Jan 5 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Alex Breitler The Record, Stockton, Calif.

Nuclear waste could be shipped through Stockton if a group of Fresno-area businessmen succeeds in its plan to build the state's first nuclear plant in more than two decades.

Don't expect to see cooling towers rise above the farms west of Fresno anytime soon.

The state forbids construction of new nuclear plants until there's a proven way to dispose of spent fuel, most of which is being temporarily stored at plants across the country. A national disposal site planned for southern Nevada has been delayed.

This doesn't deter John Hutson, head of the Fresno Nuclear Energy Group. He wants the Fresno plant to ship its waste via railroad to the Port of Stockton, where it would be loaded onto a barge and exported to France for reprocessing.

Bringing the spent fuel through Stockton was news to some San Joaquin County officials and environmental activists, who said they had not heard of Hutson's group nor its plan.

"Are there railroad accidents ever? Yes. Are there ship accidents ever? Yes. I don't want nuclear waste shipped through my town," said John Morearty, a longtime Stockton activist.

Nuclear waste was hauled through San Joaquin County in the days of the Mare Island naval base in Vallejo, said Ron Baldwin, director of the county's Office of Emergency Services. Today, many other hazardous materials are shipped through the region.

"Everyone is very concerned with radioactivity," Baldwin said. "But from a practical point of view, the way they ship those things, spent fuel isn't horribly dangerous."

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission requires spent fuel to be shipped in containers or casks that contain the radioactivity and heat.

These fuels no longer produce enough energy for a nuclear reaction, but are "intensely radioactive and continue to generate heat for thousands of years," the U.S. Government Accountability Office reported in 2005.

Among the accountability office's findings in that report was that nuclear power plants have been inconsistent in accounting for their spent fuel.

Port of Stockton Director Richard Aschieris said he hadn't heard of the Fresno group nor its plans to use the port.

"We do handle hazardous materials," he said. "But I don't have any personal knowledge of what it takes to ship (nuclear waste)."

Hutson said the Fresno group formed about three years ago to consider a plant as one solution to high poverty levels in that city. The plant would provide jobs, reduce utility rates and help curb related problems such as domestic violence, he said. The city's treated wastewater would serve its cooling towers.

"We thought that if nuclear is going to go in California, it has to be a case where it puts back into the community more than it takes out," Hutson said.

He argues that nuclear power will help California meet greenhouse gas emission goals. The state's two operating nuclear plants provide a significant amount of the state's energy from non-fossil fuel sources.

There is still the thorny issue of the moratorium. But Hutson said he believes the political winds may shift in favor of lifting the ban on new nuclear plants. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has hinted that he supports nuclear power, contrary to the views of many environmental groups.

Two prior efforts to lift the ban on new nuclear power have failed, and there are federal complications with sending nuclear waste overseas, said David Weisman, outreach coordinator for the San Luis Obispo-based Alliance for Nuclear Responsibility.

"We think the Fresno thing is a lot of hot air," he said.

Contact reporter Alex Breitler at (209) 546-8295 or abreitler@recordnet.com.

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