>Nuclear incumbents aren‘t upset that billions of dollars are thrown away on waste disposal and unnecessary cleanup projects—they are getting those contracts. For instance, 8,000 people are employed in cleanup at Hanford, Washington, costing $2.5B a year, even though the level of radiation is only a few mSv/year, well within the range of normal background radiation.

While I largely agree with the author, this misunderstands what is being cleaned up at Hanford. Hundreds of millions of gallons of nitric acid containing hundreds of tons of Plutonium are sitting in huge 70+ year old tanks that are slowly leaking. Stabilizing this waste is not throwing money away. Obviously the background radiation is no higher than anywhere else.