Tom Gorman on the sheer lunacy of adding 55,000 tons of nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain when the first 77,000 tons are already called unsafe

Wednesday, April 5, 2006 | 7:19 a.m.

As if it wasn't bad enough that Washington and the nuclear power industry want to plug Yucca Mountain with 77,000 tons of spent fuel rods, the Bush administration had the gall to announce Tuesday that it wants to throw another 55,000 tons or so into its bowels.

I mean, the administration can't assure our safety with its current plan to deposit 77,000 tons of nuclear power plant fuel rods at Yucca Mountain. And now it wants to stuff Yucca Mountain to the gills with high-level radioactive material?

But then, I know better than to expect logic from the president's people.

The proposal unveiled Tuesday calls for allowing Yucca Mountain to be filled to capacity. Federal scientists estimate the capacity at about 132,000 tons.

And the reason? So the government won't have to go out and find another site as the inventory of spent fuel rods builds up.

Well, you can't blame them for that. They know nowhere else in the country would allow a repeat of this Yucca Mountain fiasco. This is their only game in town, and their way of defending the indefensible is to thump their chest and try to bully us even more.

"This proposed legislation will help provide stability, clarity and predictability to the Yucca Mountain project," Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Tuesday.

Huh? That makes no sense whatsoever. It was a prepared statement, which tells me that he needs to hire some better PR people.

Seriously, this is scary, but I guess I shouldn't be surprised. If we were a child, this would be the case of an abusive parent who has been slapping and kicking us for years who, even as we complain, pummels us for good measure.

With this latest move, Yucca Johnny is going to have a lot of explaining to do to the kids who visit his Web site. Yucca yucca this, Johnny!

The Nuclear Energy Institute, the trade organization that fronts for the nuclear power plant operators, hired former Nevada governor Robert List a few years ago to extoll the potential economic benefits of storing their nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain.

His mission: explain how Nevada can make lemonade out of radioactive lemons.

As recently as Monday, over a lunch of shrimp, pasta and carrot cake, he tried to sell about 50 members of the Rotary Club on the merits of working with the government on allowing the use of Yucca Mountain.

There's no point fighting it, he said; let's use it as a bargaining chip to get some money for Nevada.

Well, that's like letting your spouse cheat on you because he'll buy you nice jewelry and take you on that cruise to make up for it. And now, despite all that contrition, you learn that your spouse isn't just cheating on you, but wants to line up more mistresses.

At Lawry's, when List asked the Rotary Club members if they believed that Yucca Mountain's development as a radioactive graveyard was inevitable, almost everyone raised their hands. Should we take the money and run, he asked? Yes, the Rotarians said.

Well, no we shouldn't.

I've got full confidence that our congressional delegation, led by Sens. Harry Reid and John Ensign, will put a halt to this nonsense.

Yucca Mountain is wrong at 77,000 tons, at 132,000 tons and at any number of tons. The administration's increasing assault on Yucca Mountain will rekindle the fire in our belly to fight back.