Areva recently announced that it was halting its construction of a planned nuclear manufacturing plant in Newport News. Areva arrived at the decision due to unfavorable market conditions and uncertainty over U.S energy policy.
In 2008, the plans for the 300,000 square-foot manufacturing plant were announced. During that period, the project was projected to create close to 550 jobs and result in a $363 million capital investment.
Officials with Areva are, however, still "fully committed" to the construction of the planned manufacturing plant.
As early as 2010 Areva claimed that it was slowing its timetable for the facility due to the slow-growing economy and a longer-than-expected process of federal approval for new nuclear power plants. Areva hopes to have the plan on-line by 2013.
What is Areva's loss is fortunately the rest of Virginia's gain.
For all of the talk about the "necessity" to diversify Virginia's energy portfolio with nuclear power, it's not quite clear why this gospel of nuclear power should be held sacrosanct.
More and more alarming reports are coming to the fore of the news media regarding the less-than unbiased nature of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the U.S.'s main nuclear regulatory watchdog agency.
This point alone should give Virginia pause in its bullheaded quest to grow nuclear power before some of the industry's "kinks" have been more fully worked out.
While the risk of a catastrophic event may be depreciably small according to so-called "experts," it's not a risk I am willing to take at this point in time.
Virginia should focus on renewable and clean sources of energy, not sources of energy that could endanger millions of lives in Virginia and cause billions of dollars in damages were something unforeseen and catastrophic to occur. |
