Nuke waste storage plan misleading, dangerous.

Byline: MICHAEL CARRIGAN For The Register-Guard

THE U.S. SENATE will soon be deciding whether or not to approve Yucca Mountain as a permanent repository for the nation's high-level nuclear waste.

Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham recommended and President Bush approved plans to build such a repository just outside of Las Vegas. Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn vetoed the site recommendation, and it is now up to Congress to make the final decision on the fate of Yucca Mountain.

The House of Representatives recently voted to approve the Yucca Mountain proposal 306-117; Peter DeFazio and three other Oregon Representatives rejected the site recommendation. (Rep. Greg Walden voted to approve the site.)

The project proposes launching an unprecedented nuclear waste transport scheme, bringing more than 50,000 shipments of waste through 44 states - including Oregon - for as long as 30 years. The Department of Energy estimates that 3,324 truck shipments will travel along Interstate 84, or as many as 649 train shipments will travel alongside Interstates 84 and 5. This lethal cargo may pass through Eugene, Oakridge, Klamath Falls and other cities in Oregon. The project could affect more than 21 percent of Oregon residents.

Transportation of waste poses many risks. The DOE acknowledges that there will be traffic accidents involving nuclear waste. Indeed, the DOE's own studies have concluded that a severe accident in a rural area could contaminate a 42-square-mile area, require more than a year to clean up and cost $620 million. Emergency response and public health infrastructures in Oregon could not deal with a catastrophe of this magnitude.

The threat of terrorism makes nuclear waste transport an even scarier proposition. Jim Hall, former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, has likened the casks to mobile terrorist targets. With a lack of comprehensive cask testing, each shipment has the potential to be a nuclear bomb.

Apart from transport risks, the Yucca Mountain site itself is scientifically unsuitable. It sits atop an aquifer in an earthquake zone. The site selection process has been rife with conflicts of interest and industry influence.

Although the DOE touts Yucca Mountain as a remote location in the middle of a barren desert on federal lands, Las Vegas, just 90 miles away from Yucca Mt, is home to 478,434 people and is the nation's fastest growing city. Members of the Western Shoshone Nation have resided in the area for thousands of years.

Shipping waste to Yucca Mountain will not consolidate the nation's waste in a single spot, as is claimed by the nuclear industry. Nuclear waste must cool for at least five years before it can be handled for shipping, which means there will always be waste at operating nuclear reactors.

Secretary Abraham recently conceded that the Yucca Mountain repository will only be able to hold a portion of the 77,000 tons of waste already generated. It will not be able to hold the new waste expected to be created in the coming decade.

The DOE's legacy at Hanford has taught Oregonians not to trust the department's decisions. The approval of Yucca Mountain will set a dangerous precedent for other potential waste sites like Hanford. For example, when Yucca Mountain failed to meet repository criteria, the government rewrote the rules to avoid disqualifying the site.

Approving Yucca Mountain will send a message to the DOE that it can change the rules at Hanford to the detriment of Oregonians.

There's no silver-bullet solution to the nuclear waste problem. Incredibly, there has never been a rigorous scientific search for the best long-term options to deal with the nuclear waste problem. Instead, the government has single-mindedly focused on only one site for a nuclear waste dump. Yucca hasn't been studied - it's been targeted.

Until there is a better scientific understanding of nuclear waste, it is safer and cheaper to place the spent fuel rods in dry cask storage in hardened buildings at power plant sites. For example, beginning in 2004, waste at Oregon's Trojan nuclear power plant, will be taken out of cooling pools, placed in stainless steel canisters and stored on-site. This is a better solution than endangering Oregonians by transporting the waste through Oregon's communities.

The ultimate solution to the nuclear waste dilemma is to stop making it and to replace nuclear power with conservation and renewable energy. Approving Yucca Mountain will be giving the nuclear industry a green light to build new nuclear power plants and produce even more waste.

The Yucca Mountain proposal is now in the hands of the U.S. Senate. Oregon's senators have not stated how they plan to vote. Contact Sens. Ron Wyden and Gordon Smith and urge them to vote against the Yucca Mountain proposal and to put the public health and safety of Oregonians ahead of the interests of the nuclear industry.

Michael Carrigan of Eugene is director of Oregon PeaceWorks.