2 million plus pounds of nuclear waste in South Dade, Fl.

[ensho]

FPL quietly seeking zoning change for nuclear storage


After more than two million pounds of nuclear waste has piled up in South Dade over 35 years, Florida Power & Light is quietly seeking a zoning change to allow six acres of its Turkey Point site to be used for new above-ground storage casks.

Environmentalists have known for a long time FPL planned to use casks but they knew little, if anything, about the need for a zoning change, which generally allows for public discussion that could lead to modifications of the utility's plans.

-snip-

FPL's problem is that it's running out of space to store waste at Turkey Point, and there is no place in the country to send it. For more than a decade, the feds have been trying to create a national nuclear waste facility under Yucca Mountain in the Nevada desert, but it's been stopped by vehement opposition from environmentalists and local residents.

Marc LaFerrier, director of the Miami-Dade Planning and Zoning Department, said he didn't know if FPL's request with the county could be dealt with through paperwork or would require a public hearing. ``This is a little different than the normal plan approval.''

-snip-

In a May 14 memo to the state, LaFerrier wrote that to get zoning approval, FPL must produce a plan showing a drainage system on the storage site would stop runoff water from going into Biscayne Bay or other surface water areas, even at times of severe flooding caused by hurricanes.

-snip-

At present, according to federal reports, the waste at Turkey Point increases by 40 tons each year, and that could double with two reactors in about a decade.

-snip-

But at least it will be green. For the six-acre cask site, the county is requiring ''nine trees per acre and 10 shrubs for every tree,'' although these can be planted somewhere else if FPL chooses.
-------------------------------


how's your neighborhood nuke plant doing?


"For more than 30 years, FPL has stored the Turkey Point waste in stainless steel-lined covered concrete pools. Those pools will be filled in the next two years, Veenstra wrote in an e-mail, and FPL plans to switch to dry-cask storage in silo-shaped structures six feet wide and 16 feet tall, consisting of ''stainless steel containers secured inside concrete modules,'' two to four feet thick."

and the life expectency of the stainless steel and the 2 to 4 ft. thick concrete is?

the regulations call for 2 to 4 ft. ??????


I'd rather not live in South Dade.

[imdjh]

1. Add that to the 250 lbs of waste in Palm Beach

And no, this isn't a crack about his weight.

[TheCowsCameHome]

6. 250 - And that's just his mouth.......

[madeline_con]

2. Two million pounds of nuclear waste at Turkey Point?

I'm sick of hearing this crap people spew about how we should build more nuclear plants. :mad:

[havocmom]

8. Yep. They tell us 'it's safe' and we have to build more plants to fight coal pollution

but they flat out refuse to entertain ideas to advance OTHER methods to produce electrical power that could be safer and not make a bunch of very toxic waste materials.

I fail to see that nuclear plants are really better than coal plants. With the nukes, we just put off the pollution problem for another generation (or hundreds of generations) to deal with.

Cleaner, renewable energy, not more plants creating more nuclear waste materials is what we need.

[madeline_con]

16. And the irony of this happening in "The Sunshine State" is crazy. n/t

[ensho]

17. you'd think solar would be used everywhere!

this is still a neo con state

[havocmom]

21. more like: neo-conNED state?

:shrug:

[Statistical]

33. Solar and other variable power sources can't handle baseline.

Power requirements aren't flat. They vary throughout the day based on the needs of consumers.

Production by solar, wind, other renewables VARY.

Solar produces nothing at night (obviously) but it also produces very (10%) little durring early morning and evening. For most locations there is a window of about 4-5 hours where it produces 90% of the power for the day.

We have no technology that can store 100s of Megawatts of power so it is ready when it is needed.

So even if we were 60% solar/wind/tidal/hydro/geo tomorrow (and it will take decades to get there) we would still need baseline production.

Right now we have 50% coal and that number hasn't changed in 3 decades.
Three decades ago people said no nuclear there must be something else.... so they built more coal plants.
As we have been shoveling in trillions of pounds of coal ever since.

There is no magical solution that will allow 100% of consumers needs to be met by solar/wind/tidal/hydro/geo.

We should strive to make that renewable number as high as possible.

However as long as we pretend baseline requirements don't exist the coal plants will keep belching out pollution and piling up ultra toxic fly ash.

[imdjh]

3. What does nuclear waste look like? Does anybody here know?

I have this mental picture of liquid mercury.

[ensho]

4. I think it is rods

as to size, etc., don't know

[Statistical]

25. Depends on what it is.

Media often uses "nuclear waste" like it is a single thing.

The most dangerous stuff are the depleted fuel rods. These are VERY radioactive.



However it is unlikely they have 2.5 million tons of fuel rods. All the reactors in the world since the invention of nuclear power haven't used that much fuel yet.

Most of it is other stuff that got contaminated.

When they replace say a pump assembly it is slightly radiactive. They can't just throw it in a dumpster so it goes stored also.
Everything coming out of the reactor plus disposable stuff (wipes, towels, rags, grease, etc) all gets stored.

The fuel is the most dangerous stuff. You could make a dirty bomb (not a true nuke but a dirty bomb) from one.
The fuel is a tiny minority of all of the waste.

90% of it looks like trash it is just radioactive.
10% looks like those fuel rods in the photo above.

[monmouth]

5. Get me outta here!...n/t

[sarcasmo]

7. How is the water in South Dade?

[havocmom]

9. self heating?

:shrug:

[sarcasmo]

10. I would imagine it has a few colors.

[havocmom]

19. a dripping bathroom faucet could eliminate any need for a night-light

[ensho]

11. sometimes the beaches are closed because of sewage

they don't call it sewage, use other words

doubt they check for nuclear

[Javaman]

12. Man, these guys really need to read the grand jury decision on Rocky Flats...

they tried these concrete casks back then. After a few years, they turned into swiss cheese and leaked the stuff into the ground water.

But hey, no worries, it will be all underwater by the end of the century, right? RIGHT?

:banghead:

[SidDithers]

13. Compared to the ~575 billion pounds of CO2 generated...

if the same amount of electricity had been generated by a coal-fired station, generating 2 x 693 = 1386 MWe, over a 35 year period.

(using accepted rate of 1.35 lbs of CO2 / kWh for electricity generated from coal)



Sid

[Statistical]

20. Even worse.

fly ash is the most toxic stuff out there.
the coal burns off leaving behind all the heavy metals, radioactive isotopes and other "gunk".

People think coal is "pure coal/carbon" but it isn't.
A coal plants produces far more of that toxic stuff than a nuclear plant does.

It is horribly dangerous, toxic, and there is lot of it.

The big problem is we have no strategy to safely store all this waste in one location.
It is spread out all over the country in cooling pools, and concrete casks (protected by a chain link fence).

Even people who hate nuclear should accept we can't just turn the plants off. Even if we went to 0% nuclear (which I think would be a huge mistake) it would take decades.

We need a location to store all of this safely and SECURELY. Armed guards, 24/7 possibly a small military base. Uniform storage standards (i.e. everything in the same type of container), sensors, routine inspections, etc).

[havocmom]

22. Straw man

It doesn't have to be 'coal or nuclear'.

As mentioned above, nuclear's advantage over coal is it puts the pollution problem off to other generations to deal with. Some solution!

There are other means.

[SidDithers]

27. There are no other means that generate the amount of electricity needed...

and certainly, there have not been other means used over the 35 years that the OP is talking about in their post.

So, no, it's not a strawman.

Sid

[havocmom]

29. Today, no. Tomorrow, oh let's give it a try, shall we?

Why create more pollution rather than work toward the goal of no pollution?

Question, for you in particular: Do you remember that nuclear engineer feller who installed solar panels on the roof of the White House? I wonder why he did that. I do not wonder why he was derided, ridiculed unfairly for his efforts to lead us to better solutions. $$ that's why.

Those who profit from the status quo don't much care about what future problems they leave in their wake.

[Statistical]

31. Replacing power generation with solar is GREAT!

However it can't replace baseline requirements.

Solar can't adjust to load changes.

What are you going to do if a grid of 100% renewable is producing more power than needed?
Even worse how do you handle times when it produces less?


We should put solar on EVERY govt building.
We should put natural gas micro turbines in every neighborhood (far cleaner than coal and reduces reliance on long haul production).
We should build large wind projects both onshore and offshore (sorry Kennedy you need to help out 2).
We should start a project to equip 10,000,000 homes with solar power and/or hot water in next decade.
We should have a 10 year plan to go to 0% coal and help the displaced workers (build solar production plants in hard hit states?).
We should shut down the most polluting and oldest plants.
We should work with international allies to standardize nuclear reactors (most are custom built which leads to custom problems, and need for custom parts).


Despite that we still need baseline energy production.
Something to handle the base load.
Something to act as a fallback when renewable are producing enough that minute or hour or day.
Something that can scale back when renewable are producing too much.

[Statistical]

30. Baseline generation can NOT be accomplished by solar, wind, or other variable sources.

What happens if the grid need 8500 MW of electricity but it is a cloudy day and solar is only producing 4300 MW. Massive brownouts?


We can replace 60-70% of our powergrid with variable sources but we still need baseline generation.

So your choices are:
coal
natural gas turbines
nuclear reactors

I would like to see nuclear reactors plus some NG turbines (much cleaner, much more efficient than coal).
Nuclear Reactors have problems adjusting rapidly to changing energy needs. A NG turbine can handle a variable load and handle rapid load changes.

This belief by environmentalist that we can go 100% solar, wind, tidal, geothermal is not based on any reality.
As a result we keep the status quo = BIG COAL!

A grid that is
30% nuclear
20% natural gas (newer 60% efficient dual cycle turbines)
50% renewable

would cut our pollution & CO2 from energy by 70%-80% not to mention be able to handle replacing millions of ICE cars with electric cars and/or produce the massive amount of H2 needed to replace gas.

However that isn't acceptable because of the 100% renewable myth.
So likely when I die in 40-50 years we will still be 50% coal!

[dixiegrrrrl]

14. Rising sea levels, severe hurricane winds, flodding...whatpossibly could go wrong?

We did not even have a direct hit from Katrina, but an offshore oil derrick was uprooted,
blown in from the Gulf and smashed against one of our bridges.
If Fla. keeps on going, they could easily contaminate the entire Gulf.

[konnichi wa]

15. A ton of depleted nuclear fuel would fit in a small refrigerator.

They can rent my back 40 for storage, it wouldn't bother me at all.

[ensho]

18. would your neighbors agree? do you have kids?

nt

[OmahaBlueDog]

23. Perhaps the better question is whether the neighbors are safer with the waste from the coal plants

..or whether the neighbors and kids are safer from the waste from the oil burning plants in addition to the military and foreign policy decisions we have made to keep oil flowing.

Don't misunderstand -- I also question why South Florida isn't covered with solar panels, but I'll take the nukes over the coal & oil plants any day.

[konnichi wa]

24. Yes and yes.

Years ago there was some justification for opposing nuclear power but it has been proven far safer than anything else that can approximate the available output. Nowadays it is simply stupid and irrational to campaign against it.

[ensho]

26. guess I'll stay stupid and irrational

nt

[konnichi wa]

28. That, my friend, is entirely up to you.

:shrug:

[ThomWV]

32. That is an absurdly high number

[konnichi wa]

34. Maybe not...200 tons is only about 12 x 12 x 12 feet.

It could fit into small Ryder truck.

The tires, of course would go flat.
:evilgrin: