by Maceo Carillo Martinet
Daily Lobo columnist
With talk of an energy crisis and Iranian weapons common these days, the issues of nuclear power and nuclear weapons are as relevant as ever.
A class action lawsuit was filed last month against a nuclear plant, the Braidwood Generating Station and its parent company, Exelon, for spilling millions of gallons of radioactive water about 60 miles outside of Chicago.
In response to press coverage, the company's spokesman declared the lawsuit had no merit, because no one has proved the contamination has made them sick, nor has anyone proved the contamination has affected their property. So if a company is doing something bad, it is acceptable as long as no one knows exactly how it is impacting this Earth or its inhabitants.
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What is scary is that those with this mentality are in charge of handling nuclear energy programs and its waste. If you really want to get to know the true merit of this argument, pick any major creek coming from this contaminated area or private well near the plant and see what is in the water.
President Bush has called for the development of nuclear power plants as a way to meet the nation's future energy needs. In the last month, several existing nuclear power plants have been found to be leaking radioactive material into the ground. In Illinois, near the Braidwood Generating Station, a domestic well was found to be contaminated with radioactive tritium. Demolition crews destroying the Yankee reactor in Connecticut also found contaminated soils. There are still open uranium mining pits that we need to cap and bury because they are releasing contaminated dust particles into the atmosphere.
If the Romans used nuclear energy back in their day, we would still be taking care of their waste today.
Yes, the future holds great wonders now that we are getting back into the nuclear energy business.
Regarding nuclear weaponry, in 1970 the United States signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which obligated all of the 187 signing countries to end the production or pursuit of nuclear weapons and committed the five nuclear powers of the time to nuclear disarmament. In 1996, we agreed to abide by the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which was to stop the testing and developing of nuclear weaponry.
Unfortunately, as with many treaties, the United States has trouble following words it has written on paper. President Bush signed an agreement last month with the government of India that would allow India to add to their nuclear weapons infrastructure, unilaterally breaching the nonproliferation treaty. Bush also recently asked Congress for $27 million to help jump-start the country's first nuclear weapons program in two decades, which would unilaterally breach the test ban treaty.
Article IV of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty states that signatory nations have the inalienable right to develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. So the United States' condemnations and threats toward Iran for wanting to develop their nuclear technology are again in violation of the spirit of the nonproliferation treaty.
We are turning back the clock in our dealings with environmental and civil protection laws. In Hiroshima, Japan, time has turned back. When the United States and Britain conducted testing at the Nevada Test Site earlier this month, the watchtower in the courtyard of the Peace Memorial Museum in Hiroshima - which marks the time since the last nuclear test - was set back to zero.
Sixty years after atomic bombs last brought hell to Earth, people in Nagasaki and Hiroshima still suffer from damages and sicknesses induced by the bombs.
When the clock was turned back in Hiroshima, there was a moment of eerie silence. Back in America, there was an eerie statement by our nation's top nuclear weapons official, Linton Brooks, who said we are on the verge of an exciting time.
I guess one could get excited to think that we are giving birth to a generation of user-friendly bombs, such as the bunker-busting weapons and mini-nukes, which promise to significantly reduce their collateral damage.
Some of these nuclear weapons will require plutonium pits and workers to be exposed to more contamination. Boy, I can't wait - the excitement is overwhelming.
