[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > � � �As opposed to the present policy of leaving the waste in place near the >Mississippi River, in one case cheek-by-jowl with the Prairie Island Ojibwe >community? Why, are they moving the site to the Metrodome?
~~~ The present policy re: Prairie Island will not change. �Xcel admits that only about half the waste from Paririe Island and Monticello will be going to Utah. �Is Xcel going to stop producing waste at these plants once Yucca Mtn. fills up? �No. �And what exactly, happens to plants when they are de-commissioned. �Do we get to build resorts there? > � � I'd like to see some documentation on this. The rail network in Minnesota is >hardly >so sparse that all trains must pass through Minneapolis, and to run truck convoys >north ~~~ The DoE proposed train routes come north from Prairie Island and south from Monticello. �Here is a DoE map of proposed routes: � http://www.mapscience.org/pdf/eis_j_MN-WI.pdf Take a look. �Go ahead. �Note the train and truck routes around the metro. �And it's not just stuff from Minnesota. �The metro will be a central routing point for other states. �That's part of what is disturbing, is that shipments from other states, lots of them will be coming through here. >from Prairie Island to the metro area when Nevada is well south of here is >counterintuitive. >Can we have a link? Preferably from the DoE? I'm a big fan of primary documents. > >> By contrast, Wisconsin, which has no plants, will have a total of 3 shipments. >> > � � No, but you don't have to have a nuclear generating plant to produce high-level >radwaste. Any hospital with a radiology department does that. Or should we close all >those down, too? ~~~ Hospital waste is not near as poisonous as power plant waste (by orders of magnitude) and you most likely know that. �So that is a non-starter argument. > � � You forgot the part where we all grow an extra eye and become glowing mutants. >Environmental groups have a really crappy record on estimating these things, and I >find this estimate no more persuasive than the rest of the scaremongering they >indulge in on a regular basis...first the "global cooling" crisis, then the Club of >Rome's wildly inaccurate prognostications, then Paul Ehrlich's dud "Population >Bomb"... >do I really need to go on? > ~~~ Actually, environmental groups have excellant records as far as scientific research goes. �Especially when it comes to health effects of pollution, which is what we are talking about here. > � � To say nothing of all those poor cuddly animals at the Minnesota Zoo. >Come on, Eric, we're talking about radioactive waste here, not nuclear weapons. >People manage to get along in those hospitals and schools and homes just fine >despite all the shipments of corrosive, acidic, explosive, and flammable substances >that move through the metro area on a daily basis, so what's the fuss over a bunch >of spent fuel rods wrapped in tons of steel and concrete? It's not like we're asking >people to take in the fuel rods and keep them in their living rooms, or even in their >garages. ~~~ Spent fuel rods are the most poisonous substance on earth, bar none. �And they remain poisonous for centuries. �Here's a question for you: if one of these trucks or trains did have an accident, even in the middle of nowhere-land Nebraska or something, how do you respond to it? �How do you clean it up? �Who do you send in? �How do you deal with a substance that will remain deadly for 10,000 or more years which has been released outside it's tidy containment? > � � Not very. In spite of the fact that this stuff would be nearly useless for >making any kind of nuclear weapon, except a "dirty bomb" which would probably kill >more terrorists during its construction than Americans after its detonation, >shipments of high-level radwaste are routinely escorted by DoE security types who >will probably be given authority to shoot to kill. Besides, these casks are HEAVY. >No train carrying them is going to be moving very fast, and it's certain that DoE/ >Homeland Security is going to be checking the tracks very very carefully. "I pity >the fool that messes with a radwaste truck," as Mr. T might say. ~~~ Well, I'm glad you are willing to spend our tax dollars on all that extra security. �I would rather that the citiznry and Xcel take responsibility for its own garbage. �And why do you want to take this chance? �You know, I don't think many folks were thinking that a 767 could fly into the Pentagon either. > � � Again, I'd like to see documentation on this. All the literature I've seen says >that all the high-level waste (spent fuel rods, mainly) is going to Nevada. > ~~~ Documentation compiled from DoE Impact Statement: � http://www.mapscience.org/pdf/waste_left.pdf And again, is Xcel going to stop producing waste? �No. > � � Nothing personal, Eric, but this whole post screams out why I could never >support the Green Party above the local level. Nuclear power is the safest and >cheapest power generation method available to us, from beginning (extracting the >fuel) to end (disposing of the waste) of the power generation cycle. It doesn't >put miners' lives at risk, it doesn't pollute rivers and other bodies of water, >and the current waste is the product of DECADES of plant operation. At that, those >rods could be recycled into new fuel, if we had ever built the breeder reactors >to do it - but thanks to the demagoguery of "ecology-minded" groups, those were >shelved here in the States. France, Germany and Japan don't seem to have problems >with theirs, oddly enough. Nuclear reactors don't release noxious gases into the >air, as do coal and oil. Nuclear reactors don't pollute the water table, as the >manufacture of solar cells does. Nuclear reactors operate 24x7, 365 days a year, >unlike wind farms and solar cells...neither of which could begin to replace the >megawattage generated at Monticello and Prairie Island. > � � It is the blind refusal of the Greens to see this, and their continued >scaremongering on the issue, that totally frustrates me. By all means, promote >energy conservation and alternative power sources (preferably ones that don't >need subsidies from the government to make them cost-effective) but spare us >the lectures on the horrors of nuclear power. ~~~ So, this multi-billion dollar storage repository, the trains, the security, the casks, they don't count as a public subsidy? �OK... �Seems to me we gave a large chunk of cash to Xcel in 1993-94 to build those extra storage casks. �Am I wrong on that? There are far more health hazards >involved in NOT going nuclear. Ah, the big lie of the nuclear power - "It's clean!" because there are no emissions. �It's not clean. �It generates the most poisonous substances on earth. � And DECADES of generation produce MILLENNIA of waste. �Waste on a scale we have never even considered dealing with. �The Europeans are going through the same issues we are, even though they have breeder plants. �At some point, the stuff can't be recycled and you have to do something with it. �Additionally, by that point the stuff is even more long term poisonous than it was before recycling. �France is burying waste as fast as they can generate it (at great public expense). �They have also of course, made New Caladonia a little cancer factory for the next several centuries, never telling the indiginous folk that the fish they were eating were full of rads from waste dumped in the ocean. � We won't even talk about how much waste there is in the Russian arctic circle. But to bring it back to Minneapolis (as I'm sure the list manager would like me to), the facts are there. �The shipments from our plants and others WILL be coming through Minnesota's most heavily populated areas (documented above). �It IS the most toxic substance on earth. �It will NOT aleviate the storage issue associated with nuclear power (also documented above). �An accident WILL have very serious consequences on the population of Minneapolis. � This is not a NIMBY thing. �I don't want it in anyone's backyard. Eric Oines Lind-Bohanon Minneapolis __________________________________________________________________ Your favorite stores, helpful shopping tools and great gift ideas. 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