Comments on California AB-305 proposition to allow new reactors

California bill AB-305 is a blatant attempt to reverse rules that have been in place since 1976. With a few specific exceptions, the California Public Resources Code prohibits the use of land in California for any facility that generates nuclear waste. The prohibition is supposed to remain in effect until a solution for nuclear waste is implemented. But of course, that has not happened and isn't about to happen, if it ever does.

AB-305 is an attempt to exempt ANY nuclear reactor with an electrical generating capacity of up to 300 megawatts per unit from the existing rules. Of course, no reason is given for such an exemption because it doesn’t make any sense.

When it comes to nuclear waste, “Small Modular Nuclear Reactors” (SMNRs) do nothing to address the criteria specified by the Public Resource Code. These mythical machines (no commercial SMNR has ever been built), would produce a somewhat different -- and in many ways MORE toxic mix per pound or per kilowatt of power produced -- of radioactive hazards than existing reactors (such as Diablo Canyon). But like the toxic waste from DCNPP, the waste from any SMNRs would also need to be contained for 100s of thousands of years.

From a nuclear waste perspective, MORE waste would be generated by four 300 megawatt reactors versus one 1,200 megawatt reactor. And with many plans to have clusters of SMNRs in one location, a catastrophic accident at the SMNR site could be larger than at a current large reactor site.

In addition, AB-305 directs the Public Utilities Commission to “... adopt a plan to increase the procurement of electricity generated from nuclear facilities …”. Why? The purported reason for all of this new reactor nonsense is to combat climate change.

But nuclear power is far from "carbon-free". The carbon footprint of mining, milling, enriching, manufacturing, and transporting nuclear fuel is immense. Building and decommissioning nuclear plants requires even more carbon, and the carbon footprint of operating a reactor is also significant, from upkeep, parts replacement, downtime energy replacement, and the hundreds of employees needed during fuel replacement and during operation.

Furthermore, nuclear power is too expensive and takes too long to build to help California reach any climate protection milestones, and harms the environment throughout its entire cycle, even without a catastrophic accident such as Fukushima or Chernobyl, Santa Susana, Three Mile Island, Fermi 1 etc..

Even a study that touts the benefits of nuclear power (https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/energy-research/articles/10.3389/fenrg.2023.1147016/full) admits that the emissions from operating reactors: “… are underestimated …” and that: “… input data for carbon accounting … are difficult to obtain and analyze …”.

For a comprehensive analysis of how ridiculous it is to propose nuclear power as a way to resolve the climate crisis, consider the analysis in M.V. Ramana’s excellent 2024 book, “Nuclear Is Not the Solution: The Folly of Atomic Power in the Age of Climate Change”. M.V. Ramana is a physicist who has carefully compared the available options...and nuclear is not a viable option.

Every sensible Californian should be against AB-305.

Diablo Canyon should be shut down immediately, and all the funds and transmission lines that are currently devoted to creating more nuclear waste should be reallocated to actual renewables ranging from rooftop solar to offshore wind. It will be cheaper, faster, and far less damaging to the environment than continuing the status quo, or worse yet passing AB-305.

As far as the existing waste is concerned, the best we can hope is that future generations will find a way to repeatedly repackage nuclear waste, as suggested by Gordon Edwards (http://www.ccnr.org/Rolling_Stewardship.pdf).

The less waste we leave for future generations, the better -- including the immediate ones alive now but too young to know what we are "gifting" them, and those 10,000 generations hence, who will STILL be grappling with OUR waste.

Ace Hoffman, Carlsbad, California USA

Fine your California representative with this link: https://findyourrep.legislature.ca.gov/

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Ace Hoffman
Carlsbad, California USA
Author, The Code Killers:
An Expose of the Nuclear Industry
Free download: acehoffman.org
Blog: acehoffman.blogspot.com
YouTube: youtube.com/user/AceHoffman
Email: ace [at] acehoffman.org
Founder & Owner, The Animated Software Company

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