Reader comments
Cost of Yucca Mountain soars

Coy Blair | 6:33 a.m. July 16, 2008

Keep in mind that ratepayers have been paying for Yucca Mountain for years down and will continue to do so. This NIMBY response ignores the security aspects of a smaller number of storage locations vs. a larger number of locations. Yes, dry storage is safe but we need to look at this from the technical and security aspects. The comment is made that dry storage was not available when Yucca Mountain was first selected. Dry storage has always been the storage intended for that location. PS: I am a retired nuclear utility employee, retired nuclear navy and have family living in both Idaho and Utah. I'm from AZ and my wife from Idaho.

Proof | 7:32 a.m. July 16, 2008

Yeah, more "proof" that nukes are cheap! I hope McCain is reading this as he contemplates his energy plan of more nukes! Alas, he admits that economics is not his strong point.

Don't overlook ... | 7:35 a.m. July 16, 2008

Coy, you wrote that there's an inherent security risk in storing waste at multiple sites as opposed to storing everything at Yucca Mountain. You seem to overlook that each site is already secure.

Don't believe me? Try heading down to Palo Verde and see if you can sneak out with some spent rods. That place is so locked down you won't make it past the fence.

Comments continue below

Brian | 8:29 a.m. July 16, 2008

32 Billion here, 32 Billion there, pretty soon you are talking real money!

JL | 8:34 a.m. July 16, 2008

Personally I feel safer with the waste being stored 1000 ft underground (if it is ever proven to be geologically safe) than on-site at numerous power plants, susceptible to terrorist attacks.

The DOE tells us that the transportation of the casks has been studied and tested extensively to ensure safety in case an accident occurs. So who am I to believe?

Rank the Benefit | 8:35 a.m. July 16, 2008

If all that waste will take up so little space than why is transporting it so dangerous? The old Rocky Mountain arsenal sent tons and tons of nuclear waste from weapons production to the Idaho National Lab by rail in the 1970s and 80s. I don't recall a single incident. It seems to me that the politics keeps adding $$ to the Yucca Mtn ticket by focusing on low risk criteria and not the high benefits of a single convient storage location that can protect the public for 10s of thousands of years to come.

Anonymous | 9:35 a.m. July 16, 2008

I'm not a nuclear engineer, and have never studied it seriously, but it seems to me that we need to take a page out of France's book on this one. (Never thought I'd say that about France) One of our biggest problems is that we do not use our nuclear fuel over and over again like they do. From what I understand we don't re-use it because it creates weapons grade nuclear material in the process. But, if you keep using it repeatedly it eventually becomes much more inert and compact than our current system. Our policy should change, otherwise storing nuclear waste is going to become an ever growning problem. Americans freak out when they hear the word NUCLEAR, but in reality it has the potential to be the most safe and reliable way to help solve the energy crisis. We already get somewhere around %20 of our electricity from nuclear plants. France does around %90. Electric cars are the only alternative to gas in the near future, but if we are going to do that we are going to need A LOT more electricity. Nuclear is the best option, but we need to change our policies!!!

JOHNJ | 9:44 a.m. July 16, 2008

If they move them thru Utah, let's hope an F-16 dose'nt hit one.

Former YMP | 12:28 p.m. July 16, 2008

A better headline would have been "Inflation and Expansion Increase Yucca Mountain Estimate."

A responsible, accurate article would then have pointed out that taxpayers do NOT pay for the Yucca Mountain Project. It is paid for by nuclear ratepayers.

Transportation of radioactive materials has an impressive 50 year safety record that Utah's politicians seem to be blissfully ignorant of.

The basic premise of underground storage is to safeguard future generations in case civilization falls apart. On-site storage doesn't do this, and that is a big down-side.

Gordon | 8:05 p.m. July 16, 2008

C'mon, this stuff is safe.
That, of course, is why the folks in D.C. want to store it as far away from D.C. as they can.
They've stored a lot of it in Idaho for years. They tried stashing in in New Mexico. And now they're going for Nevada.
Why? Far from D.C., NYC and other large population areas. And they can't go any farther west without getting into California, which also has lots of voters.
ID, NM,NV -- lower population, fewer voters to alienate.
But the stuff is safe -- just like the Titanic.

Walker | 5:07 p.m. July 17, 2008

Why not build a half-dozen LMFBRs around the country to re-process spent fuel? To me, that makes the most sense. Whatever happened to "Reuse-Recycle"?

Kirk Sorensen | 11:41 p.m. July 18, 2008

Why not build a half-dozen LMFBRs around the country to re-process spent fuel? To me, that makes the most sense. Whatever happened to "Reuse-Recycle"?

Probably because the LMFBR is a twitchy reactor with a non-trivial tendency to fail in spectacularly dangerous ways...a "core disruption accident" can actually lead to a nuclear detonation! Such things are not physically possible in thermal-spectrum reactors like the light-water reactors that are prevalent in our country.

Then you have to build the aqueous reprocessing facilities and fuel fabrication facilities for the LMFBRs.

We had a program for all this. It was called GNEP. It's being killed and I applaud its death. We need something much better, and a fast spectrum reactor much better than an LMFBR. It's a bomb with a hair-trigger.

sebastian | 2:39 p.m. Dec. 3, 2008

this is a great idea because if it is isalated from the rest of the country it will be much safer.

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