There are prominent environmentalists that now favor the use of nuclear power.

My main point isn’t an anti-nuclear one. It is simply predicting the outcome of this naming deal and claiming that it will do much more than simply label Utah as a dumping ground for radioactive waste in the minds of sports fans. Even if that were all it did it is a bad idea, but I’m concerned that nobody in the media seems to be discussing the obvious motive for the deal.

I’m no expert in nuclear technology, I don’t know anything about Energy Solutions in particular, and I don’t even live in Utah. But it appears to me that most of the opposition to nuclear power is even more uninformed than I am. Environmentalists should probably be supporting moves towards developing nuclear power technology, but instead they often help to foment ignorant NIMBYism. At least that’s my impression

Like I said, I’m not defending Energy Solutions in particular.

That is a great question. I agree that global climate change is the bigger threat and that nuclear power can be part of the mix of energy sources that can help mitigate that problem.

However nuclear is not a panacea. The waste is an obvious issue that we are looking at here. Is vitrification the proper long term solution for much of it? Is Skull Valley (now seemingly dead) or Yucca Mountain a better idea? Should we reverse Carter’s decision to not recycle nuclear materials?

Aside from the waste we can see looking at the world today that nuclear technology isn’t the best solution for all parts of the world. Obviously Iran and North Korea have less than honorable intentions with the technology and the world would probably be safer if India and Pakistan didn’t have bombs either. One could argue that the world would be safer if nobody had a bomb, but I don’t see that happening.

But my best response to your question is that you’ve falsely framed it as an either/or situation, which it is not, though I’ll readily admit that nuclear power looks like part of the solution in the short term. In the mid to long term I would hope that we could migrate to something that doesn’t saddle our progeny with a problem that we are incapable of solving.

Now that I’ve addressed your question, will you answer some of mine? Do you thing Energy Solutions is aiming to bring hotter waste to Utah? Do you support such efforts? Why or why not?

I am guessing that by the time most people figure out what is going on here the initiative or legislation allowing hotter waste will be well on its way to passing, “Radium Stadium” or not. I would hope that Larry would think hard about what Energy Solutions is really getting out of this deal and about whether he supports those goals.

In it Larry says that the amount that Energy Solutions paid is more than his recent donation of $21 million to the state police academy.

It also contains this gem:

Steve Creamer, EnergySolutions’ CEO, said the move is part of a campaign to educate the public that disposing of low-level radioactive waste is not dangerous.

If only that was his only ambition. I want to know if Larry Miller supports bringing hotter waste to Utah.

He owns the Jazz and the building they play in and car dealerships in several states. The Jazz alone are worth about $257 million.

So I would guess that he has several hundred million. Or about $480 million. He has admitted that Energy Solutions paid more than $21 million, so lets call it a cool half a billion dollars.

My concern is that NOBODY (Lakers fan or not) worries about 1,000 and 10,000 years from now. They’ve tried to take times scales like that into account with Yucca Mountain and have found it to be a big problem. I’m of the impression that over 10,000 years most of what Energy Solutions processes will leech back into the environment. I’ll go into why our children may care about this (and maybe us) in another post.