Call Michigan’s U.S. Senators Stabenow and Levin ASAP. Urge them to oppose Yucca Mtn.
Sen. Carl Levin ph. 202.224.6221
Sen. Debbie Stabenow ph. 202.224.4822
If you are able, fax a hand written letter to their offices as a follow up to your call. Hand written letters carry a lot of weight. See talking points and sample letter, below.
Sen. Carl Levin fax 202.224.1388
Sen. Debbie Stabenow fax 202.228.0325
Michigan’s U.S. Senators are two of the most critical “swing votes” in the entire country on this issue. This vote has been decades in the making. Help us at this critical “home stretch” to stop Yucca and Mobile Chernobyl dead in their tracks on Capitol Hill!
—Kevin Kamps (board member of Don’t Waste Michigan)
Nuclear Waste Specialist Nuclear Information & Resource Service Washington, D.C. 20036 ph. 301-270-6477
Ten Reasons Why Michigan’s U.S. Senators Should Oppose the Yucca Dump:
1. Yucca will not solve Michigan’s nuclear waste problem.
Even if Yucca goes forward, it cannot begin accepting waste until 2015, according to the U.S. General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress. Then Michigan’s waste would have to wait in a 24 to 38 year long waiting list to ship to Yucca. Meanwhile, Michigan’s operating reactors would continue to churn out waste, replacing any that gets shipped away. The U.S. Department of Energy has admitted in recent Congressional hearings that even if Yucca opens and fills up, in the year 2036 there would still be as much waste stored on-site at reactors across the country as there is today, due to all the waste that nuclear utilities plan on generating. The Bush Administration and nuclear industry’s main argument in favor of Yucca — that it would consolidate all the nation’s nuclear waste in one spot, to better safeguard it against the imminent terrorist threat — is thus completely false.
2. Yucca means throwing good money after bad.
Yucca has already cost $4 to $8 billion to study. Those studies have shown it to be an geologically unsuitable site for nuclear waste burial. To move ahead despite this would mean wasting another $50 billion of ratepayer and taxpayer money on a seismic hole in the ground that is guaranteed to leak radiation into the environment. That money must be re-directed, to search for real answers to the nuclear waste dilemma.
3. Yucca is geologically unsuitable.
Two weeks ago, an earthquake measuring 4.3 on the Richter scale struck Yucca Mtn. In 1999, a quake near Yucca derailed a train (what if nuclear waste had been aboard?!). In 1992, a 5.6 quake did a million dollars damage to the Energy Dept. field office at Yucca. All this seismic activity has fractured and fissured Yucca’s rock, creating fast flow pathways for water seepage, threatening corrosion of nuclear waste burial containers and leakage of radioactivity into the underlying aquifer. Yucca’s groundwater is the source of drinking water for farming communities downstream, including Nevada’s largest dairy, which exports milk products to millions of consumers in several western states (Got radioactive milk?). Environmental regulations have had to be weakened, or simply removed, time and time again to keep Yucca Mtn. in the running. To approve Yucca would set a major precedent that if environmental and safety regulations cannot be met, they can simply be lowered or done away with altogether.
4. Dumping nuclear waste at Yucca would violate environmental justice.
Yucca is Western Shoshone Indian land, according to the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley. The attempt of Eastern states (75% of reactors are east of the Mississippi) to dump their deadliest poisons on Native American land out West is environmental racism, pure and simple.
5. Nuclear waste shipments are vulnerable to severe accidents.
What if nuclear waste had been aboard the train that derailed in Potterville, MI near Lansing on Memorial Day? Propane burns at above 3,400 degrees Fahrenheit. With hundreds of thousands of gallons of propane aboard, if a fire had started it could have burned for many hours of even days. Nuclear waste transport containers are designed to withstand only a 1,475 degree Fahrenheit fire for 30 minutes!
6. Nuclear waste shipments are “dirty bombs” on wheels.
Terrorists would not have to steal radioactive material and smuggle it in. The Yucca plan would ship it on trucks, trains and barges through the major population centers of the country, including such cities in Michigan as Bay City, Saginaw, Flint, Detroit, Ann Arbor, Lansing, Jackson, Battle Creek, Kalamazoo, and Muskegon.
7. Nuclear waste must be fortified on-site to protect it against terrorist attacks whether Yucca opens or not.
Yucca dump proponents point to Yucca as a magic solution to the nuclear waste problem. But Yucca is the illusion of a solution. Consumers Energy, Detroit Edison, and American Electric Power plan on running their reactors in Michigan for many years, even decades, to come. As long as they operate, and even after shut down, reactors will continue to be inviting targets for catastrophic terrorist attack. Storage pools, dry casks, and on-site wastes awaiting shipment must be fortified and hardened to protect terrorist attack. This is much more doable with stationary, fixed facilities than it would be with transports. Transport containers are vulnerable to anti-tank weapons and high explosives. Waste moving through urban areas would make for more inviting targets, given that it is less defendable and in the midst of population centers.
8. The environmental movement, in Michigan and nationwide, is united in opposition to the Yucca dump.
Over 50 national and 530 local environmental and public interest organizations stand in strong opposition to Yucca. This includes the Michigan Environmental Council.
9. The Yucca Mtn. Project has been plagued by scandals from the beginning.
Most recently, the Energy Dept.’s Yucca Mtn. Project law firm, Winston and Strawn, was caught serving simultaneously as a pro-Yucca lobbyist for the nuclear power industry!
10. A vote for Yucca is a vote for high-level radioactive waste barge shipments on Lake Michigan.
An accident or terrorist attack upon any one of the 453 barge shipments proposed for Lake Michigan could cause radiation leakage (or even an underwater nuclear chain reaction!) into the source of drinking water and recreation for tens of millions of people.
SAMPLE LETTER:
June 29, 2002
Dear Senator Levin,
I strongly urge you to oppose the proposed Yucca Mtn. nuclear waste dump by voting NO on Senate Joint Resolution 34.
Yucca would not solve our nation’s nuclear waste problem, in that even if it opened and filled up, there would still be as much waste on site at reactors across the country — including in Michigan — three decades from now as there is today. Yucca would waste many tens of billions of dollars, ratepayer and taxpayer money that should be re-directed to finding real solutions to the nuclear waste problem.
Nuclear waste transportation is inherently risky, and should only be done to improve the situation, not make it worse. Yucca is geologically unsuitable for nuclear waste burial, and belongs to the Western Shoshone Indians, who oppose the dump. Shipments would be vulnerable to severe accidents and terrorist attacks as they traveled through Michigan’s major cities and on the waters of Lake Michigan.
Along with the national and state level environmental movements, I strongly urge you to oppose the flawed Yucca Mtn. proposal. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Your name and full address