Spent Fuel "Biggest Security Threat" for U.S.

"The nuclear crisis in Japan provides an impetus for Congress to confront a failed national policy on dealing with spent fuel from U.S. reactors, witnesses told a Senate subcommittee yesterday.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Ernest Moniz called for an accelerated transfer of spent nuclear fuel rods from storage in water-covered pools at reactor sites to concrete and steel 'dry' casks. Secondly, Moniz said, the federal government should create several regional facilities to store the containers for an extended period until a new strategy for managing nuclear waste fuel can be put in place -- a position he and MIT colleagues have argued for since before the emergency at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex.

'The Fukushima problems with spent fuel pools co-located with reactors will undoubtedly lead to a re-evaluation of spent fuel management strategies,' Moniz told members of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development."

Peter Behr reports for ClimateWire March 31, 2011.

SEE ALSO:

"While Nuclear Waste Piles Up in U.S., Billions in Fund to Handle It Sit Unused" (ProPublica)

"A Texas-Sized Plan for Nuclear Waste" (Mother Jones)

"Straight Talk About Spent Fuel Risks" (Las Vegas Sun)

"Nuclear Waste: America's 'Biggest Security Threat'" (CNN Money)

"Fukushima Warning: Us Has 'utterly Failed' To Address Risk of Spent Fuel" (Christian Science Monitor)