Nuclear Waste

Energy Secretary Steven Chu said the proposed Yucca Mountain site is no longer an option for storing highly radioactive nuclear waste, brushing aside criticism from several Republican lawmakers. Instead, Chu said at a hearing in Washington, D.C., that the Obama administration thinks the nearly 60,000 tons of waste in the form of used reactor fuel can remain at nuclear power plants while a new, comprehensive plan for waste disposal is developed. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Obama's rival for president last year, asked whether it was true that Obama and Chu viewed Yucca Mountain as no longer an option.

The beleaguered San Onofre nuclear power plant north of San Diego has been idle since January 2012 after the discovery of unsafe reactor conditions. The operator is now seeking approval to restart one of the plant's two reactors at 70% power for a five-month test. The plant's license expires in less than 10 years. Overlooked in the concerns about the short-term future of San Onofre are the 1,400 tons of spent nuclear fuel stored at the coastal site. Regardless of the immediate dilemma, San Onofre is destined to follow in the footsteps of nine former nuclear power plants (including two in California)

Re "House OKs Nuclear Waste Site Bill," March 23: There is a simple solution to all this "NIMBY." Pass a bill that the nuclear waste will be apportioned to each state that has nuclear facilities, and the states can decide where to put it in their own sites. DOVE MENKES Fullerton

A key contractor involved in the troubled cleanup at the former Hanford, Wash., nuclear weapons complex admitted Tuesday that it had engaged in criminal time card fraud and agreed to pay $18.5 million to settle the allegations. The project, which involves construction of a $13.4-billion treatment plant to process highly radioactive bomb waste, is years behind schedule, has exceeded its original cost estimate and is paralyzed by technical issues that have halted the work. The problems, however, have not dimmed political support for the project, given the threat that about 56 million gallons of radioactive sludge at the site could eventually leak and reach the nearby Columbia River.

In a pool of water just a football field away from Lake Michigan, about 1,000 tons of highly radioactive fuel from the scuttled Zion Nuclear Power Station are waiting for someplace else to spend a few thousand years. The wait just got longer. A lot longer. President Obama's proposed budget all but kills the Yucca Mountain project, the controversial Nevada site where the U.S. nuclear industry's spent fuel rods were to spend eternity.

WASHINGTON-- Sidestepping a new debate over the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, the Senate confirmed two of President Obama's nominees to the beleaguered Nuclear Regulatory Commission - including a critic of the proposed waste dump in Nevada who will become the panel's new chair. The Senate on Friday confirmed Allison Macfarlane, a geologist who has raised questions about the viability of the site 90 miles north of Las Vegas, despite earlier opposition to her nomination from some Republicans.

WASHINGTON -- The chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission who was championed by watchdogs for his cautious approach to nuclear power but criticized by Republicans in Congress for an overly hard-charging style has announced he will step down. Gregory Jaczko, who led the commission's efforts to protect Americans in Japan during the nuclear crisis at Fukushima and played a key role in fighting the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain as a former top aide to Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.)

A state ballot initiative proposed for next fall would force California's two nuclear power plants to immediately shut down, causing rolling blackouts, spikes in electricity rates and billions of dollars in economic losses each year, a nonpartisan analyst has found. The report by the Legislative Analyst's Office says the shutdown of San Onofre in northern San Diego County and Diablo Canyon in San Luis Obispo County would disrupt one of the state's most reliable power sources and have profound effects on government and the economy.

No radioactive leaks have been found following an explosion Monday at a nuclear-waste facility in southern France that killed one person and injured four others — including one person who was left with serious burns. None of the injured were exposed to radiation, and the cause of the blast remains unknown, according to a statement from France's Nuclear Safety Authority. The explosion was said to be under control within an hour of the blast that occurred shortly about 12:37 p.m. The explosion took place within an industrial oven used at the nuclear-waste processing facility called Centraco.

The Energy Department has asserted that Bechtel Corp. underplayed safety risks from equipment it is installing at the nation's largest nuclear waste cleanup project, according to government records. A federal engineering review team found in late July that Bechtel's safety evaluation of key equipment at the plant at the Hanford site in Washington state was incomplete and that "the risks are more serious" than Bechtel acknowledged when it sought approval to continue with construction, the documents say. Senior scientists at the site said in emails obtained by The Times that Bechtel's designs for tanks and mixing equipment are flawed, representing such a massive risk that work should be stopped on that part of the construction project.

For nearly four weeks, Japanese emergency crews have been spraying water on the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors, a desperate attempt to avert the calamity of a full meltdown. Now, that improvised solution to one nuclear nightmare is spawning another: what to do with the millions of gallons of water that has become highly radioactive as it washes through the plant. The water being used to try to cool the reactors and the dangerous spent fuel rods is leaking through fissures inside the plant, seeping down through tunnels and passageways to the lowest levels, where it is accumulating into a sea of lethal waste.

U.S. nuclear waste: A March 23 Section A article about U.S. nuclear waste management said a 2005 National Research Council study recommended that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission force utilities to partially unload pools of spent fuel rods at their nuclear power plants and move their oldest waste into dry casks, which are considered much safer. The council did not make a formal recommendation but advised the NRC to determine whether such a change would be prudent. Sexual abuse lawsuit: In the March 22 Section A, a brief news item about a civil lawsuit alleging sexual abuse by a priest in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia misspelled the name of a parish cited by the man who filed the suit.