Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste of Time

In 1987 the US Congress voted to site the nation's nuclear waste depository in tunnels miles under the desolate and arid Yucca mountains of Nevada.

Nearly a quarter century later and $13 billion dollars, the project is complete needing only final regulatory approval. During all those years power plants have been holding nuclear waste in tanks which is growing at the rate of 2000 tons per year.

Now the Obama administration has decided to dump the whole project. The new energy secretary claims there is a better way to dispose of nuclear waste. (Why didn't he speak up 20 years ago?).

No doubt this is really Senate leader Harry Reid of Nevada's decision. He got the money and jobs for his state to dig the holes. And now he'll have the money and jobs to fill them back up.

Full story HERE.

Some thoughts...

I used to think a $13 billion boondoggle was a big deal. When one no longer views it as big money, then truly boondoggle inflation has already taken its toll.

Worse is the 22 years of wasted time. It will surely take another quarter century to arrive at another costly, make-work, non-decision to decide what not to do with the nuclear waste.

This goes to show that anyone who thinks we will ever build another nuclear plant in this country is inhaling u-238. One should look elsewhere for an alternative energy play. Nuclear energy has too much NIMBY baggage.

We in Illinois have some of the largest nuclear plants in the country providing clean power throughout the Midwest. Yet the spent nuclear waste is sitting in the midst of a populous state and in the midst of some of the most productive farm land in the world. What we need is a senator with both the cojones and integrity to stand up and face down Harry Reid! Tell him a thing or two! Put him in his place! Oh wait. I forgot. We have senator Roland (can't get his Blago story straight) Burris. Never mind.

Harry Reid is the same guy who has funds in the recent stimulus bill to build a high speed rail between Las Vegas and Los Angeles. Would it not be cheaper and quicker to simply legalize gambling in LA?

All this make-work "rail roads to casinos" and "hole digging to no where" reminds me of this story...

An economist visits China while under Mao Zedong. The economist sees hundreds of workers building a dam with shovels. He asks the project manager: "Why don't they use a mechanical digger?" "That would put people out of work," replies the project manager. "Oh," says the economist, "I thought you were making a dam. If it's jobs you want, take away their shovels and give them spoons."

;-)