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Archive for the ‘Radioactive Waste’ Category

Radioactive Waste Commission meeting on August 20th

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , on July 13, 2011 |

The Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission will meet Saturday, August 20, 2011, at 10:30 AM in the James Roberts Center, 855 Hwy 176 East, Andrews, TX 79714.  Don’t know yet what they will have on their agenda, but they say it will be posted in the Texas Register and on the Commission website when available.

Click here to read more about legislation that passed this session, opening the state wide to accept radioactive waste from around the country and giving Waste Control Specialists, the operator of the Texas waste site, carte blanche for much of the regulation of this site.

Have Questions?  Contact the Texas Low Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission

http://www.tllrwdcc.org
Telephone: 512-820-2930
Mailing Address:
TLLRWDCC
3616 Far West Blvd., Ste. 117, # 294
Austin, Texas  78731
NOTE:  This is a mailing address only and not the physical location of the Commission.

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Tepco, wouldn’t want to be you

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , on July 6, 2011 |

In their ongoing effort to accomplish a cold shutdown by January, Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), the beleaguered operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear-power plant said it had resumed the use of recycled water to cool the reactor cores this weekend, a week after its first attempt was suspended due to leaks that developed within minutes of starting up the recycled water system.

Tepco has installed a tank to store 1,000 metric tons of decontaminated water to complete the recycling system, stabilizing the water source for cooling the Nos. 1-3 reactors, eliminating the need to use fresh water from an outside source to cool the reactors, and creating even more irradiated water, which then requires storage or disposal.

Establishment of a closed cooling system is essential to stabilizing the Daiichi reactors and getting the reactors to cold shutdown, which is defined as lowering the temperature of the fuel rods to below 100 degrees Celsius—water’s boiling point—and keeping it there.

If Tepco’s current efforts are successful, they hope to increase the flow of water and bring down the reactor-core temperatures, which currently hovers between 100 and 160 degrees Celsius.

Even if the recycling system works smoothly, Japan is still left with the problem of how to dispose of the radioactive sludge being created during the filtering process.  Japan, like Texas, has a disposal site for low-level radioactive waste, but there are no guidelines for disposing of the type of sludge now being created, which is expected to total 706 metric tons.

In the meantime, work at the complex is being hampered by the unseasonably hot weather.  There have been 17 reported cases of heatstroke at the plant in recent weeks.

And if that wasn’t enough

Tepco also faces other issues as senior members of Japan’s government developed secret plans to break up the nuclear plant operator, according to reports uncovered by Reuters.

The plan would bring nuclear operations of Tepco under government control, and force Tepco to sell its power distribution business.  Only the power-generation operations that use thermal and hydraulic power plants would remain as the company’s business cutting Tepco’s size to one third of its current operations.

I guess a really, really big mistake costs industry really, really big.

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New NRC rule would minimize “legacy sites” but might create more waste for WCS

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , on June 20, 2011 |

Facilities that process large quantities of radioactive material have the potential for significant environmental contamination due to the scale of their operations. Over time, leaks from these facilities can lead to significant radioactive contamination of the subsurface soil and groundwater.  In addition, the high costs of disposing of radioactive material off-site may lead these facilities to store more waste on site, increasing the potential for subsurface radioactive contamination and significantly higher decommissioning costs.

Currently these facilities are required to perform surveys to verify that radioactive releases are below regulatory requirements and do not pose public health hazards.  However, the NRC believes that existing regulations were not clear enough concerning subsurface contamination.

A new Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) rule would now require these facilities to minimize the introduction of residual radioactivity at their sites during operations. It also requires reporting of additional details about a facilities cost estimates for decommissioning and tightens NRC control over certain financial instruments set aside to cover eventual decommissioning costs.

These new regulations, which will take effect December 17, 2012, were designed to prevent future “legacy sites” with insufficient funds for decommissioning. A legacy site is a facility with an owner who cannot complete complex decommissioning work for technical or financial reasons, causing those costs to fall to the taxpayer.

An unintended consequence will be that there is that much more low-level radioactive that will need to be disposed of in sites such as the Andrews County site that the Texas legislature just passed legislation on opening it up to accept waste from outside the original two state compact (Texas and Vermont).  Click here to read more about radioactive waste disposal in the US.

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Aging nuclear plants create radioactive waste in need of disposal, with few options available

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , , on June 15, 2011 |

Critiques of nuclear generation have generally revolved around safety risks and high construction fees, but relatively little attention has been paid to what happens when a nuclear plant powers down for good.

Costs Can Reach Over $1 Billion

Nuclear plants must be decommissioned at the end of their useful life, and operating licenses are generally for 40-60 years. The costly, labor-intensive process involves two major actions: nuclear waste disposal and decontamination to reduce residual radioactivity.

There are currently 104 commercial nuclear power plants operating in the US, most of which were built in the 1970s and are slated for decommissioning during the next three decades.

At least one nuclear plant now running will be shut for good in the next several years, namely Exelon Corp’s Oyster Creek plant in 2019. Before then, we could see Entergy Corp’s Vermont Yankee plant shutter as early as next year, should the state’s veto of a license already granted by the NRC hold up in court.  And New York State politicians continue to wield whatever pressure they can to keep Indian Point from winning a license extension in ongoing proceedings.

South Texas Nuclear Project (STP) in Matagorda County licenses expire in 2027 and 2028, they recently applied for a license renewal which would extend the life of the plants 20 years, and they would expire in 2047 and 2048 respectively.  The license renewal application is being contested and you can click here to find out how you can listen in to the 1st Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) hearing on this license renewal application.  However, even if the license renewal is approved, there is a possibility that at some point before the license expiration dates, the costs of repairs could exceeded the value of the plant, and dismantling it could offer a better financial option.

As of April 2011, there were 23 nuclear units in various stages of decommissioning. Only ten out of the 23 have been completely cleaned up.

Decommissioning costs typically run at $500 million per reactor unit. But actual costs vary based on size and design, and some have reached over $1 billion — that is between 10 percent and 25 percent of the estimated cost of constructing a nuclear reactor today.

About 30 percent of the cost of decommissioning goes towards waste disposal.

A decommissioned plant creates several different streams of waste

  • Spent nuclear fuel rods are kept in dry storage or in spent fuel ponds at the reactor sites. An average nuclear plant generates 20 metric tons (44,092 lbs) of used nuclear fuel annually, or 1,200 metric tons over a plant’s 60-year lifespan. Every 3 to 5 years, one-third of the fuel assembly rods in the reactor are removed and stored in storage pools for about 10 to 20 years. During this period, the fuel loses much of its radioactivity and heat.  After that period, the fuel can be stored in large sealed metal casks that can be cooled by air. Typically a 1000 MWe reactor will discharge about 2 metric tons of high level waste each refueling. A PWR will discharge 40 to 70 fuel rods; a BWR will discharge 120 to 200 fuel rods.
  • Anything contaminated with lower levels of radiation — pipes, tools, workers’ clothing, reactor housings, really, pretty much everything but the spent fuel rods — are sent to special low-level nuclear waste facilities around the country. The remaining non-radiated waste can be disposed of in regular landfills.

Three pathways to decommissioning

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission offers utilities three options for decommissioning plants.

  • The first option is immediate cleanup after the plant shuts down.
  • In the second option, called SAFSTOR, the plant is closed and awaits cleanup at a later time, offering plants extra time to increase their decommissioning funds.While there is a requirement for operators to set aside funds for decommissioning, some plants have had to shut down before they had sufficient decommissioning funds and once they shut down, the revenue stream dries up.  This means they must wait until their funds accrue sufficient interest to begin decommissioning.The NRC gives utilities up to 60 years to complete decommissioning.This waiting period adds flexibility for plant owners with multiple reactors that shut down at different times. Once all the reactors cease operation they will be decommissioned together to save money and resources.

Of the 13 reactors currently being decommissioned, six chose immediate decontamination and seven remain in SAFSTOR conditions.

  • No U.S. plant has ever chosen the third decommissioning option, called ENTOMB.Workers would begin by moving the fuel rods into dry storage casks removing 99.9 percent of the plant’s radiation, but which currently must be stored on site.  Next, they use solvents and filters to clean up other contaminated surfaces.The other radioactive material onsite is sent to low-level waste facilities, and the plant is left to sit for decades.With ENTOMB there is no requirement to build extra containment buildings because the NRC postulates that most of the radiation will already be gone, though plant operators would continue to monitor the site for security.After 80 to 100 years, the plant would be safe enough to enter while wearing street clothes, and workers could dismantle the plant with just “a plasma torch and dust mask”.Still utilities don’t like the ENTOMB option because they don’t want to deal with the long-term liability.

Radioactivity for Volume

Low-level radiation waste comes in three varieties: Class A, B and C. Class A waste contains the lowest levels of radiation.

There are three low-level nuclear waste facilities in the United States — in Clive, Utah; Barnwell, South Carolina and Hanford, Washington. Clive only accepts Class A waste; the other two sites accept Class B and C waste but only from select northwestern and eastern states.

The new low-level waste facility under construction in Andrews County, Texas will accept Class A, B and C waste, and originally limited its intake to nuclear waste from Texas and Vermont, but the Texas legislature just opened the site up to take waste from outside the original compact, meaning it could take waste from anywhere in the United States.  However, a study by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality indicates the site only has the capacity to take the low-level radioactive waste from the six Texas and Vermont reactors.

When Barnwell and Hanford started restricting their operations, nuclear plants adjusted their practices. Operators began changing filters more often to selectively create Class A waste that could be sent to Clive.  As a result, Class B and C now make up less than 15 percent of low-level nuclear waste.

So after nearly 60 years, with 104 nuclear reactors approaching the end of their useful life, it remains unclear how this country is going to deal with the decommissioning waste.  How foolish would a nuclear renaissance be in the face of this unsurmounted problem?  The industry continues to insist, over-optimistically, that we will find a long-term solution, yet ,pessimistically, doesn’t think we can find a replacement renewable energy source in the same time frame.  The industry dost protest too much, methinks.

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Oi Polloi – Nuclear Waste

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , on May 25, 2011 |

In honor of SB 1605, a Simmons‘ led bill on the Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission, we decided to post a music video speaking of more sensible, viable options for clean energy. Hope you enjoy it!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHORHE7YcbM]

And the lyrics after the jump if you want them: (more…)

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Simmons’ Cronies

Posted in Global Warming, Nuclear, Radiation, Radioactive Waste, Toxics, tagged , , , , , , , on May 24, 2011 |

All rights reserved by Public Citizen Texas

Infamously dubbed by Dallas Magazine “Dallas’ Most Evil Genius”, socialite and energy tycoon Harold Simmons is no stranger to Texas lobbying.  As this blog previously reported in January, Simmons has contributed $1.12 million from 2001 to September 2010 to Rick Perry significantly increasing his contributions between 6/25/2009 and 9/30/2010 totaling $600,000 in a 15 month period or more than doubling his previous contributions. Now why did Simmons increase his campaign contributions? Perhaps it’s been used to grease the wheels on his  recently passed radioactive waste bill SB 1504 allowing Simmons’ company Waste Control Specialists a monopoly on Texas low-level radiation waste disposal.

Simmons’ money didn’t stop at Perry. According to the Texans for Public Justice, Simmons paid $182, 350 in the 2010 election cycle to 92 members of the House, 94% Republicans and 6%  Democrats. Obviously, all of this is significant because of the recent vote in the House on bill SB 1504. 76% of the members who received Simmons contributions or $138,350 voted with the money, yea, while only 13% or $24, 500 voted nay and 11% or $19,500 abstained from voting. Contrary to a damning report by Public Citizen addressing the dangers of nuclear waste disposal , 84% of the House members who took Simmons’ money voted following the company line while only 16% or 15 members abstained from voting or voted nay.

Simmons granted a rare interview to the Dallas Business Journal in 2006 offering an eerie outlook on his lobbying efforts “It took us six years to get legislation on this passed in Austin, but now we’ve got it all passed. We first had to change the law to where a private company can own a license [to handle radioactive waste], and we did that. Then we got another law passed that said they can only issue one license. Of course, we were the only ones that applied.

Most House Members Who Took Simmons’ Money Voted To Grant Him A Monopoly to Import Nuclear Waste

Simmons BillVote in House No. of Members Percent of Members Total Amount From Simmons Average Amount from Simmons
Yea 108 72% $138,350 $1,281
Nay 36 24% $24,500 $681
Not Voting 6 4% $19,500 $3,250
Totals 150 100% $182,350 $1,216

House Members Taking Simmons’ Money but Bravely Went Against Their Benefactor

House Member Dist. Party Simmons Amount in 2010 Cycle 2nd Reading Vote 5/17 3rd Reading Vote 5/18
Anderson, Charles 56 R $2,000 Absent Absent
Carter, Stefani 102 R $2,000 Nay Nay
Coleman, Garnet 147 D $15,000 Yea Nay
Davis, Sarah 134 R $500 Yea Nay
Dukes, Dawnna 46 D $1,000 Nay Nay
Farrar, Jessica 148 D $500 Absent Nay
Gallego, Pete 74 D $15,000 Nay Nay
Giddings, Helen 109 D $1,000 Nay Nay
*Howard,  Donna 48 D $500 Nay Nay
Hunter, Todd 32 R $2,000 Absent Absent
Issac, Jason A. 45 R $1,000 Nay Nay
Kolkhorst, Lois 13 R $1,000 Nay Nay
*Martinez Fischer, Trey 116 D $1,000 Nay Nay
Reynolds, Ron 27 D $500 Nay Nay
Straus, Joe 121 R $15,000 Not Voting Not Voting
Villarreal, Mike 123 D $1,000 Nay Absent

*Member of House Natural Resources Committee that first approved bill.

Note: If you are interested to see  if your representative voted with the money or even received 2010 campaign contributions from Simmons please visit this link provided by TPJ, Bankroll Call: Correlating Simmons Contributions To Texas House Votes.

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Texas House passes Bad Radioactive Waste Bill

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , on May 18, 2011 |

Guest Submission by Karen Hadden, Executive Director of the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development (SEED) Coalition

NOTE: SB 1504 is up for third reading on the House floor later today. 

On May 17, 2011 the Texas House voted 108 Ayes to 36 Nays to pass SB 1504, which will allow WCS’ Andrews County radioactive waste dump to accept wastes from around the country. We’d been able to make some improvements in the bill on the front end and there are some limits on Out of Compact waste, an amazing accomplishment in light of our current legislature. There was also good debate on the floor, which will help in having oversight and scrutiny of the radioactive waste dump in the future. Still, this bill is bad news… It has already passed in the Senate.

In an act of utter disgrace to Texas, 108 House members voted in favor of allowing radioactive waste from around the country to be dumped in Texas. They should have instead limited the site to Texas and Vermont waste. The SB 1504 vote shows many Representativesʼ disregard for health and safety and their willingness to pander to a Dallas billionaire and his waste empire.

It is disgusting to see supposedly educated legislators vote down basic amendments that would allow a study of transportation risks and whether emergency responders are trained and equipped to deal with an accident involving radioactive waste. Some legislators, including Reps. Lon Burnam, Jose Menendez, Roberto Alonzo and Pete Gallego deserve huge credit for trying to improve the bill, but overall, money ruled the day instead of common sense and decency.

Bill info can be found by searching the bill number at www.capitol.state.tx.us

The Vote

As shown by Texas Legislature Online: Legislative Session: 82(R) Unofficial Bill: SB 1504

Disclaimer: This vote has not been certified by the House Journal Clerk. It is provided for informational purposes only. Once the vote is certified, it will be recorded in the journal according to Rule 5 of the House Rules and made available on this web site.

RV# 1140 — Unofficial Totals: 108 Yeas, 36 Nays, 2 Present, not voting

Yeas – Aliseda; Alvarado; Anderson, R.; Aycock; Beck; Berman; Bohac; Bonnen; Branch; Brown; Burkett; Button; Callegari; Chisum; Christian; Coleman; Cook; Craddick; Creighton; Crownover; Darby; Davis, J.; Davis, S.; Deshotel; Driver; Eiland; Eissler; Elkins; Fletcher; Flynn; Frullo; Garza; Geren; Gonzales, L.; Gooden; Guillen; Hamilton; Hancock; Hardcastle; Harless; Harper-Brown; Hartnett; Hilderbran; Hochberg; Hopson; Howard, C.; Huberty; Hughes; Jackson; Johnson; Keffer; King, P.; King, S.; King, T.; Kleinschmidt; Kuempel; Landtroop; Larson; Laubenberg; Lavender; Legler; Lewis; Lozano; Lyne; Madden; Mallory Caraway; Margo; Martinez; Miller, D.; Miller, S.; Morrison; Muñoz; Murphy; Nash; Oliveira; Orr; Otto; Parker; Patrick; Paxton; Peña; Perry; Phillips; Pickett; Pitts; Price; Quintanilla; Riddle; Ritter; Schwertner; Scott; Sheets; Sheffield; Shelton; Smith, T.; Smith, W.; Smithee; Solomons; Taylor, L.; Taylor, V.; Truitt; Veasey; Weber; White; Woolley;  Workman; Zedler; Zerwas

Nays – Allen; Alonzo; Anchia; Burnam; Cain; Carter; Castro; Davis, Y.; Dukes; Dutton; Farias; Gallego; Giddings; Gonzales, V.; Gutierrez; Hernandez Luna; Howard, D.; Isaac; Kolkhorst; Lucio; Marquez; Martinez Fischer; McClendon; Menendez; Miles; Naishtat; Raymond; Reynolds; Rodriguez; Simpson; Strama; Thompson; Turner; Villarreal; Vo; Walle

Present, not voting – Gonzalez; Mr. Speaker(C)

UPDATE:

According to a story by KHOU-Channel 11 out of Houston, radiation has contaminated the underground pipes, water tanks, and plumbing that provide drinking water for much of Central Texas and the Hill Country, much to the consternation of  concerned city officials in the region, who have tested the pipes with Geiger counters.

The City of Brady city made the discovery when it recently dug up older steel water pipes from the ground in an attempt to replace them.  When the city brought the older pipes to a local recycling scrap yard, the scrap yard turned them away as “too radioactive” to recycle.   Could this be even more radioactive waste that will be traveling through Texas to the WCS dump in Andrews County?  Check out the KHOU story at Texas drinking water makes pipes and plumbing radioactive.

Check out these news stories on the bill.

Texas House OKs taking in more radioactive waste

Texas House OKs plan for radioactive waste dump owned by Dallas billionaire Simmons

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Pray for rain, pray for no radioactive waste transport accidents

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , , on April 25, 2011 |

In spite of, Governor Rick Perry’s designation of this past Easter weekend as official days of prayer for rain, Texas is expected to break its yearly record for the number of acres burned by wildfires, with officials warning that today through Wednesday would see a high risk of fresh blazes.

2006 set the previous record of acres burned in one entire year at 1.94 million. So far this year, the figure is 1.84 million, and we’re just in April.  We’ve still got summer and a lot of the fire season left.

Meanwhile, a state report has found that many of the Texas counties that endured the worst damage from this month’s wildfires received only a small portion of the more than $128 million the state awarded to volunteer fire departments over about a decade for training and equipment.

According to the State Firemen’s & Fire Marshals’ Association, there are 1,042 volunteer departments in Texas with about 28,000 firefighters and these make up the first line of defense for many of the counties that have been battling wildfires recently.

The sunset commission’s analysis, which was released in January and is currently being considered by the Texas Legislature, found counties with a low risk for wildfires had received a greater share of the $128 million handed out through the Texas Rural Volunteer Fire Department Assistance Program than many of those with the highest risk.  Specifically, 59 of the 74 counties determined to have a high risk for wildfires got less than $1 million in grant money for their volunteer fire departments from 2001 through 2009.

Three of the high-risk counties that received less than $1 million — Tom Green, Andrews and Palo Pinto — have been significantly affected by the current fires.

Andrews County is home to WCS’s hazardous waste dump, that could soon be open to “low-level” radioactive waste coming into the state from all over the country.  In addition to radioactive waste disposed of at the site, thousands of truckloads of radioactive waste could be traversing the Texas countryside over roads in counties prone to wildfire.  If an accident happens while our first responders are working to the point of exhaustion at local wildfires, I shudder to think about the consequences to the folks near an accident and the liability to the state.  I think the Governor needs to expand the parameters of his call to prayer.

Related Articles

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WCS and Texas Wildfires

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , on April 21, 2011 |

WCS and the Frying Pan Ranch wildfire

As fires rage throughout Texas, we should remember that besides brush, farm land and homes, wildfires are a danger to many industrial sites.  According to today’s Texas Forest Service incident management situation report, a wildfire designated the Frying Pan Ranch fire in Andrews Co. has been contained, but not before scorching 80,907 acres.

While a remote and sparsely populated area, this corner of Texas is home to the controversial Waste Control Specialists’ (WCS) low-level radioactive waste disposal site.  Currently, two bills are moving through the Texas legislature (HB 2184 and SB 1504) which could open this site up to waste from the rest of the U.S. without significantly reducing the liability to Texans should there be a transportation accident or should there be a leak at the site.  I haven’t even seen anything about what issues are at stake in the event of an incident of wildfire.

Environmentalists have been calling on the legislature to improve HB 2184 and SB 1504 by slowing things down until:

  • We have a capacity study completed
  • We have analyzed the risk of a major leak
  • We have analyzed the fiscal liability to the State of Texas for a major leak
  • We have examined the transportation routes and the readiness of first responders and our ability to handle the costs of a transportation accident
If you are concerned about this radioactive waste dump, contact your representative and tell them to make sure we don’t move forward without making sure that Texas taxpayers don’t end up holding a big bag of radioactive liability.
Click here if you don’t know who your representative in the Texas House is.

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Public Citizen, SEED Coalition and We Texans, rally against WCS Radioactive Waste Dump

Posted in Radioactive Waste, tagged , , on April 20, 2011 |

San Antonio Press Conference on Radioactive Waste facility in West Texas. From left to right: Debra Medina, We Texans; Karen Hadden, SEED Coalition; Trevor Lovell, Public Citizen; and Peggy Day, Sierra Club member

Public Citizen, Sustainable Energy and Economic Development (SEED) Coalition and We Texans are traveling around the state to get the word out to folks in Houston, San Antonio, Austin and Dallas against proposed bills that would allow states to ship nuclear waste to a West Texas low-level radioactive waste disposal facility.

The facility in Andrews County is still under construction and was originally designed to house radioactive and nuclear waste from Texas and Vermont.The bills working their way through the Texas Legislature would broaden the scope to allow them to accept waste from anywhere within the United States.  (Bill numbers HB 2184 and SB 1504)Debra Medina, a former Republican gubernatorial candidate who is currently the director of We Texans is joining the environmentalists in protesting Waste Control Specialists plan to import low-level radioactive waste from 36 states to their site in Texas.

SEED Coalition and Public Citizen believe the danger is the estimated annual 4,600 truckloads of hazardous waste on state roads. Medina is angered over what she’s calling “crony capitalism,” where political donors get political favors.

In this case, she claims, Waste Control Specialists is getting a profitable license but only having to set aside $500,000 to pay for any possible accidents or spills. Medina said that small amount leaves the liability on the backs of Texas taxpayers.

“It’s not free market anymore when you tell a company they’re not liable for the harm their product or service may cause,” she said.

“It’s a very limited revenue stream for Texas. It’s a huge revenue stream for the private contractor and a great liability for Texas taxpayers.”

One of the things Public Citizen is calling for is a state study ratifying whether there is actual additional capacity at the site before opening it up for importation outside of the original compact states.

Concerns were also raised over the increase in nuclear waste traveling on Texas roads. While traffic accidents involving waste are rare, they said more studies need to be done to avoid endangering Texans.

Suddenly, all that waste is going to get packed up and shipped out from power plant facilities, hitting the highways around the nation and it’s all going to end up coming through Texas.  We’re going to see a concentration of shipments, and we’re going to see a commiserate concentration of accidents that we’re going to be liable for.  Seems like a good deal for WCS but a pretty bad deal for Texans if there is a big accident.

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Texas Nuke Waste Dump site to Premiere summer blockbuster X-men: First Class

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , on April 1, 2011 |

In a stunning press release this morning, 20th Century Fox announced that the tiny Texas town of Andrews, home to a new nuclear waste dump owned by Waste Control Specialists, will hold a gala event to premiere one of this summer’s blockbusters, X-men: First Class.  For those not familiar, X-men follows a team of super-powered mutants. For those not familiar with the WCS facility, please read previous posts on our blog here, here, here, and here. From their press release:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

APRIL 1, 2011

HOLLYWOOD, CA — X-men are “gone to Texas” for their premiere, which will take place on the grounds of the country’s newest and potentially largest nuclear waste dump.

Fox executive Tim Rothman said, “The X-men have been referred to as ‘The Children of the Atom’- so we decided to showcase that in our premiere”

Harold Simmons

While the site, owned by Waste Control Specialists and Dallas supervillain billionaire Harold Simmons, only contains so-called “low level” radioactive waste, the waste site will house all of the radioactive waste created by a nuclear reactor except for spent fuel rods, meaning there is plenty of radiation emitted by some waste products to have its desired effect:

“We’d really like to cut costs for future sequels by creating actual super-powered mutants,” said Rothman. “Who better to start irradiating than our actual cast?”

Rothman also noted that the proximity of the waste site to the Ogalalla Aquifer, which provides water to 11 states, is also ideal. “There’s how many million people who might drink this water? Surely some of them will have to get superpowers!” Several Texas environmental regulators quit their jobs in protest of the waste dump possibly leaking into the water.

Executive Producer Bryan Singer and Director Matthew Vaughn also added this statement, “We love the idea. This is the type of groundbreaking marketing we ought to do more of, and will allow us to use more practical effects in future… no, stop! They have guns to our heads and have kidnapped our families. We’re being forced to say this.This is a &#$%ing TERRIBLE IDEA. Don’t believe anything…” They were unavailable for further comment.

In an unprecedented display of corporate synergy, this will further tighten the bonds between billionaires, campaign finance spending, and Fox.  Simmons, who is known for his political contributions to Republican candidates, will donate the use of his site rather than making more ad buys attacking Barack Obama on Fox News, a sister company of  20th Century Fox. “It’s all Rupert [Murdoch]’s  money anyway, so who cares? We billionaires have to stick together. We thought we’d help out our team indirectly this time instead of giving more campaign bribes, err donations to politicians, as those usually have to be disclosed, ” a spokesperson for Simmons stated.

###

We here at Public Citizen Texas are aghast at this proposal and will keep our eye on further developments to try to keep you informed. We’d like to remind everyone of the date today, April 1, and to keep an eye out for tricksters who might try to pull any sort of sort of trick on folks here in Texas.  Like, say, storing a bunch of nuclear waste here, making us the dumping ground for the country. Or opening the state to radioactive waste from all over the country, turning Texas into the nation’s dumping ground.

That’s the real trick. And it’s not very funny.

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HB 2184 – moving forward, but now more questions

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , on March 30, 2011 |

HB 2184 was voted out of the Texas House State Affairs Committee earlier today.  HB 2184 is a piece of  legislation that impacts how much, from where and how safely radioactive waste will be transported and stored at a West Texas site, and who will pay for it if something goes wrong.

While this bill has been moving rapidly through the Texas legislature, today when being reconsidered in State Affairs, a number of members offered amendments, none of which were agreeable to the bill’s author, Representative Tryon Lewis (R-Odessa) and none of which were amended to the bill that passed out of the committee.  Nevertheless, the issues raised by the proposed amendments got the attention of several members of the committee. (more…)

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HB 2184 – A Texas-Sized Plan for Nuclear Waste

Posted in Nuclear, Radiation, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , , on March 30, 2011 |

HB 2184 will probably be voted out of the Texas House State Affairs Committee later this afternoon and so far, legislation that impacts how much, from where and how safely radioactive waste will be stored at a West Texas site is moving forward in favor of the private operator, giving them the power to negotiate private deals to import waste, make a gigantic profit and do it without any oversight by Texas regulatory agencies or the Texas Low-level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission.

According to an article in Mother Jones:

The compact allows him (Simmons) to get paid for burying other states’ nuclear trash while outsourcing much of the risk to Texas taxpayers. Though the state will receive a cut of disposal fees and $36 million to cover “corrective action” and “post-closure” expenses, it will have to bear any other cleanup costs on its own. According to a report by the Texas Sunset Advisory Commission: “Potential future contamination [from the waste] could not only have a severe impact to the environment and human health, but to the State, which bears the ultimate financial responsibility for compact waste disposal facility site.”

Click here to read the recent Mother Jones article on the history and issues with this site.

In light of the massive cleanup that faces Japan from the radiation that is flooding the area around the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in the wake of its ongoing recovery efforts – seemingly contributed to by Japan’s failure to adequately regulate and reign in the runaway plant operator, is it in Texas’ best interest to just let this company have their way with us?

This bill will go next to the floor of the House and if it continues to move, as we expect it will given the money and influence behind it, on to a Senate committee.  If we are to have any chance of making this bill more protective of the health, well-being and pocketbooks of regular Texans, regular Texans are going to have to let their lawmakers know they are concerned.

House State Affairs

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March 24th – Bill of the Day

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , on March 24, 2011 |

HB 2184 – BAD

by Lewis (more…)

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Texans for Lots of Radiation bring attention to nuclear-waste kingpin’s donations to Texans for Lawsuit Reform

Posted in Nuclear, Radioactive Waste, tagged , , , , , , on March 2, 2011 |

Texans for Lots of Radiation bring attention to Harold Simmons' donations to Texans for Lawsuit Reform

Texans for Lots of Radiation (TLR too) brought attention to the record donations raised by Texans for Lawsuit Reform (TLR) PAC ($6.9 million in the 2010 election cycle) with help from its No. 1 donor: nuclear-waste kingpin Harold Simmons. To reduce the cost of negligently harming other people, the PAC took 12 cents of every dollar it raised from Simmons. Not coincidentally, this billionaire is imposing unprecedented liabilities on Texans by importing staggering volumes of toxic and radioactive waste into West Texas.

TLR too is an ad hoc coalition of concerned organizations that include Texans for Public Justice, Public Citizen and the Sustainable Energy and Econimic Development (SEED) Coaliton. 

 
Lobby Watch also finds that many of TLR’s biggest new donors are righteously litigious dudes.  Click here to read the Lobby Watch report on this PAC’s contributions and its biggest contributor.  You can also check out the TLR too website for more information. 
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