WE ARE ASKING A DIFFERENT QUESTION.
Debates about nuclear energy are often reduced to two positions:
FOR IT.
or
AGAINST IT.
IJT does not think that binary is enough. A technology can have low operational carbon emissions and still require serious examination of:
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land;
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water;
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fuel;
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waste;
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cost;
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public subsidy;
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insurance and liability;
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construction risk;
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decommissioning;
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cultural resources;
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Tribal sovereignty;
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and obligations extending beyond our own lifetimes.
The question is not simply:
“Is nuclear good or bad?”
The better question is:
Photo: Washington State Magazine
WHAT WOULD JUST GOVERNANCE REQUIRE?
Our research explicitly rejects treating IJT’s position as simply anti-nuclear, pro-geothermal, or anti-data-center. The stronger framework examines cumulative obligations and decision-making across technologies.
THE CLOUD
HAS AN ENERGY SYSTEM
The renewed nuclear conversation is happening at the same moment the Northwest is confronting extraordinary electricity demand from hyperscale computing, semiconductor manufacturing, electrification, and other new loads.
Amazon’s own public disclosures connect its investments in advanced nuclear development with the electricity demands associated with its data-center business.
That makes the conversation bigger than a reactor.
A hyperscale facility can drive:
→ generation
→ transmission
→ substations
→ land
→ water
→ tax structures
→ public financing
→ waste
→ long-term infrastructure.
The Future Ready question applies here too:
Who gets to decide how much growth a place can absorb, who pays for it, and when sovereign Tribal Nations enter the decision?
THE NUCLEAR JUSTICE EXCHANGE
ACROSS THE OCEAN.
ACROSS GENERATIONS.
IJT is developing a reciprocal nuclear justice exchange connecting Wanapum community members and partners in the Marshall Islands. The intention is not to compare suffering. It is to create relationship. Participants will have opportunities to share place, history, food, culture, community knowledge, policy experience, healing practices, and strategies for protecting future generations.
Our larger vision includes reciprocal gatherings:
one in the Marshall Islands
and one in the Columbia River region.
The exchange is being imagined around:
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cultural exchange;
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community-led storytelling;
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nuclear history;
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environmental restoration;
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health access;
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policy advocacy;
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healing;
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youth;
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reparations and repair;
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and long-term solidarity.
CLEANUP IS NOT A FOOTNOTE.
The federal plutonium-production mission ended. Its obligations did not.
Hanford still contains enormous quantities of radioactive and chemical waste, contaminated groundwater, aging infrastructure, and cleanup responsibilities expected to continue for decades. Cleanup has also made real progress, including the beginning of low-activity waste vitrification.
Both things can be true:
progress matters
and the obligation remains unfinished.
BEFORE CREATING A NEW CENTURY-SCALE NUCLEAR OBLIGATION HERE,
WHAT MUST BE REPAIRED, PROTECTED, AND GUARANTEED FIRST?
TRUTH
Whose history has been preserved?
Whose has been minimized?
Who tells the story?
JUSTICE CANNOT
STOP AT REMEMBERING.
REPAIR
What obligations remain after displacement, contamination, and exclusion?
HEALING
What do communities need physically, culturally, spiritually, and environmentally?
POWER
Who makes the next decision?
WANAPUM × MARSHALLESE EXCHANGE
Reciprocal relationship-building around nuclear history, health, healing, advocacy, culture, environmental repair, and intergenerational responsibility.
HANFORD + PRIEST RAPIDS STORYWORK
Supporting community-controlled histories and narratives about place, displacement, memory, survival, and relationship.
CASCADE WATCH
Tracking the proposed advanced nuclear project at Hanford, including licensing, land, public financing, electricity allocation, water, waste, transmission, and Tribal engagement.
NUCLEAR JUSTICE POLICY
Researching Washington’s role in nuclear subsidies, economic risk, ratepayer exposure, infrastructure planning, Tribal processes, and public accountability.
FUTURE ANCESTORS
Creating pathways for young people to learn the history they are inheriting—and to participate in decisions about what happens next.
NUCLEAR HEALTH + HEALING
Building relationships around health access, cancer burden, healing, environmental health, and long-term community care.