Nuclear waste is a ‘problem from hell.’ California should keep banning new reactors | Opinion
No new nukes
On April 6, California lawmakers killed a bill that would have permitted small nuclear fission power plants — AKA microreactors — to proliferate across the state. On Monday, the state Assembly Committee on Natural Resources will consider another bill, AB 2647, that would do the same thing expanded to include all “advanced” nuclear reactors.
The committee should dismiss it for the same reason it rejected the last one and half-a-dozen similar bills over the last 20 years: They’re illegal. State law prohibits any more nuclear power plants until the technology exists for the permanent disposal of high-level nuclear waste, AKA the problem from hell. After seven decades of promises, there is no such technology. Both bills attempt to carve out exemptions to the law.
Twenty years of hand waving by nuclear advocates has not changed reality. Today, pointing to energy projections for data centers does not change the reality of a Trump-era Nuclear Regulatory Commission seeking to rubber stamp the rapid deployment of untested reactor designs via rollbacks of its regulations and shortened environmental reviews. California should continue to defend a commonsense law that was enacted because the nuclear industry put the cart before the horse.
Andrew Christie
San Luis Obispo
Put down that phone!
Berkeley’s Dean Erwin Chemerinsky has opined that jury verdicts against Meta and Google for damages caused by their addictive algorithms violate the First Amendment, and he is probably right. While we would all like to see some meaningful controls on social media platforms, there are already trends that will eventually limit their use without violating anybody’s freedom of speech.
There was a time not long ago when cigarette smoking was popular — look at movies made in the 1960s to see how it was. Cigarettes are unpopular now because there were ad campaigns, legislative proposals and other concerted efforts to limit smoking and educate the public on how bad it was.
The same things are already happening with cell phones and social media. Parents are limiting the use of social media by children; schools are banning cell phones because they interfere with teaching and socialization; bars and restaurants are attracting patrons by banning cell phones, so that people can interact with each other instead of bots on social media.
Eventually, spending too much time on social media will be as popular as chain-smoking or passing gas in an elevator — just put your phone away and give it some time.
Christopher Toews
San Luis Obispo
Shameful praise for Orban
I didn’t think it was possible for the Trump administration to sink to new lows, but shame on me!
Last week, in Budapest, Hungary, the sitting vice president of the United States openly praised and elicited support for Hungary’s autocratic, corrupt and Putin acolyte, Viktor Orban.
To make this even more outrageous, Vance arranged for #47 to call in and also praise this wanna be dictator who has stifled free speech, freedom of the press, individual rights and isolated Hungary from the rest of the EU.
Oh right, now I get it. Orban and the Trump administration are in lock step on how to run a democracy into the ground. Richard Mortensen
San Luis Obispo