Halt Holtec! Public Comments Due to NRC by July 30th
Now is the time to submit your comments to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) about the proposed Holtec project to bring all of the commercial high-level radioactive waste from across the country to a site in southeast New Mexico for storage. Comments are due by Monday, July 30th to Holtec-CISFEIS@nrc.gov. Hundreds of New Mexicans have empathically stated that they do not consent to New Mexico becoming a national radioactive waste dumping ground. They have submitted written comments and spoke eloquently at public meetings in Roswell, Hobbs, Carlsbad, Gallup, and Albuquerque. Sample public comment letters you can use are available at https://action.citizen.org/p/dia/action4/common/public/?action_KEY=13813
The NRC is asking for comments about their 543-page environmental report. It provides information about the 960-acre site, which contains playa lakes, and is located half way between Hobbs and Carlsbad. Holtec, a limited liability corporation, is asking NRC for a 40-year license to temporarily store the waste in Lea County, with an opportunity to extend the license to 120 years. Holtec stated in its license application that the waste could be stored there for 300 years. https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-storage/cis/hi/hi-app-docs.html
Nevertheless, the federal government may never find a permanent place for the waste, with the real possibility of the proposed Holtec temporary storage site becoming a permanent site. But the environmental report does not analyze for the long-term impacts of spent radioactive fuel being left there indefinitely.
Over 10,000 overweight rail cars would carry the dangerous waste from across the country to the proposed site and the waste would likely travel very near to the Carlsbad sinkhole. Proposed transportation maps are available at: http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/356082/27450667/1486998445013/Rail-Transport+routesWCS-1.pdf?token=wgGRSYLr7EbqxLd54LrQ0V8Jd4s%3D and http://static1.1.sqspcdn.com/static/f/356082/27010289/1462420316290/5+4+16+WCS+Transportation+Maps.jpg?token=fdXd0O9cuEa7l77eBIMXkEv0ih4%3D and water transportation routes by state, https://web.archive.org/web/20151101154823/http://www.nirs.org/fukushimafreeways/watertransport.htm
Even so, the environmental report does not include all of the transportation routes and potential impacts of accidents or terrorism incidents on public health and safety along all the routes crisscrossing the country.
The environmental report does not analyze how radioactive waste from a cracked or leaking storage canister would be handled since the Holtec site will not have hot cells or pools to handle the leaking waste.
Finally, Holtec estimates there will be as many as 135 jobs for the construction and operating phases. This is a small number of jobs compared to the damage that could be done to the 28,000 jobs in the oil and gas industry, and the 6,000 jobs in the dairy industry, if there was a leak or accident.
Please submit your comments to the NRC at Holtec-CISFEIS@nrc.gov about the inadequacies of the environmental report.
This has been the CCNS News Update. For more information, please visit http://nuclearactive.org/ , No Nuclear Waste Aqui at http://nonuclearwasteaqui.org/ , Beyond Nuclear at http://www.beyondnuclear.org/ , and the Nuclear Information and Resource Service at https://www.nirs.org/ . Sample comment letter at: https://action.citizen.org/p/dia/action4/common/public/?action_KEY=13813
Tags: commercial nuclear power plant waste, dairy jobs, high-level radioactive waste, Holtec, New Mexicans Do Not Consent, NRC, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, oil and gas jobs, public comments
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