How many flaws can you spot? First, read this story about Yucca Mountain.
Anything leap out at you?
Transporting the existing 70,000 metric tons of spent fuel now scattered among the various sites will take care of an overcrowding problem as well as centralize storage more safely — 1,000 miles below the surface, in the desert and near an Air Force base, supporters say.
1000 miles? Let's see, the earth's crust averages about 15 miles, so I guess we are going to drop the spent fuel directly into the mantle. Sheesh, doesn't anybody read what they write?
While numbers vary, NIRS says the project will require more than 96,000 truck shipments impacting 44 states and a combined population of 123,000 in major cities including St. Louis, Atlanta, Omaha, Chicago, and Indianapolis.
Only 123, 000? We get more than that into Bristol Motor Speedway on a race week. Somehow, I thought the cities listed were a little bigger than that.
Singer said that NRIS has exaggerated how many shipments there will be, saying the numbers are closer to 200 shipments annually, about one and a half a day — not the five per day that opponents are talking about.
Hmmm. 365 days per year, 1.5 shipments a day 547 shipments per year, not 200. Or we could go the other way. 200 shipments per year equals roughly one shipment every day and a half. Once again, doesn't anybody read what they write? This is simple math here folks.
OK, enough of the factual errors, let's get to the meat of the article. Opponents claim that waste transportation would be a prime terror target. I guess we should halt the transport of medical waste, hazardous chemical wastes and mixed wastes as well.
As for fears of leakage, I worked at a plant which performed volume reduction and stabilization of spent ion exchange resins for nuclear reactors. While classified as low level wastes, the dose rates were fairly high on many of the containers. For two years we averaged a shipment every two days. Not once were we involved in any accidents. The resin was shipped in a High INtegrity Container, or HIC, which was made of a very thick, very tough poly. The HIC was transported inside of a lead shielded stanless steel cask. This cask was subjected to tests, and was able to withstand the impact of a freight train without rupturing.
And all of this was for low level waste. Spent fuel is shipped under even tighter controls.
Finally, which is more dangerous: leaving this stuff in multiple temporary locations, most situated very near major population centers, or to consolidate it into one, heavily shielded storage facility, one which has been designed for permanent storage?
It's a no brainer once you have the facts.
Posted by Rich at April 24, 2002 12:22 AM