" [It] is not that we should retreat from new technology" has brought the American people into the new century with new hopes and aspirations. Nuclear power and disposal of nuclear waste can be consisted one of those technologies that people just don’t understand and cause people to "retreat." The incident of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant of 1979 (Nuclear 12/1/02) is one such accident that makes people fear nuclear power. The fact that this type of power produces a nuclear waste whose half-life is 100,000 to 500,000 years (Long, 33) is not too comforting to people. Although there is much opposition to nuclear power and waste, this "new" technology will evolve and people will learn that this new technology will help them.

        Nuclear power is one of the most clean and efficient power known to man. About 20% of the United States electricity comes from nuclear power (Nuclear 12/1/02). On top of being the most widely used type of power in the United States, Ambassador John B. Ritch III declared "only nuclear energy can help meet the world's energy needs without threatening the environment." (Nuclear 12/1/02). In a PBS documentary about nuclear power, environmentalists noted that nuclear power does not produce carbon dioxide emissions nor does it produce any kind of emission. Thus, nuclear power is safe on the environment and reduces the greenhouse effect on the Earth. Compared to other power plants, nuclear power is reliable because it produces 75% electricity when operating. Other forms of power, including wind and solar do not come close to the amount of power produced by one reactor (Nuclear 12/1/02). Therefore, nuclear power is the most "safest, most economical, and environmentally methods of producing electricity." (Nuclear 12/1/02).

        The people that oppose nuclear power are those who look at the bad that has happened. They see the disasters of Three Miles Island, Chernobyl and Windscale, which has brought about fear in the American public. "Some opponents of nuclear power claim that reactors are unacceptable because they cannot be made entirely safe." (Kaku, 86). In one aspect they are correct. Nuclear power plants cannot be so safe that no major accident will happen but they are made so to diminish the chance of a big accident. So what about disasters like Three Mile Island and most recently Chernobyl? People pro to nuclear power say this shows how to design power plants better; "to learn from your mistakes". Critics say this is why the industry is starting to crumble and the start of denuclearization. By far, the most hurtful opposition to the nuclear industry is critics because they don’t see the good of nuclear power. But what if there was no nuclear power?

        "Nuclear electricity will be too cheap to meter" was the claims by its early promoters. The Wall Street Journal said that it is "power derived from the atom is essential to solving the energy problem." Politicians would say it would "get that foreign oil monkey off our back." (Kaku, 155). So what would happen if we didn’t have nuclear power? The United States would be paying for oil to run old power plants that pollutes the air and depletes and ozone layer. The carbon dioxide produced by the other forms of power plants would cause the "atmosphere to rise at about 3 percent per decade" (Kaku, 158). Therefore, the absence of nuclear power would cause environmentalists to go crazy because of the ozone layer being destroyed and the increase of oil prices. Aside from the arguments of nuclear power, the waste it produces as brought out many controversial issues.

        When nuclear power is produced, a certain type of radioactive waste is created. Nuclear power plants consist "of extremely radioactive spent fuel rods that must removed… and isolated for tens of thousands of years." (Kaku, 109). Unfortunately, there is no way to transport these wastes to places where people aren’t. In the Supreme Court case of New York vs. United States, the main concern for the case was transporting nuclear waste to where it won’t harm humans. Most of the nuclear waste is transported across states to Nevada or in the deserts of the Southwest United States. In Paducah, Kentucky, 38,000 cylinders of depleted uranium lays outside to the open air. Residents are afraid that the uranium cylinders could leak uranium that could go into the water supply causing sickness. (Long, 16). People are also concerned about the nuclear testing that went on during the 1940’s that has left land wasted with nuclear fallout and waste. In the court case involving the Yucca Mountain, the US government has named the Yucca Mountain range for nuclear waste dumping. The waste would be dumped 1,000 feet under the Earth and kept there for thousands of years. "Do you think we will still have a Department of Energy 300,000 years from now?" is a major question environmentalists are asking (Long, 33). Of course no one knows that answer to that but if nuclear waste is dumped at this site, it won’t matter because it will be away from the public. It is extremely hard to get rid of nuclear waste so it is not surprise that people oppose it.

        Why would they want to oppose it? Doctors say that it causes leukemia (Guide 12/1/02) if exposed to it for a long enough time. But this would only happen if a person were exposed to the waste for a long period of time. Environmentalists argue that putting nuclear waste 1,000 feet down might touch water supplies contaminating the water, as in the Yucca Mountain court case. Congress has tried to pass a Nuclear Waste Act of 1999, which would enable the transport of nuclear waste to a nuclear dumpsite, preferably Yucca Mountain for the government purposes. Of course people won’t let this happen because of the fear the media and environmentalists have put on the subject. In the December 8 LA Times an article about radioactive waste makes the headlines. "It’s so safe we can sprinkle it on your children’s cereal…" says Daniel Hirsch (Bustillo, 10). The radioactive waste they are talking about is the lowest radioactive waste possible and people still threat it. People are so afraid of the smallest speck of radioactive waste. What do they think an x-ray is? They are radiated every time they get one. Therefore, nuclear waste is hard to get rid of because people fear it so much. Yes there are side effects of nuclear waste if exposed to them. Transporting the waste would not expose anyone because the waste is contained within thick cement walls. As a result, people fear nuclear waste and want nothing to do with it.

        Although there is much opposition to nuclear power and waste, this "new" technology will evolve and people will learn that this new technology will help them. Nuclear power is the way of the future because of its economical benefits and amount of power produced. Although nuclear waste is bad for humans, they must learn to deal with it and find ways to minimize the risk of exposure. The need to get rid of the waste is present but the way to get rid of it is not. The government is trying every way to get rid of these wastes and the people are rejecting it. Maybe Michael Long, the author to "Half-Life", was right when future humans might say, "what were those ancient Americans thinking when they put that hot stuff in the earth and decided 10,000 years was time enough to contain it?"

Bustillo, Miguel. "Radioactive Debate Over Landfill Waste" LA Times 8 December 2002: 1 and

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"Guides: Nuclear Power." http://www.oneworld.net/guides/nuclear_power/front.shtml December 1, 2002.

Kaku, Michio and Trainer, Jennifer. Nuclear Power: Both Sides. New York: New York, 1982

Long, Michael E. "Half Life" National Geographic July 2002: 2-33.

"Nuclear Power: Energy for Today and Tomorrow"

http://pw1.netcom.com/~res95/energy/nuclear.html December 1, 2002.