Yucca Mountain

[john grant <grantjoh@pacbell.net>]

senator@feinstein.senate.gov wrote:



>                August 2, 2002

>

> Mr. John Grant

> 3583 South Court

> Palo Alto, California  94306

>

> Dear Mr. Grant:

>

>      Thank you for contacting me about the development of a

> nuclear waste storage facility at Yucca Mountain.  Your interest

> and involvement are important to me, and I welcome the

> opportunity to respond to your concerns.

>

>       Currently, 77,000 tons of high level nuclear waste,

> generated by power reactors and nuclear weapons production, are

> stored in temporary surface storage facilities located at 131 sites in

>

> 39 States.  President Bush recently approved the Energy Secretary's

> recommendation of Yucca Mountain as the nation's first long term

> underground repository for high level radioactive waste.

>

>      Recently, I voted against the development of the storage

> facility in the Energy Committee.  I oppose the development of the

> site because it would involve transporting high-level nuclear waste

> through populated areas of California and I am concerned about the

> safety of this process.



Have you looked in detail at the transportation casts?  What are the

details of your safety concerns?



> I am also concerned that the site lies

> adjacent to Death Valley National Park and any leakage from the

> Yucca Mountain site could contaminate Death Valley's

> groundwater.



Have you looked in detail at the stainless steel and concrete containers

that the material will be stored in.  How do you feel leakage might

occur?  And how will it get from Yucca Mountain to Death Valley, 60

miles away?



> As I understand it, the site's capacity is inadequate

> and there could be enough nuclear waste in the U.S. to fill the

> entire site by 2010.



Then we better start on another nearby site.



> We must find a viable, environmentally sound, long term

> solution to our nation's nuclear waste problem. I believe it would

> be a mistake to bring all of our nation's nuclear waste to Yucca

> Mountain.  Instead of a single repository, it would be better to

> develop regional nuclear waste permanent storage facilities which

> would increase overall storage capacity and reduce transportation

> risks.



The design of the casts reduces transportation risks to very close to

zero.

In picking Yucca Mountain, many other sites were examined and Yucca was

picked as the best.  The other regional sites would come under the class

"second best" or worse.



>  The full Senate is scheduled to vote on the Yucca Mountain

> storage facility later this summer.  Please know that I will certainly

>

> keep your thoughts in mind as the Senate considers this important

> issue.



I hope you will examine the facts and vote for Yucca Mountain.



John Grant





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