shut Over Explosives

A nuclear power station in Sweden has been sealed off after a worker was stopped at the entrance with a plastic bag containing traces of explosives.

Investigators took the man, a welder who was scheduled to do work at the Oskarshamn plant, in for questioning.

They later arrested a second man because "there is some uncertainty about who owns the bag", a spokesman said.

Plant operator OKG downplayed the incident, saying there was no threat to the safety of the plant, about 150 miles south of Stockholm.

Sky News