***************************************************************** 10/10/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.239 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 (CMEP-list) 2 Rowland Not Fretting About Missing Nuclear Fuel Parts 3 Second-phase power project at Qingshan starts trial operation 4 Nuclear power study says waste remains issue 5 Nuclear Power Stop Possible in Fight Against Terror 6 Dounreay can learn from Winfrith's experience 7 Protesters line up for German nuke waste shipments 8 German N-plants may go offline if in danger - EnvMin 9 Germany shuts N-plant after safety incident 10 King sees safety gap at Maine Yankee 11 German LPX shrugs off nuclear outage 12 Russian official upbeat on small nuclear power stations' design 13 Sanctions have made India nuclear self-reliant 14 US senators move to secure domestic energy sites 15 House panel talks Yucca security 16 Editorial: Yucca proposal is awful idea 17 Ensign warns DOT of Yucca risks 18 Ontario nuclear emergency response plan sits on shelf, 19 One Pool Covers All Nuclear Plants 20 Celebrities urge voters to oppose Sydney reactor 21 Nuclear reactor worker injured 22 Funds urged for nuclear waste project 23 Politics & Yucca Mountain 24 American Ecology reorganizes Company makes two changes in jobs at 25 One Pool Covers All Nuclear Plants 26 Nuclear Plant Security Increased NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 England:CND Steps Up Anti-War Protests 2 Radioactive dust sprays 6 workers at ORNL 3 Duratek Lands Contract for Hanford Site Cleanup Work 4 Russia plays down Kursk safety fears 5 Kursk to be placed in dock on October 13th 6 Deluge of embarrassing headlines was 'buried' by terror crisis 7 Hanford reactor restart effort assailed 8 Justice Dept. OKs Exposure Claims 9 Affected apply for IAAP benefits package 10 Mercury in creek decreasing 11 Wind blows radioactive dust on six workers 12 Seaborg's progeny pays visit 13 Author: Hughes' memos show he knew risks of radioactive movie site 14 HHS Seeks Public Comment on Rules to Assist Compensation of ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 (CMEP-list) Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 13:52:29 -0700 >From: "Noel Petrie" >Subject: (CMEP-list) >To: "undisclosed-recipients:;" > >PUBLIC CITIZEN OPPOSES PRICE-ANDERSON REAUTHORIZATION > > >The House Energy and Commerce Committee is scheduled to mark-up H.R. 2983, the reauthorization of the Price-Anderson Act, on October 11, 2001. > >Public Citizen OPPOSES the reauthorization of the Price-Anderson Act and urges the rejection of H.R. 2983 for the following reasons: > >* The Price-Anderson Act was originally enacted in 1954 to assist a nascent nuclear power industry get off the ground. The nuclear industry has had a 50-year economic stimulus package with this taxpayer subsidy and it is time to end it. > >* The Price-Anderson Act distorts the economic viability of the nuclear power industry since it relies on taxpayer subsidies to cover the insurance costs for the industry. > >* The Price-Anderson Act is blind to risk as it treats all nuclear power plant operators uniformly and does not differentiate risk from power plant to power plant. > >* The insurance coverage required in H.R. 2983 is disproportionate to the calculated risk for operating nuclear power facilities. > >* The Price-Anderson Act does not sunset until August 2002. H.R. 2983 does not address the issue of increasing security and strengthening the safety of nuclear facilities in the event of terrorist attack. There should be a thorough and independent assessment of the security needs at U.S. nuclear power facilities before Price-Anderson is even considered for reauthorization. > >* H.R. 2983 continues to have the American taxpayer foot the bill for negligent and even willful misconduct by private contractors working at Department of Energy facilities. No other government agency provides this level of taxpayer indemnification to non-government personnel. > > >VOTE NO ON H.R. 2983 > >To learn more about PRICE-ANDERSON visit: http://www.citizen.org/cmep/energy_enviro_nuclear/nuclear_power_plants/nucle ar_revival/articles.cfm?ID=4912 > >_____________________ >If you would like to be removed from the cmep-list, send an email to cmep@citizen.org with the words "unsubscribe cmep" in the subject. > >Questions about the CMEP-list can be directed to cmep@citizen.org > >To learn more about this and other issues Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program works on, visit our website at www.citizen.org . > >Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program > > > ***************************************************************** 2 Rowland Not Fretting About Missing Nuclear Fuel Parts ctnow.com CONNECTICUT » APWIRE Associated Press October 09, 2001 HARTFORD Conn. (AP) - Gov. John G. Rowland said Tuesday he is not overly concerned about two missing fuel rods at the Millstone One nuclear plant in Waterford. The rods were last seen 21 years ago. The plant's former owner, Northeast Utilities, said Friday the rods could be in a spent-fuel pool at Millstone or could have been mistaken for other equipment and sent to radioactive waste disposal facilities in South Carolina, Washington or California. Rowland said he has spoken with NU Chairman Michael Morris, who blamed the problem on a record-keeping error. The 13-foot-long rods were damaged in 1972, and then removed and placed in the storage pool. They were last verified to be in the pool in 1980 and discovered to be missing last November. According to Morris, the pencil-thin rods can be cut and reduced and repackaged, so the fact they are missing is not as shocking as it may seem, Rowland said. "Having said that, where are they now?" Rowland asked. "Is there any danger? We don't think there is." While the exact location of the rods is not known, "we know where they're not," Rowland said. "They're not anywhere that could cause trouble in Connecticut." South Carolina Attorney General Charlie Condon was less optimistic. He called the disappearance of the fuel parts "outrageous" and said he has asked South Carolina officials to look into whether the rods are in the state. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspectors are at Millstone, reviewing a report of how the fuel rods disappeared. The inspectors, who are scheduled to remain at the site for two weeks, will decide whether Northeast Utilities searched thoroughly enough for the rods. AP-ES-10-09-01 1508EDT ©2001 MyWay Corp. Portions ©2001 ctnow.com ***************************************************************** 3 Second-phase power project at Qingshan starts trial operation (10/10/2001) (xinhua) The trial operation of China's first self-designed and constructed nuclear power plant is a milestone in the development of the country's nuclear power technology, experts said. The total investment of the second-phase project amounts to 14. 8 billion yuan (1.79 billion US dollars). It will send 8 billion kwh of power a year to the east China power grid since June, 2002. Zhang Yuliang, a nuclear power expert, said that measures had been taken to prevent nuclear leakage in the second-phase Qinshan power plant. The first-phase project of Qinshan nuclear power plant started operation in 1991. Copyright 2001 By chinadaily.com.cn. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 4 Nuclear power study says waste remains issue Oil & Gas Journal - By the OGJ Online Staff HOUSTON, Oct. 9 -- New nuclear plant designs promise to overcome some of the commercial and safety barriers of nuclear power, said the Baker Institute for Public Policy at Rice University in a recent report. But the institute said designs are still burdened by poor public perception, the risk of rogue states using nuclear power plant construction and refueling as a cover for nuclear weapon proliferation, and nuclear waste problems. Nuclear technology is moving towards smaller scale design, just as conventional power plant technology is, the report said. The so-called micro-nuclear technology involves new designs that make reactors smaller, with fewer components, simpler design, and simpler operation and maintenance. The new designs include:  International Reactor and Secure Nuclear Power System, a pressurized water reactor with steam generators integrated within the reactor pressure vessel.  Pebble Bed Modular Reactor, a modular graphite-moderated, helium-cooled reactor that employs a direct cycle gas turbine and fuel contained in small graphite-covered balls.  4S, a sodium-cooled modular fast reactor designed to operate for 30 years without refueling.  Encapsulated Nuclear Heat Source Reactor, a modular lead-cooled reactor designed to function as a nuclear battery; it is shipped to the site fueled and then replaced by a new module after 20 years of operation. An advantage to modular design would be shortened construction time compared to conventional reactors, which take at least 5 years to construct. The smaller modular units should be built in less than a year, said the institute. The cost advantage still would not materialize unless enough modular plants were ordered to make the manufacturing facilities cost-effective, noted the institute. It would not be economic to build a manufacturing facility to produce one nuclear plant module. "The chicken-egg problem of the manufacturing process will stand as a barrier," the report said. Several of the designs expected to be ready after 2020 eliminate the possibility of severe accidents by relying on the physical process itself for safety as opposed to the functioning of mechanical and electrical components like valves and pumps. For example, because some of the new designs don't circulate coolant, they will avoid accidents that involve large loss of coolant, the report said. However, other safety issues that involve the possible failure or leaks from the containment structure have not been overcome, said the report. It noted that because these units would require refueling less often, they would help ease concerns about clandestine nuclear weapon proliferation under the pretense of refueling. The institute proposed that modular plants could be constructed in one country in a heavily guarded "nuclear park." Then the modules could be shipped to the host country. However, the institute admitted the concept might be politically difficult to implement. Finally, no matter what the technology, waste disposal challenges will be "daunting." The Baker Institute said if nuclear power were to become the fuel of choice internationally, the spent fuel generated annually would be about 50,000 tons -- equivalent to one Yucca Mountain dumpsite being constructed every 18 months. To date there is no long-term repository for spent nuclear fuel available in the US, as Yucca Mountain is still under review. ***************************************************************** 5 Nuclear Power Stop Possible in Fight Against Terror F.A.Z. - English Version 11. Oct. 2001 By Manfred Schäfers BERLIN. Temporarily closing down some or all of Germany's 19 nuclear power plants as a precautionary measure is a step that the German government could yet take in the struggle against terrorism, according to the country's environment minister. "There is a legal basis to do this," Jürgen Trittin of Alliance 90/The Greens told a symposium on nuclear power law here on Tuesday. If the Interior Ministry foresees a concrete danger of an attack, he said, the German Environment Ministry and the state environment ministries would then have to decide whether one or all of Germany's nuclear power plants should be taken off-line for an indefinite period. "I explicitly rule nothing out in this context," Mr. Trittin said, but at the same time, he added that, as far as is currently known, there is no known threat to German plants. Mr. Trittin warned that the security measures in the wake of last month's terrorist attacks on the United States should not be limited to tracking down terrorists and closing bank accounts. Efforts must be made in numerous areas to reduce Germany's vulnerability, he said. But as Mr. Trittin spoke, the nuclear policy of the Social Democrats and Alliance 90/The Greens coalition was again coming under fire from the Free Democratic Party and a leading environmental protection group. The FDP's environmental policy spokeswoman, Birgit Homburger, accused Mr. Trittin of duplicity, saying he was obscuring his own responsibility for a serious security problem. "Instead of storing nuclear waste deep underground in a central, secure place, the environment minister is forcing the establishment of more than a dozen provisional depots out in the countryside," she said. Meanwhile, the German Association for Environmental and Nature Protection called on the parliament and the government to look for ways to shift immediately from nuclear to other sources of energy. The association said the terrorist attacks on the United States had clearly shown that continued operation of nuclear power plants was irresponsible. Mr. Trittin also discussed the decision taken this weekend to shut down the Philippsburg power plant in the state of Baden-Würrtemberg. He said the lax approach to security which had been discovered there was unacceptable. Mr. Trittin said the malfunction in Philippsburg was not the result of decisions by shift supervisors, but a failure of management, and he credited the operators for acting on their own to temporarily shut down the facility. "This shows that something has changed for the better," he said. A hearing on revising German nuclear power law is scheduled for Nov. 5. The German parliament's environment committee will end hearings on new bill on Dec. 12 and present it to parliament two days later. Mr. Trittin said he expects the legislative process to be finished by the end of the year. Several nuclear waste transports are set for Wednesday. They are to converge on the town of Wörth, near the French border, before proceeding to a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in La Hague, France.Oct. 9, 2001 © Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 2000 ***************************************************************** 6 Dounreay can learn from Winfrith's experience The Scotsman Online - scotsman.com > John Ross TO THE uninitiated, it is just a nondescript patch of grass in the middle of an industrial estate. To those in the know, however, it is a monument to innovation and pioneering technology. The piece of land, half the size of a football pitch, represents the ultimate in nuclear decommissioning. Just over ten years ago the greenfield site was a two-storey building housing a plutonium handling facility at the UK Atomic Energy Authority’s (UKAEA) Winfrith facility in Dorset which has since been decontaminated, cleaned, stripped out and demolished. It is the sort of environmental clean up which the UKAEA hopes to mirror on a larger scale at its site at Dounreay which is proposed to revert to a near-greenfield site within 60 years at a cost of £4.5 billion. The change in focus has delighted environmentalists, but as the buildings are emptying, work is continuing on other fronts to leave Caithness with an economic legacy to replace the nuclear-related employment which has helped sustain the economy for the past 50 years. Winfrith has ten years of experience of the complete cultural change Dounreay is now undergoing after the government wound down its nuclear programme. Thomas Hardy’s Egdon Heath is being given a new identity, gradually swapping its role as a nuclear research and development site to a thriving science and technology park. As facilities are de-licensed for nuclear use, they are torn down or refurbished for other clients in defence and environmental research, computer software or security products. At its peak, Winfrith, built in the late 1950s to undertake research and development in electricity generation from nuclear power, employed 2,000 staff. It had nine operational nuclear reactors, including the steam generating heavy water reactor which provided the National Grid with enough electricity to supply a large town. In the 1990s work started on dismantling the buildings - which some never considered would come down - as part of a £700 million decommissioning programme. All Winfrith’s fuel and high level waste has been removed and 80 per cent of its nuclear facilities will be gone in the next decade, the rest disappearing in the next 25-30 years. It now has 1,500 workers on site, but only 100 work for UKAEA, the rest being employed by the contractors engaged in decommissioning, or the new tenants. Among them are the staff of 35 firms occupying starter units created from a collection of small buildings. The challenges Dounreay faces are on a greater scale to Winfrith, with 1,500 separate projects to tackle, all costing millions of pounds. They include the cleaning out of the notorious waste shaft, the dismantling of the Prototype Fast Reactor (PFR) and the decommissioning of the Dounreay Fast Reactor (DFR), the famous golf-ball shaped building which dominates the site. Work on the shaft is seen as one of the most serious problems facing the nuclear industry anywhere in the world. It will take over 20 years to complete and cost over £300 million to retrieve its cocktail of 16,000 items of radioactive and chemical material. PFR, which shut down in 1994, has had its fuel removed and the next stage will see the disposal of 1,500 tonnes of sodium coolant. A £17 million plant has been built to remove radioactivity from the sodium and convert the rest to salt to be discharged into the sea. DFR, completed in 1958 and connected to the National Grid in the 1960s when it was the world’s first fast reactor to produce electricity for public consumption, represents another challenge. While 57 tonnes of coolant and about 1,000 breeder elements, some of which are jammed, are being removed, much of the building will remain. The famous dome is being considered as a listed building, meaning every step of the stripping out process has to be approved by Historic Scotland as well as nuclear regulators. But after decades of controversy, culminating in a damning safety audit in 1998 when the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency made 143 safety recommendations , Dounreay is now basking in the unprecedented position of having everyone agreeing with its current role, shutting itself down. Peter Welsh, the site director, said: " Dounreay has changed considerably, people are focused on a brand new business. "What we say to our critics now is ‘please judge us on our current and future performance, please do not keep harping back to the past’. That is the business of yesterday, not of today." The business of tomorrow is finding the jobs to replace those which will go with the nuclear era and ensuring there is a sustainable economic entity. Already there is talk of making Dounreay a centre of excellence for decommissioning work as well as other high-tech research and development work, possibly on renewable energy. What would Welsh like to see on the site post Dounreay? "It is a no-win question because if we paint a picture of nice green fields , people call it an economic desert," he said. "What I want is the sustaining of jobs, a healthy economy in this region and a halt to the bleed of young people from the area." ***************************************************************** 7 Protesters line up for German nuke waste shipments Planet Ark Environmental News: GERMANY: October 10, 2001 HAMBURG - Environmental groups said yesterday that anti-nuclear protests would accompany planned shipments of nuclear waste from several German nuclear power plants to the reprocessing site in La Hague, France. The rail-based shipments were expected to start during Tuesday/Wednesday night from the Brunsbuettel plant in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein, a Greenpeace spokesman told Reuters. Further shipments were expected from the nearby Stade plants and the Muelheim-Kaerlich plant in Germany's west, he said. Protesters were expected to demonstrate along the whole stretch of the transportation route. A Hamburg police spokesman confirmed a shipment of nuclear waste was planned, but would not give an exact timeframe. Anti-nuclear organisation X-tausendmal quer (no, a thousand times) in a statement said protesters would set up pickets and blockades in a number of locations. The shipment, consisting of seven containers, would probably cross the German-French border between Woerth and Lauerburg in Rhineland-Palatinate late today afternoon. Given the tense security situation at a time of U.S.-led air strikes against Afghanistan, protesters believed it was especially dangerous to send atomic waste on its way, X-tausenmal spokesman Jochen Stay was quoted as saying. "In order to protect people from damage, it would be a priority to stop carrying out nonsensical shipments of highly-radioactive waste," he said. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 8 German N-plants may go offline if in danger - EnvMin Planet Ark Environmental News: GERMANY: October 10, 2001 FRANKFURT - German Environment Minister Juergen Trittin said yesterday German nuclear plants could be switched off if there were signs of possible attacks on them. Speaking at a nuclear industry law symposium in Berlin, he said: "We have the legal powers to do so." He said if interior ministries in any of Germany's 16 states believed a strike against a plant was possible, their environment ministries together with him would decide whether the particular plant or all plants should be taken off the grid. But there was no intelligence pointing to such plans, Trittin added. Germany's 19 nuclear plants supply one third of the nation's electricity requirements. Trittin's remarks come in the context of U.S.-led air strikes against Afghanistan following the refusal by its ruling Taliban movement to hand over Osama bin Laden, the main suspect in the September 11 airliner attacks on U.S. landmarks. Germany has pledged solidarity with the United States, so has to consider becoming a target for possible retribution. Trittin said shutting down nuclear reactors reduced the risk of an uncontrolled nuclear reaction. Access procedures at the plants were being reviewed amid heightened security measures, he also said. A group of German atomic scientists is due to report to Trittin by mid-October on how to enhance overall safety at the nuclear plants. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 9 Germany shuts N-plant after safety incident Planet Ark Environmental News: GERMANY: October 9, 2001 BERLIN - A German nuclear reactor was closed temporarily on the weekend following government outrage at a new report of an incident in August that it says raised serious doubts about safety procedures at the plant. Environment Minister Juergen Trittin said Energie Baden-Wurttemberg AG had agreed voluntarily to the shutdown of one of two reactors at Philippsburg, near Karlsruhe, and it would last several days. Ministry sources said the company was also likely to be fined several million marks. "This move is the right and unavoidable consequence of the fact the atomic energy authority has raised lots of questions about safety measures at the plant," Trittin told reporters after talks with company executives. "The length of the shutdown is not a question of hours or days," Trittin added, saying the plant would only reopen once all questions relating to the incident, revealed in a report last week, were answered. The 1.4 gigawatt pressurised-water reactor, in use since 1984, was operated for two weeks in August following a routine refuelling with a fault in its back-up cooling system, the ministry said. Once discovered it took staff at the plant some days to realise the full extent of the fault. At no time was there a real security risk, the state of Baden Wuerrtemberg said in a statement. Nuclear power is a controversial issue in Germany, which since 1998 has been ruled by a coalition of Social Democrats and Greens. The government force the industry last year to agree to gradually phase out the country's 19 operational reactors over the next 25 years or so. The Greens, of which Trittin is a member, made an end to nuclear power a condition of their participation in government. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 10 King sees safety gap at Maine Yankee Federal policy for closed nuclear plants 'clearly does not address the event of Sept. 11,' the governor says. --> Wednesday, October 10, 2001 By BARBARA WALSH, Portland Press Herald Writer Copyright © 2001 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. In the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, Gov. Angus King wants the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to tighten security at Maine Yankee and take responsibility for the spent radioactive fuel soon to be removed from the decommissioned Wiscasset nuclear plant. King wrote the NRC on Oct. 4 urging the federal agency to rethink its nuclear waste regulations after hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. A sign instructs visitors to Maine Yankee that they must stop for an inspection prior to entering. Officials at the nuclear plant say they have tightened security since the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, but would not specify what changes have been made. The NRC's current policy for closed nuclear plants like Maine Yankee, which is in the process of removing nuclear fuel from its reactor, "clearly does not address the event of Sept. 11," King wrote. "These circumstances raise significant safety and security issues for Maine, soon to be faced with stranded radioactive materials and an absence of abundant nuclear professional expertise normally associated with production or research activity." The nuclear plant had expected to begin relocating 1,434 nuclear fuel rods from its reactor to an on-site storage area in September, but the transfer has been delayed. It is expected to begin later this month or in November. The 12-foot rods, which contain high levels of radioactive waste, will be placed in steel containers and dropped into 28-inch-thick, steel-reinforced concrete casks. The casks will then be placed inside a building surrounded by razor-wire fences and surveillance cameras. "These concrete casks will be able to withstand a fair amount of damage, but there still needs to be a fair amount of security to watch over them," said the governor's spokesman, John Ripley. "The governor made it clear there is no danger as far as we can tell that Maine Yankee would explode if hit by a terrorist attack, but he's concerned that some nuclear material could end up in the atmosphere. It's a fear." Catherine Ferdinand, Maine Yankee spokeswoman, said she understands the governor's concern about keeping the reactor rods safe. "The security building is designed to withstand hurricanes, tornadoes, but if you're talking about somebody dive-bombing a plane into the facility, I don't think anyone designed these buildings for that type of scenario," Ferdinand said. "They were designed to withstand what the NRC deemed plausible threats." Maine Sen. Olympia Snowe also has contacted the NRC, requesting a complete accounting of enhanced security steps for the nation's nuclear plants. "I would specifically like to know what is being done to protect the spent nuclear fuel on-site at the Maine Yankee facility," Snowe wrote in a letter to NRC Chairman Richard A. Meserve. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the NRC has begun to review its regulations and policies "from top to bottom," said spokeswoman Rosetta Virgilio. The agency has also talked to nuclear plants across the country about security issues, she said. "Everyone's security has been duly heightened," Virgilio said. "And we've been working very closely with the FBI and other law enforcement and military forces with regard to these issues." Maine Yankee has tightened security since the terrorist attacks, but would not specify what changes have been made. Unlike the nation's airports, which now have National Guardsmen patrolling them, the nuclear plant has no such military force. "Putting the Guard there is being looked at," said Ripley, King's spokesman. Kris Christine, an anti-nuclear activist from Alna, believes the governor should supplement Maine Yankee's security immediately. "They have the National Guard at the Portland jetport with machine guns," Christine said. "Do they have National Guard like that at Maine Yankee? I don't think so. I think they have rent-a-cops." Christine also said the governor should temporarily close the Wiscasset Airport, which is near Maine Yankee. She said air traffic could be diverted to the airport in Owls Head. "They have not looked at the threat from the air," she said. Paula Craighead, nuclear adviser to King, doesn't believe bringing in the National Guard is necessary, nor is shutting down Wiscasset's airport. "We don't think we fit the profile for a terrorist attack," Craighead said. "They're looking for a facility in an urban area with symbolic and maximum damage." The governor is more concerned, Craighead said, with pressuring the NRC and the Department of Energy to transfer Maine Yankee's radioactive fuel to a federally regulated site. "Let's get it to a place with national security with no-fly zones and checkpoints," she said. The NRC is researching a federal nuclear waste site in Yucca Mountain, Nev., but officials say it is far from becoming a reality. Maine Yankee expects it will take until late 2004 to fully shut down its plant. There are now 60 employees at the plant, compared to 500 when it was operating. When the reactor fuel is completely removed, the nuclear waste will be monitored by 15 workers in a bulletproof room in the security building. "We understand the state's concern's about post-decommissioned security," said Ferdinand of Maine Yankee. "Our engineering support will no longer be at the site then. And the question is, what happens when our additional staff isn't there, and will the security be adequate?" Staff Writer Tess Nacelewicz contributed to this report. Staff Writer Barbara Walsh can be contacted at 791-6382 or at: bwalsh@pressherald.com Copyright© Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. ***************************************************************** 11 German LPX shrugs off nuclear outage Planet Ark Environmental News: UPDATE - GERMANY: October 9, 2001 FRANKFURT - German electricity traders said yesterday that bearish sentiment on the Leipzig Power Exchange (LPX) showed that utility EnBW's (EBKG.DE) closure of a big nuclear power plant at the weekend had not affected prices. EnBW closed the 1,400 megawatt German Philippsburg II reactor over the weekend, following government outrage at a new report of an incident in August which it said raised serious doubts about safety procedures. "All of the market had expected EnBW to be out buying on the LPX to replace that lost power, and that would have pushed up prices," a trader said. "But that didn't happen, and in fact the LPX prices were lower than OTC levels," he added. The LPX cleared at 1230 (1030 GMT) at softer levels than OTC ranges, at 21.01 euros per megawatt hour baseload and at 26.69 euros peakload for Tuesday's contract. Dealers had said earlier yesterday that only once the LPX cleared could they get a full picture of how the outage would affect prices. But dealers said that Germany's power market was already at over-capacity yesterday, with mild temperatures and rainfall supporting bearish sentiment. Traders said market expectations that EnBW would close the unit had had a slight bullish effect during Friday's trading for Tuesday, with prices firming by around 50-70 eurocents. Day ahead OTC power prices opened yesterday at 23.5 euros per megawatt hour baseload and at 31.5-32 euros peakload. By 1130 (0930 GMT) baseload was unchanged, while peakload had softened to 29.95-30 euros. Traders said November and December firmed around 15-20 euros cents, but added that they expected any further bullish influence would be limited to the daily products. "The only effect we would expect is on the short term, because the plant will probably be back in a couple of weeks," a trader said, adding "Though it is not clear yet what will happen to EnBW, what the government will do." Environment minister Juergen Trittin said the plant would only reopen once all questions relating to the incident were answered. The Philippsburg II reactor, the larger of two units at the site, last rejoined the grid on August 11 after a two-week maintenance period. Maintenance on the smaller 870 MW block was carried out in June. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 12 Russian official upbeat on small nuclear power stations' design BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 10, 2001 Text of report in English by Russian news agency Interfax Moscow, 10 October: Russia has designs for 35 small nuclear power stations, including 30 on land and five or six floating ones, Aleksandr Polushkin, deputy executive director of Rosenergoatom concern, told Interfax on Wednesday [10 October]. The first 70 MW floating station will most likely be built in Severodvinsk at a cost of 100m-120m US dollars, he said. The station will be installed in a barge, where a crew of 60 will stay in shifts of four months, Polushkin said. Nuclear waste will also be kept on the barge, he said. Rosenergoatom is negotiating the construction of the stations with Primorye, Kamchatka and Chukotka authorities, Polushkin said. Private capital will only be allowed to provide repayable credits for the construction, he said. The licensing of the Severodvinsk construction is to be completed in the first quarter of 2002, Polushkin said. The construction of one such station will take four to five years, he said. Small nuclear power stations reach the breakeven point in nearly 10 years compared to 14 - 20 years for large stations, Polushkin said. In Kamchatka and Chukotka, small nuclear power stations offset construction costs, he said. Floating nuclear power stations are guarded as stringently as the large ones, Polushkin said. Rosenergoatom will see to it that all precautions and security procedures are observed, he said. Terrorists will not be able to penetrate the nuclear power stations' security systems, Polushkin said. Source: Interfax news agency, Moscow, in English 1326 gmt 10 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 13 Sanctions have made India nuclear self-reliant Expressindia.com Press Trust of India Indore, October 10: The sanctions imposed on India after the 1998 nuclear tests helped the nation become self reliant in the nuclear power sector, chairman of Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), Anil Kakodkar said. "The ban has helped us a lot in becoming self-reliant in the field of nuclear technology," Kakodkar who is also secretary, department of Atomic Energy (DAE), told reporters on the sidelines of a two-day conference on nuclear technology-challenges in the 21st century, organised by Indian Nuclear Society (INS). Kakodkar said, "We welcome external help provided it is for strengthening our nuclear programme and not making us dependent on their programmes. AEC has urged the government to amend the atomic energy act to encourage private participation and its recommendations are lying with the government." © 2001: Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd. All rights ***************************************************************** 14 US senators move to secure domestic energy sites Planet Ark Environmental News: UPDATE - USA: October 10, 2001 WASHINGTON - Warning of cracks in security at U.S. oil refineries, pipelines and electric power plants, the Senate Energy Committee yesterday endorsed measures to protect private facilities from cyber-attack and guard huge federal hydroelectric dams in the West. The deadly Sept. 11 attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Center have focused new attention on the vulnerability of American energy facilities. The Democrat-controlled Senate energy committee is looking at options ranging from restricting information on the Web about nuclear power plants to arming Bureau of Land Management employees. The energy panel will vote on specific measures on Thursday. Louisiana Sen. Mary Landrieu said she would offer legislation to provide federal funds to all 50 states to protect oil and natural gas pipelines, refineries and other industry infrastructure from attacks or sabotage. Landrieu, a Democrat from a major oil-producing state, said the federal government needs to do more. Money for the program would come from royalties that energy firms have paid for federal leases for oil and natural gas from the Gulf of Mexico. Landrieu did not specify how much money would be needed for the program. "I think the whole issue is of critical importance to our nation," she said at a Senate Energy Committee hearing. U.S. lawmakers, who have frequently railed against U.S. dependence on oil imports from the politically sensitive Middle East, emphasized that they are now concerned about the security of domestic energy. WESTERN DAMS, CYBER-ATTACKS New Mexico Democrat Jeff Bingaman agreed to sponsor an amendment proposed by the Interior Department to beef up federal oversight at federal hydroelectric dams. The huge dams provide a large amount of electricity to consumers and businesses, especially in the West. John Keys, commissioner of Interior's Bureau of Land Management, testified that his agents need authority to carry weapons, make arrests and enforce vandalism and trespassing laws on the nation's 8 million acres of public land. "We have over 400 sites that need some security," Keys said. One amendment being considered by the energy committee would let the federal government hire extra security guards and perform criminal background checks at federally owned dams such as the Bonneville Power Administration in the Pacific Northwest. Utah Sen. Robert Bennett, a Republican, raised the specter of a cyber-attack on computer networks that control energy installations and urged legislation to protect them. Calling privately owned sites like oil refineries and power generation plants "a major national blindspot," Bennett has proposed to restrict government documents about the sites through requests filed under the Freedom of Information Act. Lawmakers laid out several scenarios that could disrupt U.S. domestic energy supplies. For example, a computer hacker might be able to disrupt a railroad line's computer that controls trains carrying coal to utility power plants. "Someone can break in one place and then have an impact somewhere else," Bennett said. Bennett also wants private companies and federal agencies to share information on Internet security breaches. NUKE PLANT INFORMATION The federal government already oversees private security measures at nuclear power plants and hydroelectric dams. Some lawmakers want the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to remove from its Web site information about the location and safety features of the nation's 103 nuclear power plants. "I can't imagine the public needs to know the exact latitude and longitude of nuclear power plants," said Alaska Sen. Frank Murkowski, a Republican. The lawmakers' push for more security at energy facilities reflects heightened concern about another possible attack in the United States, now that American troops have bombed radical Islamic forces in Afghanistan. Last week, an Alaska man was arrested for shooting a hole in the huge Trans Alaska Pipeline System that ships crude oil from Alaska's North Slope. The puncture forced the pipeline and oil production to temporarily shut down, delaying some 2.7 million barrels of crude oil set for delivery to the market. The bullet hole also caused the second-biggest oil spill the pipeline had seen, spewing some 6,800 barrels of crude. The incident was described by police as a random shooting, and not connected to any terrorist group or threat. Story by Chris Baltimore and Tom Doggett REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 15 House panel talks Yucca security Las Vegas SUN October 09, 2001 By Benjamin Grove WASHINGTON -- The best way to protect nuclear waste from terrorists is to ship it from sites around the country to a high-security location in Nevada, a key senator on energy issues said today. For years Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, has been the Senate's leading proponent of the federal proposal to permanently bury the nation's nuclear waste -- eventually, 77,000 tons -- in underground tunnels at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The waste is piling up at nuclear power plants and government sites nationwide. Nevada officials adamantly oppose the plan. Terrorist attacks Sept. 11 have sparked debates in Congress about how vulnerable nuclear power plants and waste are to terrorist attack. Nevada lawmakers argue that if Yucca is approved, cross-country shipments of waste would be easy terrorist targets. But Murkowski suggested leaving waste on-site is a worse alternative. "Securing our nation's waste in one central, secure and remote facility is far safer than our current scattershot approach of leaving waste at 103 nuclear power plants nationwide," Murkowski said today at a Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee hearing. He is the ranking Republican on the panel. Murkowski spoke at a committee hearing as the panel considered how to better protect energy infrastructure -- power plants, oil refineries, hydroelectric dams and the computers that run them all. "Clearly there are some things we can and should do immediately," Murkowski said. "We should complete Yucca Mountain so that our high-level radioactive waste can be stored safely." Securing the nation's nuclear waste away from terrorists is just one of the issues being debated in Congress as lawmakers scramble to cobble together a broad array of terrorism-related legislation. The committee this week is expected to act on a bill that would allow the Bureau of Reclamation to use more local, state and federal law enforcement officers to protect the nation's 58 hydroelectric power plants, including one of its largest at Hoover Dam. Las Vegas depends on the dam for water and electricity. Dams are now operating at a heightened state of alert and are "secure," Bureau of Reclamation Commissioner John Keys assured the panel. But Keys lobbied for a law change that would allow local, state and other federal police to enforce federal laws -- using weapons and making arrests if necessary -- on bureau property, such as dams. "The lack of enforcement authority within a Reclamation project or on Reclamation-administered lands impedes the Bureau's ability to provide for public safety and the security of its facilities," Keys said. Lawmakers also considered a broader bill introduced by Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, aimed at protecting a vast array of U.S. sectors from cyber-terrorism, including energy, banking and finance, telecommunications and transportation systems. Bennett said U.S. companies need to share information about possible threats and about how to best protect against them. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 16 Editorial: Yucca proposal is awful idea Las Vegas SUN Today: October 10, 2001 at 8:52:39 PDT The federal government, working with local and state officials, mostly has come up with reasonable plans to prepare for potential terrorism threats. But there are others that have been poorly thought-out, including one by Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska. On Tuesday the Alaska Republican told a Senate committee, which is considering anti-terrorism legislation, that the best way to protect nuclear waste from terrorism is by shipping it to Nevada. Murkowski for years has led the charge in Congress to send the nation's 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste to Nevada's Yucca Mountain, so it isn't too surprising that he would try to jump aboard the anti-terrorism train with this proposal. Murkowski contends that keeping the waste all in one location is the best way to fend off terrorist attacks. What he neglects to mention, however, is that leaving the waste at guarded nuclear power plants is much safer than hauling the waste to Nevada. But Murkowski would rather take his chances with shuttling man's deadliest waste around the nation, radioactive garbage that would have to travel through at least 43 states before it would arrive in Nevada. It's also estimated that it could take as many as 100,000 shipments -- over our nation's highways and by rail -- to deliver nuclear waste to Nevada from the 103 nuclear power plants in the United States. Even if terrorists didn't go after these shipments, which could be a tempting target for them, the odds of an accident occurring are great enough that the nuclear waste should stay where it is. In the wake of what happened Sept. 11, some members of Congress believe they can resurrect their moribund and controversial proposals by saying that they're essential in the war against terrorism. A Washington Post editorial last month dubbed as "hitchhikers" those congressional Republicans who want to push tax cuts that benefit the wealthy as an economic answer to the terrorism attacks. Murkowski has proved that hitchhikers aren't confining themselves to just tax cuts, but that they will look to catch a ride with other vehicles, including anti-terrorism legislation. Congress so far has shown its seriousness in addressing the terrorism threat by dismissing unworkable measures. It should continue down that road and refuse to give a lift to Murkowski's proposal to send nuclear waste to Nevada. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 17 Ensign warns DOT of Yucca risks Las Vegas SUN Today: October 10, 2001 at 10:46:19 PDT By Benjamin Grove WASHINGTON -- Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., today urged Department of Transportation officials to consider the risk of terrorist attacks on shipments of radioactive waste as part of a broader look at terrorist threats to the nation's trains, trucks, buses and airplanes. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks Nevada officials have demanded that federal officials analyze risks to trucks and trains that eventually could haul high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain for permanent storage. Yucca is the proposed site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas that, if approved, could become the nation's first high-level waste burial ground. The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee today held a hearing on terrorist threats to the nation's buses, trucks and hazardous materials shippers. Committee member Ensign told witnesses from the DOT that putting waste on cross-country rail and highway routes to Nevada would be even more dangerous than leaving it where it now sits -- at nuclear power plants and government storage sites. DOT research and special programs administrator Ellen Engleman said the department was examining the issue. Ensign vowed to send her more written questions to explore the topic further. "In the past, the question was 'What if one of these shipments crashes?' " Ensign said after the hearing. "Now it's 'What if someone blows it up?' It's a completely different scenario." Ensign's comments during the hearing were partially in response to statements from leading Yucca project supporter Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, who this week said waste would be more secure at Yucca than at scattered sites around the country. "I wanted it on the public record that while he thinks that it is less dangerous to have it in one place, I think it is more dangerous to have it in one place" because of the risks of shipping it there, Ensign said. The committee considered testimony from bus and truck experts. Lawmakers have said the nation may need new rules for obtaining a commercial driver's license; higher standards for shipping hazardous materials; and better methods of tracking shipments. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is urging shippers to strictly follow security procedures and to take advantage of new shipping technologies in locks, seals, alarms and engine controls, agency administrator Joseph Clapp said in prepared testimony. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 18 Ontario nuclear emergency response plan sits on shelf, opposition charges October 9, 2001 Ontario nuclear emergency response plan sits on shelf, opposition charges TORONTO (CP) -- A week after a man slipped undetected into the grounds of the country's largest nuclear plant, the industry's watchdog was complaining that Ontario is unprepared for an emergency at its reactors, opposition leaders charged Tuesday.  Dalton McGuinty, Ontario's Liberal leader, says an emergency response plan for nuclear reactors has been in the works for five years, and remained so last week, three weeks after the horrific U.S. terror attacks put the country's nuclear plants on high alert.  It was also one week after a man slipped undetected through a chain-link fence at the Bruce nuclear plant on Lake Huron, McGuinty said.  The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission drew attention to the emergency plan last week during hearings into whether to fire up the dormant reactors in Pickering, Ont.  Commission member Chris Barnes said last week it was "incredulous" that provincial officials have been operating using an "interim plan" for several years.  But Ontario Energy Minister Jim Wilson said the plan has already been implemented, although it has not yet officially been signed off.  Wilson defended the emergency measures now in place to handle any disaster at the province's three nuclear plants -- Bruce on Lake Huron; Pickering, east of Toronto; Chalk River, north of Ottawa.  "We have good plans in place," he said. "We're working with our American counterparts ... and they tell us our plans are at least as good (as those at American plants)."  McGuinty argued important decisions have not yet been taken.  "You've deferred decisions like the following: how should we mark evacuation routes with signs, how would we distribute radiation-protective doses of iodine, (and) how wide an area should we give notification to after an incident including a terrorist attack?" he said to Wilson during question period.  McGuinty said the Sept. 23 entry of a man onto the grounds of the Bruce facility was proof that security measures now in place don't work.  "A man entered the grounds of the Bruce Nuclear Plant and he actually got inside a building, and all that he wanted to do fortunately was make a phone call," he said.  The man, who had just spent five hours in cold water following a boating accident, entered the plant undetected to call for help.  A spokeswoman for the plant said the man was never closer than three kilometres to the live reactors, and would have had to pass several security hurdles to get there. 2001, Canoe Limited Partnership. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 19 One Pool Covers All Nuclear Plants ctnow.com By TOM CONDON The Hartford Courant October 10, 2001 If a terrorist attack - or anything else - caused a release of radiation from a U.S. nuclear plant, one of the first calls would be to a suite of offices in West Hartford Center. That's where the nuclear insurance company is. When Congress encouraged the commercial development of nuclear energy in the 1950s, it also looked out for the public. The Price-Anderson Act of 1957 required operators of nuclear plants to provide liability coverage for injury or property damage. The insurance industry created American Nuclear Insurers, a pool or joint underwriting association of about 40 U.S. property-casualty insurers and two dozen overseas reinsurers. ANI now insures all 103 nuclear plants in the country, plus a small number of related facilities, such as transporters and fuel fabricators, said Waldemar Burzynski, the company's vice president for finance. The arrangement could be a model for Congress as it crafts a pooling mechanism for terrorism insurance. Indeed, legislators could pray for the same kind of results. The ANI pool provides three layers of fiscal protection. The company itself offers $200 million worth of coverage per incident, and keeps $400 million, enough for two full claims, in reserve. Should that limit be breached, the public utilities industry, the owners of the plant, agree to provide as much as $9 billionin coverage. Should the cost of a catastrophe exceed that amount, the federal government is the reinsurer of last resort. The good news is that no accident, even the partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979, has even come close to exhausting ANI's reserves. In 1979, the primary policy limit was $140 million per incident. Burzynski said that was "more than sufficient" to cover claims from Three Mile Island, although some claims are still in litigation. In addition to underwriters, American Nuclear employs engineers, physicists and health specialists to inspect and improve the properties. Burzynski credits inspection, upgrades and a strong industry commitment to security for keeping accidents to a minimum. "Nuclear security is normally very tight, but after Sept. 11 it's way beyond that," he said. "You can't get near them." ©2001 MyWay Corp. Portions ©2001 ctnow.com ***************************************************************** 20 Celebrities urge voters to oppose Sydney reactor theage.com.au, Breaking News Source: AAP|Published: Wednesday October 10, 1:19 PM Celebrities joined a protest today urging Sydneysiders to use their federal election votes to oppose the building of a second nuclear reactor in Sydney. The lobby group People Against a Nuclear Reactor, who organised the protest attended by media and entertainment personalities, said the current international climate was added reason to oppose the reactor. Singer/songwriter Jenny Morris, Mick Hart, radio personalities David White and Adam Spencer and author Linda Jaivin were on hand to support the protest. The chairwoman of Sutherland Shire's Nuclear Reactor Taskforce, independent councillor Genevive Rankin, said events in recent weeks meant there was now even more danger that a nuclear reactor could be the target of terrorist attacks. She said the concerns of the lobby group had fallen on deaf ears within the coalition government, but Labor had agreed not to build a second nuclear reactor in Sydney. '); document.write(' '); document.write(''); "With all that's going on, with all the security threats that we've had at Lucas Heights, with all the problems with nuclear waste, now is the time to say no to nuclear in the middle of Sydney," she said. "We have a right to know if our security is going to be threatened by having a nuclear reactor. "We can make (the government) listen by using your vote to vote against a nuclear reactor at the federal election." She said the Labor Party had changed its stance on the reactor. "They're saying that we probably do need it for Australia, but it should be in another location that's remote from urban location," she said. "To put a nuclear reactor which is a terrorist target right in the middle of the biggest city in Australia is quite crazy." NSW Greens MP Lee Rhiannon said the state and federal governments had been complacent on the potential risks of an aircraft attack on the reactor site, particularly since the September 11 attacks in the US. "Australia can no longer tolerate the terrorist vulnerability of having a nuclear reactor in our largest city," Ms Rhiannon said. She called on NSW Premier Bob Carr to reveal how emergency plans had been altered to take account of the new aircraft attack threat. "Have flight paths been altered to create a security safety zone around Lucas Heights?" Copyright © 2001 The Age Company Ltd. Any unauthorised use, ***************************************************************** 21 Nuclear reactor worker injured [St. Petersburg Times Online: News of Florida] At a Crystal River hospital, his clothes test positive for radiation, but Florida Power says the low level is not unusual. By CARRIE JOHNSON and ALEX LEARY © St. Petersburg Times, published October 10, 2001 CRYSTAL RIVER -- A temporary worker in the Crystal River nuclear plant's reactor containment building was hospitalized Tuesday when a piece of equipment fell on him and injured his ankle. The employee, whose name was not released, was taken to nearby Seven Rivers Community Hospital and tested for radiation contamination. He was released Tuesday night. No contamination was found on his body, although his clothes tested positive for a low level of radiation, said Florida Power spokesman Mac Harris. Harris said he did not know what the worker was doing at the time of the 6 p.m. accident, though he was one of 900 temporary workers brought in for a monthlong refueling and maintenance operation that began Sept. 29. Harris said he did not know what fell on the man's ankle. "All we know is that it was large enough to injure the man's foot," said Harris Florida Power staff will investigate to determine the cause of the accident, Harris said. In keeping with Florida Power policy, the employee was accompanied to the hospital by two radiation protection technicians, who monitor and survey for radioactive material, Harris said. The man was wheeled into a special decontamination room and scanned with Geiger counters by Florida Power and hospital employees. "I can confirm he was not contaminated," said Joyce Brancato, the hospital's chief operating officer. "The Florida Power personnel, as well as my staff, took all precautions in the event that he might be . . . but there is no contamination." Harris said all employees working in the plant's containment building must wear anticontamination clothing. The injured worker was wearing cotton coveralls, shoe covers and gloves, he said. The clothing was discarded. It is not unusual for plant workers to pick up a low level of radiation on their clothing while working in the containment building, Harris said. In addition to the reactor, the building houses the steam equipment that turns the plant's turbines, driving the generator. Small radioactive particles attach themselves to impurities in the water used to make steam. So if workers brush against a wet pipe or wall, their clothing may pick up particles, he said. © Copyright 2001St. Petersburg Times.All rights ***************************************************************** 22 Funds urged for nuclear waste project Buffalo News - WEST VALLEY News Washington Bureau Chief 10/10/01 WASHINGTON - Rep. Jack Quinn, R-Hamburg, said he believes a measure of progress on funding for the West Valley Demonstration Project was made Tuesday in a meeting with Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. In addition to Quinn, those who attended included Sens. Charles E. Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., and Rep. Amo Houghton, R-Corning, whose district includes the facility. Quinn said Abraham reported he will have a response in 10 days to pleas from the delegation and local officials to restore the program to its full funding request of $107 million for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. Abraham, Quinn said, wanted resolved a question raised by federal staffers that the project may not actually be able to spend the entire amount in the next 12 months. A meeting between officials of DOE and the New York State Energy and Research Authority, to discuss this issue, is scheduled for today. Congress and the White House reduced the appropriation by more than $12 million, and the project, like the rest of the federal government, is being funded under an emergency appropriations bill that expires Oct. 18. The meeting was held in Abraham's office at Quinn's request. Houghton commented afterward, "My impression is that we are all on the same page." Another purpose for the meeting, Houghton said, was "reaffirming our intentions that the federal government stay at West Valley and watch over its operations until the job is done." Houghton's comment underscored the delegation's desire that the federal government commit itself to overseeing the project until all high level nuclear waste is either removed to another site or stabilized on-site. DOE staffers want the federal government to downgrade its responsibilities as soon as possible. Copyright © 1999 - 2001 The Buffalo NewsTM ***************************************************************** 23 Politics & Yucca Mountain Las Vegas Tribune By Drew Lords 10/3/01 When I got back from my two year mission last year I was very excited to find out that my friend, Pete O'Neil, had made the decision to run for Congress in Nevada's new Third District. I was pleased to see someone from outside our state's corrupt political elite taking charge. The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) is studying Yucca Mountain, Nevada, to determine if it's a suitable place to build geologic repository for the nation's commercial and defense spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. This critical decision will have immeasurable impacts on Las Vegas. On September 20th , O'Neil and a group of reporters and local voters headed out to Yucca Mountain to see with our own eyes what the pending project was all about. The night before I had to call all the guests to remind them to be on time at 6:20 A.M. to meet the bus. I also had to get missing information from a few of the guests coming on the tour regarding their security clearance needed to get on the site. A few of the guests felt angry having to give their place and date of birth along with their social security number to get clearance to come. A few of the guests that night told me they where looking forward to "giving the DOE people a piece of their minds" and that "this site will never get built as long as Harry Reid is our man in the Washington". I called Pete O'Neil the night before to warn him that this was not going to be a bus full of "happy" people. O'Neil had been on the local talk radio show Alan Stock a week earlier and had invited Alan's listeners to call our office and come on our fact finding mission. I knew that some of the folks we where bringing we had never met in person and that by previous phone calls I could tell that they where not Pro-Yucca at all. Pete has a policy that even if someone disagrees with your view, you always remain polite and professional. Well, we went on the tour at Yucca and its changed all of the minds, including mine. Our tour guide Patrick Rowe was very informative. I must tell you that, as someone who grew up here in Las Vegas, I was raised to fear the Yucca Mountain project. I promised Pete I would go up with an open mind. What I and the others on our tour found was a DOE staff very open to answering all our questions. I also took note on how much care they put into our safety. At the end of the day, I found out that most of the information that I grew up believing from environmentalists was false. I realized that this is a tolerable thing. They are going to build a site at NASA standards. I would recommend anyone who has not gone up to the site yet to do so. It is an eye opener. Before our trip to Yucca Mountain, we went the the DOE's public hearing held in North Las Vegas on September 5th. At the hearing many people present where raking the DOE people over the coals. The majority of the folks attending that night went out of their way to be rude to the DOE stafffers. As always I noticed Pete in his normal matter telling me, "If we are going to truly get all the facts regarding this we must have a open honest dialog with the DOE people." That evening at the Yucca hearing I started to see the ugly side of politics. Drew Lords is Media Director for Pete O'Neil, who is running as an independent for Nevada's new third congressional district seat. His commentary will continue in the next issue of the Las Vegas Tribune. Copyright (c) 2001, Las Vegas Tribune. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 24 American Ecology reorganizes Company makes two changes in jobs at the top IdahoStatesman.com October 9, 2001 By Ken Dey Jack Lemley Chairman and CEO Steve Romano Gets new position Steve Romano, American Ecology Corp.'s president of Idaho operations and vice president of corporate development, was named chief operating officer Monday by company Chairman and CEO Jack Lemley. Romano will assume many of the day-to-day operating duties from Lemley, who is relinquishing his CEO title and scaling back his responsibilities. Lemley, who became chairman and CEO of the Boise-based chemical, radioactive- and toxic-waste disposal company in 1995, said his goal was to turn the financially troubled company around and assemble a solid management team. "I believe that has been accomplished and an excellent management team is now in place," Lemley said in a company news release. Romano, who has been with American Ecology for more than 12 years, said Lemley will stay on as chairman of the board, but will now have more leisure time that he plans to spend "out on his boat." Romano has 22 years of experience in the waste management field, including time with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the Idaho National Environmental and Engineering Laboratory and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. In his newly formed position, Romano will take many of the day-to-day operating responsibilities of the company away from Lemley. The remaining functions of a CEO will now be handled by the board of director's executive committee. Longtime company board member Edward Heil will be chairman of the executive committee. Both Heil and Romano credit Lemley for rebuilding the company's finances. Before joining American Ecology, Lemley was CEO of Transmanche-Link, where he managed the construction of the "Chunnel," the 31.4-mile tunnel beneath the English Channel that connects Great Britain and France. Lemley also worked for 12 years with the Morrison Knudsen Corp. (now Washington Group International), where he was a senior vice president. Romano said that under Lemley's leadership, the company has posted increased revenues for the past seven quarters and is one of the nation's most successful hazardous-waste disposal companies. The company employs about 300 people nationwide, including 68 in Idaho. It has waste-disposal facilities in Texas, Nevada, Idaho and Tennessee and a low-level-waste disposal site in Washington state at the Department of Energy's Hanford site. The Idaho site at Grand View was purchased from Envirosafe Services of Idaho Inc. in February. Romano said the company is well positioned for future growth "Because we're small, we are much more effective and can make decisions faster," Romano said. To offer story ideas or comments, contact reporter Ken Dey at kdey@idahostatesman.comor 377-6428. ***************************************************************** 25 One Pool Covers All Nuclear Plants ctnow.com By TOM CONDON The Hartford Courant October 10, 2001 If a terrorist attack - or anything else - caused a release of radiation from a U.S. nuclear plant, one of the first calls would be to a suite of offices in West Hartford Center. That's where the nuclear insurance company is. When Congress encouraged the commercial development of nuclear energy in the 1950s, it also looked out for the public. The Price-Anderson Act of 1957 required operators of nuclear plants to provide liability coverage for injury or property damage. The insurance industry created American Nuclear Insurers, a pool or joint underwriting association of about 40 U.S. property-casualty insurers and two dozen overseas reinsurers. ANI now insures all 103 nuclear plants in the country, plus a small number of related facilities, such as transporters and fuel fabricators, said Waldemar Burzynski, the company's vice president for finance. The arrangement could be a model for Congress as it crafts a pooling mechanism for terrorism insurance. Indeed, legislators could pray for the same kind of results. The ANI pool provides three layers of fiscal protection. The company itself offers $200 million worth of coverage per incident, and keeps $400 million, enough for two full claims, in reserve. Should that limit be breached, the public utilities industry, the owners of the plant, agree to provide as much as $9 billionin coverage. Should the cost of a catastrophe exceed that amount, the federal government is the reinsurer of last resort. The good news is that no accident, even the partial meltdown at Three Mile Island in 1979, has even come close to exhausting ANI's reserves. In 1979, the primary policy limit was $140 million per incident. Burzynski said that was "more than sufficient" to cover claims from Three Mile Island, although some claims are still in litigation. In addition to underwriters, American Nuclear employs engineers, physicists and health specialists to inspect and improve the properties. Burzynski credits inspection, upgrades and a strong industry commitment to security for keeping accidents to a minimum. "Nuclear security is normally very tight, but after Sept. 11 it's way beyond that," he said. "You can't get near them." ©2001 MyWay Corp. Portions ©2001 ctnow.com ***************************************************************** 26 Nuclear Plant Security Increased ctnow.com CONNECTICUT » APWIRE Associated Press October 09, 2001 HARTFORD Conn. (AP)- Security has been increased at Connecticut's nuclear power plants in the wake of airstrikes in Afghanistan. John T. Wiltse, director of Connecticut's Office of Emergency Management, said Monday the increased security at the Millstone nuclear plants in Waterford was the only real change state officials made following the start of the airstrikes Sunday. Wiltse said his office is coordinating the new security precautions with local government, but declined to say exactly what additional security was being put in place. Kevin Moore, a spokesman for United Illuminating, said Monday UI increased security immediately after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and has maintained that level. "We've added more security guards for night shifts, and we're cooperating with local, state and federal police authorities," Moore said. UI provides electricity to 318,000 customers in a 17-town service area in Greater New Haven and Bridgeport. Frank Poirot, spokesman for Northeast Utilities, which provides electricity for about one million customers in Connecticut, said the company also has been on a heightened state of alert since Sept. 11. "For obvious reasons, I can't go into detail, but we are keeping a closer watch on our facilities that normally aren't staffed," said Poirot. AP-ES-10-09-01 0803EDT ©2001 MyWay Corp. Portions ©2001 ctnow.com ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 England:CND Steps Up Anti-War Protests Date: Wed, 10 Oct 2001 22:53:50 -0500 (CDT) Via NY Transfer News * All the News That Doesn't Fit http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,3604,565947,00.html The Guardian - October 9, 2001 Anti-war groups widen protests CND vigil at Commons by Stuart Millar The British anti-war movement shifted into high gear last night with a nationwide series of vigils and demonstrations against the bombing of Afghanistan. A vigil organised by CND was held outside parliament to coincide with the emergency Commons debate, while the Stop the War Coalition staged protests in cities including London, Manchester, Glasgow, Birmingham and Newcastle. The anti-war groups say there is huge unease among the public about Britain's involvement in the bombing campaign. CND has gathered 46,000 signatures on a petition against military action, while more than 3,000 turned out for a protest at Downing Street last week. The launch of the bombing campaign has increased the pressure on the diverse range of groups opposed to military action - which includes trade unionists, pacifists, anti-globalisation campaigners and political organisations - to present a united front. A national demonstration against the war, involving all the various groupings under the umbrella banner of "Justice and peace for all", will take place in London on Saturday. But the majority of events are being organised separately by individual groups. Last night, Kate Hudson, vice-chair of CND, met the Labour MPs Tam Dalyell and Bob Marshall-Andrews before the Commons debate to ask them to urge the prime minister to end Britain's involvement in the bombing. Ms Hudson said: "Military action of the kind that was begun last night won't stop terrorist attacks. Punitive bombing raids in which civilians are killed and injured will not bring the perpetrators of September 11 to justice." The Stop the War Coalition described the missile attacks as "acts of war wholly outside all accepted legal, democratic and civilised norms". ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytcov-10.10.01-04:13:47-3859 ***************************************************************** 2 Radioactive dust sprays 6 workers at ORNL By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer OAK RIDGE - Six workers were sprayed with radioactive dust Monday when an unexpected gust of wind reportedly spread contamination from a work site at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Bechtel Jacobs, the U.S. Department of Energy's environmental manager in Oak Ridge, did not release any information on the incident until late Tuesday. Dennis Hill, a company spokesman, said the contractor did not believe any of the exposures posed a health concern. But he said authorities are waiting on results from a "whole body count'' on a couple of workers to determine if there were internal doses. The incident occurred about noon Monday at what's known as the Old Hydrofracture Site, a laboratory facility once used to inject liquid nuclear waste into the ground for disposal. Hill said workers were tearing down a wall at the facility and were misting the operation in order to keep down dust. A sudden wind, however, blew some of the radioactive dust outside the roped-off "contamination zone" and exposed some unprotected workers nearby, he said. The project was being conducted by a subcontractor identified as Demco. According to Bechtel Jacobs, two people received contamination on their skin and clothing, while four others got contamination on their clothes. The contaminated clothing was disposed of, and the surface contamination was removed from workers, Hill said. Four vehicles in the area also were tainted with radioactive material and had to be decontaminated, he said. The Bechtel Jacobs spokesman said officials believe the radioactive material was cesium-137. The cleanup operation at the Old Hydrofracture Facility was shut down and will remain down until procedures have been reevaluated, Hill said. Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 or twig1@knoxnews.infi.net. Copyright 2001 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 3 Duratek Lands Contract for Hanford Site Cleanup Work EarthVision Environmental News COLUMBIA, MD, October 9, 2001 - Duratek, Inc., a company whose expertise lies in the management of radioactive materials, has won a contract to remove approximately one million tons of radioactively contaminated soil and more than four miles of contaminated piping from the US Department of Energy's Hanford Site. The five-year, $13.6 million contract, awarded by the Hanford Site's prime contractor Bechtel Hanford, Inc., will complete the cleanup of three reactor effluent areas at site. "This job is important to us for two reasons," said Duratek president Bob Prince. "First, it is Duratek's largest remediation contract to date at Hanford. Also, it is the final project that will complete remediation of the Hanford reactor effluent areas, so we are happy to support Bechtel and the Department of Energy by making this significant contribution to the overall site cleanup effort." The waste will be removed from areas near the Columbia River and hauled to the on-site Environmental Restoration Disposal Facility, which is also operated by Duratek for Bechtel. Associated Link: Duratek ***************************************************************** 4 Russia plays down Kursk safety fears BBC News | EUROPE | 10 October, 2001, A barge towing the Kursk is pulled carefully to dock Russia's Kursk nuclear submarine is expected to make its long-awaited arrival at a dry dock on Wednesday in the northern town of Rolyakovo, near Murmansk. Russian residents have been given fresh reassurances about the radiation risk from the submarine, although local officials have worked out contingency plans in case emergency evacuation becomes necessary. The concerns centre on possible leaks from the submarine's two nuclear reactors. Although the water around the wreck was regularly checked for radiation and found to be clear, it is feared that moving the Kursk could have destabilised them. We are absolutely confident nothing will happen to the reactors Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov It is more than a year since two on-board explosions sent the submarine plunging to the bottom of the Barents Sea. All 118 men on board died. Although the submarine is expected to arrive in Rolyakovo on Wednesday, the docking operation itself may take some time. Northern Fleet Commander Admiral Vyacheslav Popov said an attempt would be made to dock it on Saturday, when high tides would make it easier. The vessel was finally lifted to the surface on Monday, after an unprecedented 15-hour lifting operation using 26 steel cables. Radiation concerns The riskiest part of the process is yet to come. The recovery of 22 Granit missiles on board will begin on Saturday or Sunday - a "potentially dangerous operation" according to Admiral Viacheslav Popov, the commander of the Russian Northern Fleet. The success of the lifting was celebrated by senior officials But the Russian navy has also issued statements assuring the public that the Kursk's reactors are firmly sealed in their steel containers. Samples of water and silt are also being taken every two hours during the towing operation to check radiation levels, officials said. And a Northern Fleet spokesman said further radiation tests would also be conducted before the submarine was put in dry dock. Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov, who has been overseeing the final stages of the recovery, similarly dismissed the concerns. "We are absolutely confident nothing will happen to the reactors," he told reporters. "If there had been a one-in-a-million chance that something would happen, we would never had carried out the operation," he said. Samples The recovery of the submarine from the sea bed had gone better than expected. Graves prepared for the bodies in the Kursk Twenty-six steel cables had been painstaking attached to holes drilled in the hull, and the Giant 4 recovery barge simply reeled the submarine in. At least 30 graves have been dug at the Serafimov cemetery in St. Petersburg to prepare for the burial of bodies that might be recovered. Northern Fleet spokesman Captain Vladimir Navrotsky said officials only hope to find 30-40 bodies. These must be removed promptly from the submarine to avoid contact with the air. Investigation After initial investigations, the wreck will be towed to nearby Snezhnogorsk. Investigators will search for clues as to what caused the catastrophic explosions on 12 August last year. The Russian navy initially blamed the sinking on a collision with a Western vessel. A subsequent investigation suggested the cause was more likely to have been an accident in the torpedo bay. WATCH/LISTEN ***************************************************************** 5 Kursk to be placed in dock on October 13th Background information and news about the numerous accidents and incidents that involve the nuclear vessels in the Northern Fleet. Jump to section (Murmansk:) This night the Giant-4 barge approached the Kola Bay. However, the Northern fleet commandership due to safety precautions decided to proceed with the transportation at 8 a.m. The Northern fleet headquarters will allow docking after the report about readiness of the PD-50 dock. 2001-10-10 17:37 The traffic is banned in the Kola Bay when the barge with the Kursk was to enter the area. The barge is expected to arrive at Roslyakovo at around 1 p.m. After that the barge will be stationed in the harbour and prepared for docking. Before the docking the radiation monitoring will take place on the submarine. This operation will last until 11 p.m. today. According to the Northern Fleet commander-in-chief admiral Vyacheslav Popov, the docking of the barge Giant-4 with the Kursk will take 2 days provided the weather is good. Expected start of the docking is 4 p.m. on October the 13th. Exactly at this time high tide is expected. The first compartment will be guarded The Kursk Rescue Expedition will be disbanded today. Admiral Popov said at the press conference that the main task for the Rescue Expedition was at sea, that is why as soon as the submarine is placed into the dock, there is no need further for the Rescue Expedition. However, the first torpedo compartment will be guarded as long as it is at the seabed. The raising of the first compartment is planned for the next year. Russians will do the bulk part of the job, foreigners will be likely engaged as well, Vyacheslav Popov said. The need for the foreign companies will depend on how the project to lift the first compartment and its fragments, is structured. The investigators of the Military Prosecutor's Office to begin examination from the 9th compartment The group of 37 investigators of the General Military Prosecutor's Office and the prosecutor's offices of the Northern Fleet and the Leningrad Military Command, arrived at Severomorsk the other day. Deputy chief of the investigation department of the General Prosecutor's Office, Andrey Mayorov, said that the group is ready to carry out investigation procedure, i.e. full examination of all the submarine compartments and the hull. It is decided to engage various experts in the investigation: medical experts, explosion and fire specialists - all together more than 10 experts in various areas. "Nobody will enter the submarine before the Military prosecutor's investigators," admiral Popov said. It is difficult now to determine the time for investigation, all depends on the destruction in the compartments, tempo of water draining from the compartments, and presence of the objects inside the compartments. But the plan of the investigation actions in the compartments has been already established. "The first stage of our work is searching and evacuation of the bodies. That is why it is logically to examine the 9th compartment, where we expect to find 11 bodies of the Kursk crewmembers," Andrey Mayorov, said. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 6 Deluge of embarrassing headlines was 'buried' by terror crisis © 2001 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd Labour email furore: Spin By Andrew Grice, Political Editor 10 October 2001 The Government has used the international crisis over terrorism to camouflage several unpopular decisions and embarrassing policy U-turns. Whitehall officials said that ministers felt it was "a good time" to slip out unpopular decisions that would normally attract unfavourable front-page news stories. While Tony Blair has told aides to spend less time fretting about "tomorrow's headlines" in his second term, in practice the Government's spin doctors still go to great lengths to secure positive treatment for "good news" stories – and to bury "bad news". Whitehall sources say that news of the appointment of Gavyn Davies, a Labour donor and friend of the Chancellor, Gordon Brown, as the chairman of the BBC governors, was rushed out after the terrorist attacks in America to dilute the inevitable headlines about cronyism. The plan worked; the story was largely relegated to the inside pages. During last week's Labour conference in Brighton, the Government news machine went into overdrive at a time when it is normally in limbo. The decision to replace the widely-criticised student loans scheme with a graduate tax was Mr Blair's most spectacular U-turn since becoming Prime Minister. Yet the move was drowned out by the international scene. On the same day, the Government sneaked out a long-awaited decision to give the go-ahead to a controversial British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) radioactive fuel recycling plant at Sellafield in Cumbria. The next day, ministers scrapped plans for a national athletics stadium at Picketts Lock, north London, after another fiasco over a huge sporting project. At about the same time, there were hints from Mr Brown's normally reticent aides that taxes might have to rise before the next general election to maintain the increase in spending on public services. Mr Blair was emboldened to make it clear for the first time that he would like to call a referendum on the single currency during this Parliament. The reaction of the Eurosceptic press was muted: The Sun, which has promised to wage war on Mr Blair over the euro, was too preoccupied with the war on terrorism. At the weekend, details emerged of another big policy change – the Government's decision to pull the plug on Railtrack and turn it into a "not-for-profit" trust. This would have been on Monday's front pages but was overshadowed by the military strikes. Tim Collins, the Tories' Shadow Cabinet Office Minister, said on Tuesday that several "bad news" announcements had been rushed out. He added: "These were controversial decisions which would normally have been front page news and led the television bulletins. "It is important, particularly when normal politics has been suspended, that no one is open to the charge of exploiting the truce when the public's attention is elsewhere." ***************************************************************** 7 Hanford reactor restart effort assailed Watchdog groups say government program is flawed with conflicts of interest, urge that process be halted Wednesday, October 10, 2001 By ROBERT McCLURE SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER A government review of whether to restart a controversial nuclear reactor at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation is riddled with conflicts of interest that should be checked out by federal prosecutors, two watchdog groups plan to charge today. Citing hundreds of pages of documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and government leaks, the activist groups say efforts to restart the Fast Flux Test Facility reactor should be immediately halted. "The process is so tainted that you couldn't possibly move forward with reopening the reactor, and especially with this set of players," said Tom Carpenter, director of nuclear oversight programs for the Government Accountability Project. His group has scheduled a news conference today in Richland along with the two other groups leveling the allegations, Heart of America Northwest and Columbia Riverkeeper. The activists' charges center around a company that, midway through its involvement in a Department of Energy review of whether to reopen the reactor, joined a consortium of companies trying to reopen the facility to develop radioactive medical compounds for profit. The Clinton administration had decided to shut down the reactor. The activists complain that members of a Bush administration team that reconsidered that decision have ties with the nuclear industry. Proponents say a reactivated FFTF reactor could produce materials for lifesaving medical tests, while opponents say reopening the facility is unnecessary, costly and dangerous. The watchdog groups notified the Department of Energy on Sept. 27 of their intent to file suit to stop the reactor restart, in part because of the role played by Science Applications International Corp., a San Diego-based Fortune 500 company. Friday, SAIC announced it was pulling out of the private consortium seeking to reactivate the reactor because its dual involvement in the private restart proposal and the government restart review had created controversy. SAIC, which also prepared an Energy Department environmental-impact report last year on the reactor project, denied any conflict of interest. Its senior managers and board members chose to withdraw because of a "potential perception" of a conflict, a company spokesman said. The activists contend in a letter to be mailed to the Energy Department today that SAIC's financial interest in restarting the reactor was undisclosed. However, the company did write a letter to the Energy Department about the potential conflict. SAIC asked whether it could work with the government to evaluate the proposed restart at the same time one of its divisions joined a team trying to win the department's approval of the proposal. That letter was written June 11, 10 days before proposals to reopen the reactor were due. It was not until July 26, records show, that the Energy Department wrote back to say that it did not see any conflict of interest. The government added that it would reserve the right to look at the matter again if a decision was made to reactivate the reactor and SAIC was part of the team. By that time, though, the SAIC team's proposal had emerged as the only one of 91 judged "fully responsive" to the Energy Department's request for plans on how to reactivate the reactor. "This is why we're asking that the Department of Justice review this -- something that can't pass the smell test was given the go-ahead by the Department of Energy," said Gerald Pollet, director of Heart of America Northwest. "They were doing a review of their own (environmental report) and in a position to recommend their own project, and DOE says that's OK? It smells." The consortium of companies seeking to reopen the facility was organized by Advanced Nuclear and Medical Systems, a company based in the Tri-Cities that has sought for years to reopen the reactor. Its president, Bill Stokes, said his company sought out help from SAIC because it has run a former federal reactor in Sacramento, Calif., with a purpose similar to that envisioned for the reactivated FFTF. "The reason we approached SAIC is that they are basically the best people in the business for this type of project," Stokes said. He pointed out that SAIC's first environmental review of the reactor proposal led former President Clinton's energy secretary, Bill Richardson, to shelve the project. Later, Eastern Washington's Rep. Doc Hastings, a Republican, prevailed upon Bush's energy secretary, Spencer Abraham, to re-examine that decision. Stokes said SAIC's role in advising the Energy Department was "more like fact finders" rather than influencing the outcome of the deliberations. "We're convinced there was no conflict of interest," Stokes said. Repeated efforts yesterday to obtain comment from the Energy Department were unsuccessful. P-I reporter Robert McClure can be reached at 206-448-8092 or robertmcclure@seattlepi.com [Seattle Post-Intelligencer] 101 Elliott Ave. W. Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 448-8000 ©1999-2001 Seattle Post-Intelligencer ***************************************************************** 8 Justice Dept. OKs Exposure Claims Las Vegas SUN October 09, 2001 WASHINGTON (AP) - A record number of people who contracted illnesses after being exposed to radiation during Cold War weapons development had government compensation claims approved last year. But many who qualified had payments delayed for months when the program ran out of money. Several died with government IOUs. The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed in 1990 to compensate victims of the nuclear weapons program or their survivors for illnesses caused by radiation - mostly cancer and respiratory illness. The act provides $100,000 to uranium miners and $50,000 to "downwinders" - residents exposed to radioactive fallout from atomic bomb tests in Nevada. In the last fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, the Justice Department approved more than 4,000 claims totaling $111 million from uranium miners, millers, haulers and downwinders. That is more than was approved in the previous five years combined. The categories of people eligible and types of diseases covered under the act was expanded twice beginning in 1999, but funding remained the same and the program first ran out of cash in May 2000. In July, President Bush signed a bill that included payments for more than 2,000 outstanding claims worth more than $102 million. But the program's future funding remains uncertain. The Senate voted last month to treat the payments much the same as Social Security, forcing the government to pay any future claims. The House bill didn't include the provision, meaning it is up to a group of Representatives and Senators to work out the difference. Individuals from every state have applied for compensation. Utah claimants have been approved more than $109 million; Colorado residents more than $70 million; Arizona $50 million and New Mexico individuals more than $49 million. Since the program began, the Justice Department has approved 5,128 claims for more than $359 million. On the Net: Justice Department Radiation Exposure Compensation Program: http://www.usdoj.gov/civil/torts/const/reca/index.htm All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 9 Affected apply for IAAP benefits package The Hawk Eye Newspaper October 10, 2001 Iowa Time: 12:16 AM By Dennis J. Carroll The Hawk Eye MIDDLETOWN -- Just rounding up all the proper medical and IAAP work records was hard enough for Marcie Noss, but applying for the nuclear-workers' survivor's compensation packed an emotional jolt as well. "Doing this was kind of hard," said Noss of Mediapolis as she sat at a table in a small room at the machinists union hall here Tuesday sorting through papers and filling out forms. "It brought back so many bad memories." Noss' husband, David, was plagued by a variety of cancers and other illnesses for years before he died on Oct. 20, 1982, at the age of 65. Noss had worked as a radio technician at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant from 1963 up until just four years before he died. Family and friends suspected his illnesses may have been caused by his exposure to hazardous materials while he helped make the nuclear weapons that, though never used, helped bring about the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War. They encouraged a reluctant Marcie Noss to apply for the compensation package now being offered by the Department of Energy. "People said that for all that I went through I should do this," Noss said. Noss and thousands of other former nuclear weapons workers or their survivors at IAAP and throughout the country are being offered a benefits package of a lump sum payment of $150,000 and coverage of some medical bills. The process of applying can be a tedious, cumbersome process, especially after decades have passed. Medical and work records often must be rounded up -- often from many sources -- and even after they are gathered, it can be problematic trying to make sense of them. For example, records Noss obtained from Great River Medical Center, formerly Burlington Medical Center, were so poorly copied that they were nearly illegible. Other former IAAP workers have been told that their work records were somehow lost. Health researchers from the University of Iowa College of Public Health were in Middletown Tuesday -- and will be again Thursday -- to assist former workers or their survivors in sorting papers and documents, and to ensure that the former workers, many of them elderly now, fill out the application forms correctly. "I think many of them are frustrated with all the forms they have to fill out," said Christina Nichols a U of I research assistant. She also said many former workers have had a hard time tracking down their medical records because over the years, their physicians retired or died, or records were lost or destroyed. "But that's one of the things that I'm doing," Nichols said, "helping them sort through what physicians offices they have been to, and having all that information sent to them." The U of I researchers and health experts are working under a $500,000 contract with the Department of Energy to find and screen for health problems thousands of people who helped build nuclear bombs for the Atomic Energy Commission at IAAP from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. The U of I team will be in Middletown again from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday. Those wanting help are asked to call toll-free at (866) 282-5818 to schedule an appointment, but walk-ins also were being helped Tuesday. The Hawk Eye 800 S. Main St., Burlington Iowa 52601 319-754-8461 Front Desk · 319-754-6824 FAX · 1-800-397-1708 Toll Free ***************************************************************** 10 Mercury in creek decreasing Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:21 a.m. on Wednesday, October 10, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff Over the last decade Mercury has decreased steadily in the water but not in fish in Upper East Fork Poplar Creek, an Oak Ridge National Laboratory official says. The creek runs from the Y-12 National Security Complex through the city of Oak Ridge, then west, where it empties into Poplar Creek just north of the Oak Ridge K-25 Site. The creek's floodplain was contaminated with mercury as a result of past discharges from Y-12. Jim Loar with ORNL's Environmental Sciences Division spoke about the current state of the creek Tuesday night during a meeting of the Citizens' Advisory Panel of the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee. The group met in the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation office on Emory Valley Road. "We've had some successes," Loar said of remediation efforts involving the creek. The mercury contamination of Upper East Fork Poplar Creek began in the early 1950s with the startup of lithium isotope separation processes at Y-12. This operation resulted in the release of thousands of pounds of mercury and other contaminants into the creek. Biological monitoring of the creek has occurred since 1985, two years after the Department of Energy revealed that large amounts of mercury had been released into the creek. "Improvements in the ecological health of the creek continue, but have slowed," Loar said. Loar pointed out that future remedial actions and modernization activities at Y-12 could have short-term adverse effects on the creek. For example, he said concentrations of several metals, including copper, lead and nickel, have recently increased in periphyton, which are algae and microbes. He said this trend may be related to recent disturbances or activities inside Y-12, such as moving soil and doing construction work. With improvements to the creek being reported, Susan Kaplan, a member of the Citizens' Advisory Panel, asked Loar what that means for the people living near the waterway. "For the protection of human health, no contact with the water Š and don't eat the fish," Loar said, referencing signs posted along the creek. Susan Gawarecki, executive director of the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee, then asked Loar if there is still a need for those warning signs. "I didn't put them up so I don't have a role in the decision," he responded. The LOC provides advice to local, state and federal officials regarding DOE environmental management efforts. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 11 Wind blows radioactive dust on six workers Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:20 a.m. on Wednesday, October 10, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff Test results indicated that workers received no internal exposure after an act of Mother Nature resulted in their being sprayed with radioactive dust while working at Oak Ridge National Laboratory this week. The incident happened around noon Monday while the workers were tearing down a concrete wall at the Old Hydrofracture Facility, located in the Melton Valley area of ORNL. The facility, which shut down in 1980, was once used for deep geologic disposal of liquid radioactive waste. Dennis Hill, a spokesman for Bechtel Jacobs Co., notified The Oak Ridger of the incident late Tuesday afternoon. He said the six workers are employees of a company called Demco, which has a subcontract with Bechtel Jacobs, the Department of Energy's environmental manager in Oak Ridge. According to Hill, workers on the project were using a "spray mister" to keep down dust while tearing down the wall. But that tool didn't prevent a sudden gust of wind from blowing the radioactive dust onto four vehicles in addition to the six employees. "What happened is a little bit of wind shifted and blew that stuff outside the [contamination zone]," Hill said. "It appears to be mainly cesium." The Bechtel Jacobs spokesman said all six employees got the dust on their clothing, but only two got it on their skin. He added that the dust was washed off the employees' skin, while their clothing will be disposed of as radiological material. Hill said the workers were monitored, and that test results indicated they did not receive any internal contamination. Work on the cleanup project was shut down following the incident, Hill said, adding that activities should resume by this weekend or early next week. At this point, Hill said it doesn't appear that any health- or safety-related issues arose from the incident. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 12 Seaborg's progeny pays visit ContraCostaTimes.com Published Wednesday, October 10, 2001 By Jennifer Shaw EDITOR It felt a bit like a family reunion : the swapping of stories and recalling past celebrations. Only, the patriarch was not present : at least not in the physical sense. A group met last week at the Lafayette Book Store to hear his collaborator for the newly released, "Adventures in the Atomic Age" (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2001). At 6-ft., 5-inches tall, Glenn T. Seaborg's son, Eric, was the focal point in the room. He would have towered over his father by two inches. "It's strange showing up for his autobiography and not being him," Eric Seaborg told the audience, which included a scientific colleague of the Nobel laureate, who died in February, 1999 : and a fellow devotee of the outdoors. There was talk of the 80th birthday cake decorated as the periodic table that the baker had "triple checked for accuracy" and the prized photograph taken with the section with the element plutonium, which the senior Seaborg discovered : and of which father and son shared a healthy respect. "There are two ways to use it, one is the bomb and the other is electrical power. You don't get one without the other... As crazy as it seems, the doctrine of mutual assured destruction still worked," Eric Seaborg told the Sun. "Science is neutral. You can't control what you're going to discover." But at the book store, Eric Seaborg, author of "American Discoveries: Scouting the First Coast to Coast Recreational Trail," chose to speak of excerpts from his father's work which had a political bent. "It's better after-dinner conversation than what it's like sitting around the cyclotron," he said, noting that the text had been pre-read by members of the Atomic Energy Commission, representatives from the Berkeley Lab, and Seaborg's widow, Helen, who still lives in Lafayette. "As a kid, I met Lyndon Johnson. We could always get tickets to the Super Bowl, that way it was a real special kind of life," Eric Seaborg said earlier. The resident of Virginia spoke of a meeting of the minds between his father and John F. Kennedy, both "passionate about arms control", for instance, favoring a ban on the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons. The father/son book project started five years ago, when Glenn Seaborg sent his son a barely decipherable draft. The career writer then began a series of lengthy interviews with his father. With a science background which consisted of a sole course in introductory chemistry at UC Davis, he began translating the dense text into language accessible to the lay reader. "My father wanted to address the social implications. He wanted to use his fame to advance causes he thought were important : arms control, science education and that the general population understand and support science and its long term impact," Eric Seaborg told the Sun. "It's all his and all mine. I guess there's 200 percent of a book in there," said Eric Seaborg. While the memoir was never intended to "settle any scores," Eric Seaborg noted his father's only rift with a U.S. President, during his tenure chairing the AEC, was Richard Nixon. Reportedly he had urged Seaborg to "limit his remarks to the technical aspects" after he had questioned even the need for discussion about keeping a nuclear arsenal at the bottom of the ocean. Eric Seaborg shared the familiar, influential adages: "It's not going to take any less time tomorrow than it's going to today" and "do the worst thing first." There were recollections of a personal discipline of which Eric said he'd be hard-pressed to meet. "I went hiking with my father when he was 60 and I was 20 and I thought then that he hiked too fast." "We always had periodic tables near the dinner table : I have five left-handed children. That is where I had the most influence in this family," Helen Seaborg remarked at the signing. ***************************************************************** 13 Author: Hughes' memos show he knew risks of radioactive movie site LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL: NEWS: COLUMN: NORM! NORM CLARKE Howard Hughes knew the cast and crew of "The Conqueror" were at risk when they filmed in 1955 on an abandoned nuclear test site, an author says. Las Vegas News Bureau file photo Wednesday, October 10, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal COLUMN: NORM! It remains one of the most intriguing of the many Howard Hughes mysteries: What was he thinking when he filmed a John Wayne movie on an abandoned nuclear test site? "His memos definitely indicated he knew it was dangerous (from radioactivity)," said Richard Hack, author of "Hughes: The Private Diaries, Memos and Letters." In his book, Hack mentions in passing the radioactivity connection to the deaths of Wayne and others involved in the film "The Conqueror." But during a telephone interview Tuesday, he said Hughes' memos shed damning evidence that Hughes knew the cast was at risk. Hack said almost 80 percent of the cast and crew died of cancer, including Wayne, Susan Hayward, Agnes Moorehead and Pedro Armendariz, as well as director Dick Powell. Wayne played Genghis Khan, the Mongol invader whose conquests included Afghanistan. Most of the film was shot in 1955 near St. George, Utah, about 100 miles downwind of the Nevada Test Site. The high number of cancer-related deaths "could be just a very huge coincidence but an extraordinary coincidence," said Hack. There is no evidence that Hughes informed those on location of the possible danger. Furthermore, Hack said there is documentation that Hughes had 60 tons of radioactive sand hauled to the RKO sound stage in Los Angeles in order to match the set for close-ups. Norm Clarke's column appears Sunday, Monday, Wednesday and Friday. You can reach him at 383-0244 or norm_clarke@lvrj.com. webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 14 HHS Seeks Public Comment on Rules to Assist Compensation of Nuclear Workers for Job-Related Cancers [HHS News] FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Friday, Oct. 5, 2001 Contact: CDC/NIOSH Press Office (202) 401-3749 The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) today asked for public comment on two rules under which the department will provide scientific expertise to assist in decision-making under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000. The two rules, "Methods for Radiation Dose Reconstruction" and "Guidelines for Determining the Probability of Causation," are published in today's Federal Register as an interim final rule and a notice of proposed rulemaking, respectively. Under the Compensation Act, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) is administering claims by current and former employees of nuclear weapons production facilities and their survivors who seek compensation for cancers caused by radiation exposures sustained in the performance of duty, chronic beryllium disease, and silicosis. The Act directs HHS to provide scientific information that DOL will use to evaluate claims by workers who seek compensation for certain cancers caused by occupational radiation exposures but are not requesting compensation under the "Special Exposure Cohort" provisions of the Act. The Special Exposure Cohort includes workers with specified cancers who were employed at specific sites designated in the Act. "For a program as important as this, we have to bring the best scientific expertise we can to the table and move as quickly as possible," HHS Secretary Tommy G. Thompson said. "With today's notices, we are taking steps to put some key processes in place immediately as we proceed with further steps to make sure that our products pass rigorous scientific scrutiny and public review." The interim final rule specifies the methods that HHS will use in developing the scientific information that it will provide to DOL, and the proposed rule presents scientific guidelines that DOL would follow in making use of information from HHS: + The interim final rule establishes the methods that will be used by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) in estimating claimants' past occupational exposures to radiation, in cancer cases referred to CDC/NIOSH by DOL. That process is called dose reconstruction. The interim final rule allows CDC/NIOSH to proceed with dose reconstructions while public comments are received, reviewed, and incorporated into a final rule. + The notice of proposed rulemaking specifies the scientific guidelines that DOL would use in determining whether it is at least as likely as not that an energy employee's cancer was caused by occupational exposure to radiation at nuclear weapons production sites. That process is called determining the probability of causation. A final rule on probability of causation will go into effect after the public and an independent expert advisory board have had an opportunity to comment on today's proposal. To the extent that the science and data involve uncertainties, those uncertainties will be handled to the advantage of the claimant. The methods and guidelines rely on well-established scientific procedures and principles for estimating radiation exposures and determining radiation-related cancer risks. They will take into account available radiation exposure and health data, including information obtained from the work sites and from parties with expertise on exposure conditions at the work sites, which includes the employees themselves. CDC/NIOSH is drawing on scientific models developed by the National Cancer Institute. HHS is seeking public comment on the interim final rule on dose reconstruction within 30 days, and public comment on the proposed rulemaking on probability of causation within 60 days. Comments should be sent to the CDC/NIOSH Docket Officer at CDC/NIOSH Docket Office, Robert A. Taft Laboratories, M/S C34, 4676 Columbia Parkway, Cincinnati, Ohio 45226, or may be submitted electronically by e-mail to NIOCINDOCKET@CDC.GOV. The interim final rule and the notice of proposed rulemaking will be available online at http://www.cdc.gov/niosh. They also may be obtained through the toll-free information number, 1-800-35-NIOSH (1-800-356-4674). Note: All HHS press releases, fact sheets and other press materials are available at http://www.hhs.gov/news. ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************