"Kirk Urges President to Halt Canadian Proposal to Store Nuclear Waste Near Great Lakes"

U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL)U.S. Senator Mark Kirk (Republican-Illinois, photo left) has issued a press release, and the text of a letter he sent to President Obama, calling for administration action to protect the Great Lakes against Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) proposed "low" and "intermediate" level radioactive waste dump, targeted at the Lake Huron shoreline at Bruce Nuclear Generating Station.

Sen. Kirk stated: “As co-chair of the Senate Great Lakes Task Force, I am fighting to keep our lakes free from toxins that could harm our precious ecological system and threaten the drinking water source for more than 30 million Americans. Storing nuclear waste underground along the shores of the Great Lakes directly jeopardizes the wellbeing of this shared natural resource, and I urge the President to work with the Canadian Government to postpone this decision and protect our lakes for generations to come.”

In 2011, and again in 2013, Sen. Kirk sent letters of concern to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator. Last year, and again this year, Sen. Kirk has introduced resolutions of disapproval for the site.

In his letter to President Obama, Sen. Kirk stated: "This matter presents an immediate threat to all the Great Lakes, and I ask you to use all diplomatic means available to urge the Canadian government to delay its decision-making process until the proposal has been given all due consideration by the [International Joint Commission."

Sen. Kirk warned: "As a permanent repository, the Kincardine, Ontario facility would hold 7 million cubic feet of nuclear waste for thousands of years. Any leak during that time could unleash toxic material throughout the Great Lakes Basin, and contaminate the largest surface freshwater system in the world while causing irreparable damage to the more than 3,500 plants and animals that inhabit the ecosystem."

More information about Canada's Great Lakes shore radioactive waste dump is posted under Beyond Nuclear's Canada website section.

Help stop dangerous radioactive waste dumps! Contact Congress and the White House today!

The lethal legcy of radioactive waste has mounted since 1942, and we don't even know what to do with the first cupful. It's time to stop making it!Radioactive waste wars have been declared, yet again, by the nuclear power industry and its friends in high places.

In the U.S., House Republicans hope to revive the Yucca Mountain dump for high-level radioactive waste, despite Nevada's long-standing objections. Yucca is not only geologically unsuitable, and would leak massively if ever opened, but it is also Western Shoshone Indian land, and they don't want the dump!

Senate Republicans will likely make their own move to resurrect the Yucca dump via an amendment on the Senate floor. See Beyond Nuclear's Yucca Mountain website section for recent updates.

In Canada, the federal Environment Minister will act by September 6th -- but could act at any time -- on the recommendation by the federal Joint Review Panel to approve the environmental assessment, and go forward with licensing the construction and operation of Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) proposed "low" and "intermediate" level radioactive waste dump on the Great Lakes shoreline. See Beyond Nuclear's Canada website section for recent updates.

Please contact your U.S. Senators and U.S. Representative right away. (You can get patched through to your Senators' and Representative's offices via the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121; fax numbers and postal addresses, as well as web forms, can be found at each of your Congress Members' websites, via the links above.)

Urge your Members of Congress to oppose the Yucca Mountain dump's revival, as included in the U.S. House Energy and Water Appropriations bill, and likely to be introduced as an amendment to the U.S. Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations bill.

Also urge your Congress Members to co-sponsor bipartisan resolutions opposing OPG's Great Lakes shore radioactive waste dump. (In the House, the resolution is H. Res. 194; in the Senate, the resolution is S. Res. 134. See the list of current co-sponsors, below.)

Please also contact President Obama at the White House. Thank him for his long-standing, strong opposition to the Yucca dump, and urge him to continue to stand strong against congressional Republican efforts to revive the cancelled project. Also urge President Obama to take action to stop Canada's Great Lakes shoreline radioactive waste dump, before it's too late, in order to protect the drinking water supply for tens of millions of people on the U.S. side of the Great Lakes, in eight U.S. states (from west to east: MN, WI, IL, IN, MI, OH, PA, NY).

Current co-sponsors of the congressional resolutions opposing Canada's Great Lakes shoreline radioactive waste dump:

U.S. Rep. Kildee (D-MI) has taken the lead in the U.S. House with H. Res. 194, and has been joined by the following 19 co-sponsors: Benishek (R-MI); Bishop (R-MI); Conyers (D-MI); Dingell (D-MI); Dold (R-IL); Duckworth (D-IL); Duffy (R-WI); Fudge (D-OH); Gibson (R-NY); Higgins (D-NY); Joyce (R-OH); Kaptur (D-OH); Lawrence (D-MI); Levin (D-MI); Miller (R-MI); Moolenaar (R-MI); Renacci (R-OH); Schakowsky (D-IL); Slaughter (D-NY); and Trott (R-MI).

U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) has taken the lead in the U.S. Senate on S. Res. 134, and has been joined by the following four co-sponsors: Baldwin (D-WI); Durbin (D-IL); Kirk (R-IL); and Peters (D-MI).

"Nuclear Waste Hard To Handle For GOP Candidates"

Forget about a hot potato -- how about a radioactive hot potato?!

As reported by Jason Plautz in National Journal, "Two early voting states are on opposite ends of the Yucca Mountain divide." South Carolina -- the third presidential primary after Iowa's caucus and New Hampshire's primary -- stores a large amount of irradiated nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste at its many commercial atomic reactors, as well as at the Savannah River Site nuclear weapons complex. The powers that be in South Carolina have long been in favor of dumping its radioactive wastes on Nevada, even though the Silver State already suffered the ravages of four decades of nuclear weapons testing, and has not one single atomic reactor within its borders.

But the Nevada caucus comes just days after the South Carolina primary in the presidential campaign. Republican presidential candidates are now trying to walk that tightrope, dangling above a mountain of radioactive waste 73 years high.

As Hannah Northey at E&E Daily has reported, U.S. Sen. Dean Heller (R-NV) is keeping tabs on which Republican presidential candidates support the Yucca dump, and which oppose it. Members of the latter category are much more likely to receive his support, Sen. Heller had indicated.

"Yucca Mountain left out of Senate funding bill" -- but for how much longer?!

As reported by Devin Henry in The Hill, U.S. Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) has not included funding in the Energy and Water Development section of the Senate Appropriations bill to revive the cancelled Yucca Mountain, Nevada radioactive waste dump. However, Alexander -- a long time Yucca dump supporter -- has made clear that the Senate floor debate of the Appropriations bill would be a good place to add Yucca dump funding by amendment.

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), the Democratic Leader of the U.S. Senate, can be expected to fight any such amendment with everything he's got. After all, he's been successfully leading the fight against the Yucca dump since the "Screw Nevada bill" of 1987, when he was a rookie Senator.

President Obama has also opposed the Yucca dump as "unworkable" -- de-funding the project, and even moving to withdraw the U.S. Department of Energy's application to construct and operate the high-level radioactive waste dump in Nevada.

The U.S. House has included funding for Yucca's U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) licensing proceeding. A conference committee between House and Senate appropriators would be another juncture for Yucca dump opponents to remain vigilant against funding being added to the bill.

Alexander's Senate Appropriations Bill language also includes funding for centralized, or consolidated, storage of commercial irradiated fuel -- something opponents have dubbed de facto permanent parking lot dumps. Nuclear boosters near the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in NM, as well as at Waste Control Specialists in Texas, have expressed interest in becoming consolidated interim storage sites -- for a price. Alexander's provision, supported by ranking Democrat Dianne Feinstein on the Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee, would launch unprecedented numbers of risky high-level radioactive waste trucks, trains, and barges onto the roads, rails, and waterways.

"Obama Administration threatens veto on nuclear funding bill"

As reported by Jaclyn Brandt in FierceEnergy, President Obama has threated to veto the House Energy and Water Appropriations bill (HR 2028), unless changes are made -- such as to better promote renewables.

The very pro-nuclear bill also includes $175 million for the U.S. Department of Energy and Nuclear Regulatory Commission to revive the Yucca Mountain, Nevada high-level radioactive waste dump licensing proceeding. The process was halted when the Obama administration effectively cancelled the project in 2009-2010, de-funding the dump, and even moving to withdraw the application to construct and operate the repository.

As reported by the article:

The president's statement also said the funding for the Yucca Mountain project is a "rejection of the practical solutions proposed in the President's nuclear waste strategy."

U.S. Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), who has successfully led the opposition to the Yucca dump since the "Screw Nevada bill" of 1987, can be expected to yet again block any additional funding from being wasted on the Yucca dump.