Ed Markey: “The reason Mr. Fortenberry and I are making this amendment is that it would address a wrongheaded plan by the Department…”

“The reason Mr. Fortenberry and I are making this amendment is that it would address a wrongheaded plan by the Department of Energy to build a facility to produce dangerous, highly radioactive nuclear fuel that no one actually wants to buy. {time} 1620 The Department wants to take uranium and plutonium from dismantled nuclear bombs and make fuel for commercial nuclear reactors. This plan will cost taxpayers $2 billion. It is a nuclear bomb budget-buster. It is the most expensive way to boil water that has ever been proposed on the planet. It is also unnecessary--no electric utility in the United States wants to buy this fuel. It is also a serious threat to human health. The MOX--the mixed oxide plutonium fuel--is actually more dangerous than existing commercial nuclear fuel. And in the event of a nuclear disaster, the releases from a MOX fuels reactor will cause between 39 and 131 percent more fatalities than a traditional fuel nuclear reactor. MOX is a reverse Field of Dreams. If you build it, they will not come. The utility industry is not going to arrive. Instead, it is a nightmare that will leave future generations to safeguard a dangerous fuel with no buyers. I congratulate the gentleman, and I urge an ``aye'' vote. The Acting CHAIR. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Nebraska (Mr. Fortenberry). The question was taken; and the Acting Chair announced that the ayes appeared to have it.”