defend

by Stephanie Hemphill, Minnesota Public Radio
February 8, 2010

St. Paul, Minn. — A former member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is at the Capitol Monday telling lawmakers now is not the time to repeal the state's ban on new nuclear power plants.

John Tuma’s Capitol Update – The Pre-Session Version

MEP lobbyist John Tuma discusses the history of radioactive nuclear waste storage in Minnesota and the fact that “all waste remains where it is first put.”

Allen W. Klien was the Minnesota Administrator Law Judge appointed in 1992 to collect evidence and provide an opinion to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) as to whether Northern States Power Company (NSP, now known as Xcel) was allowed to store spent nuclear rods in dry casks outside its Prairie Island nuclear power plant.  The Prairie Island power plant is located just outside of the city of Red Wing on an island at the mouth of the Cannon River that had been used for centuries by the Dakota Indians as a village.  The first accounts by white explorers of this village go all the way back to Father Hennepin.