Las Vegas Sun

I'm amazed at how poorly informed all three of the candidates were on the Yucca Mountain issue. Either that, or they are pandering for votes. All three seem to think that somehow there is no science being done to support this project, when in fact, the science has been going on for over 20 years with literally thousands of our best minds devoted to the project. Mr. Obama wants to get a group of experts together to discuss the problem; well that is a good idea but it was already done 20 years ago by a little group called the National Academy of Sciences, who recommended geologic disposal as the preferred option. Mr. Edwards talks about some new science that had changed his opinion on the subject, but he never says what that new science is. He also talks about "forged documents" by which I presume his is referring to a couple of emails by some disgruntled USGS employees who were mad about having to do all of the quality assurance paperwork; several committees and the NRC have look in-depth into this issue and concluded that the modeling study in question is valid; to be safe, though, the DOE decided to do the whole set of analyses over from scratch. They all agree we need a solution to nuclear waste, but they want to throw away 20 years of research and $2billion just for a few Nevada votes. Will the Yucca Mountain project be safe for Nevada? That question is supposed to be decided by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission after the DOE submits a license application. The decision should not be made by a politician who made poorly informed promises to get votes.