Nevada Attorney Endorses Private Takeover of Yucca Mountain Project

Our Yucca Mountain point person, Steve Kraft, shot me a short note about this past Friday's Foundation for Nuclear Studies luncheon on the status of Yucca Mountain.

Mike Voegele spoke on behalf of the Yucca Mountain Project and Marty Malsch, an attorney representing Nevada, spoke against the project. It was pretty much a ho-hum affair, Steve told me, with little newsworthy said, except at the end.

In answer to questions, Voegele clarified what happened with those three USGS scientists who falsified quality assurance (QA) documents in the 1999 -- 2000 time frame. He pointed out that he personally reviewed the information in question and said that while QA documents were falsified, none of the science and none of the data were falsified. In fact, he a said that the most talked about matter -- the two data notebooks -- was a great case in point. The only difference between the books was that one met the QA requirements for format, etc., while the other did not. Both notebooks contained the same data. This is a far cry from what the media has been saying, where I have seen many references to falsified science -- which is not accurate.

Malsch countered with questioning how many chances would DOE get to make the QA correct. "How many strikes is out -- seven?" This lead to a question about privatizing the project. Malsh responded "While this is my opinion -- not Nevada's -- geologic disposal is OK as a concept." He went on to say that a successful geological repository program will require taking the program out of DOE and having the private sector take it over.

Interesting.

Technorati tags: Nuclear Energy, Nuclear Power, Used Fuel, Energy, Technology, Electricity, Yucca Mountain

Comments

Sneak Peek

There's an invisible force powering and propelling our way of life.
It's all around us. You can't feel it. Smell it. Or taste it.
But it's there all the same. And if you look close enough, you can see all the amazing and wondrous things it does.
It not only powers our cities and towns.
And all the high-tech things we love.
It gives us the power to invent.
To explore.
To discover.
To create advanced technologies.
This invisible force creates jobs out of thin air.
It adds billions to our economy.
It's on even when we're not.
And stays on no matter what Mother Nature throws at it.
This invisible force takes us to the outer reaches of outer space.
And to the very depths of our oceans.
It brings us together. And it makes us better.
And most importantly, it has the power to do all this in our lifetime while barely leaving a trace.
Some people might say it's kind of unbelievable.
They wonder, what is this new power that does all these extraordinary things?

A Design Team Pictures the Future of Nuclear Energy

For more than 100 years, the shape and location of human settlements has been defined in large part by energy and water. Cities grew up near natural resources like hydropower, and near water for agricultural, industrial and household use.

So what would the world look like with a new generation of small nuclear reactors that could provide abundant, clean energy for electricity, water pumping and desalination and industrial processes?

Hard to say with precision, but Third Way, the non-partisan think tank, asked the design team at the Washington, D.C. office of Gensler & Associates, an architecture and interior design firm that specializes in sustainable projects like a complex that houses the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys. The talented designers saw a blooming desert and a cozy arctic village, an old urban mill re-purposed as an energy producer, a data center that integrates solar panels on its sprawling flat roofs, a naval base and a humming transit hub.

In the converted mill, high temperat…

Seeing the Light on Nuclear Energy

If you think that there is plenty of electricity, that the air is clean enough and that nuclear power is a just one among many options for meeting human needs, then you are probably over-focused on the United States or Western Europe. Even then, you’d be wrong.

That’s the idea at the heart of a new book, “Seeing the Light: The Case for Nuclear Power in the 21st Century,” by Scott L. Montgomery, a geoscientist and energy expert, and Thomas Graham Jr., a retired ambassador and arms control expert.

Billions of people live in energy poverty, they write, and even those who don’t, those who live in places where there is always an electric outlet or a light switch handy, we need to unmake the last 200 years of energy history, and move to non-carbon sources. Energy is integral to our lives but the authors cite a World Health Organization estimate that more than 6.5 million people die each year from air pollution. In addition, they say, the global climate is heading for ruinous instability. E…

NEI Nuclear Notes

Search This Blog