Skip to content
View Featured Image

Stop Fukushima Freeways

The Stop Fukushima Freeways Campaign shows the perils of the massive and unnecessary radioactive waste transportation that would occur across the U.S. if the moribund and scientifically-indefensible Yucca Mountain, Nevada waste dump were to be revived. Such large-scale transport would also occur if, as some in Congress advocate, a “centralized interim storage” site for high-level radioactive waste were created. In that case, the waste would either have to move twice (once to the interim site, and then to a permanent site), thus doubling the risks, or the “interim” site would become a de facto permanent waste dump–without going through the necessary scientific characterization.

The solution to the radioactive waste problem begins with ending its generation as quickly as possible. And we work non-stop to acheive that goal. But for the highly radioactive waste that exists and continues to be produced, putting it on trucks, train cars and barges and transporting it across the country to a scientifically-indefensible site solely for the benefit of the nuclear power industry is an unacceptable risk to our cities, our communities, our agricultural heartland, our entire nation.

Twenty years ago, the Stop Mobile Chernobyl Campaign was launched to defeat a similar Congressional effort to open Yucca Mountain and/or establish a “centralized interim storage” site and thus begin a national radioactive waste transportation program. That campaign ultimately led to a veto by President Bill Clinton of such legislation that was sustained in the Senate by one vote.

 

Campaign Actions and Updates

This campaign launched with a coordinated national media release on October 27, 2015. Please contact Mary Olson (maryo@nirs.org) at NIRS Southeast office for more information.

DC area press release: October 27, 2015. Stop Fukushima Freeways Campaign kicks off; 250 shipments of lethal radwaste expected through DC metro area. Press release.

Fukushima Freeways Briefing Book for local decision-makers and concerned citizens on the transportation of highly radioactive “spent” nuclear fuel via road, rail and barge across 43 states. Urge your local governing body to pass a resolution in opposition to unsafe and unnecessary radioactive waste transportation. PowerPoint version: Download, add your group’s contact information, post online and distribute to your elected officials. Read in pdf format here.

FLASH VIDEO: Stop Fukushima Freeways. Two minute basic introduction to campaign by Three Mile Island Alert’s Scott Portzline. Please spread widely on social media. Post this url on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etc: http://tinyurl.com/flashstopfukushimafreeways

 

Talking Points/Media Documents

Talking points on maps and nuclear waste transport to Yucca Mountain.

Tips for Contacting Media.

 

Educational and Organizing Resources

Are your emergency responders prepared for a radioactive waste accident? Full-color brochure. Download, print and distribute!

Get the facts on property values and nuclear waste transportation. Full-color brochure. Download, print and distribute!

The HOSS principles. More than 200 clean energy, environmental and consumer groups have signed on to the HOSS (Hardened On-Site Storage) principles as the best of a lot of bad alternatives for the storage of radioactive waste at present. These principles call for high-level radioactive waste to be stored at the point of generation, in dry casks, hardened and bermed to help secure them from natural disasters and deliberate attacks; until a better, more permanent solution for radioactive waste is in place.

US House Energy and Commerce Committee Hearing on Nuclear Waste Transport October 1, 2015.

Link includes posted written testimony and video from webcast.
Written testimony of Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear presented at October 1, 2015 House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Reuters footage of Union Pacific derailment in Texas due to flooding: What if this train were carrying highly radioactive waste?
Hot Cargo: Nuclear Waste Transport Fact Sheet
High-Level Radioactive Waste Factsheet
Talking Points on Yucca Mountain
Presentation on the Geology of the Proposed Yucca Mountain Site
Why Radiation from Routine Shipment of Radioactive Waste is a Local Concern
NIRS’ Mobile Chernobyl campaign page, including background info, history, more resources on radioactive waste transport, and more from this successful campaign from 1994-2014.

 

Expert and Technical Documents

Worst Case for Nuclear Waste Transport Accident, Dr Marvin Resnikoff
Radiation Exposures from Nuclear Waste Transport, Robert Halstead, State of Nevada
Radiological Consequences of a Severe Rail Accident in a Tunnel, Dr. Marvin Resnikoff
Yucca Mountain Transportation Issues. A presentation by Fred Dilger, PhD., a consultant to the State of Nevada, February 2015.
Appendix G: Transportation; from the Department of Energy’s 2002 Environmental Impact Statement on the proposal for a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. This appendix to the EIS is difficult to find online, so we have posted it here. Large file (250 pages, 11 mb).

 

Maps and Statistics

Road and Rails transport This link takes you to a publication from the State of Nevada, which includes transport maps for every state. We will post individual state maps separately when those are available.
Water transport
Full-size national transportation map; to download, right click and choose “save image.”
This sheet, excerpted from the State of Nevada report, shows the number of casks, by road and rail, that would be shipped from each state under a full-scale atomic waste transportation program.
Here is the cover page of that report, for citation purposes.

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Urgent End Of Year Fundraising Campaign

Online donations are back! 

Keep independent media alive. 

Due to the attacks on our fiscal sponsor, we were unable to raise funds online for nearly two years.  As the bills pile up, your help is needed now to cover the monthly costs of operating Popular Resistance.

Sign Up To Our Daily Digest

Independent media outlets are being suppressed and dropped by corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our daily email digest before it’s too late so you don’t miss the latest movement news.