Despite fears of uncertainty, a huge underground repository in southeastern New Mexico being used for the disposal of plutonium-contaminated nuclear waste from the defense program has been running for almost a decade and is demonstrating great benefits — short-term and possibly long-term — to the public.
With the building completed seven years ago, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plan (WIPP) is the world’s first underground repository for the permanent disposal of nuclear waste. Thus far, more than 81,000 containers of long-lived transuranic waste have been placed in the facility.
DOE manages WIPP, and its successful operation after years of litigation by anti-nuclear groups and efforts by the state of New Mexico to stop construction of the repository, portray that DOE is absolutely capable of handling another controversial project — the storage of spent fuel from nuclear power plants at Yucca Mountain.
DOE’s experience with WIPP is not unlike the one it is currently having with the Yucca Mountain project.
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Exelon is “actively” evaluating eight sites in Texas as possible locations for a new nuclear reactor. Exelon is actually the fourth company last week to say it wants to apply for a license to build a nuclear plant to meet growing power needs.
It looks like some areas in desolate West Texas might be seeing more action now than ever before due to all of the hype of building a nuclear plant. Residents of Mentone, Texas, which is in the least populated county in the U.S. are hoping for the economic boom that comes along with the growing interest and revenue of an energy boom.
Of the 19 preliminary proposals for new U.S. reactors, Texas has attracted the most interest, with four proposals, according to NEI. However, Exelon is also considering adding reactors in Illinois and as part of NuStart, a 12-member consortium looking at sites in Tennessee and Mississippi. Both NRG and TXU (two other Texas generators) have said that they would like to reduce the risk of building new reactors by attracting partners.