Earth Week '10 - The EnergySolutions Debate, Part III

April 21, 2010 at 7:34am by Marianne Bartman

Earth Week ’10 – Will nuclear power prove a viable option?

written by Jake Brugger '11, who took a research and development role in a spring 2010 class project

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Driving west on I-80, it is easy to see why this area has long attracted the attention of those in the waste disposal business. The vegetation is sparse. The people are sparse. A general feeling of malaise hangs heavy on the land. Beginning with the Tooele Army Depot and the Dugway Proving Grounds, one can experience the Superfund site MagCorp smelter, the worst air polluter in the nation. Finally, after miles of empty desert, the traveler arrives at one of the most controversial sites in Utah, the EnergySolutions Disposal Facility in Clive, Utah.

"I like to think we're building the pyramids," says Sean McCandless, Director of Compliance and Permitting for EnergySolutions. "Years from now, maybe, archaeologists will study this area."

It's easy to see what he's referring to-this is the site where EnergySolutions buries millions of cubic feet of low level radioactive waste in enormous, monolithic mounds rising forty feet above the desert floor.

"Isolation is the foremost principle of waste disposal," says McCandless.

The only radioactive waste legally stored in Utah is Class A Waste, which loses its radiation hazard after 100 years. Class B Waste loses its hazard after 300, Class C after 500, and the most dangerous radioactive waste, spent nuclear fuel, can cause death within minutes of exposure. Although EnergySolutions only stores Class A-level waste, Class B and Class C waste admittedly finds its way into the landfill, in a controversial process dubbed 'mixing' by the media. In spite of this, the whole of the waste meets the standards for Class A waste, making it legal for deposition in Clive, whose facility is designed above Class A guidelines.

EnergySolutions, which reprocesses low level radioactive waste in the United States and United Kingdom and operates nuclear plants in the United Kingdom, received negative attention for a proposed waste accepting project, which would have accepted 1600 tons of Italian nuclear waste over five years. However, the deal never transpired, and the black boxcars responsible for transporting the waste will not be seen thundering across the west desert in the foreseeable future.

EnergySolutions maintains that they operate a safe facility; indeed, they have had over three million working hours without a major accident, and residence within five miles of the waste is forbidden. The site was selected for a variety of reasons; most obvious among them is its isolation. At close to eighty miles west of the Salt Lake valley, there is little chance of direct contamination. Additionally, the location, in the basin and range, presents very little risk for earthquake, which could hurt the storage containers and serve to spread waste. The facility has 29 air sampling stations on site, 89 groundwater stations, and 67 soil stations, which are maintained full time by three environmental engineers, according to Jeff Gardner, Vice President of the Clive Facility.

Environmental science students engaged in a mock senate hearing following the visit to the facility. The hearing involved the question EnergySolutions itself is facing and has been for some time: should waste above Level A be deposited at the the Clive facility? Keep in mind, Class B and C waste take 300 and 500 years to deradiate to safe levels, respectively. The trial involved testimonies from, among others, por-business representaties, pro-environment activists, economists, and local residents. The bulk of the environmentalists arguments rested on the shock factor; that is, horror stories involving higher-level nuclear waste, while the businessmen's arguments focused primarily on the revenue generated by the company, and the taxes paid to the federal governement, which totaled over $14 Million in 2007. Additionally, it was brought to light that the State has been accepting Class B and C waste, via the aforementioned 'blending' process.

Nuclear power remains a divisive issue. There exist today no viable solutions for permanent radioactive waste or recycling; isolation and deposition are the only realistic options. And it is not merely nuclear fuel which needs disposal-there are control rods, water used in the reactor core, pipes, and parts of decommissioned plants, as well as massive amounts of irradiated soil and uranium tailings. However, nuclear power does have its benefits. Mere miles from the Clive facility is the US Magnesium Smelter, which refines magnesium from the sediments of the Great Salt Lake. This smelter is consistently ranked among the most polluted sites in the country, both in air quality and ground pollution – indeed, it had been declared a superfund site by the Federal Government. And from the clouds of carcinogenic polychlorinated dibenzodioxins (PCDDs) and Furans belched from the US Magnesium smelter and others around the desert, it is easy to see why some exalt the benefits of a power generation system which produces no air pollution other than water vapor. Also, nuclear power is among the most efficient forms on the planet, with 808.97 Billion Kilowatt-Hours generated annually in the US alone. And yet, I have seen massive reactors, irradiated soil, uranium tailings and parts sealed away to deradiate over generations in this state.

Will nuclear power prove a viable option? Only time will tell.

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