New Leak at nation's most contaminated nuclear site

[Sara S]

Another sign that we should move away from nuclear power. Hopefully we listen this time.

"The long-delayed cleanup of the nation’s most contaminated nuclear site became the subject of more bad news Friday, when Washington Gov. Jay Inslee announced that a radioactive waste tank there is leaking.

The news raises concerns about the integrity of similar tanks at south-central Washington’s Hanford nuclear reservation and puts added pressure on the federal government to resolve construction problems with the plant being built to alleviate environmental and safety risks from the waste.

The tanks, which are already long past their intended 20-year life span, hold millions of gallons of a highly radioactive stew left from decades of plutonium production for nuclear weapons.

On Friday, the U.S. Department of Energy said liquid levels are decreasing in one of 177 underground tanks at the site. Monitoring wells near the tank have not detected higher radiation levels, but Inslee said the leak could be in the range of 150 gallons to 300 gallons over the course of a year and poses a potential long-term threat to groundwater and rivers."
https://www.boston.com/business/news...d=Most+Popular

There are two huge, unavoidable obstacles to nuclear power use in this country. How to dispose of the nuclear waste in a manner that completely guarantees the safety of the public, and the need to completely eliminate human error from the equation.

These two facts have to airtight because of the simple fact that we're dealing with nuclear issues here. Even the leak of a small amount of nuclear waste will greatly contaminate the Earth and possibly kill lots of people over a long period of time. You have to guarantee no human error because even the smallest of problems can lead to a major accident that would kill tens of thousands and contaminate large areas of the Earth. Worse, as in the case with Fukishima, that human error can show up decades after it was committed.

Since we can't make ironclad guarantees on these two issues, we have got to move completely away from nuclear power. There is no need for it now. Green renewables are cheaper than nuclear power, and more than capable of shouldering the load that nuclear power now carries.

Nuclear power is now a dinosaur whose time has gone. Time to pull the plug on our nuclear power program and remove the threat of nuclear power from our country.