This past weekend, I visited the site of Oregon's first and—for now—only commercial nuclear power facility—the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant. My visit left me remembering two things:

1. We've won against the nuclear industry before, and we can do it again. Organizers in the 1970s succeeded in decommissioning the Trojan plant and passing the 1980 moratorium against new nuclear power in Oregon. That 1980 ballot measure has been a saving grace against additional nuclear projects in Oregon, but it's not enough to keep us safe much longer. Oregon's 2025 session alone saw 13 pro-nuclear bills introduced that, if passed, would chip away at our state's anti-nuclear safeguards. 
2. Radioactive waste will outlive us. We have no long-term solution for safely disposing radioactive waste, including uranium and its byproducts. Spent uranium fuel rods sit in cooling pools and concrete storage casks all across the country—including 34 dry storage casks sitting on a concrete pad along the Columbia River at the Trojan site. To invest in nuclear power is to kick the problem of radioactive waste down the road to the next generations.

Learn a little more in this recent OPB piece on the 20th anniversary of the Trojan tower implosion. Let's keep this fight against Aurora Uranium Project going.