Yucca Mountain
...ich would ultimately lead to a nuclear explosion. The precipitation has changed dramatically in the Yucca Mountain area in the last 1,000 years. A global warming could mean that water level could be higher as well. A possible earthquake, which is not rare in Nevada, could cause leakage, and an outflow from the containers would lead to nuclear explosion. Volcanic activities are also possible before the 700,000 years are up. Just to put the volume of the planned nuclear waste into perspective, the atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima contained 15 kilograms (about 33 lbs) of Uranium 235. When all the nuclear waste is transferred to Yucca Mountain, there would be about 2 million kilograms (about 4.4 million lbs) or uranium in the repository. Another concern is that the current plan is leaning towards of burying the radioactive waste in the repository instead of storing it. There are suggestions to have this nuclear waste accessible in the future, incase they find a way to re-use it. Non-Market Environments in the Project The Yucca Mountain project is a major development. It involves the federal government, multiple federal agencies, state agencies, counties, cities, contractors, and citizens. It is inevitable to have non-market issues during this process. Ethics, or the lack of ethics, are always present in our daily lives. Amongst other ethical issues, President Bush (back then he was running for office) promised that they would make a decision about Yucca Mountain based on “Best Science”. Shortly after, President Bush accepted the recommendation from the energy secretary about the Yucca Mountain project. Most newspapers in Nevada called this a lie, since it did not seem that they conducted too much “best science” researches. Another site would have been in Texas…but he might want to retire there, and who would want to have a nuclear waste repository in their backyard? Another ethical issue in the Yucca Mountain project was the firing of two DOE employees. Robert Clark and Jim Mattimoe, both quality assurance specialists, were fired because they voiced their concerns about safety. Mattimoe tried to show DOE that there have been many occasions, when corners were cut to meet deadlines. After some lawsuits, one of these two ex-employees has been re-instated. However, this mentality shows that bad ethical decisions are being made, furthermore these are direct results of bad management decisions. Law making is also affecting the Yucca Mountain project. The House will have to pass the bill to make Yucca Mountain the nation’s nuclear waste destination. Senator Harry Reid, who is the assistant minority leader in the House, has been fighting to keep nuclear waste out of the state of Nevada. Senator Reid has been in the senate since 1986 and he has influence on democrats and republicans as well. It will be interesting to see how the bill will do in the House. Furthermore, the State of Nevada and the City of Las Vegas have already shown that they will not agree with the bill even if it passes. Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman completely against the project, and he expressed that no nuclear waste will be transported through Las Vegas as long as he is the mayor. This will be an interesting battle between federal and local governments (given that the bill will pass). Media coverage is very important in this process. The Yucca Mountain project has a high societal significance, however intrinsic audience interest is not too high, which results in moderate media coverage. The reason for this is that citizens do not understand how dangerous the nuclear waste really is. Local media has extensive coverage on this issue, but this would have to be exposed nationwide to educate citizens better about the dangerous of the project, including the transportation of the hazardous material. Citizens in the Midwest might not care about what is going on in Nevada, however if they realize that nuclear waste will be transferred through their cities they might pay more attention to ...