Comparing cost of nuclear energy absurd
Editor, The Times:
President Obama’s decision to withdraw licensing of the Yucca Mountain waste dump is a reminder of how absurd it is to compare the cost of nuclear energy with other energy types [“Nuke waste has no place to go; new hunt begins,” page one, March 29].
We do not know the true cost of future production. Considering the unresolved disposal question, potential cost of a terrorist attack on a plant or its accidental meltdown, we don’t even know what use of nuclear energy already costs. We’re still spending billions to find and safeguard a final resting place for toxic byproducts of nuclear energy used decades ago.
— John Tuttle, Seattle
Yucca Mountain what it is because of politics
The story, on Yucca Mountain needs a bit of perspective.
On the siting of the nation’s nuclear waste storage facility, the process was riddled with politics. The 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act established a selection process that includes six candidate sites: three in the East (where 80 percent of the waste and most of the commercial reactors are) and three in the West.
While scientists were studying the sites, the political power of the Eastern congressional members got the three Eastern sites removed from consideration (even though the site in Maine seemed to be superior). This left three sites in the West: the Texas site, which lies above a huge aquifer that irrigated thousands of farms; Hanford in Washington, next to the Columbia River and Yucca Mountain in Nevada, which lies above an aquifer and is in an earthquake zone.
The Texas and Washington congressional delegations got them removed from selection, leaving only Nevada. Since the state’s population was small and had little power in Congress, the nuke dump was rammed down Nevada’s throat.
It was raw politics that led to the selection of Yucca Mountain. Do not be too critical of Obama’s closing of Yucca Mountain. It is really Congress’ failure to do its job fairly. It should start over with a new site selection process without the politics.
— Phil Quigley, Olympia