Posted on 06/12/2011 1:37:51 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
WASHINGTON — In the two years that Gregory Jaczko has led the nation's independent nuclear agency, his actions to delay, hide and kill work on a disputed dump for high-level radioactive waste have been called "bizarre," `'unorthodox" and "illegal."
These harsh critiques haven't come just from politicians who have strong views in favor of the Yucca Mountain waste site in Nevada. They've come from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's own scientists and a former agency chairman.
An inspector general's report released last week exposed the internal strife under Jaczko. The internal watchdog said he intimidated staff members who disagreed with him and withheld information from members of the commission to gain their support.
The tactics disclosed in the investigative report are just the latest in a saga unfolding since President Barack Obama put the former aide to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, the Nevada Democrat who is Yucca's leading opponent, at the helm of the agency in May 2009. Less than a year after Jaczko was named chairman, the Energy Department sought to pull back its application to construct the dump.
[snip]
Emails and documents gathered by investigators on three House committees and reviewed by The Associated Press, along with interviews with NRC staff members, paint an even more damning portrait of the NRC leader. They also raise questions about whether the agency's independence and scientific integrity have been compromised to advance a political agenda.
"He was put there to stop Yucca Mountain, and that is what he is doing," said former NRC chairman and commissioner Dale E. Klein. Klein was appointed chairman in 2006 by President George W. Bush and left in March 2010.
(Excerpt) Read more at chron.com ...
Full article is worth a read.
It's a big place. They'll never notice ~ but it's a warning to the people of that state to NOT ever vote for Harry Reid or people like him again.
He's not dumb. He's not failing to achieve his noble goals. He's having spectacular success in everything he has tried to achieve. There is a power behind him, and we are all under the harrow.
“...After fighting Jaczko for its release, congressional aides who reviewed a draft of the analysis say it showed that NRC experts determined Yucca was safe. While Jaczko had not seen the document, his decision to halt the review meant the staff’s conclusions were stripped from the report...”
A very good friend was directly involved with Yucca Mt. I won’t give out his phone or cell so yu are going to have to take it from me that the place is safe. How safe, I’d let any and all of my family camp out in there.
I was shocked this was written up by AP and published in the Houston Chronicle.
It’s damning (not unexpected from these guys). Will this get any coverage?
Drudge?
If a Republican was President, you would call 60 Minutes or the New York Times.
As I recall, the physical permit app for Yucca filled three tracto-trailors.
It was approved, then cancellled.
I really dislike our government.
No kidding.
So was last week’s WSJ story on this guy.
I worked at Yucca in ‘97, and it is a great facility. Unlike many of the tunnels in Area 12 (weapons side of the NTS) it is very dry.
Once the casks go in there, that stuff isn’t going anywhere.
I wrote the definitive history of Yucca Mountain. It is in a rewrite and this has to go into it. Out in another month or so.
Thank you. Do you have a link?
June 10, 2011 - WSJ: Report Slams U.S. Nuclear Regulator "The seven-month investigation that culminated in the report is the topic of a congressional hearing scheduled for next week."
Bump.
Yes: 95%
No:5%
I rounded numbers.
We used to joke that Yucca wouldn’t be killed off until every government contractor got a piece of the action.
My impression was that Nevada was fine with it as long as the money came in.
I oppose the whole idea of a nuclear waste storage facility. There is too much valuable material in "spent fuel" to bury it forever. It's the uranium and plutonium in the "spent" fuel that have long lives, and they're valuable nuclear fuels. Plutonium and U238 should be recycled in reactors. The fission products could be separated out and stored, if there is no further use for them. They don't need to be stored for geologic ages. In something like 700 years they will have decayed to less radioactivity than the original uranium ore. Storing the fission products has the virtue that if we ever figure out a use for any of those isotopes, they'll be easily recoverable.
The Obama administration is a criminal cabal greater in scope, intensity and vision than any evil enterprise in history. In a few short years violent men have destroyed the economies of countless nations and brought the global movement of democracy to its knees.
Any foolish notion that they will abdicate peacefully is doomed. They have achieved a level of power and authority that can only be ended by open revolution. They will not withdraw nor will it be possible to adjudicate their enterprises through legal means. They have abdicated any commitment to the law, the constitution or civil society.
The Obama administratioon is, by any standard, a demonic force sitting at the source of all worldly power.
Almost every county in the USA has a statue on its’ lawn. The really hot stuff could be encapsulated in glass, lead and steel and buried deeply beneath these statues. Or beneath the courthouse, never to be disturbed. If anyone wanted to recover them, they’d have a lot of digging to do. Yucca Mtn. is no doubt safe enough.
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