Tag: Public health

More than a TAD

Commonsense at the Nuclear Crossroads, an anti-nuclear group located in Asheville, North Carolina, has commissioned a report on plans for transport and reprocessing (falsely advertised as “burning up”) high-level nuclear waste. The report is available for free viewing and/or downloading.

This is a big and dangerous deal. Quoting from the report’s executive summary:

The DOE has proposed purchasing Transport, Aging and Disposal (TAD) canisters to handle this waste and has issued specifications for their manufacture. From the data tables it is calculated that, on average, each TAD canister will contain about one and a half times the fissile uranium in the atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima, plus about ten times the amount of fissile plutonium in the atomic bomb that was dropped on Nagasaki. The number of these canisters needed to move the waste accumulated at each reactor site is calculated. This indicates the number of loads that would be needed.

Continue reading “More than a TAD”

Life-threatening Issues

We are all downwind.

Let’s imagine – I know this is far-fetched, but for purposes of discussion, we might try it anyhow – a political atmosphere dominated by fear of terrorists and their bombs. There are shoe bombs, pipe bombs, pressure cooker bombs, fertilizer bombs, tannerite bombs, suicide bomb vests, car bombs, truck bombs, improvised explosive devices, drone bombs, commercial airplanes used as bombs …

Whoa, there’s a lot to be worried about. Fear of terrorists and their bombs can be used to make an argument for lots of countermeasures. Obviously, all airplane travelers need to be searched before they board airplanes. Police need to be able to search anyone’s house when they are chasing a possible terrorist. Suspected terrorists who are caught by the police need to disappear into secret prisons forever … Continue reading “Life-threatening Issues”

No Confidence in Spent Fuel Storage

NRC’s current regulatory guidance concedes that “data is not currently available” supporting the safe transportation of high burn spent nuclear fuel.

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists recently published a complex article outlining some reasons current plans for storing spent nuclear fuel are flawed and dangerous. We’ve outlined the gist of the argument here, but for more details and references, you’ll need to read the original article. Continue reading “No Confidence in Spent Fuel Storage”

Keep Liquid Radioactive Waste Off Our Highways

PRESS RELEASE & Telephone Briefing Tuesday 8/16 @ 11am EDT

BEYOND NUCLEAR
CANADIAN COALITION FOR NUCLEAR RESPONSIBILITY
CITIZENS FOR ALTERNATIVES TO CHEMICAL CONTAMINATION ENVIRONMENTALISTS, INC – LONE TREE COUNCIL
NUCLEAR INFORMATION AND RESOURCE SERVICE
SAVANNAH RIVER SITE WATCH – SIERRA CLUB

Groups File for Injunction to
KEEP LIQUID RADIOACTIVE WASTE OFF OUR HIGHWAYS

For Immediate Release: August 15, 2016 Continue reading “Keep Liquid Radioactive Waste Off Our Highways”

Our Corrupt EPA

(Originally published March 10, 2016 on https://athf3.wordpress.com/)

Act Now! Tell OMB to reject EPA proposal to increase allowable radioactivity in drinking water following nuclear emergency

March 9, 2016

Dear Friends,

EPA has quietly proposed to raise the allowable levels of radioactivity in drinking water to hundreds of times their current limits following a nuclear emergency. The Safe Drinking Water Act establishes Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCL’s) for specific radionuclides. But now EPA has proposed allowing people to drink water with concentrations of radioactivity at vastly higher levels with no actions taken by government to protect people. Continue reading “Our Corrupt EPA”