Op Eds

TMI-Alert's Eric Epstein and nuclear activist Gene Stilp discuss, with the Patriot-News editorial board, nuclear power, electrical deregulation, alternative energy and their challenges to PPL's application to construct a new nuclear reactor at Bell Bend near Berwick, Pa. 

videos.pennlive.com/patriot-news/2009/07/activists_gene_stilp_and_eric.html 

By Marlene Lang 

Think you are the only one who can't manage to set aside a nest egg? Don't feel lonely. Your neighborhood nuclear power plant may be busily creating a remedial savings plan of its own. 

Twenty-six plants nationwide showed shortfalls in the funds they are required by federal law to set aside for dismantling the reactors someday and cleaning up after themselves. The closely watched Three Mile Island plant was not on the shortfall list. 

Every year the Nuclear Regulatory Commission checks on the state of so-called "decommissioning funds." Most years there are only a handful of plants running short of having those estimated costs laid up, usually four or five one official said. Those billions set aside for close-down and clean-up don't just pile up under a mattress, of course; the money is invested in the stock market. According to an Associated Press report, some $4.4 billion in decommissioning funds was lost in the downturn, even as the actual costs for shutting down plants has risen by $4.6 billion because of (I love this part) rising energy costs – and labor costs. 

By Marlene Lang

We all know trash ain't cheap.  

Electricity users have long paid a "garbage fee" on that portion of their power produced by nuclear reactors – a fee of one tenth of a cent per kilowatt-hour. The pennies go into the Nuclear Waste Fund. Since the fund was set up in 1982, about $30 billion has accumulated. 

The money has gone unused as politicians and scientists debate what is the best the location for a national dump where the radioactive waste will rest for thousands of years. 

Congress in 2002 designated Yucca Mountain in Nevada as the nation's – and possibly, the world's – nuclear waste repository site. But not every one thought the desert outside of Las Vegas was such a great location. Then-governor of Nevada Kenny Quinn vetoed Congress and the power-volley continues. 

Obama cut Yucca Mountain out of the budget and in response, a group of Republicans has sponsored a bill that would give the Nuclear Waste Fund back to the utilities and customers, if Yucca is not built and soon. 

As part of a course in Engineering and Public Policy Carnegie Mellon, graduate student Katie Bastine and fellow students are gathering input from communities that are home to nuclear power plants. 

Three Mile Island Alert will post the results of the survey as they are made available.

To link to the survey web site, go to: www.epp.cmu.edu/httpdocs/undergraduate/summaries/Nuclear/index.html

Here is a response from the former editor of Middletown's hometown newspaper:

 1. As an outside observer, what is your impression of the nuclear power plant?

It scares me and I wonder when something will go wrong, and if  people will know about it, if and when it does.