{"id":108,"date":"2017-09-11T22:54:41","date_gmt":"2017-09-11T22:54:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.law.fordham.edu\/elr\/?p=104"},"modified":"2017-09-11T22:54:41","modified_gmt":"2017-09-11T22:54:41","slug":"the-yucca-mountain-nuclear-waste-repository-deadly-or-new-lease-on-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/?p=108","title":{"rendered":"The Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository – Deadly or New Lease on Life?"},"content":{"rendered":"

While the Trump Administration has been a major proponent of coal, it also plans to increase<\/a> America\u2019s nuclear power capabilities.\u00a0 Nuclear reactors provide roughly 20%<\/a> of America\u2019s power supply\u2013the percentage is considerably higher in New York, which relies on nuclear energy for just over 30%<\/a> of its power needs).\u00a0 Currently, most of the nation\u2019s spent fuel and high-level nuclear waste is held on-site<\/a> at individual reactor sites around the country, but this cannot continue indefinitely.<\/a><\/p>\n

Spent fuel and high-level nuclear waste remains radioactive for thousands of years<\/a>, and most agree that the safest way to store it over the long-term is in an underground repository<\/a>.\u00a0 In 1982, Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act<\/a> (NWPA), which directed the Department of Energy (DOE) to find locations for underground repositories that could hold all of America\u2019s spent fuel and high-level waste, safely, for the next 10,000 years.\u00a0 Five years after NWPA\u2019s enactment, Congress designated Yucca Mountain<\/a>, about 100 miles northwest<\/a> of Las Vegas, as the only spot where DOE could conduct geological surveys.\u00a0 This decision was not without controversy.<\/p>\n

Nevada, unenthusiastic at the prospect of being the nation\u2019s garbage bin for nuclear waste, has doggedly opposed<\/a> the project since its inception.\u00a0 It has joined forces with environmental<\/a> and business<\/a> groups in challenging the wisdom and safety of the Yucca Mountain site.\u00a0 They emphasize that the site is within a seismically active zone<\/a>, threatening the long-term stability of a structure meant to last 10,000 years.\u00a0 Any seismically-induced radioactive leakage could seep into the ground and eventually into an aquifer<\/a> that lies below the Yucca Mountain site.\u00a0 DOE and other proponents have stated that the area is safe<\/a>, and that the earthquakes, which are not as violent there as in, say, along the San Andreas Fault, pose minimal threat<\/a> to the structure\u2019s stability.<\/p>\n

In any event, the project was mothballed<\/a> by the Obama Administration in 2009.\u00a0 Since then, little concrete progress has been made towards a long-term solution to America\u2019s nuclear waste problem.\u00a0 Nuclear waste continues to accumulate, and the government\u2019s failure to provide a repository has its own costs.\u00a0 Although the Federal government intended to start accepting waste in 1998<\/a>, it has failed to do so.\u00a0 As of 2015, DOE has paid over $5 billion<\/a> in judgements to energy providers who expected to have their waste taken but now must store it on-site.\u00a0 DOE estimated in 2015 that if it could get things up and running by 2025, it would still be on the hook for about $23.7 billion<\/a>.\u00a0 Liability will continue to grow as the project stalls.<\/p>\n

Nevada businesses, residents, and politicians<\/a> of both<\/a> parties<\/a> remain firmly opposed to the Yucca Repository, with few exceptions.\u00a0 Everyone agrees that the nation needs a place to safely store its nuclear waste \u2013 but must it be Yucca Mountain?\u00a0 Without an amendment to the NWPA, the answer is, for now, yes.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

By Cameron Kummer<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While the Trump Administration has been a major proponent of coal, it also plans to increase America\u2019s nuclear power capabilities.\u00a0 Nuclear reactors provide roughly 20% of America\u2019s power supply\u2013the percentage is considerably higher in New<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[39,40,41,38],"class_list":["post-108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy","tag-energy","tag-nuclear-energy","tag-pollution","tag-waste"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fordhamlawelr.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}