ML24226A128
| ML24226A128 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Kemmerer File:TerraPower icon.png |
| Issue date: | 08/11/2024 |
| From: | Public Commenter Public Commenter |
| To: | NRC/NMSS/DREFS |
| NRC/NMSS/DREFS | |
| References | |
| 89FR49917 | |
| Download: ML24226A128 (4) | |
Text
From: Christopher L <ctm_logan@yahoo.com>
Sent: Sunday, August 11, 2024 3:54 PM To: TerraPowerEnvironmental Resource
Subject:
[External_Sender] Comment on Terra Power's application in Wyoming Attachments: NRC-Wyoming.pdf
Greetings, officials!
Attached, you will find a brief comment on the Natrium nuclear project in Wyoming, proposed by Terra Power.
I would appreciate hearing from you, to the effect that my comment has been received and acknowledged.
Thank you, Christopher Logan Federal Register Notice: 89FR49917 Comment Number: 1005
Mail Envelope Properties (1952110258.6443184.1723406025391)
Subject:
[External_Sender] Comment on Terra Power's application in Wyoming Sent Date: 8/11/2024 3:53:45 PM Received Date: 8/11/2024 3:54:00 PM From: Christopher L
Created By: ctm_logan@yahoo.com
Recipients:
"TerraPowerEnvironmental Resource" <TerraPowerEnvironmental.Resource@nrc.gov>
Tracking Status: None
Post Office: mail.yahoo.com
Files Size Date & Time MESSAGE 273 8/11/2024 3:54:00 PM NRC-Wyoming.pdf 81015
Options Priority: Normal Return Notification: No Reply Requested: No Sensitivity: Normal Expiration Date:
Christopher Logan 1229 Dalton Dr.
Eugene, Oregon 97404 August 11, 2024
RE: Docket ID NRC-2024-0078, Notice of Intent to Conduct Scoping Process and Prepare Environmental Impact Statement; US SFR Owner, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of TerraPower, LLC; Kemmerer Power Station Unit 1
Greetings, NRC officials!
Although the NRC has long encouraged nuclear power in the United States, it is clear that these efforts have been misplaced. Over 80,000 metric tons of high-level nuclear waste are sitting in pools or dry casks around the country today - not only an economic liability but a serious and permanent threat to the lives and health of Americans.
What will you do with the waste? we ask again and again. Permanent storage has not been accomplished, because it was proved that no effort known to man can contain these deadly radioactive poisons. Interim storage is not going to work. Judges have decreed that tossing the stuff out into the deserts of New Mexico and Texas is inappropriate. Theyre absolutely right about that.
Plutonium-239 has a half-life of 24,000 years; plutonium-242, 375,000 years; plutonium-240, only 6500 years. Strontium-90 decays fairly quickly, with a half-life of only 29 years - but the other half persists considerably past the 100-year shelf-life of the dry casks. Given earthquakes, tornadoes, floods (consider the desert regions of Somalia and Darfur, recently inundated, or that dam that just broke in Libya), not to mention warfare and terrorism, how can the containment of these horrible poisons in dry casks be guaranteed even for that 100-year period?
What happens to empires? In 390 AD, most Romans had confidence in the Roman Empire. A century later, there was no empire and chaos reigned. In 756, the Tang Dynasty was at its height. By 763, much of the country was in ruins due to the An Lushan Rebellion, which featured mass cannibalism.
In 1890, the British Empire was at its height; by the Depression Era, 40 years later, it was abased economically, then bombed by Hitler, then had to let go of its colonies, some of which descended into serial warfare and dictatorships, destroying much of the infrastructure. We cannot assume that because America is now fairly stable, it will continue to have the resources, national will and the peace - to not only maintain, but continually re-cask the high-level nuclear waste, which otherwise would leak into the land, be blown on the air, enter the water table, and poison a progressively larger region... for hundreds of thousands of years.
Now we come to the notion that taxpayer dollars should be given to one of the richest men in the world, in order that he can make more nuclear waste.
What? The SMR is being rushed through the approval processes, actually strongly encouraged by the DoE. And yet you dont know what to do with the existing waste. Have we learned nothing from Chernobyl (human error),
Three Mile Island (system failure) and Fukushima (unanticipated natural event)? Things go wrong with any system.
You cannot guarantee nothing will go wrong. If it were something like a faulty dam or a bridge or a Navy ship, only a small amount of harm would result. But when youre working with the worlds most dangerous substance, theres no room to gamble. Something will go wrong.
The HALEU fuel proposed for Mr. Gates Natrium project in Wyoming is richer than other fuels, and therefore will produce more concentrated waste.
Cooling the process with liquid sodium risks catastrophic fire or explosion, and no such process should be allowed to go on, even if nuclear waste were not the issue. The 9/11 attacks should be a warning that empowered terrorists are willing to do extreme damage. Such nuclear wingnuts as Kim Jong Un are a constant threat, as well And extreme weather events around the country should mitigate against any dangerous project that natural forces could disrupt.
Please change your typical course, of rubber-stamping specious nuclear projects. Have a good re-think about nuclear power. There are other energy sources, and we could use a lot less power and still be a great nation. Please dont put my family at risk by subsidizing an industry that creates eternal poisons for profit.
Sincerely, Christopher Logan Eugene, Oregon