Spring break at Yucca
A congressional junket shows the foolishness of plans for nuke waste dump
Wednesday, April 27, 2011 | 2:01 a.m.
As part of his “investigation” into President Barack Obama’s decision to shut down the Yucca Mountain project, Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., led a congressional delegation to Nevada on Tuesday to tour the site.
Shimkus, chairman of a House subcommittee that oversees nuclear waste, said the administration has “illegally closed Yucca Mountain.” He points to a law that pushed the nation toward building a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The administration is trying to withdraw an application before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the agency tasked with determining whether a nuclear waste dump is built there.
The government has spent a quarter of a century trying to prove that Yucca Mountain is a good place to put nuclear waste, but all the site has proven to be is a money pit. After spending more than $13 billion, all the government has is a massive hole in the ground. It would takes billions more to complete the project, and that would be a waste. Yucca Mountain is an unsuitable site and the plans to send waste there are dangerous.
Shimkus is doing the bidding of the nuclear power industry, which wants to turn Nevada into a nuclear waste dump. His complaints about the administration’s actions are laughable. Should Congress really continue to support a failed project, especially in this era of budget cutting? And if he’s concerned about legality, he should know that Congress recently approved a plan that zeroed out funding for Yucca Mountain. After all, he voted for it....
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2011/apr/27/spring-break-yucca/