[CPEO-MEF] The S.F. Bay Area's Nuclear Legacy

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

The Bay Area's Nuclear Legacy 

Gregory Dicum,
San Francisco Chronicle
January 5, 2005 

With the dawn of a second Bush Jr. administration, there is talk of
renewed nuclear testing and development of new nuclear reactors.
(Indeed, the licensing process has already begun.) Advocates suggest
that these things are safe and necessary, but here in the Bay Area, we
have six decades of experience on the nuclear front lines and an ongoing
legacy to show for it -- one we all live with daily, whether we like or
not. Before we ramp up another nuclear age, a quick look at the hangover
from the last one might serve as a cautionary tale. 

The Bay Area is one of the worldwide centers of the shadowy nuclear
story -- there is far more weapons-grade radioactive material here than
in the "axis of evil" countries combined, and nearly 50,000 people in
the Bay Area are thought to be dependent on the nuclear-weapons economy
in one way or another. If the Bay Area were a rogue nation, we'd be very
scary indeed. 

Although other, more remote parts of the country suffered far more
blatant effects (as in, for example, the radioactivity from more than
900 nuclear explosions in Nevada, or the devastation at the Hanford Site
in Washington state, the most contaminated place in North America), the
Bay Area's status as a major military port and high-tech center made
this one of the most active urban regions in America's nuclear history. 

...

For the entire article, see
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2005/01/05/gree.DTL

-- 


Lenny Siegel
Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org
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