What Is Legislative Requirements And Procedure?

•     Waste from nuclear energy stays radioactive for thousands of years. Great care has to be taken in storing this waste safely.

Since its discovery in the late 19th century, nuclear energy has been used in a diversity of areas such as atomic bombs, medicine, reducing pollution and food irradiation (Gupta, 2012). However, one of the biggest outcomes since this discovery is nuclear energy generation. This subject is largely controversial as it has many pros and cons. It is considered to be a more eco-friendly alternative source of electricity, as it emits less carbon emissions than coal-fired power stations, for example. Yet there still an environmental risk provided by the radio-active waste and its inability to be disposed of for 100,000 years (Phillips, 2012). Today in Australia there are no active nuclear power plants but that is predicted to change in the

Disposal of the high level nuclear waste that comes from nuclear power plants continues to be a big problem. It has been challenging and costly to find safe ways to store this waste. According to a report from the U.S National Academy of Sciences, it will take 3 million years for radioactive waste stored in the U.S. as of 1983 to decay to background levels (thinkquest.org). Who wants this amount of waste stored in the environment where they live? Currently in the U.S. nuclear power plants produce 3,000 tons of this high level waste each year (thinkquest.org). If nuclear power continues to be produced, this amount of waste will only continue to increase, causing a bigger dilemma as to what to do with the waste. As the waste is removed from the plant it still contains a high level of radiation. Exposure to radiation whether it occurs in the moving process or leakage from storage not only has a negative impact on the environment but also can pose a major health threat to humans. Based on the level of exposure, symptoms to humans can range from nausea and headaches to damage of nerve cells, loss of white blood cells and even death (think .org). The potential risk of exposure is not worth human life.

Along with the health risks that a nuclear waste site causes, there are also frequent earth quakes in the area that has been proposed and it is flood land. This poses a threat to not only the people in the area but the surrounding environment too. The radioactive waste would contaminate the water and the ground if there was a flood or earth quake and because Uranium has a half-life of 4.5 billion years none of us will be alive when the area is no longer

It is no secret that the lawmaking process is a long winding road of difficulty and roadblocks. Without a few representatives, a bill cannot be introduced in the House or into the Senate. If a bill is introduced to the House, it is named a number with the letters “HR” before it. If it is taken to the Senate, then it’s given a number with the letter “S” before it. When presenting a bill, what is most important is who supports said bill. Usually, more powerful members of Congress are wanted to sponsor a piece of legislation for support for its path of approval.

Studies have been performed on activities like disposing in the oceans, as well as on more exotic proposals such as deep geological disposal and launching into space. Some of these methods have been found wanting in terms of feasibility, costs and legal restrictions [1]. The management community in charge of nuclear waste disposal had come to the agreement that the only practical route for ensuring sufficient long-term isolation of HLW from the environment is deep geologic disposal[3].For example, Canada has focused on the concept of Deep Geological Disposal for long term management of nuclear wastes generated from nuclear activities. The Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) is in charge of disposing radioactive wastes in the country. Canada’s long term management plan for used nuclear fuel is called “Adaptive Phased Management” [3] ,The plan is to confine and isolate the used fuel in a suitable host-rock with the help of a multiple barrier system. Selection of the site is based on screening of potential sites followed by a preliminary assessment of

Laws are the foundation of our society, they keep citizens safe and preserve our individual freedoms. Before a law is enacted it must start out as a bill. Each bill has an extensive process it must go through to become a law of the United States of America. This process of approval ensures that those three different parts of government agree on the bill before it becomes a law. In order to become law, a bill needs to be approved by the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the President of the United States. The law-making process, or Legislative process, can be broken into two basic steps, proposition and approval. These steps are the traditional and basic steps. As time went on, these steps have been altered and changed. A bill

The word “Nuclear” instills fear in the general American public’s mind. The simple utter of said word brings memories of huge mushrooms clouds and destruction, or the thought of communism and 50 years of an uncertain, yet terrifying Cold War. Whatever it may be the fact of the matter is that Americans are extremely afraid of anything that has the word Nuclear in it. In the article “Nuclear Waste” published in 2008 by physics professor, and winner of the MacArthur Fellowship award, Richard Muller claims that storing nuclear waste under the Nevada Yucca Mountains can prove to be a safe and efficient way to solve the problem of nuclear waste disposal. Muller supports his argument by first providing the reader with the anti-nuke

While reading Richard A. Muller Nuclear Waste a professor of physics from the University of California. I really enjoyed the reading and learning how nuclear waste “is one of the biggest technical issues that any president is likely to face”. In this chapter he also spoke of Plutonium which is a transuranic radioactive chemical element with symbol Pu and atomic number 94. Richard also went on to say that there is a “safe” nuclear waste disposal located in Yucca Mountain, Nevada. In order to keep the waste disposal safe, it is buried in a storage room in which is 1000 feet below the surface.

Long term storage of nuclear waste has been a debated topic for many years. “The properties of nuclear waste that affect the disposal strategy include radioactivity, chemistry, and thermal output” (Long & Ewing, 2004). Nuclear waste contains uranium and plutonium that have exhausted their energy potential. These materials have a very long half-life, which is the amount of time it takes to lose half its energy, and some half-lives can take thousands of years. In 1982 the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA) mandated that the Department of Energy (DOE) create regulations to find a suitable site for long term storage. With that the DOE recommended Yucca Mountain as the number one option. Since then scientists have been studying the site to make sure

In the current political climate in the Iowa Statehouse can be very toxic for bills that are novel and are trying to push the envelope on issues. Currently, House is where these types of bills go to die. There is very little support for progressive legislation in the House. With Republicans having a 57 to 43 Democratic margin in the House; it would be best to start the bill in the Senate.

USAG-KA shall conduct preconstruction and pre-demolition planning to minimize C&D waste generation, facilitate appropriate handling during the project and ensure proper disposition of waste and recyclable materials. A National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) Record of Environmental Consideration (REC) is generated for all USAG-KA demolition projects and shall contain a waste management plan delineating the required controls. The NEPA REC for construction projects does not require a separate waste management plan but should contain descriptions of anticipated waste streams and the controls necessary to properly manage the waste streams. The conditions contained within the NEPA REC and the associated waste management plans, where

Nuclear energy is the energy released by a nuclear reaction, it uses fuel made from mined and processed uranium to generate heat and electricity. It is the world’s largest emission free energy source. Nuclear energy also has the lowest impact on the environment than other energy sources. But it can still be very harmful because of the radiation is causes and the radioactive waste it produces. Radioactive wastes are the ruins of nuclear materials that are used in providing nuclear energy. These wastes contain high levels of radiation that can be very hazardous to humans and the environment. Some people accept and support the idea of using nuclear energy and others don’t. In the following paragraphs, some major nuclear accidents and the public acceptance of nuclear energy will be discussed.

Nuclear waste is the substance that nuclear fuel becomes after it has been used in a reactor. Although the metal rods appear unchanged after their use, the material inside has changed greatly. Before it was used to produce power, the fuel mainly consisted of uranium. In order to create heat energy in the reactor, U235 undergoes fission. Fission is a nuclear reaction in which the nucleus of an atom splits into smaller parts. As a result of this, there is a chain reaction which creates heat. The control rods control the fission rate and the temperature. In the steam generator, the heat and cooling water create pressured steam which moves the turbine. The turbine creates energy that goes into a generator which gives off electricity. The water from the turbine is able to become usable since it gets cooled. Once a reactor reaches its lifetime, it becomes spent fuel and is treated as waste. Most countries bury the spent fuel or reuse it. In the U.S., we haven’t decided what to do with the spent fuel so most of the spent fuel rods are stored in temporary storage pools. In the future, the United States plans to bury the waste in the Yucca Mountains which are located in Nevada. This would be a suitable place since it is not close to humans or the environment.

The problem with nuclear waste is getting worse everyday while we try and find a solution to dispose of the waste properly, however there are some people who think that the nuclear waste project for waste disposal is not that serious and it does not have an affect on the environment, but they are wrong because our lack of care for proper disposal of nuclear waste is having a tole on the environment where the waste is buried and the life forms around these waste sites.