EU aims to bury high-level radioactive wastes in "deep geologic repositories"

Reuters has reported that the European Union has set a deadline of 2015 for its 14 member states with nuclear power industries -- comprising a total of 143 atomic reactors -- to come up with plans for "deep geologic disposal" sites for burial of their high-level radioactive wastes. However, the EU admits it will take as long as 40 years to construct those repositories. Deutsche Welle also reported on this story, including on the loophole in the new EU directive that will still allow high-level radioactive waste exports to foreign countries for reprocessing, so long as those countries also have deep geologic repositories.

Japanese nuclear establishment hunting for high-level radioactive waste dumpsite

As the Mainichi Daily News reveals in its question and answer format, the Japanese federal government, on behalf of the Japanese nuclear power industry, has been quietly, and not so quietly, seeking a "voluntary" host community somewhere in the island nation "willing" to "serve" as the national "deep geologic" (if 900 feet can be called "deep") dumpsite for high-level radioactive wastes leftover after reprocessing 54 reactors' worth of irradiated nuclear fuel. In the year 2000, Kevin Kamps, now serving as Radioactive Waste Watchdog at Beyond Nuclear, travelled to Japan as the guest of the Japanese Federation of Environmental Lawyers, on a national speaking tour about the risks of Yucca Mountain in the U.S. Kamps travelled to a town near the major city of Nagoya, long studied as a potential dumpsite within an abandoned uranium mine located there. However, fast-flowing creeks of water down the sides of the mine tunnel would seem to indicate this might not be the best choice for trying to isolate the forever deadly poisons. Kamps also travelled to Sapporo, the capital city of Japan's northern island, Hokkaido. Given its less densely populated rural regions, Hokkaido is more likely to be targeted for such a dump.

Obama administration makes major moves to end Yucca Mountain dumpsite proposal!

Fulfilling a campaign pledge, President Barack Obama has zeroed out the Yucca Mountain Project's funding in Fiscal Year 2011. Energy Secretary Steven Chu has moved to end the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission construction and operating license application proceeding within the next month. Many observers regard these actions as a clear signal that the Yucca Mountain dumpsite proposal, after over 20 years, has now been cancelled. Extensive media coverage can be found at the State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Project's "What News" page. U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, as a rookie Democrat from Nevada, suffered the humiliation of the "Screw Nevada Bill" in 1987 that singled out Yucca Mountain for the country's high-level radioactive waste dump based on raw political expedience, not sound science. Ever since, he has devoted his career to stopping the dump. He seems to have succeeded. Reid has called for the Yucca site to be considered for other uses. But the Western Shoshone Indian Nation, to whom Yucca belongs according to the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley signed by the U.S. government, must be consulted and agree with any such decisions, an environmental justice never granted them in regards to Yucca Mountain dumpsite decision making (the frame for a Western Shoshone sweat lodge at the foot of the western face of Yucca Mountain, photographed by Gabriela Bulisova in Jan. 2004, shows that the site has still recently been used for sacred ceremonies). Beyond Nuclear would like to take this opportunity to thank the over 1,000 grassroots and national environmental groups whose work over the past 20+ years has made this environmental and environmental justice victory possible. Special thanks and congratulations go to the grassroots Nevada Nuclear Waste Task Force, the State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, as well as such Western Shoshone Indian bodies as the National Council, Defense Project, Shundahai Network, and bands such as the Timbisha Shoshone Tribe in Death Valley, without whose tireless, and often thankless, efforts for over two decades, this fight would have been lost long ago. Kevin Kamps, Beyond Nuclear's Radioactive Waste Watchdog, issued a press statement.

WIPP leaking toxic carbon tet into air

Opened in 1999, the U.S. Department of Energy's Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, New Mexico is the first "deep geologic repository" in the world for radioactive wastes, specifically for disposing of plutonium-contaminated nuclear weapons complex wastes. As described on WIPP's homepage, the "Waste Isolation Pilot Plant uses a continuous miner to carve disposal rooms out of the Permian Salt Formation, nearly a half mile below the surface," as pictured at the left. Despite assurances by WIPP's "Chief Scientist" that it could never happen, carbon tetrachloride leaks to the air outside the facility located 2,150 feet below ground have now reached a "level of concern," as reported by a Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety (CCNS) news update based on research by the Southwest Research and Information Center (SRIC). Beyond Nuclear, CCNS, and SRIC are members of the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability. ANA's annual DC Days will be held in Washington March 14-17.

Energy Secretary Chu vows to "accelerate" nuclear loan guarantees, while affirming Yucca dump's cancellation

Energy Secretary Steven Chu, at a briefing on the Department of Energy's priorities for 2010, admitted that finalizing the first round of $18.5 billion in taxpayer-backed nuclear loan guarantees for financing new atomic reactors has proven "more complicated" than he originally thought it would be. Chu assured that the first nuclear loan guarantees would be issued "soon," despite the fact that DOE's top pick candidates are plagued with problems: the partners behind the proposed South Texas Project "Advanced Boiling Water Reactors" are embroiled in a $32 billion internecine legal dispute; the AP1000s planned at Vogtle GA and Summer SC have a major safety related design flaw, as does the Areva "Evolutionary Power Reactor" targeted at Calvert Cliffs MD. On a brighter note, Chu affirmed that "Yucca Mountain is off the table," and added that his blue ribbon commission, established to study alternatives to Yucca, will not be charged with identifying a new centralized geologic repository to take its place. This raises the specter, however, that dirty, dangerous, and expensive reprocessing may be pushed as the latest "illusion of a solution" to the radioactive waste dilemma.