Whywe willne verbuild anew

nuclearpower plantin America

Mike Sylvester

I spent six years as a Reactor Operator on a nuclear submarine

in the United States Navy. I spent another two years as an
equipment operator in a civilian nuclear power plant in
Nebraska.

I strongly believe that nuclear power is a good source of energy

and is safe. The nuclear power industry has been nearly
destroyed by the United States government and its excessive
regulations. The regulations are so oppressive that I decided to
make a career change in 1998. I do not think we will ever
complete a new nuclear power plant in The United States.

The government has undermined nuclear power in two different

ways.

The first way is through excessive levels of government

regulation. The nuclear power plant I worked at (The Fort
Calhoun Nuclear Power Station) is a perfect example. In 1978
(Before Three Mile Island) the plant employed about 80 people,
mostly equipment operators and security guards. The plant
was operated in a safe and efficient manner.

Today, that same plant employs about 550 people. The plant
makes the same amount of power today that it did in 1978, it
just costs a whole lot more to produce that power. The plant
hired about 470 people just to comply with government
regulations after Three Mile Island.
The second problem is dealing with nuclear waste in the form of
spent fuel rods. These fuel rods are radioactive and must be
safely disposed of. The United States government decided to
tax all consumers of nuclear power in the country and collect
enough money so the government could fund and build a
disposal facility.

The Nuclear Waste Fund was created in 1982. One tenth of a

cent was charged for each kWh of electricity produced at a
nuclear power plant. By 1992 the government had collected
enough tax revenue to build a “state of the art” disposal facility.
Eventually, due to pressure from the Utility industry, the
government finally agreed to build the facility by Jan 31, 1998 at
Yucca Mountain.

Yucca Mountain was not completed in 1998 and approximately

sixty lawsuits were filed by the Utility industry and various
States against the Federal government for breach of contract.
It is estimated these lawsuits could cost the Federal
government (taxpayers) as much as fifty billion dollars.

In 2001 the Department of Energy completed a cost study and

determined it would cost four and a half billion dollars to build
the Yucca Mountain facility. Today, The Nuclear Waste Fund
has almost 16 billion dollars. This fund is currently used by
Congress to offset a small portion of the annual budget deficit.
The nuclear waste disposal facility at Yucca Mountain is no
where near completion, in fact, Department of Energy officials
now openly question whether the facility will be completed by
2010, twelve years after the promised completion date.

Since the disposal facility is not operational nuclear power

plants have been forced to store their own spent fuel rods at
their own cost.

President Bush wants to spur the growth of nuclear power

plants. I am all for nuclear power, that being said, President
Bush’s proposal makes no sense; in fact, it will waste billions of
dollars. The new Energy Bill provides almost six and a half
billion dollars of subsidies and direct spending to nuclear
power generation companies to convince them to build new
nuclear power plants. This is absurd. I would suggest The
Department of Energy finish Yucca Mountain before it gets
involved in building new nuclear power plants.

If we want new nuclear power plants to be constructed we need

to minimize government regulation. A new nuclear power plant
has not been started since 1973 due to excessive government
regulation. The free market should dictate which power
generation companies succeed and which ones fail, not the
government.

We have experience with failed nuclear power plants right here

in Indiana. Public Service Indiana proposed The Marble Hill
nuclear power plant in 1973 with an estimated cost of 700
million dollars. Construction on the plant began in 1977 and
expenses quickly doubled to about 1.4 billion dollars. In 1984
the project was halted and the plant was abandoned. This failed
project cost The State of Indiana 2.8 billion dollars.