TAKE ACTION!
"STOP WASTING OUR TAX MONEY ON MOX!"
PHONE
CONGRESSMAN
PETE VISCLOSKY
202-225-2461
CONGRESSMAN PETE VISCLOSKY is head of the House Energy & Water Subcommittee which controls the purse strings for MOX.
Pick up the phone today and tell Rep. Visclosky whether you think the dead-end MOX boondoggle should continue to drain our tax dollars.
You may wish to mention that there are better alternatives for plutonium disposition through plutonium immobilization and that the MOX program has fallen apart with the failure of the MOX fuel test and subsequent cancellation of the contract with Duke Power to use MOX in its reactors.
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404-378-4263
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PLUTONIUM | MOX LEGAL INTERVENTION
Environmental Lawsuit Exposes Critical Weakness in MOX Plutonium Fuel Plans
ATLANTA (9/2/09) Failure to deal with waste from processing weapons-grade plutonium into MOX nuclear reactor fuel is holding up a public hearing about the controversial plutonium processing factory at Savannah River Site (SRS).
On August 31, 2009, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff which has the license for a MOX plutonium fuel factory at SRS under review sent a surprising letter to the NRC Atomic Safety & Licensing Board overseeing Nuclear Watch South's legal intervention opposing MOX. The NRC's letter reveals that problems with volatile MOX plutonium wastes remain unresolved and the public hearing sought by Nuclear Watch South, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League and the Southeast office of Nuclear Information & Resource Service will not be held before 2010 or even later, whenever the waste problems are addressed.
In 2007, Nuclear Watch South along with BREDL and NIRS requested a hearing on the absence of MOX waste plans in Shaw AREVA MOX Services' application to possess plutonium and operate a plutonium fuel factory at the former nuclear weapons complex in South Carolina. The MOX factory, which is already under construction, would process 50 tons of surplus weapons-grade plutonium into a new type of reactor fuel which mixes plutonium oxides with conventional uranium oxides, called MOX for short. Because the weapons material is intended for use in commercial nuclear reactors, the Department of Energy-sponsored project must obtain a license from the NRC which regulates commercial nuclear facilities.
"We are still waiting for SHAMS to prove they can handle the MOX waste," says Glenn Carroll, Nuclear Watch South coordinator. "We have thought all along that this is a most serious stumbling block in the problem-plagued MOX program."
At issue is SHAM's ability to handle extremely dangerous and volatile interactions between radioactivity and solvent acids in MOX waste which produce a poisonous and explosive state called "red oil." The NRC's letter supports contentions brought by Nuclear Watch South exposing the lack of nuclear waste planning by the DOE's MOX contractor SHAMS in its 2007 MOX licensing application.
Despite the $500 million per year in tax money being lavished on MOX factory construction, the final design remains only 75% complete. In addition to the critical waste issues raised by the citizen groups, there are outstanding issues on plutonium security and emergency planning.
"This latest admission by the NRC reveals that licensing the MOX plant is just a roll of the dice," says Tom Clements of Friends of the Earth SE nuclear campaign and who has worked to stop MOX with a coalition of international, regional and local groups since the program's inception in 1994.
Many other deep problems beset the MOX plutonium disposition project which is now 10 years behind schedule. SHAMS has been repeatedly cited by NRC with construction violations for using substandard rebar and concrete which not meet nuclear building standards, or even conventional standards.
The required MOX fuel assembly test failed at Duke Power's Catawba nuclear station in Rock Hill, SC. Afterwards, Duke Power declined to renew its contract to "burn" the MOX fuel proposed to be produced at the MOX factory. Even if a utility were to sign up to use its reactors for MOX, there is no source for additional trial MOX fuel to conduct the seven-year-long test required preceding MOX use in a commercial reactor.
"It is painful to watch precious tax money being poured into this dangerous dead-end project," says Ms. Carroll. "It would be so much more practical to convert the building to a plutonium immobilization factory and dedicate ourselves to protecting the plutonium forever by glassifying it in the old plutonium waste stored in the 60-year-old underground tanks!"
CALL VISCLOSKY @ 202-225-2461 TODAY
and say "Please Stop the MOX Boondoggle!"
"To the village square
we must carry the facts
of atomic energy.
From there must come America's voice."
ALBERT EINSTEIN
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MORE ON MOX LEGAL INTERVENTION
NRC MOX LETTER
NRC MOX WEBSITE
NRC MOX LICENSING
MOX LICENSE APPLICATION
RED OIL REPORT
MOX PLAN HITS ROADBLOCK
NUCLEAR FUEL TEST FAILURE RAISES CONCERNS
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PLUTONIUM FACTS
Year plutonium was discovered by Glenn Seaborg and others
1941
Minimum amount of plutonium required for bomb
1 kilogram (2.2 pounds)
Amount of plutonium used in Nagasaki bomb
6.5 kilograms
Average amount of plutonium used in modern atom bomb
3 kilograms
Estimated amount of U.S. weapons-grade plutonium
85,000 kilograms (93.5 tons)
Estimated amount of Russian weapons-grade plutonium
160,000 kilograms (176 tons)
Hazards associated with plutonium
Radiation, fire, inhalation, ingestion, criticality, reactivity, decay
Length of time that
plutonium 239 (weapons-grade) remains hazardous
240,000 years
(Ten 24,000-year half-lives)
Form of plutonium most hazardous to life
Plutonium oxide powder
What happens to plutonium metal when exposed to air
Gradually turns to
plutonium oxide powder
Lethal amount of plutonium oxide powder (inhaled)
2000 micrograms
Lethal amount of plutonium oxide powder (ingested)
500,000 micrograms
Amount of sugar substitute in average 1 gram package
1,000,000 micrograms
Excerpted from Stop Plutonium Fuel: Plutonium Index, compiled by Don Moniak. Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, www.bredl.org