Tri-Valley CAREs works to strengthen global security by stopping the development of new nuclear weapons in the US and by promoting the elimination of nuclear weapons globally. Tri-Valley CAREs monitors nuclear weapons and environmental clean-up activities throughout the US nuclear weapons complex, with a special focus on the Lawrence Livermore Lab and surrounding communities.
Nuclear Costs- A Letter to the Editor by Tri-Valley CAREs Board Member Loulena Miles
Dec29
The Independent Newspaper
Mailbox/Opinion, December 22, 2011
Nuclear Costs
Loulena Miles
Livermore
A recent analysis by San Francisco-based Ploughshares Fund sparked needed debate about the true cost of nuclear weapons.
Ploughshares calculated that we are poised to spend around $700 billion on nuclear weapons and related programs in the coming decade.
Deputy Undersecretary of Defense, James Miller, jumped in to argue that the cost of cleaning up the contamination associated with nuclear weapons shouldn't be included in the estimate.
Cleanup cannot be separated from the programs that created the mess. To pretend otherwise is to grossly underestimate how much nuclear weapons cost the U.S. taxpayer.
Moroever, other expenses were underrepresented in Ploughshares' estimate - including compensation for atomic workers who contracted life threatening diseases working with bomb materials.
Let's face reality. By any calculation, new nuclear weapons programs will cost hundreds of billions of dollars over the coming decade. Cleanup costs and compensation for sick workers must be paid. Beyond that, rising nuclear costs cannot be justified.
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