Re: GAO Challenges Yucca Plans

[RuthWeiner@AOL.COM]

This post was so full of errors and distortions that I am compelled to respond.  Let me say at the outset that I am not opposed to deep ocean disposal in principle.  


In a message dated 12/2/01 2:38:05 PM Mountain Standard Time, jjcohen@prodigy.net writes:



>     Politics aside, I maintain that from a standpoint of public health and safety, as well as economics, ocean disposal of nuclear waste is still preferable to any alternative method. Disposal of SNF is a bad idea in any case, as is the concept  of retreivability.


In the late 1970s a group of us looked at disposing empty nuclear submarine cores in the Pacific Trench, and considered the rate of radioisotope decay of the activation products v. the rate of corrosion, and decided that land disposal was safer.  I know of no study that says that ocean disposal is "safer" from a health and safety point of view, though it is probably no less safe.  It may just not have been studied enough.  One feature of ocean disposal that is worrisome:  if the casks of SNF sink (are lost) before they get to the site, they are essentailly irretrievable.  Moreover, transportation and handling is essentially no different than for land disposal.  In fact, there is more of it.  From an occupational safety point of view (the handlers), ocean disposal is probably less safe.


>    Now considering politics, if we are to continue to allow the environmental wackos (greenpeace et al) dictate our nucwaste policies, there is no chance of success to begin with and it is stupid to even try. The nuclear waste impasse is their best shot at halting nuclear power production and they will strongly oppose adoption of any approach toward nuclear waste management. It is a waste of time and money to try to appease them. 


Apparently we are now hostage to national "political wackos" since it is claimed that the only problem to opening Yucca Mountain is political.  International wackos would just be harder to deal with.  We are in fact dealing with the national wackos quite successfully, if slowly.


>    Perhaps even worse, if we allow the national labs/contractors to dictate policy, the situation is also hopeless. Nucwaste "research" is their cash cow and it is not likely that they want it to go away.

In the last decade, the national laboratories have played a very minor role in the Yucca Mountain investigation.  The M&O until last year was TRW and it is now a Bechtel/SAIC consortium.  TRW, Bechtel, and SAIC are not national laboratories.  Sandia is a subcontractor on performance assessment to the M&O, and PNNL has a very small part of a sub-contract on the EIS.  I believe LLNL and the other labs also have  sub-contracts.  The support contractor to NRC on this project is Southwest Research Institute -- also not a national lab.  The bulk of the work (and the money spent) on both site characterization  and environmental assessment is in the private sector.  This has not been a "cash cow" for the National Laboratory system.  Many of these jobs will disappear when the repository opens.


 Perhaps you have noticed that their "studies" on nuclear waste  

> generally conclude with a recommendation that further study is needed. 


Not true.  Most of the clamor for "further study" comes from the anti-nukes.


Although such recommendations are little more than their 

> attempt at further money grubbing, it comes across to the public that we don't know what we are doing and  it is  logically concluded that it is too dangerous to proceed. The recent GAO report reflecting the views of Becctel/SAIC is a classic example of this sort of thing.


It's Bechtel.  The GAO report did not reflect the views of Bechtel/SAIC.

 

>    Therefore, as I have previously suggested, it appears that there exists a symbiotic condition, if not an out and out conspiracy, between the national labs/contractors and anti-nuke activists to prevent implementation of a solution to the nuclear waste problem. If Greenpeace, Unplug, etc. did not exist, Sandia, Bechtel/SAIC, and their cohorts would have had to invent them.


This is so egregious I cannot respond.  I would like to see citations of evidence for this kind of accusation.  If you really believe this I suggest you write to your member of Congress and have them investigate the national laboratory system.  


>    The only way out of the morass, after ~50 years of blundering,


The Nuclear Waste Policy Act was enacted at the end of 1982 -- 19 years ago.  The 1987 amendments requiring characterization of only Yucca Mountain  was enacted 14 years ago.


 is to get an administration and congress in Washington with the 

> courage to say "enough already", and to implement any of several previously proposed alternative methods that would adequately protect the public health and safety at reasonable cost. Of these, I still think that Oceanic Disposal is the best. 


You have not provided a basis for this contention.  I don't necessarily disagree with it -- I just think it needs more investigation.  By the way, Sandia had a major contract for investigating deep ocean disposal until the project was cancelled.  Was that a "cash cow" too?


>    Continuation of current policies would essentially guarantee failure. In stating all of this, why do I feel like "a voice in the wilderness"?    
>
>  
I suggest that if you stuck to the facts and bolstered your contentions with references, this would not be the case.



Ruth Weiner, Ph. D.

ruthweiner@aol.com