<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<div>Hey all,<br>
<br>
See forward below. <br>
<br>
Can we do a quick consensus on allowing Erika to fax the sample letter
below to the Natural Resources Committee on behalf of the SFGP?<br>
<br>
[Aaron Israel wrote]<br>
<br>
Tomorrow letters are due to oppose a bill to lift the ban on new
nuclear plants in California.<br>
<br>
If you are an organization, or if you would like to send your own
letter, the Natural Resources Committee fax is:<br>
<br>
916-319-2192<br>
<br>
The Committee prefers faxes, but if this is not possible letters can be
emailed to <a onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:aurora.wallin@asm.ca.gov" target="_blank">
aurora.wallin@asm.ca.gov</a><br>
<br>
Letters must be received by 4:00 pm, Wed. April 11th to be included in
Committee packets for hearing next Monday, April 16th.<br>
<br>
Questions? Contact Rochelle Becker of the Alliance for Nuclear
Responsibility and Sierra Club's national chair for radiation and
toxics, at <font color="#00681c">"<a
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:rochelle489@charter.net" target="_blank">rochelle489@charter.net</a>"</font><br>
</div>
<div>sample letter:</div>
<div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">Dear
Chairwoman Hancock</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
I(WE) am writing in opposition to AB 719, Assemblyman Devore's bill to
lift California's ban on the siting of new nuclear plants in California.<span
style=""> </span>In 1976 our state had the foresight to question the
federal government's ability to create a permanent and safe solution
for long term storage of high-level radioactive waste.
<span style=""> </span>To undermine this protective legislation could
have serious health and economic impacts to California residents—on
whose fragile and seismically active coasts radioactive waste continues
to accumulate.
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;">
<span style=""> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;">
AB 719 states that:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;">
<span style=""> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Times-Roman;">
<font face="Times New Roman"><span style=""> </span>(f)<span
style=""> </span>Current California law prohibits the permitting of
any new commercial nuclear powerplants until an approved means of
disposal of high-level nuclear waste becomes available. With federal
efforts well underway to provide an approved means of high-level
nuclear waste disposal, and given that timelines for nuclear powerplant
design, permitting, construction, on line operation, and first
refueling would likely be in excess of 10 years, by the time a
powerplant would be ready for operation, an approved high-level nuclear
waste disposal means will be available.
</font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;">The current ban, PRC 25524.2, which AB 719
seeks to overturn, states that there can be no new nuclear power plants
sited in California until:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
style="font-family: Arial;"> </span><br>
</p>
<pre><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman';"><span
style=""> </span>(a) The commission (California Energy Commission) finds that there has been developed and that the United States through its authorized agency has approved and there exists a demonstrated technology or means for the disposal of high-level nuclear waste.
</span></pre>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
As of this date, <u>none</u> of those conditions have been met.<span
style=""> </span>The Federal government has been trying—for a
quarter of a century—since the passage of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act
of 1982, to wrestle with the unwieldy problem of radioactive waste.
<span style=""> </span>When the author of AB 719 writes, "</span></span><span
style="font-family: Times-Roman;"><font face="Times New Roman">
With federal efforts well underway to provide an approved means of
high-level nuclear waste disposal…" </font></span><span
style="font-family: Arial;">one wonders where the facts are to back up
this assumption.
<span style=""> </span>The only solution on the table, the Yucca
Mountain national repository, has been mired in scientific,
administrative and political problems for decades.<span style="">
</span>The Department of Energy has yet to even set a date on which
it will submit its application for approval by the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, and the NRC may be a long way from granting that
application, as evidenced by these statements from the Las Vegas
Review-Journal of January 23
<sup>rd</sup>, 2007:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 16pt;"><span
style="font-family: Times-Roman;">
<font face="Times New Roman">Ed McGaffigan, a veteran member of the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said Monday that the Yucca Mountain
program is deeply flawed and that the Nevada nuclear waste site should
be scrapped.</font>
</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 16pt;"><span
style="font-family: Times-Roman;">
<font face="Times New Roman">"It may be time to stop digging, and it
may be time to rethink," McGaffigan said in a critique of the Energy
Department program as he prepares to retire from the five-member
commission that regulates nuclear safety….
</font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 16pt;"><span
style="font-family: Times-Roman;">
<font face="Times New Roman">"I think Yucca Mountain has been beset by
bad law, bad regulatory policy, bad science policy, bad personnel
policy, bad budget policy throughout its history," McGaffigan said.
"Every time somebody has done something to try to speed things up, it
has backfired….
</font></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><font
face="Times New Roman"><span style="font-family: Times-Roman;">"Each
year that passes, we are not going to get any closer to Yucca under the
current circumstances," McGaffigan said.
</span><span class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;"></span></span></font></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
It is therefore, at this time, wholly inappropriate to consider lifting
the moratorium on new nuclear power plants in California, as
conditioned by PRC 25524.2.<span style=""> </span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
I (WE) urge that this bill, AB 719, be opposed and rejected.</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;">
Sincerely,<br>
</span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span
class="boldtextmedlrg1"><span
style="font-weight: normal; font-size: 10.5pt; color: black; font-family: Arial;"><br>
</span></span></p>
</div>
<br>
</body>
</html>