No one signed up for this.
While the federal government does its best to get into an area it doesn't belong -- your health care -- it is retreating from one of its most solemn and necessary national security obligations: storage of nuclear waste.
Now, after the investment of more than 20 years, some $13 billion -- and study after study, expert after expert -- the Obama administration has decided the federal government won't have a national nuclear waste storage facility at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
Scientists long ago studied several dozen possible sites for a nuclear waste repository and decided on Yucca Mountain -- largely because it is geologically the safest site.
It is also a national security issue, in that Yucca would have provided one secure location for storage of nuclear waste, instead of dozens of sites throughout the states.
But perhaps to assuage Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada -- who is facing a tough re-election battle next year -- the Obama administration has announced it is abandoning Yucca.
There are a great number of problems with that -- not the least of which is the fact that the country has no Plan B.
The feds are forming a new panel to study what's next. But the goal isn't likely to be finding a better site; we've been through that and through that, and there is no better site.
So, it appears the Obama administration's goal is not to have a national repository at all. That would mean nuclear waste will remain at sites neither best suited nor prepared for long-term storage.
Including, of course, the Cold War-era "bomb plant" just over the border from Augusta, the Savannah River Site.
This is a huge issue for our area. We've got to come to grips with the Obama administration's decision and how to react.
No one here ever signed up for SRS being a permanent repository for nuclear waste.
"The government's about-face on this critical issue leaves state and local leaders with more questions than answers," says David Jameson, vice chairman of the Savannah River Site Community Reuse Organization, a nonprofit that exists to enhance SRS-related economic opportunities in the region. "The federal government has broken faith with communities across the nation. It has violated its promise to provide permanent storage of nuclear waste. As a result, we must come to terms with our own lingering -- perhaps permanent -- role as caretaker for a large part of the nation's highly radioactive defense waste."
A statement by the group also says, "If left unaddressed, (the administration's decision) will negatively affect the region's image, create new long-term safety concerns, slow the deployment of nuclear power plants and impact the region's ability to retain and attract business and industry and create new jobs ..."
The SRSCRO has compiled a white paper on the subject -- at www.srscro.org -- and is making speakers available to public and private groups in the area in an effort to increase awareness and begin consensus-building on the region's response.
We need to speak with one voice on this issue.
And it needs to be heard.
The Augusta Chronicle ©2010 Morris Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
you can Start your career by earning a degree in Crime Scene Investigation check http://bit.ly/3fyWG4
I said a long time ago, SRS will become Yucca Mt. by default. Not only will it have to keep its own wastes, be prepared for the rest of the country to send theirs here.
The Obama admin has just committed a fraud! They have been accepting your money for 20 years for Yucca Mt. and have spent over 13 billion and continue to take money for Yucca Mt. Can you say theft by conversion!!
Enjoy the Glow of your new found industry.
There has been some crazy logic on this subject. On the one hand the the Savannah River Site Community Reuse Organization raises concerns about Yucca not proceeding but on the other they support research into reprocessing, which could mean that the nation's spent commercial fuel is brought to SRS for storage and processing. So, they aren't really concerned about nuclear dumping they just want to make some profit form it. This scheme isn't going to fly as South Carolinians are tired of being dumped on.
SRS IS prepared, and I for one am prepared to keep jobs in our area.
SRS has been storing nuclear waste from all over the world since its inception. While we were sharing "safe nuclear energy" with the world, we could not trust them to dispose of their waste properly. And the beat goes on for the "sheeple of the once great America". How great she was and now to become the scorn of the world.
But there IS a plan B. Develop the sodium fast reactor which burns nuclear waste, emits no CO2, shuts itself down in the event of an accident, and will end global warming.
"The federal government has broken faith with communities across the nation".......lets see if we can count how many times barry has done this in just eleven months?....Wake up Sheeple!!!!!!!!!!!! We must rid ouselves of this fungus.!
Another gift to his countrymen by the Liar/Socialist in Chief.
Nobody wants their neighborhood or their state to become a nuclear waste dump forever. But unfortunately South Carolinians and Georgians too are going to inherit nuclear waste sites. Even in the news lately, Georgia Power claims to have a cheaper way of building a larger nuclear waste pile.
Yucca Mountain was funded by fees added to utility customers bills over the years. Both the Federal Government and Nevada politicians have committed fraud. Only after the $13B had been spent - with a lot going into Nevada revenues - did the Nevada politicians develop a NIMBY attitude. I have recommended that the Federal Government place an interstate access fee on all commerce and travel to Nevada until the utility customers have been repaid in full. Any vehicle, airplane, train, etc. trying to enter Nevada would have to pay the IAF - including tourists. The utility companies have a valid suit against the Dept of Energy (led by an anti-nuke) and the State of Nevada on behalf of their customers.
That ought to teach you red-state voters.
deekster - You said - You said the US was kindly accepted the world's nuclear waste for a long time while we were sharing "safe nuclear energy" with the world. That's hard top understand when you listen the harangue hurled at Iran for wanting nuclear energy. Didn't we suggest they burn oil instead?
sconservative - You said the nuclear industry gave 13 billion to buy a burial place for their waste forever. Do you consider 13 billion a paltry sum of money? I recall George W. Bush's aid going to Africa was more than that!
Although a scientific process was supposed to be used in selecting a nuclear waste repository site, in the end politics prevailed and there is no evidence that the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada is the best site or even came close to being the best site. Politicians from other states where a site was being considered were politically more powerful and succeeded in eleiminating their states from consideration. the selection process waas a travesty. Senator Craig said Vermont granite was the best site and some other countries are considering crystalline rock sites, not volcanic rock sites. Susanne E. Vandenbosch
If you want to blame somebody about Yucca Mountain, blame all the politicians that voted for it and had no problems with it being built along seismic fault lines. Who was president back in 1987 when it started? Ronald Reagan. A staunch Republican.
repugnant repugnicans.