Mayor's Youth Advisory Council

We previously blogged about inviting 20 Idaho students who were members of the Mayor’s Youth Advisory Council for a week long visit to France to AREVA headquarters and to tour our Georges Besse II uranium enrichment facility, which is similar to the facility we’re planning at Eagle Rock near Idaho Falls.

We wanted the students to have a first hand experience of what is being planned for their community and to get their feedback. The Mayor’s Youth Advisory Council just releaed their own report from the trip and as student Ericka Gianotto wrote:

“We’re going to be able to go back into our schools and to the community and explain what’s coming and here’s what’s not, because it’s important for the students of our schools to realize we’re not going to be having nuclear reactors, we’re not going to have water towers, and here’s what it does and what it’s going to look like and what it plays a major role in the nuclear fuel cycle.”

Here are some more excerpts from their report:

This facility is nearly identical to the proposed Eagle Rock Enrichment Facility, with a few minor differences. For example, the Eagle Rock facility will have slightly lower air emissions, slightly lower water consumption and include a sloped roof while the Georges Besse II facility has a flat roof. These minor differences, however, will make the Eagle Rock facility an even more environmentally friendly plant….

Previous nuclear technologies did require large amounts of water. The centrifuge technology employed in this facilit y will not. The expected annual water usage of the Eagle Rock facility is comparable to the amount of water normally required to irrigate a golf course for a year, and is around one fiftieth that of the previously used enrichment technology….

The United States has a continually growing need for energy, and it is becoming increasingly difficult to meet this need. Some analysts are predict ing that by 2020, the United States will be unable to produce enough enriched uranium to meet its own demand for nuclear fuel. The Eagle Rock facility will be used to supply 25% of the needed enriched
uranium, and thus will decrease the amount of uranium that has to be imported, resulting in a more energy independent United States…
We would like to express the feeling of pride we have in our community, and how honored we are that all of the sites Areva was considering for this facility, they chose Idaho Falls.

We urge anyone with questions about this plant and anything related to it to feel free to ask any member of the Mayor’s Youth Advisory Council. We are excited about both the direct and indirect positive impacts this project will have on our community and hope that you share our enthusiasm and support for this project.

You can see the whole report here...