Antinuclear

#Nuclear delusions exposed at Festival of Dangerous Ideas

• In his book, Schlosser, who will be speaking on Nuclear Delusions at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas next month, has explored this in depth and does not believe systems can be made completely foolproof…….
• He also thought it was possible that building a nuclear waste storage facility in Australia, which stockpiled high level waste that could be reprocessed into fuel for nuclear weapons, may make the country a target for terrorists.

  “The challenge of storing nuclear waste safely is huge,” Schlosser said, adding nuclear waste could also be used to make a dirty bomb that spread plutonium dust over a few kilometres, not just for nuclear weapons.

  “These are real concerns, I just would think … there are other ways to drive economic activity (in Australia) besides accepting nuclear waste,” he said.

Eric Schlosser exposes our Nuclear Delusions at Festival of Dangerous Ideas news.com.au AUGUST 11, 2015 IT TOOK 20 years and an estimated $19 billion to build and all but the simplest of typos to shut it down.

A nuclear accident that has crippled a purpose-built waste storage facility serves as a terrifying warning to Australia.

As support for a potential nuclear power plant and waste disposal facility appears to grow in South Australia, where politicians are groping for ideas to stimulate the state’s flagging economy, investigative journalist Eric Schlosser has a cautionary tale that should make us think twice.

The US author of Command and Control has explored America’s nuclear weapons program and discovered how little errors and complacency have led to the US almost blowing itself up on a number of occasions.

An accident also occurred on Valentine’s Day last year at America’s only underground nuclear waste facility, when a radioactive drum burst open.

What’s more frightening is investigators later blamed the incident on someone putting the wrong type of kitty litter in the drum containing radioactive waste.

Despite being a pioneer of nuclear technology, even the US has struggled with how to manage the waste it produces.

The seemingly absurd error has crippled the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, New Mexico, which was built for an estimated cost of about $19 billion, in an underground salt bed under the Southern New Mexico desert.

“It sounds great (economically) but you’ve got to know what you’re doing,” Schlosser told news.com.au.

“It’s really difficult to store this stuff, it’s really complicated … good luck with that.” For 15 years, WIPP was held up as a model facility for its safe design and operation, and one of only three such facilities in the world. It was supposed to house low and medium level radiation waste created as part of the US nuclear weapons program, for at least 10,000 years.

• Drums of radioactive material were trucked in from around the US, where they were placed in salt caverns that would eventually be collapsed, burying the waste. Some even started advocating for high level waste to be buried there.

  But in what seems an unbelievable chain of events, the addition of organic, instead of inorganic (clay) litter to the contents of a drum, created an explosive substance and led to it bursting open. Those investigating how this happened, have blamed it on a possible typo……..

• It’s believed the litter may also have been used in up to 5000 other containers, meaning they could also be potentially explosive. These containers have had to be buried in rooms that are now being sealed, while others were moved to a reinforced temporary storage site in case they also burst.

  There are also concerns heat from the radiation leak could make surrounding barrels unstable.

  Robert Alvarez, a nuclear waste expert and a former special assistant to the US energy secretary, told the New York Times that a safety analysis done before the WIPP facility opened, predicted one such incident every 200,000 years, but the facility had been open for just 15 years.

  Now Mr Alvarez is not sure the site is safe,…..

• Defusing this potentially deadly situation is a complicated and long process. The facility has been closed since February last year and will likely not be operation again until next year. The US Department of Energy has estimated it will cost about $551 million to get the facility running again and to install a new ventilation system and exhaust shaft……..
• In his book, Schlosser, who will be speaking on Nuclear Delusions at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas next month, has explored this in depth and does not believe systems can be made completely foolproof…….
• He also thought it was possible that building a nuclear waste storage facility in Australia, which stockpiled high level waste that could be reprocessed into fuel for nuclear weapons, may make the country a target for terrorists.

  “The challenge of storing nuclear waste safely is huge,” Schlosser said, adding nuclear waste could also be used to make a dirty bomb that spread plutonium dust over a few kilometres, not just for nuclear weapons.

  “These are real concerns, I just would think … there are other ways to drive economic activity (in Australia) besides accepting nuclear waste,” he said.

  Already anti-nuclear activists have broken into high security facilities in America, proving it could be done.

  “I’m glad they believe in peace, love and understanding, rather than killing in the name of God,” Schlosser said…….http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/eric-schlosser-exposes-our-nuclear-delusions-at-festival-of-dangerous-ideas/story-fn5fsgyc-1227478302666

August 12, 2015 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized