To Use a Mountain: Filmmaker Casey Carter on America's Nuclear Waste Crisis

Filmmaker Casey Carter joins Big Blend Radio to talk about his feature documentary debut, "To Use a Mountain," which traces the search for a permanent U.S. nuclear waste repository back to the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Casey and Lisa dig into the six candidate communities featured in the film — in Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Nevada — and the farmers, miners, tribal leaders, and citizen scientists who fought back when their land was marked as a possible dumping ground for the nation's most dangerous waste. The conversation traces a direct line from that 1980s fight to today's headlines: Casey explains how the current data-center boom and a so-called "nuclear renaissance" are reviving interest in new reactor sites, including small modular reactors proposed for underground placement near data centers. Lisa connects the dots to ongoing battles over public lands, from Chaco Canyon to Bears Ears, and asks what it means for communities asked to carry this burden for 10,000 years with no lasting solution in sight. "To Use a Mountain" opens theatrically at DCTV in New York on Friday, August 21st, and arrives on VOD through Grasshopper Film in early 2027. Learn more: https://www.touseamountainfilm.com