|
By JIM FABER
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
843-706-8137
Published Wednesday, April 11, 2007
Two South Carolina sites are among 11 finalists for a U.S. Department
of Energy nuclear fuel recycling center, an advanced recycling reactor
and an advanced fuel cycle research facility.
Local residents will have their first chance to ask questions about one
of the sites tonight in Bluffton and a chance to learn about the other
next week.
A consortium of representatives of the Savannah River Site -- a
310-square-mile Department of Energy nuclear site on the Savannah River
about 15 miles south of Aiken -- will host a meeting at the Holiday Inn
Express at 35 Bluffton Road in Bluffton from 5:30 until 8:30 tonight.
The Savannah River Site is the proper location for the new facilities,
which would recycle spent nuclear fuel, because the infrastructure and
security are already in place, said Fred Humes, director of the Aiken
& Edgefield Counties Economic Development Partnership, one of the
members of the consortium.
The high-tech facility would also have a great economic impact on the area, Humes said.
But not everyone wants an increased nuclear presence in the state. Sara
Barczak, safe-energy director for the nonprofit, nonpartisan Southern
Alliance for Clean Energy, said inviting the world to send its spent
nuclear fuel here for recycling isn't a good idea.
Recycling the fuel is "the most polluting part of the nuclear cycle,"
Barczak said, noting there are already large stores of waste at the
Savannah River Site.
The other possible S.C. location for the new facilities is the Energy
Solutions site in Barnwell. The nuclear dump there is about 100 miles
northwest of southern Beaufort County, but it has a direct connection
to the Lowcountry by water. Some of the site's shallow
nuclear-waste-disposal trenches are less than a half-mile from a small
waterway that feeds into the Savannah River, which provides 60 to 70
percent of the drinking water here.
Energy Solutions will hold a public meeting for the potential new
facilities on Tuesday, April 17, from 6 to 9 p.m. at Fennell Elementary
School in Yemassee.
Thanks to Sara Barczak of Southern Alliance for Clean Energy for the link.
|
