***************************************************************** 09/14/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.219 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 Nevada scientist says Yucca Mountain volcanic activity possible 2 Duwamish now on cleanup list 3 Stockholm lenders meeting okays Russia eco-projects 4 Columnist Ruthe Deskin: Fix was in at Yucca hearing 5 Managing Radioactive Waste Safely 6 Daily Events Report 7 IAEA Daily Press Review 8 Nuclear waste plan is still five years off 9 Anti-aircraft guns urged at nuclear plants / Critics say jet 10 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Friday, September 14, 2001 11 TVA sour on nuclear lease deal 12 Blair: Terrorists may go nuclear 13 Executive stalls on commitment to nuclear power 14 Scots call for delay on nuclear plant 15 NRC Staff Proposes $11,000 Fine for Radiation Overexposure Last NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 Attacks stoke memories of Oak Ridge threat 2 Are There Any Nuclear Secrets Left to Steal? 3 Reid to visit U.S. labs; Nevada Reps. inspired at Pentagon 4 Las Vegas SUN: Workers to Lift Kursk Submarine 5 Now terrorists vow to hit Indian N-sites 6 Reid to go to New Mexico to visit national nuclear labs 7 Time to use the nuclear option 8 Reconciliatory courts by June next: Ranjha 9 Deadline extended for comments on sick worker compensation plan 10 Health work group to meet 11 DOE oversight funding issued today 12 Are There Any Nuclear Secrets Left to Steal? **************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Nevada scientist says Yucca Mountain volcanic activity possible Las Vegas SUN September 13, 2001 LAS VEGAS (AP) - A Nevada state geologist said the federal Energy Department is downplaying the risk of volcanic eruptions at Yucca Mountain, where the federal government has proposed storing the nation's nuclear waste. "If you stand atop Yucca Mountain and look at relatively young volcanoes, it's obvious something is going on here," Steve Frishman, Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency technical policy coordinator, said during a hearing on Wednesday. Frishman referred to several cinder cones that protrude like stepping stones from the desert landscape west of the mountain at the western edge of the Nevada Test Site, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. "It's pretty clear to me that the project is not ready for site recommendation," Frishman told a presidential panel reviewing technical information on the Yucca Mountain Project. The Energy Department is holding public hearings on site suitability studies, and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham is expected within a few months to make a recommendation on the project to President Bush. If approved, Yucca Mountain would become the nation's nuclear repository - a high-tech burial tomb for 77,000 tons of radioactive commercial, industrial and military waste - beginning about 2010. Frishman said that instead of downplaying the chances that radiation could be unleashed by molten rock, the Energy Department should examine actual releases that could result. Calculations on that scenario would show much higher public exposure, especially if molten rock laden with nuclear contamination breaches the mountain's surface and leaves radioactive ash that could be inhaled, he said. "This is the information decision-makers should have. ... and they're just not getting it," Frishman told the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, a panel that reports to Congress and the energy secretary. Yucca Mountain Project scientists have said the last time molten rock penetrated the surface near Yucca Mountain was about 80,000 years ago, at the Lathrop Wells cinder cone, 12 miles south of the mountain. Yucca Mountain was formed some 13 million years ago from alternating periods of volcanic ash falling from the sky and lava oozing out of a caldera near Timber Mountain, 12 miles to the north. The volcanoes and cinder cones near Yucca Mountain are extinct, according to Eric Smistad, an Energy Department geologist. Smistad's team has calculated a 1-in-70 million chance per year that magma could rise through the floor of a repository, if one is built, wipe out nuclear waste canisters and continue upward to the mountain's surface, releasing radioactive materials into the air. His team estimates that such a release might result in a dose of one-tenth of a millirem to a person downwind. That would be a fraction of the Environmental Protection Agency's standard of 15 millirems per year of allowable radiation exposure from all sources: air, soil, water and the food chain. A standard chest X-ray emits 10 millirem or less. Frishman said the dose from radioactive ash escaping from Yucca Mountain could be about 1,000 rem. A millirem is one-thousandth of a rem, the measurement of radiation dosage. During Wednesday's panel discussion, Smistad referred to Frishman's worst-case analogy as a "semantics issue." Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 2 Duwamish now on cleanup list Badly polluted waterway designated a Superfund site Friday, September 14, 2001 By LARRY LANGE SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER The federal government yesterday added Seattle's heavily polluted lower Duwamish River to a national priority list for cleanup, officially equating it to some of the most badly polluted sites in the nation. The Environmental Protection Agency ordered the unusual move to make the river a Superfund site after failing to negotiate cleanup agreements with The Boeing Co. and the Port of Seattle, historically two of the major polluters in the Duwamish corridor. The move puts at least a six-mile stretch of the tainted stream on a list with more than 1,230 other sites nationwide and 48 others in the state, including nearby Harbor Island. Environmental groups hailed the listing. Now begins a years-long cleanup process for which costs -- and those ultimately responsible for paying them -- have yet to be completely identified. "It's a bad site," said Curt Hart, spokesman for the state Department of Ecology. The river has been the drainage system for one of the city's most heavily industrialized neighborhoods for more than a century. Chemicals and sewage regularly flowed into it from businesses as big as Boeing and from utilities and other facilities run by the city, King County and the Port of Seattle. Contamination began long before laws forbade it and went on for decades before regulations put limits on it. As a result, the lower Duwamish section, before it empties into Elliott Bay at Harbor Island, is laced with a nasty stew of chemicals: PCBs, volatile organic compounds and heavy metals. Some have been tracked to depths of 4 feet below the river bottom, but officials said the layers could go even deeper. Pockets of mercury hundreds of times above state limits have been reported in spots, and tests of some fish show elevated levels of carcinogens, said B.J. Cummings, coordinator for the Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition. Public Health -- Seattle &King County has warned residents not to fish in the river or eat the fish. Young Puget Sound chinook salmon, already listed as threatened, traverse the lower river segment en route to the sea, as do coho salmon that face possible listing as threatened or endangered. People fish, play and work on the lower river "and have such a stake in seeing it cleaned up so their kids can play in the river and they can be around it," Cummings said. But that could be years away. Adding the lower river to the national Superfund list came after the collapse last fall of EPA efforts to forge agreements with two of the major polluting landowners. The port and Boeing objected to language that didn't limit their cleanup liability, and the talks broke off. The four major landowners, which also include Seattle and King County, have accepted some degree of pollution responsibility. King County agreed several years ago to clean up some of the contamination in a settlement reached with federal agencies. But much of the precleanup work of the next three years will involve a search for other culprits, many of them businesses who have left. "The river has been an industrial dumping ground for years and years for a lot of industries that are no longer in the valley," said Don Theiler, King County's waste-water treatment division manager. "It is hard to sort this out." The state's last addition to the Superfund list -- contaminated wells in Lewis County -- was last year. Other sites include the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Central Washington, Tacoma's shut-down Asarco smelter and Commencement Bay, parts of Fort Lewis and the Bangor Naval Submarine Base. The Duwamish River's listing leaves virtually no limit to the time and expense that could go into a cleanup. Studies must determine the extent and location of pollution, the risks it poses to humans and the environment and possible cleanup methods. EPA Superfund program manager Lori Cohen said the agency hopes to identify some sites that pose the greatest hazard, and start cleanup efforts by early next year. Others, she said, will take longer. She could not say when the entire cleanup might begin or end. "I hope we're done in 10 years," said Cummings, the citizen coalition coordinator. P-I reporter Larry Lange can be reached at 206-448-8313 or larrylange@seattlepi.com [Seattle Post-Intelligencer] 101 Elliott Ave. W. Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 448-8000 ***************************************************************** 3 Stockholm lenders meeting okays Russia eco-projects Planet Ark Environmental News: FINLAND: September 13, 2001 HELSINKI - Multilateral lenders, the European Commission and Russian officials meeting in Stockholm yesterday endorsed plans to step up funding of environmental projects in Russia and the Baltic Sea region, the Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) said. The conference was the first meeting of the steering group of the Northern Dimension Environmental Partnership (NDEP), approved by the European Union's Gothenburg summit in June. The meeting brought together officials from the NIB, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the Word Bank, the Nordic Environment Finance Corporation (NEFCO), the Commission in Brussels and Russia, NIB said. "(The meeting) was a very significant step forward," said NIB Senior Vice President Oddvar Ronsen. "(Now) for the first time we have set a partnership between the international financial institutions, bi-lateral financing institutions and the Russian Federation to accelerate implementation of significant environmental projects in Russia," he said. The first projects in line to receive funding from the partnership are a waste-water treatment plant in St Petersburg and environmental investments in the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, the NIB, the Nordic countries' international lending institution, said in a statement. The partnership would also consider funding for nuclear clean-up and nuclear waste management projects in the Northern Dimension Area, the NIB said. A pledging meeting for an NDEP fund is planned by the European Commission and the EBRD for the last week of November in Brussels, the NIB said. Ronsen said that the first funds for NDEP projects could be provided before the end of this year. The EBRD-administered Fund would work to attract grant financing from the European Commission and a wider group of contributing countries and to channel funds into environmental projects identified by the NDEP Steering Group, the NIB said. Finland and Sweden have spearheaded a "Northern Dimension" of the EU, to involve regions in northern Russia and the Baltic Sea region in environment and infrastructure projects to promote stability by bridging the gap in living standards between those areas and the West. "It is important that the Russia Federation is involved in this because the owners of the projects will be institutions and municipalities in Russia," Ronsen said. On a recent visit to Finland, Russian President Vladimir Putin called for real substance to be given to the Northern Dimension. "I think we are moving along with a lot of substance," Ronsen said. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 4 Columnist Ruthe Deskin: Fix was in at Yucca hearing Las Vegas SUN September 13, 2001 Ruthe Deskin is assistant to the publisher. Reach her at deskin@ lasvegassun.com. We came. We saw. They conquered. The Department of Energy's public hearing on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste plan was a farce. If ever a fight was rigged, this was it. As hundreds of protesters awaited their turn to speak, the DOE's handpicked proponents -- some from out of state -- were given prime time. As the hours ticked by, disgruntled would-be participants began to leave without having had the opportunity to be heard. Some remained until the bitter end at about 2 a.m., but their protests were heard by a dwindling crowd. It was a blatant example of the arrogance of power by the DOE and the federal government. I have personal knowledge of what federal agencies can do, as I have been privy to a vendetta against a young rancher and his family in Northern Nevada. They made a mistake. They took their case to court and won. Since that time they have been harassed, bullied and driven to near bankruptcy. Of the people, by the people and for the people is a bleak promise. Nevada's elected officials -- every one of them -- are diligent in their opposition to making Nevada the nuclear trash can of the nation. Hundreds, yes thousands, of residents object to the autocratic DOE and its efforts to shove Yucca Mountain down our throats. Fairness demands more hearings that are properly monitored so that all sides might be heard. Otherwise, as Rodney Dangerfield would say, "We don't get no respect." Note to the mayor and City Council: For a small portion of that $500,000 set aside for a feasibility study of the best use for the 61-acre downtown development, let's put together a committee of local sports writers and sports enthusiasts and let them report on determining the success or failure of a baseball park in that area. They probably would point to the mediocre career of minor league baseball at Cashman Field. I know what it is to try to promote baseball in Las Vegas. Years ago my husband was the business manager for the Las Vegas Wranglers, who played at the old Cashman Field, a far cry from the present facility. It was a nip-and-tuck battle to entice enough fans to meet the club payroll. If baseball can't succeed at the new Cashman Field, what makes anyone think it would be successful elsewhere? Parking at Cashman Field is more than adequate. Would it be the same downtown? It is relatively easy to get to Cashman. Not so in the proposed area. Would Major League Baseball approve a franchise in Las Vegas? I doubt it. City taxpayers need to watch this one carefully. Would the time come when the city would ask for public financing to assist in building a new ballpark? As a recent Sun editorial suggested: "You don't need to spend money to know that a minor league baseball team would have a tough time in Las Vegas." Sports franchises in our city are tough propositions. Examples abound, not only at Cashman Field, but in football, hockey, basketball and even volleyball. There might even be better ways to spend "feasibility" money. How about solutions to the problems of the homeless? All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 5 Managing Radioactive Waste Safely UK DEFRA | Environmental Protection Department for Environment, Food &Rural Affairs The consultation paper on "Managing Radioactive Waste Safely" aims to start a nationwide debate on how to manage solid radioactive waste. For the moment, it is safely stored, but the Government and the Devolved Administrations recognise that it is now time to work towards implementing a policy for its final management that gains widespread public support. Before this can be achieved, we must ensure that we involve people fully in the debate. Successful debate can only be accomplished if sufficient and accurate information is made available, and by employing various techniques that will encourage a wide range of people to take part. We are therefore seeking your views on how best we can engage you in discussions on this important issue. The results of this consultation will help map out the way forward, so that we can successfully implement a policy which people in the UK fully support. The consultation document has been made available in Adobe Acrobat format (390kb) for downloading. The Adobe Acrobat Reader can be freely downloaded. Viewers with visual difficulties may find it useful to investigate services provided to improve the accessibility of Acrobat documents -- http://access.adobe.com Responses Responses need to be received by 12 March 2002. You can either E-mail your comments to radwaste.consultation@defra.gsi.gov.ukor to one of the addresses shown in the consultation paper. We are also hosting an online debate to enable people to exchange their views and thoughts on this issue. Comments that are expressed here will also be taken into account when we decide the next steps in the process. If you wish to take part, you can do so by going to: www.ukonline.gov.uk/online/citizenspace/default.asp?url=consultation/default.asp Enquiries If you have any queries regarding this consultation, you can telephone Claire Herdman of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Radioactive Substances Division on 020 7944 6366. DEFRA is not responsible for the contents or reliability of the linked web sites and does not necessarily endorse the views expressed within them. Listing should not be taken as endorsement of any kind. We cannot guarantee that these links will work all of the time and we have no control over the availability of the linked pages. ***************************************************************** 6 Daily Events Report U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Operations Center Event Reports For 09/13/2001 09/14/2001 ** EVENT NUMBERS ** 38282 38284 38285 38286 Power Reactor Event Number: 38282 FACILITY: VERMONT YANKEE REGION: 1 NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/13/2001 UNIT: [1] [] [] STATE: VT NOTIFICATION TIME: 02:00[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] GE 4 EVENT DATE: 09/13/2001 EVENT TIME: [EDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: BRIAN COPPERTHITE LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/13/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: FANGIE JONES PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY STEVE BARR R1 10 CFR SECTION: GLENN TRACEY IAT NINF INFORMATION ONLY UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT INFORMATION REPORT IN ACCORDANCE WITH NRC INFORMATION NOTICE 98 35 A suspicious vehicle was noted in area around the plant site. Immediate compensatory actions were taken upon discovery. Contact HOO for further details. Fuel Cycle Facility Event Number: 38284 FACILITY: BATTELLE MEMORIAL INSTITUTE NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/13/2001 RXTYPE: ADVANCED FUEL R AND PILOT PLANTS NOTIFICATION TIME: 09:39[EDT] COMMENTS: HOT CELL R EVENT DATE: 09/13/2001 EVENT TIME: 09:25[EDT] LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/13/2001 CITY: WEST JEFFERSON REGION: 3 COUNTY: MADISON STATE: OH PERSON ORGANIZATION LICENSE#: SNM 7 AGREEMENT: N SONIA BURGESS R3 DOCKET: 07000008 FED BROWN NMSS STEINDURF FEMA NRC NOTIFIED BY: C. JENSEN HQ OPS OFFICER: JOHN MacKINNON EMERGENCY CLASS: UNUSUAL EVENT 10 CFR SECTION: AAEC 50.72(a) (1) (i) EMERGENCY DECLARED EVENT TEXT UNUSUAL EVENT DECLARED DUE TO CONTAINED FIRE. Unusual event was declared because of a small contained fire, now out, in High Energy Cell (HEC) lasting less than 10 minutes. A "berry can" was being ground open in order to dispose of some combustible material. The grinding caused the contents inside the can to catch fire. The fire remained within the can until it burnt itself out. First water was sprayed into the can to extinguish the fire but the flames got larger so the licensee let the fire burn itself out. The max. flame height was approximately 18 inches. The "berry can", which looks like a one gallon paint can, was located in a 20 foot high hot cell located in building JN 1B. There was no release and nobody was injured. Smears taken detected no radioactivity except for radon which was caused by an atmospheric inversion. Any gases released within the hot cell must go through a HEPA filter. The licensee notified NRC Region 3, the DOE Project Manager, and local officials of this event. * * * UPDATE ON 09/13/01 AT 1026 ET BY C. JENSEN TAKEN BY MACKINNON * * * Unusual event terminated at 0957 ET based on negative air samples. R3DO (Sonia Burgess), NMSS (Fred Brown) and FEMA (Barden) notified. Power Reactor Event Number: 38285 FACILITY: TURKEY POINT REGION: 2 NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/13/2001 UNIT: [3] [] [] STATE: FL NOTIFICATION TIME: 14:17[EDT] RXTYPE: [3] W 3 LP,[4] W 3 LP EVENT DATE: 09/13/2001 EVENT TIME: 12:45[EDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: MICHAEL MATUSZEWSKI LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/13/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: STEVE SANDIN PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY JOHN MONNINGER R2 10 CFR SECTION: APRE 50.72(b)(2)(xi) OFFSITE NOTIFICATION UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 3 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT OFFSITE NOTIFICATION INVOLVING CONTAMINATED SCAFFOLD KNUCKLES "While performing incoming routine surveys, Turkey Point Health Physics personnel discovered low levels of radioactivity on several pieces of scaffolding knuckles and elbows received from a vendor. The knuckles never entered the site's radiation controlled area. These items were counted in a Small Articles Monitor (SAM) and indicated low level contamination was present. In total 3 out of approximately 2700 items surveyed indicated the presence of low level fixed activity. The highest level measured was 9,800 disintegrations per minute (dpm) when counted in the SAM and non detectable using a standard HP 210 (pancake GM) probe. Isotopic analysis indicates Cobalt 60 and Cesium 137. No loose surface contamination was found. The items identified with low level fixed contamination are now being held inside the Turkey Point radiation controlled area. "Florida Power & Light Company has notified the owner of the scaffolding and the State of Florida (Department of Health, Bureau of Radiation Control) of this matter." The licensee informed the NRC resident inspector. Power Reactor Event Number: 38286 FACILITY: WOLF CREEK REGION: 4 NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/13/2001 UNIT: [1] [] [] STATE: KS NOTIFICATION TIME: 19:11[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] W 4 LP EVENT DATE: 09/13/2001 EVENT TIME: 17:48[CDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: DAVE DEES LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/13/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: STEVE SANDIN PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY MARK SHAFFER R4 10 CFR SECTION: APRE 50.72(b)(2)(xi) OFFSITE NOTIFICATION UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT PRESS RELEASE INVOLVING AN INJURED CONSTRUCTION WORKER "The following is a press release issued by a construction company that is working on a construction project at Wolf Creek Generating Station. The project is associated with a training center outside the protected area but inside the owner controlled area. The Senior Resident has been notified. This four hour notification is being made pursuant to 10CFR50.72(b)(2)(xi). " 'BURLINGTON, Kan. A workman performing metal building erection on a training center renovation located just outside the Wolf Creek Generating Station fell 20 feet to the ground sustaining multiple injuries. The workman, who worked for Total Construction Enterprises located in St. Louis, Mo., was flown out via Life Star to a Topeka hospital for treatment. The name of the workman is not being released nor is his medical status known at this time.' " ***************************************************************** 7 IAEA Daily Press Review IAEA Daily Press Review Date 2001-09-14 Number 176 1. Non-proliferation Terrorist attacks in US appear to have strengthened prospects for congressional support of MD plan. Russia, Australia offer US military help in anti-terrorism war; India will allow use of its facilities in case of military strikes against Afghanistan; China tries to contain scope of looming conflict, appeals to US to consult countries 'beyond NATO' before launching counterattack. Asia warns US against declared 'eye for an eye' strategy. American Business Council seeks termination of nuclear-related sanctions against Pakistan. (BBC; CNN; DAW; NYT - 14/9) Afghanistan; Asia; Australia; China; India; Pakistan; Russian Federation; United States of America 2. Terrorism World on high alert after terrorist attacks in US: Swiss parliamentarian asks for shut down of NPPs; terrorism highlights UK energy security debate; According to Russian newspaper 'Izvestija', further attacks might involve NPPs. (R - 13/9) Russian Federation; WORLDWIDE 3. Nuclear power Russia commissions new power line from NPP Rostov to Shakhty, North Caucasus. Czech NPP Temelin-1 to be restarted for further tests. Draft ordinance for plebiscite on NPP submitted in Miyama, Mie Prefecture of Japan. Scotland rules out approving new NPPs until after 2006. Seminar on 'Resurgence of Nuclear Power' takes place in Pakistan. Indian NPPs to provide about 10,000 MW by 2011, official says, provided finance available. (DAW; FT; R - 13, 14/9) Czech Republic; India; Japan; Pakistan; Russian Federation; United Kingdom 4. Radiation, health Russian, Norwegian specialists to monitor radiation in 'Kursk' wreck zone. (R - 13/9) Norway; Russian Federation 5. UN Nomination of US ambassador to UN sent to full Senate for approval. (NYT - 14/9) United States of America 6. Miscellaneous 'Kursk' bow sawn off, lifting scheduled for 25 September. (BBC - 14/9) Russian Federation ***************************************************************** 8 Nuclear waste plan is still five years off news.telegraph.co.uk - By Charles Clover, Environment Editor (Filed: 13/09/2001) AFTER four years without any plans for dealing with the nuclear industry's 50-year legacy of radioactive waste, the Government yesterday unveiled a strategy unlikely to produce a result before the next election. Michael Meacher, Environment Minister, said the programme of public consultation and research into burial - with or without the possibility of retrieval - or above-ground dry storage would culminate in 2005 with a series of options for public consultation and an announcement of the result in 2006. He said that the Government was "starting from scratch" following the cancellation by the last government of plans to build an experimental disposal shaft near Sellafield, which was hotly opposed by Cumbria county council. Mr Meacher said a decision about the disposal of 500,000 tons of nuclear waste that the industry will produce over this century, even if there are no nuclear power stations, "must not be rushed and may take decades to implement". Among the options that have been rejected at the outset as too dangerous are firing waste into space aboard missiles. Mr Meacher issued assurances that the Government had at present no preferred option or preferred site for a nuclear waste dump. "There is no site on the radar screen at the moment. I want a national debate. I don't want people ever to wake up and find out there is to be a nuclear storage facility near them. "Today the news is full of horrendous events that people will be discussing for a very long time. I want to say that this too is an issue which affects the public, their children and their children's children." © Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited2001. Terms &Conditions of ***************************************************************** 9 Anti-aircraft guns urged at nuclear plants / Critics say jet bomb could cause disaster like that at Chernobyl Friday, September 14, 2001 Stunned to see how a hijacked commercial airliner can be used to topple skyscrapers, critics of the nuclear industry are urging the federal government to consider whether nuclear power plants are vulnerable to a similar attack. A commercial airliner crash on a nuclear plant could set off a Chernobyl- style disaster that would spew radioactive poisons over a large area, rendering it uninhabitable for many years, critics say. And to defend against such an attack, they say, the government should consider equipping personnel at nuclear power plants with anti-aircraft weapons. Pacific Gas and Electric Co. acknowledged late Tuesday, after the attack on the World Trade Center, that it had instituted a "security alert" at its Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant on the California coast near San Luis Obispo. The state's other nuclear power plant, San Onofre, also went on alert immediately after the terrorist attacks. That decision was made by its majority owner, Southern California Edison. The alerts continued through yesterday, and it is uncertain when they will end. "Given the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, I think one has to assume that the consequences could be far more severe if a nuclear power plant were hit," said Paul Leventhal, head of the Nuclear Control Institute in Washington. Even if a crashing plane didn't penetrate the thick containment vessel shielding a reactor, it might disable external cooling systems that prevent the reactor from overheating, said Leventhal, a former congressional staff member who directed the U.S. Senate's investigation of the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in 1979. Hence, the federal government should investigate the potential vulnerability of nuclear reactors to such flying bombs. If they prove vulnerable, then one possibility is installing "anti-aircraft missiles or rapid-fire machine guns" to down threatening aircraft, Leventhal said. "I was frankly surprised that the Pentagon didn't have any such protection" before one of the four terrorist-seized airliners crashed into it Tuesday, Leventhal said. The feasibility of anti-aircraft systems is questioned by some critics, though. "If you do that for nuclear power plants, where do you draw the line? Say, do you also put them around dams?" asks Christopher Hellman, a senior analyst at the Center for Defense Information in Washington, D.C.. As part of the security crackdown, PG is canceling visitor tours and refusing inessential deliveries to the power plant, PG spokesperson Jeff Lewis said. Lewis said PG took the step in response to a request from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The step was not motivated by any specific threats to the Diablo Canyon plant, he said. After the terrorist assaults on the East Coast on Tuesday, the NRC asked all 106 U.S. commercial nuclear power plants to consider going on security alerts. At the San Onofre nuclear plant, officials cracked down in part by positioning armed guards at all gates, increasing security patrols inside and around the plant and ordering manual inspection of all staff IDs, said Southern California Edison spokesperson Ray Golden. A Nuclear Regulatory Commission rule dating from 1981 requires nuclear plants within regions with considerable aircraft activity to be constructed sturdily enough to withstand an aircraft impact. If a power plant faces less than one chance in 10 million of such an impact, then the NRC doesn't require it to meet the safety standard, said Jim Riley, an engineer and senior project manager at the Nuclear Energy Institute, a nuclear power industry group in Washington, D.C.. However, Riley acknowledged, "when we designed these plants, we didn't expect people to be flying around with aircraft as full-scale weapons. . . . We were not expected to design against military-type attacks. I guess you'd classify this (Tuesday's terrorist assault) as a military-type attack." Nonetheless, Riley is confident that a plant meeting the regulatory standard would be safe from an airplane assault. He doesn't know how many U.S. nuclear power plants actually meet the standard. Riley declined to comment on the question of whether nuclear plant operators should consider installing anti-aircraft defenses. The impact of one airline crash into the World Trade Center generated an explosive force of about one kiloton, or one thousand tons -- about one- twentieth the energy of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945. That's the calculation by Stanford University researcher Professor Steven Block, a senior fellow at Stanford's Institute for International Studies and member of the department of applied physics. Block is also an adviser to the Jasons, leading scientists who often do classified research for government and military agencies. "I think we're all surprised that the (World Trade Center) collapsed," Block said in an interview. "I think we've just seen the dawn of a whole new generation of terrorism." Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory maintains a building for research on plutonium, a fissionable material in nuclear weapons. After the East Coast terrorist strikes, a lab representative assured a reporter that the building is designed to withstand direct impact by a commercial airliner. Given Tuesday's disaster, does the nation need to revive some form of coastal or interior air defenses against short-range threats such as hijacked jets? Such action is both unnecessary and infeasible, analyst Hellman says. The Air Force and Air National Guard maintain almost 1,000 aircraft whose purpose is to guard the nation against attack, he said. "I can assure you the skies were thick with them by 9:30 (Tuesday) morning in Washington," he said. E-mail Keay Davidson at . ©2001 San Francisco Chronicle   Page B - 3 ***************************************************************** 10 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Friday, September 14, 2001 State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects ADAMS - Items of Interest Recent Released Documents Added - Friday, September 14, 2001 These documents and others may be retrieved at the NRC PERR web site -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Item ID: 012560155 Accession Number: ML012540013 Document Date: 9/10/01 Title: 08/08/01 CONFERENCE CALL WITH NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE ON DEMONSTRATION PROJECT TO REVIEW INSPECTION VERIFICATION ITEMS. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560294 Accession Number: ML012410295 Document Date: 8/29/01 Title: 08/27/01 Meeting Summary Combustion Engineering Owners Group To Discuss Bulletion 2001-01 Circumferential Cracking Of Reactor Pressure Vessel Head Pentration Nozzles. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DLPM/LPD4 Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560267 Accession Number: ML012410313 Document Date: Title: 08/27/01 Meeting Summary With Combustion Engineering Owners Group To Discuss Bulletion 2001-01 Re: Circumferential Cracking Of Reactor Pressure Vessel Head Pentration Nozzles. Author Affiliation: Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560101 Accession Number: ML012470385 Document Date: 9/4/01 Title: 09/04/01 - Meeting Summary Of 08/16/01 With The GE Nuclear Energy (GENE). Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DLPM/LPD1 Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560337 Accession Number: ML012530333 Document Date: 9/6/01 Title: 09/06/01/ OMB 3150-0017, 10 CFR Part 30, Summary of Information Collection Request Author Affiliation: NRC/OCIO/IRDMD/RMB Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560416 Accession Number: ML012480081 Document Date: 9/5/01 Title: 09/10/2001 Public Meeting re Fermi 2 Radiation Protection Program Discussion. Author Affiliation: NRC/RGN-III/DRS Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560350 Accession Number: ML012560132 Document Date: 9/13/01 Title: 09/14/2001 - Notice of Cancellation of Public Meeting with Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) and Other Stakeholders on the Physical Protection Significance Determination Process & Performance Indicators. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR//DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560274 Accession Number: ML012560155 Document Date: 9/13/01 Title: 09/17/0 1- 10/22/01 Commission Meetings - FRN Author Affiliation: NRC/SECY Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560102 Accession Number: ML012430275 Document Date: 8/31/01 Title: 09/19/01 meeting with NEI, Hatch Nulcear Plan, 1 & 2; Turkey Point 3 & 4; Surry and North Anna, 1 & 2; McGuire and Catawba, 1 & 2; and Peach Bottom, 2 & 3; to discuss the status of the renewal applications and generic license renewal activities Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP/RLSB Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560157 Accession Number: ML012550141 Document Date: 9/12/01 Title: 09/26/2001 Public Meeting Notice for NRC/Agreement State Working Group Meeting on Termination of Uranium Mill Licenses in Agreement States. Author Affiliation: NRC/STP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560277 Accession Number: ML012500080 Document Date: 3/5/97 Title: Arrangement for the Exchange of Technical Information & Cooperation in Nuclear Safety & Research Matters Between the US NRC & The Commission Nacional De Seguridad Nuclear Y Salvaguardias of the United Mexican States. Author Affiliation: NRC, The United Mexican States Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560075 Accession Number: ML012360267 Document Date: 8/18/01 Title: Comment (546) submitted by Margaret G. Holt opposing Proposed Rules PR-1, 2, 50, 51, 52, 54, 60, 70, 73, 76 & 110 regarding changes to the licensing process for nuclear power reactors. Author Affiliation: - No Known Affiliation Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560076 Accession Number: ML012360269 Document Date: 8/20/01 Title: Comment (547) submitted by Jason Richard Detrani opposing NRC proposed rulemaking as described in Federal Register, 04/16/2001, Vol. 66 to change licensing hearing process for nuclear power reactors. Author Affiliation: - No Known Affiliation Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560095 Accession Number: ML003737559 Document Date: 7/31/00 Title: LTR-00-0507 - Carolyn Huntoon, DOE Ltr re Release of Surplus Scrap Materials from DOE Facilities Author Affiliation: US Dept of Energy (DOE) Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560096 Accession Number: ML003715365 Document Date: 12/31/96 Title: NUREG 1571 - "Information Handbook on Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installations." Author Affiliation: NRC/NMSS/SFPO Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560270 Accession Number: ML012490543 Document Date: 7/2/01 Title: Press Release-II-01-024: NRC To Meet With Southern Nuclear Officials To Discuss Safety Performance At Farley Nuclear Power Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-II/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-II-01-024 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560271 Accession Number: ML012490553 Document Date: 7/2/01 Title: Press Release-II-01-025: NRC To Meet with Progress Energy/CP&L Officials To Discuss Safety Performance At Robinson Nuclear Power Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-II/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-II-01-025 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560214 Accession Number: ML012540146 Document Date: 7/2/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-028: NRC To Meet With American Electric Power To Discuss Safety Performance At The D.C. Cook Nuclear Power Station. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-028 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560215 Accession Number: ML012540151 Document Date: 7/2/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-029: NRC To Meet With Nuclear Management Company Officials To Discuss Safety Performance At The Point Beach Nuclear Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-029 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560216 Accession Number: ML012550220 Document Date: 7/3/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-030: NRC To Meet With Exelon Nuclear To Discuss Safety Performance At The Byron Nuclear Power Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-030 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560217 Accession Number: ML012550227 Document Date: 7/3/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-031: NRC To Meet With FirstEnergy Company To Discuss Safety Performance At The Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-031 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560218 Accession Number: ML012550254 Document Date: 7/3/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-032: NRC To Meet With Nuclear Management Company To Discuss Safety Performance At The Kewaunee Nuclear Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-032 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560272 Accession Number: ML012560189 Document Date: 7/5/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-033: NRC To Meet With Exelon Generation Company To Discuss Safety Performance At The LaSalle Nuclear Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-033 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560273 Accession Number: ML012560212 Document Date: 7/5/01 Title: Press Release-III-01-034: NRC To Meet With FirstEnergy Company To Discuss Safety Performance At The Perry Nuclear Plant. Author Affiliation: NRC/OPA:RGN-III/FO Document/Report Number: Press Release-III-01-034 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560269 Accession Number: ML012550260 Document Date: Title: Probabilistic Risk Assessment Database for Internally Generated Events. Author Affiliation: Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560288 Accession Number: ML012530109 Document Date: 9/6/01 Title: Public Meeting Announcement - Engineering Initatives - North Anna Power Station, and Surry Power. Author Affiliation: NRC/RGN-II/DRP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560304 Accession Number: ML012480179 Document Date: 8/29/01 Title: Response to NRC Bulletin 2001-01, "Circumferential Cracking of Reactor Pressure Vessel Head Penetration Nozzles." Author Affiliation: Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corp Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560446 Accession Number: ML012560116 Document Date: 9/6/01 Title: SECY-01-0170 - "Weekly Information Report - Week Ending 08/31/01" Author Affiliation: NRC/EDO/AO Document/Report Number: SECY-01-0170 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560295 Accession Number: ML012490017 Document Date: 9/5/01 Title: SUMMARY OF 07/25/2001 MEETING WITH THE NUCLEAR ENERGY INSTITUTE (NEI) LICENSE RENEWAL TASK FORCE ON DEMONSTRATION PROJECT USING IMPROVED RENEWAL GUIDANCE DOCUMENTS. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012560284 Accession Number: ML012500341 Document Date: 8/24/01 Title: United States of Mexico National Report, Presented to fulfil the Requirements of the Convention of Nuclear Safety. Author Affiliation: United States of Mexico Document/Report Number: ***************************************************************** 11 TVA sour on nuclear lease deal ChattanoogaNow | Chattanooga Times Free Press Friday, September 14, 2001 By Dave Flessner Business Editor Tennessee Valley Authority officials on Thursday dismissed an initial offer from developer Franklin L. Haney to finance the restart of the utility's oldest nuclear reactor. But Mr. Haney immediately proposed an alternative which he said would go even further in helping TVA cut its debt costs and increase its power generation. TVA Vice President Jack Bailey said Mr. Haney's latest proposal may be considered along with other financing options, but not until next year at the earliest. "First and foremost, TVA is not going to make a decision on financing one of our nuclear plants until the board makes a decision whether we want to restart the plant," Mr. Bailey said after meeting with Mr. Haney and his representatives Thursday. "That decision won't be made until early next year, and when we get to the financing issue, we will certainly look at all the options and solicit proposals from many sources." TVA is preparing an environmental assessment and cost estimate to restart its Unit 1 reactor at the Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant near Athens, Ala. The reactor, which began generating electricity in 1977, was shut down in 1985 because it failed to meet new federal safety standards. TVA estimates it will cost from $1.2 billion to $1.5 billion to repair, but the final environmental and cost estimates are not expected until next year. Mr. Haney has offered to pay up to $1.6 billion to restart the Browns Ferry reactor through an investor group called Nuclear Leasing. The Chattanooga financier is trying to take advantage of near-record low interest rates, including a source of long-term financing he says is cheaper than what TVA may obtain. Mr. Haney also submitted an offer to TVA on Thursday to finance the completion of the Bellefonte Nuclear Plant in Hollywood, Ala., under a similar leasing plan. "The markets are as favorable as they are likely to get in years for long-term financing and we understand that there is equipment and technologies in these nuclear plants which will become obsolete if they are not used in the next couple of years," said Joe Conner, a Chattanooga attorney who represents Mr. Haney. "We understand TVA's desire to carefully consider their power needs, and we want our proposal to be competitively bid with any others that may be out there. But there is a real opportunity for TVA to move ahead now and save a lot of money." TVA Chairman Glenn McCullough, however, said last month he will not be rushed into any decision about Browns Ferry or Bellefonte. "We will be very deliberate and make a good business decision in the fullness of time," Mr. McCullough said. "It won't be driven by bond rates. It will be driven by a comprehensive study of the facts." Some environmental leaders opposed to activating any more nuclear plants are wary of Mr. Haney's offer. "It's a shell game that still requires TVA to pay for cost overruns and delays," said Stephen Smith, executive director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. Under Mr. Haney's leaseback proposal, TVA is not expected to incur any costs during the five-year repair of the plant. The agency would then make payments from the income derived by the reactor into an escrow account for up to 25 years under the plan. The plan involves a 33-year lease which Mr. Bailey said is longer than the life of the plant and doesn't provide enough buyout options for TVA. "The life of the lease and the associated financing should be no longer than the expected life of the asset and in our opinion this violates that standard," Mr. Bailey said. Mr. Conner said Mr. Haney has offered different lease options that fully conform with TVA standards. "We appreciate TVA taking the time to review our proposal, but we were disappointed that they didn't appear to understand all of our plan," he said. TVA's internal review of Mr. Haney's original offer also concluded that TVA could borrow money at a lower rate than Mr. Haney. But with $26 billion of debt already and billions of dollars of potential capital costs for pollution control, maintenance and transmission improvements, TVA may not be able to finance more power plants and still meet its goal of paying down its debt. Mr. Haney also claims to have a new source of long-term capital for much less than his initial Aug. 6 offer. Mr. Conner said the new funding source is available for 0.17 percent less than what TVA now pays for comparable long-term debt. "We think we have a win-win for TVA and we're going to continue to work with TVA," Mr. Conner said. "In our view, the ball is still in play even if our initial offer isn't." E-mail Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com Chattanooga Times Free Press on the World Wide Web, and the ***************************************************************** 12 Blair: Terrorists may go nuclear by Patrick Hennessy, Political Correspondent A new generation of terrorists stands ready and willing to launch a nuclear strike against the democracies of the West. That was the stark warning today from Tony Blair to a crowded and deeply sombre House of Commons, recalled in emergency session in the wake of the terror attacks on the United States. The Prime Minister, in a long, heart-felt and toughly worded statement called for a worldwide effort to take on the terrorists - and those who give them shelter. He warned that it was now essential "to rethink dramatically the scale and nature of the action the world takes to combat terrorismî. He went on: "And let us make this reflection. A week ago, anyone suggesting terrorists would kill thousands of innocent people in down town New York would have been dismissed as alarmist. It happened. "We know that these groups are fanatics capable of killing without discrimination. The limits on the numbers they kill and their methods of killing are not governed by morality. "The limits are only practical or technical. We know that they would, if they could, go further and use chemical or biological or even nuclear weapons of mass destruction.î It was known that there were groups and occasionally states trading in the technology and capability for such weapons, Mr Blair went on, and the time had come for this trade to be "exposed, disrupted and stamped out'. "We have been warned by the events of 11 September. We should act on the warning,î he said. The leaders of all the main political parties joined in voicing grief for the dead and injured and their families, sympathy for the USA, and determination to fight back. Iain Duncan Smith, in his first appearance as Tory leader the day after he was elected, promised his party's "total backingî for the Government. And he went on: " President Bush has described this outrage as an act of war. He was right. This was an act of war. Let the message go out loud and clear.' The debate following Mr Blair's statement was broken at 11 for MPs to join the national three- minute silence. Mr Blair, Mr Duncan Smith and the leaders of the other parties left the Commons to attend the service at St Paul's in honour of those who died. The Prime Minister also, however, used his statement to deliver an implicit message to the Western allies, in the EU and elsewhere, not to weaken - and to President Bush not to hit out at the wrong target. He said it was right that the President and the US government had proceeded with care and he went on: "They did not lash out. They did not strike first and think afterwards ... They, together with allies, will want to identify with care, those responsible. This is a judgment that must and will be based on hard evidence.î The warning was echoed by the veteran Labour MP Tam Dalyell, who said that a US military strike which only killed more innocent people would simply fuel the menace of the terrorists. Both Mr Blair and Mr Duncan Smith called for an intense effort to strike at the "sinewsî of terrorism - the funding, often linked to crime, and money laundering around the world. But the potential threat of a nuclear attack was amplified by Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. He said that Britain must develop its defences against a "copycat attackî. But he said the West also had to pay attention to the next threat. "It should by now be obvious to everyone that people who have the fanaticism and the capability to fly an airliner laden with passengers into a skyscraper will not be deterred by human decency from deploying chemical or biological weapons, missiles, nuclear weapons or other forms of mass destruction if these are available to them.î Mr Blair, acknowleding the doubts held among some Labour MPs and others beyond Parliament over plans for a US military response, said: "There will be different shades of opinion heard today. That is as it should be. But let us unite in agreeing this: what happened in the United States on Tuesday was an act of wickedness for which there can never be justification. "Whatever the cause, whatever the perversion of religious feeling, whatever the political belief, to inflict such terror on the world, to take the lives of so many innocent men, women and children, can never ever be justified.' Mr Blair is expected to have another telephone conversation with President Bush later today and will spend the weekend at Downing Street. © Associated Newspapers Ltd., 14 September 2001 ***************************************************************** 13 Executive stalls on commitment to nuclear power The Scotsman Online David Scott Scottish Government Editor (dscott@scotsman.com) SCOTTISH ministers are to resist any early commitment by the UK government to build a nuclear power station north of the Border, it emerged last night. In a paper submitted yesterday to a UK Cabinet committee conducting a review of energy policy, the executive underlined the importance of developing renewable energy - like hydro, wind and wave power - and played down the prospect of a new nuclear power station being built in Scotland. Highlighting Scotland’s potential as an energy-rich nation, the paper stressed that no decisions about the future of nuclear energy could be taken before consultations had been completed on the management of waste and spent fuel from existing stations. The Scottish National Party insisted last night that the paper actually paved the way for the executive to say "yes" to Westminster and accept new nuclear power stations in Scotland. But the environmental group Friends of the Earth argued that the paper gave little encouragement to attempts to revive the nuclear industry in Scotland. Recent reports have suggested that the review committee has already concluded that future electricity supplies north of the Border could not be maintained without a new generation of nuclear reactors being built. The SNP claimed that, as the Westminster government had the power to decide Scotland’s future nuclear policy, an unpopular means of power was about to be foisted on Scotland without consultation. However, in its paper, the executive appears to set its face against nuclear power by saying that present indications are that it would be too expensive to compete with other sources of generation "now and for some time to come". It pointed out that, if any application was made in Scotland, development consent would need to be sought from Scottish ministers in a process with planning authorities. Any objection by the relevant planning authority would automatically trigger a public inquiry. The paper stated: "The overall timescales would be long; the newest UK nuclear power station, Sizewell B, took about 15 years between the application being lodged to the station being commissioned." The paper described Scotland’s potential for further renewable energy as "massive." It said the country has around 23 per cent of the total European wind energy resource both onshore and offshore and that the executive’s commitment is to increase the proportion of electricity supply accounted for by renewable to 18 per cent by 2010. This compares with a UK target of 10 per cent. Alasdair Morrison, deputy minister for enterprise and lifelong learning, said there was a "huge potential for the development of renewable energy". ***************************************************************** 14 Scots call for delay on nuclear plant The Times FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 14 2001 BY ANGUS MACLEOD, SCOTTISH POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT THE Scottish Executive yesterday called for a five-year delay on any decision by Westminster to build a new nuclear power station in Scotland. The stance, outlined in a submission to the British Government’s energy review consultation, comes after reports that Whitehall is in favour of the construction of a new nuclear plant north of the border. In its submission, the Executive said that no decision should be taken until a review of radioactive waste management policy has been completed — a process expected to take five years. The Executive pointed out that two major nuclear stations at Hunterston B in Ayrshire and Torness in East Lothian account for more than 53 per cent of electricity demand in Scotland. Hunterston B, it said, may well, with life extension, run until 2016 and Torness until 2029. The submission added: “While the nuclear retiral issue is not an exclusively Scottish one, its implications are intensified by the higher degree of dependence on nuclear power than the UK average of 23 per cent. ” The Executive said all the present indicators pointed to nuclear power being too expensive to compete with other sources of generation for some time to come. If an application for a new nuclear station in Scotland was to be made, development consent would have to be sought from Executive ministers, under the terms of devolution, and would involve planning authorities. Brian Wilson, the UK Minister of Energy, said that the Executive was “entirely right” to draw attention to the issue of waste management. He added: “It is an integral part of the whole debate about the future role of nuclear power.” Under devolution, nuclear power is a reserved issue for Westminster while waste management policy is devolved to Holyrood. Copyright 2001 Times Newspapers Ltd. This service is provided on ***************************************************************** 15 NRC Staff Proposes $11,000 Fine for Radiation Overexposure Last Year at Southeast Missouri State University Region III -- 2001 - 043 -- UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION III 801 Warrenville Road, Lisle IL 60532 No. III-01-043 September 14, 2001 CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630)829-9663/e-mail: Pam Alloway-Mueller (630)829-9662/e-mail: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has proposed an $11,000 fine against Southeast Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, Missouri, for violations of NRC regulations associated with a radiation overexposure to a contractor in June of last year. The overexposure occurred during work by the contractor to inventory and remove radioactive material stored in a safe in the basement of Magill Hall at the university. Subsequently, radioactive contamination was found in several areas of the building. The contamination was successfully cleaned up. The contractor was exposed to airborne americium-241 which, when inhaled, is largely deposited in a person's bones. This resulted in a radiation dose of 263 rems to the bone surface, exceeding the NRC annual dose limit of 50 rem to individual organs or body tissues. The university was cited for failing to make the necessary radiation surveys to determine the hazards present; for failure to control activities to avoid exceeding the NRC radiation dose limits; and for possessing radioactive material -- americium-241 and two other radioactive isotopes -- that was not authorized in the university's NRC license. The amount of the proposed fine was doubled because the university took four months to determine the contents of the safe once it was questioned by an NRC inspector; because it possessed the material for 10 years without license authorization; and for failing to implement an effective radiation protection program which allowed the problems to persist and contributed to the overexposure. There were two additional violations for which a fine was not assessed. These violations were failing to secure a strontium-90 sealed source, which could not be accounted for in the university's inventory and failing to have a radiation safety officer from August 1999 until July of last year. The NRC staff noted that the university had taken extensive corrective actions after the contamination occurred including retaining a qualified contractor to survey and clean up the contamination and assess individuals who might have been exposed to the americium-241. The university has until October 15 to pay the fine or to protest it. If the fine is protested and subsequently imposed by the NRC staff, the university may request a hearing. ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Attacks stoke memories of Oak Ridge threat Hijackers nearly had plane dive into ORNL By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer OAK RIDGE - As Jim Alexander watched Tuesday's horrifying events on television, he recalled the fears of a hijacking almost 30 years ago and again pondered the question, "What if ... ?" On Nov. 11, 1972, a Southern Airways jetliner circled above Oak Ridge as three hijackers with local ties threatened to crash the plane into the government's nuclear facilities. "It was a very, very scary situation," said Alexander, then a public affairs officer at the Atomic Energy Commission's Oak Ridge office. Alexander was roused from sleep early that Saturday morning by Harvey Cobert, public relations chief for Union Carbide, which operated the Oak Ridge plants at the time. He couldn't believe what he was hearing, and Cobert had to repeat himself about three times before Alexander realized it was not a dream or an early-morning prank. After rushing to the Federal Office Building, the reality became clear. "Walking out into the parking lot, you could actually see the airplane at a high altitude," he said. The threat appeared credible as officials monitored voice transmissions between the hijackers and air controllers. One of the hijackers was a former Oak Ridger, and he made familiar references to the facilities, including the High Flux Isotope Reactor - a powerful research reactor at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The DC-9 jetliner had been hijacked the night before in Alabama and made its way through a series of major U.S. cities and Toronto, Canada, before returning south in the predawn hours of Nov. 11. As the plane made circular tracks above the Atomic City, the hijackers demanded $10 million in cash from the U.S. government or promised to make a nuclear mess in Tennessee.ORNL shut down the High Flux Isotope Reactor and other, smaller reactors after the threats were made. According to Alexander, calls from the news media began to mount at the AEC's Oak Ridge office, and every reporter wanted an answer to the same question: What will happen if the airplane crashes into the nuclear reactor? Alexander said federal officials were torn. The first inclination was not to respond to hypothetical questions, but the concern was that a nonresponse might spawn even greater fears among the public, he said. After consulting with scientists and engineers, the AEC put out a statement that suggested a crash would severely damage the reactor building but probably result in a limited release of radioactivity because the reactor's core was below ground. "In the back of my mind, I could see hordes, thousands of local, national and international news media en route to Oak Ridge," Alexander said. "How do you prepare for that?" But, as quickly as the threat evolved, it dissipated. After being told their money demands would be met, the hijackers ordered the pilot to leave the area. The plane later landed in Chattanooga where $2 million was taken onboard. Ultimately, the hijackers ordered the plane to Havana, Cuba, for the second time in the 33-hour saga that involved three countries and numerous cities. They were apprehended and jailed by Cuban authorities. According to a 1977 book, "Odyssey of Terror," the threat of an Oak Ridge disaster was greater than folks on the ground realized at the time. The author, Ed Blair, wrote that hijackers went berserk after placing a call to the White House and being shunned by John Erlichman, an aide to President Nixon, who apparently was unaware of the crisis. Blair reported the hijackers held a grenade to the pilot's head and ordered him to dive the plane toward the Oak Ridge reactor. The plane was actually in a nosedive when a report came over the radio that the money demands were being met, and the pilot was allowed to redirect the aircraft, he wrote. Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 or twig1@knoxnews.infi.net. 2001 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 2 Are There Any Nuclear Secrets Left to Steal? By WILLIAM J. BROAD National Atomic Museum Blueprints of the outer casing of Fat Man, the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki in World War II, can be easily purchased by the public. Diagrams of its inner workings, however, are still classified. [T] he abrupt turnaround in the public image of Dr. Wen Ho Lee from villain to victim, from atomic spy endangering the nation's security to computer nerd unfairly put behind bars for downloading harmless minutia, is raising new questions about what constitutes a nuclear secret these days. More than half a century after the making of the atom bomb, millions of former secrets have been either declassified or posted willy-nilly on Internet sites, even as the nuclear club has grown to at least eight members, with many more wanabees in the wings. Combined with President Clinton's announcement on Friday that he would leave the decision on whether to pursue a national missile defense system to his successor -- a shield that China, Russia and the NATO allies have warned may set off another nuclear arms race -- Lee's case raises a troubling question: what's really secret anymore? The surprising answer is, a lot. Some restricted data is deemed so sensitive that Washington is engaged in a quiet effort to raise classifications from secret to top secret for 65 nuclear topics, making whole libraries of sequestered data less likely to slip into foreign hands. Though itself off limits, the list of high-risk topics, experts say, includes information that would let outsiders foil U.S. weapons, fire stolen arms, copy American bomb designs and manufacture nuclear weapons small enough to fit atop long-range missiles or into a terrorist's briefcase. Even the stack of blueprints for Little Boy, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima -- an extremely crude device by today's standards -- is now proposed to be made top secret. "We need to restore people's respect for classified information," said Dr. Albert Narath, a former director of the Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, N.M. The problem, he added, is that Washington has such a "long history of classifying too much stuff that people have lost respect." The case of Lee, 60, a Taiwan-born naturalized citizen who was fired last year from the Los Alamos National Laboratory amid a spy inquiry, is a worrisome example of just how bewildering the nation's nuclear secrets policy has become. After he was arrested in December, the government asserted that Lee was dangerous because the computer files he downloaded illegally to an unsecure computer were the "crown jewels" of the nuclear arsenal. Some of his portable computer tapes are missing, and the government argued that Lee, if freed on bail, might give secrets to China or other nations. But his defense team later showed that the data Lee downloaded was classified as secret and confidential only after his dismissal from Los Alamos. And last month, a defense witness, John L. Richter, a former top nuclear weapons designer at Los Alamos, testified that perhaps 99 percent of the downloaded information had already been made public and would not be that useful to a foreign country. Asked if national security would be hurt if the missing tapes found their way into foreign hands, Richter replied, "I don't believe that it would have any deleterious effect at all." On Aug. 24, after that testimony, a federal judge reversed himself and said Lee could be released on bail after eight months in jail, though on Friday prosecutors won an appeal that delayed a final decision. Lee's guilt or innocence has yet to be determined. But Richter's assertion has fed the growing perception that many, if not all, nuclear secrets are out of the bag -- a view based partly on fact. Decades of memoirs and histories, and the fact that scientists talk for a living, have unveiled most basic principles. It is well known, for instance, how the high heat of a small atomic explosion in a thermonuclear weapon ignites hydrogen fuel in a far more powerful blast. In addition, the dribble of official declassifications during the Cold War later turned into a flood. Private experts who have tapped this gusher include Chuck Hansen, the author of "The Swords of Armageddon," a CD-ROM containing 2,503 pages and 345 diagrams that is a near-encyclopedia of what is known publicly about America's efforts to make nuclear arms. In Washington in recent years, the push for greater openness has coexisted uneasily with an equally intense desire to raise a wall around the nation's remaining nuclear secrets. That tension began with Hazel O'Leary, who as head of the Department of Energy from 1993 to 1997 was the main keeper of the nation's atomic secrets. Her pursuit of openness was widely praised and condemned, but behind the scenes she also promoted a secrecy drive known as "Higher Fences." "People think Hazel was declassifying promiscuously," said Steven Aftergood, a secrecy expert at the Federation of American Scientists, a private group in Washington. "In fact, she was trying to bring order and logic to the classification process." The rationale was that the bag of atomic secrets had grown so large that protection would be ensured only if the most serious topics were set aside for stringent safeguarding. So it was that, long before the Lee case made Washington hypersensitive about lax security, a push was underway to put key nuclear secrets under tighter lock. In a 1994 report, the National Academy of Sciences blessed the general idea. In 1997, Narath of Sandia led a Energy Department panel that called for 137 topics to be raised from secret to top secret classification, which would increase protections and sharply cut access. But the Defense Department, which deploys the nuclear arms made and maintained by the Energy Department, balked, citing the added cost of building new storage facilities, computer networks and specialist cadres. Defense Department officials also expressed an unwillingness to shoulder the added costs of providing top secret clearances. The price of a federal investigation for a secret clearance is about $100, experts say, whereas a top secret clearance runs about $5,000. Asked to ease the load, the Energy Department then winnowed the list of proposed top-secret topics to 65, officials said. Still, nothing happened. Recently, the deadlock ended after Congress shook things up. Rep. Thomas J. Bliley Jr., R-Va., chairman of the House Commerce Committee, asked Defense Secretary William S. Cohen in a Aug. 14 letter to explain why his agency had apparently failed to make "an adequate effort" to review the Energy Department's revised plan or boost security. Last Monday, the two feuding agencies signed a agreement to make joint recommendations by Dec. 1, and perhaps to help end the false impression of a nuclear sieve created by the Lee case. Will the new study end in another standoff between the bureaucracies? "I don't engage in dry holes," said Eugene E. Habiger, head of security at the Energy Department. "I engage in making things happen." Copyright 2000 The New York Times Company ***************************************************************** 3 Reid to visit U.S. labs; Nevada Reps. inspired at Pentagon Las Vegas SUN September 13, 2001 RENO, Nev. (AP) - Nevada Sen. Harry Reid said he will visit two national laboratories in New Mexico next week to assess anti-terrorism efforts there as part of a broader review of the nation's vulnerability to terrorist attacks. Reid, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, said he wants to review the security of the nation's nuclear stockpile as well as efforts aimed at nuclear non-proliferation at Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories. "In light of the barbaric attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, we must re-evaluate all of our nation's potential vulnerabilities," Reid said Thursday in a statement from Washington. "I will travel to New Mexico to see first hand the efforts under way to protect our nation from the horror of terrorism," he said. "We must also be vigilant in our nuclear non-proliferation efforts. Our nation's nuclear laboratories have an important role to play in guaranteeing that no such act of terrorism ever revisit our nation's shores." Reid, chairman of the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on energy and water development, will visit the labs on Monday and Tuesday, most likely departing the Washington area from Andrews Air Force Base early Monday, his spokesman Nathan Naylor said Thursday. He will be joined at the lab briefings by New Mexico Sens. Pete Domenici and Jeff Bingaman, Naylor said. Bingaman, a Democrat, is the chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee and Domenici is the ranking Republican on the Appropriations' energy and water development subcommittee. Meanwhile, Nevada Reps. Jim Gibbons and Shelley Berkley were among about 60 lawmakers who visited the Pentagon Thursday to view the destruction and praise efforts of rescue workers. "I saw up close the devastation terrorism has wrought on our country and am committed, more than ever, to hunting down and bringing justice to bear on those responsible for this senseless destruction," said Gibbons, a Republican. "The heroism and commitment of the rescue teams, working around the clock, is extraordinary," he said. Berkley, a Democrat, said the visit was "both devastating and inspirational at the same time. "Looking into those blackened offices, you can feel the horror and the sadness of what happened here in a way that's so much more powerful," the congresswoman said. "But the sight of the relief workers with the flags in their hats, and the look in the eyes of all those servicemen waiting to help are also very powerful images that tell a story about the strength and spirit of this great nation." All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 4 Las Vegas SUN: Workers to Lift Kursk Submarine -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Las Vegas SUN -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- September 14, 2001 Workers to Lift Kursk Submarine MOSCOW (AP) - Preparations for attaching cables that will lift the sunken nuclear submarine Kursk from the sea floor began Friday after salvage workers successfully cut off the vessel's bow. The 26 holes cut in the main body of the submarine are being cleaned so that guides can be installed on its exterior hull for plugs to hold the cables, said Larissa Van Seumeren, spokeswoman for Dutch consortium Mammoet-Smit International. The consortium has been contracted by the Russian government for the $65 million salvage operation. Cutting off the front section of the Kursk, completed Thursday, was a key step before further salvage work could continue. The submarine is set to be lifted around Sept. 25 from the bottom of the Barents Sea, where it sank on Aug. 12, 2000 with 118 men aboard. Divers were dismantling pipes and other parts of the submarine that could interfere with installation of the cables, Navy spokesman Igor Dygalo told the Interfax news agency. He said they were focusing on the fourth section of the submarine where the greatest number of holes, 10 of the 26, are located. The weather was clear Friday morning in the area of the salvage operation, with light winds. The original plans to raise the Kursk on Saturday were put off because of delays caused by bad weather, according to Russian officials. To lift the submarine - once one of Russia's largest and most modern - the cables will be attached to a barge with hydraulic lifting devices and hoisted to the surface. The submarine will then be towed to a shipyard near the Russian port of Murmansk, where it will be put in a dry dock. Russian officials said the front part of the submarine, mangled in the explosions that sunk the Kursk, had to be removed to reduce the risk of unexploded torpedoes detonating. -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Las Vegas SUN main page -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Questions or problems? Click here. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 5 Now terrorists vow to hit Indian N-sites Sep 14 2001 ECONOMY NEW DELHI AFTER US terrorist groups based in Pakistan have threatened to target nuclear and military installations all over India in their bid to escalate their separatist campaign, reports reaching here from across the border say. Some half-a-dozen groups have dramatically stepped up their jingoistic campaign since the failure of the India-Pakistan summit at Agra in July. In the past fortnight, the threats have taken an ominous turn. While some of the threats to hit "sensitive installations" in India have been made publicly in Pakistan, some warnings have been reported by Pakistan's Online news agency monitored here. Sheikh Jamilur Rehman, leader of Tehrukul Mujahideen that is active in Jammu and Kashmir, has vowed to attack Indian political leaders as well as the country's nuclear and military installations. He said the attacks would be carried out if India "does not cease atrocities on Kashmiris immediately." He said his group would attack these installations to avenge Indian military operations in the Himalayan state. "We have a very effective network throughout India and nothing is out of our reach," he told Online. Lashker-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed said jehad would not be limited to Jammu and Kashmir. "There is no limit to it. If someone is going to stop us from carrying our mission, we will declare jehad against him as well. "We plan major operations against the Indian military installations in Kashmir and would continue to carry such actions until liberation." At a seminar organised by Al Bader Mujahideen, separatist groups pledged to launch large-scale attacks against "sensitive" Indian military installations and target important personalities. Al Bader Mujahideen deputy head Amir Hamza has also been quoted as saying that jehadi activities will continue till Kashmir was liberated. The United Jehad Council, a Pakistan-based grouping of Kashmir separatist groups, has threatened to target "sensitive installations" in India if New Delhi did not halt its "repression" in Kashmir. Its vice-chairman Muhammad Usman said his group might open "another war front like Kargil." He was referring to the large-scale intrusion into Kargil sector of Jammu and Kashmir in 1999 by Pakistan-backed Islamic guerrillas that led to a virtual war between New Delhi and Islamabad. He said the Kashmiri separatist campaign, which has claimed more than 25,000 lives since 1989, "has entered a decisive phase. We are weighing the option of an open war with India by capturing a part of Kashmir." Hizbul Mujahideen deputy supreme commander Maulana Muhammad Javed Qasoori has similarly threatened to extend military attacks throughout India. Al Badar Mujahideen chief Bakht Zameen has urged Islamabad to concentrate on strengthening the separatist campaign instead of "wasting time seeking a negotiated settlement". Hizbul Mujahideen supreme commander Syed Salahuddin said the armed struggle in Kashmir was gaining momentum. He warned that if big powers did not realise their responsibilities, South Asia could plunge into a nuclear war. Indian officials have blamed terrorist groups linked to Pakistan and some of which are active in Kashmir for a string of deadly bombings and suicide missions in the country. (IANS) Copyright © 2000 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved. | ***************************************************************** 6 Reid to go to New Mexico to visit national nuclear labs Friday, September 14, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal By TONY BATT DONREY WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Sen. Harry Reid will travel next week to New Mexico to inspect two national nuclear laboratories. Although he had intended to visit the Los Alamos and Sandia laboratories, the Nevada Democrat did not commit to the trip until Thursday. "If terrorists will fly into a building with an airplane, they'll do anything to get to our nuclear stockpile and secrets," said Reid, the Senate assistant majority leader. The laboratory in Los Alamos is charged with ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile. The Sandia national laboratory in Albuquerque concentrates on engineering research and designs all non-nuclear components for nuclear weapons. Reid will fly to Sandia on Monday and tour Los Alamos on Tuesday. He is to return to Washington on Tuesday. webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 7 Time to use the nuclear option -- The Washington Times September 14, 2001 Thomas Woodrow The time has come for the United States to make good on its past pledges that it will use all military capabilities at its disposal to defend U.S. soil by delivering nuclear strikes against the instigators and perpetrators of the attacks against the nation's political capital and the nation's financial capital. At a bare minimum, tactical nuclear capabilites should be used against the bin Laden camps in the desert of Afghanistan. To do less would be rightly seen by the poisoned minds that orchestrated these attacks as cowardice on the part of the United States and the current administration. To consider use of the nation's nuclear forces, in the present circumstances, cannot be brushed aside as an overly emotional response to the unknown face of terrorism. To begin with, we know who that face belongs to, and we know where a goodly portion of his logistical and training capabilities are located. A series of low-level, tactical nuclear strikes in the Afghanistan desert would pose no risk to large population centers and would carry little risk of fallout spreading to populated areas. Also, our nuclear capabilities were designed to include just such a mission, and they are capable of fulfilling such a mission. Lastly, the use of nuclear weapons against the bin Laden groups and his supporters will rightly shock the world, but it will also shock those nations that have been disposed for a variety of reasons to back the terrorist groups with economic and political support. The United States will, in effect, have raised the bar against future such acts from occurring. If we, as a nation, show the willingness to use the ultimate weapon in the current situation, there can be no doubt anywhere in the globe that the United States will make good on its past pledges to defend its sovereign territory with such weapons. The attacks that occurred this week have been classified both as acts of war and as a second Pearl Harbor, but these designations ennoble the acts in Washington and New York. An act of war is constituted when one nation-state uses military force against another. Pearl Harbor was used by Japan to attack U.S. military targets to begin such an act of war. The bin Laden groups are not nations or states, and they have primarily targeted civilian populations. In fact, the use of so-called Islamic fundamentalist terrorism on a global scale is a new phenomena, a product of the modern age. In centuries past, civilized nations would conduct "punitive" expeditions against pirate regimes, but those actions were strictly local in scope and the protagonists could not approach the sophistication shown by the bin Laden groups. As we have seen from such "punitive" actions by the previous administration, those actions achieved next to nothing. The fight against the bin Laden groups will be a fight to the death, and this is another valid reason to make use of our nation's nuclear forces. Unlike the more limited goals of wars between nations -- territory, formal surrender, etc. -- bin Laden's goals are the elimination of the United States as the global leader for progressive political, economic and cultural change. Should, God forbid, the United States withdraw from the Middle East and Persian Gulf, the terrorists will raise their sights to eliminate our influence elswhere in the world. For a vision of what these groups see as their ultimate objective, we need look no further than the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, where women are beaten in the street for walking in public, owners of television sets are sent to prison or shot and ancient Buddhist monuments to universal peace and understanding are reduced to rubble. No, the bin Laden groups must be exterminated completely before they become more powerful in their efforts to exterminate us. We should use our nuclear capabilities to help achieve this. We must, as a nation, take the firmest action possible against this growing evil in the world, before its poison spreads even further. If not the United States, who? If not now, under these circumstances, when? Thomas Woodrow, a 22-year veteran intelligence officer, resigned from the Defense Intelligence Agency in May. ***************************************************************** 8 Reconciliatory courts by June next: Ranjha -DAWN - National; 16 September, 2001 By Our Staff Reporter LAHORE, Sept 15: The village and tehsil level reconciliatory courts for the resolution of petty disputes will be established by June next year. This was stated by Punjab Minister for Law Dr Khalid Ranjha on Saturday. He was speaking at a function on the responsibilities of local government members and problems of people. The minister was optimistic that the reconciliatory courts would pave the way for the resolution of disputes at local level. He linked the overburdening of the courts because of the lack of any legal arrangement for the resolution of disputes at local level. He said no government official had any powers to reduce or stop the grant for the local governments. There was room for making changes in the local government ordinance, 2001. The minister said that women councillors should be consulted in making strategy for development in the education and health sectors. Meanwhile, speaking at the launching ceremony of a traders organization the minister urged the wealthy people to pay taxes so as to contribute in nation building. He said the traders community could play an important role in strengthening national economy. © The DAWN Group of Newspapers, 2001 ***************************************************************** 9 Deadline extended for comments on sick worker compensation plan Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:36 p.m. on Friday, September 14, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff People have a little more time to point out problems and suggest changes for the interim rules that govern the job-sickened nuclear workers compensation plan, which is already up and running. The comment period, which originally closed last month, has been reopened and extended to Sept. 24 for the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. Shelby Hallmark, director of the Labor Department's Office of Worker Compensation Programs, indicated the comment period was reopened because the federal agency heard requests from several organizations for more time to study the interim rules. The compensation program was passed in October 2000 and went into effect at the end of July. It provides $150,000 in compensation and related medical expenses to workers who are seriously ill because they were exposed to beryllium, silica or radiation while working for the Department of Energy, its contractors or its subcontractors in the nuclear weapons industry. The program also provides benefits to some survivors and $50,000 in compensation and related medical expenses to employees who worked with uranium, who were awarded benefits under section five of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. However, many community members have expressed concern that the compensation program is inadequate. For example, people who believe their illnesses were caused by exposure to toxicants other than those listed in the program will have to settle for possibly getting state workers' compensation, which some say is not equipped to deal with the multiple illnesses that many DOE workers have. Anyone interested in commenting on the interim rules should write Hallmark at the Employment Standards Administration, U.S. Department of Labor, Room S-3524, 200 Constitution Ave. N.W., Washington D.C., 20210. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 10 Health work group to meet Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:36 p.m. on Friday, September 14, 2001 from staff reports The Oak Ridge Reservation Health Effects Subcommittee's public health assessment work group will meet Monday. The meeting is scheduled for 5:30 to 9 p.m. at the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry field office, 197 S. Tulane Ave. Agenda items include a presentation on the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry's approach to screening for contaminants of concern and a discussion of Joseph Mangano's 1994 cancer mortality study. Mangano's study is being used as a test subject for members of the Health Effects Subcommittee, who are learning how to evaluate an epidemiological study. Mangano's study indicated that the death rate from cancer among whites in the 94 counties surrounding the Oak Ridge Reservation rose 34.1 percent between 1950-52 and 1987-89, compared to a 5.1-percent increase for the nation. After Mangano published his study, it was widely discredited by other scientists, and state and local officials. The Health Effects Subcommittee consists of citizens primarily from the Oak Ridge area, who are working with community members and advocacy groups to offer advice and recommendations to federal agencies regarding health concerns in Oak Ridge. Subcommittee members are appointed by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a federal public health agency involved in hazardous waste issues. The public health assessment work group is in charge of hammering out the details of a evaluation that will identify local off-site populations who were exposed to hazardous substances at levels of health concern. For more information about the meeting, call (865) 220-0295. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 11 DOE oversight funding issued today Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:36 p.m. on Friday, September 14, 2001 The Tennessee Oversight Agreement grants for fiscal year 2002 were expected to be awarded today and to go into effect on Saturday, officials said. The Department of Energy funds the grants, which are used to operate the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation's DOE Oversight Division, the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee and the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency. Officials said TDEC is expected to get $3.6 million for FY 2002, with around $167,500 going to the Local Oversight Committee. The Tennessee Emergency Management Agency should get around $800,000 in FY 2002. For months, there was talk that DOE would cut funding for the Tennessee Oversight Agreement so severely that the Local Oversight Committee might be forced to close shop and the Department of Environment and Conservation might have to lay people off. Representatives for those agencies say that's not the case now. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 12 Are There Any Nuclear Secrets Left to Steal? By WILLIAM J. BROAD National Atomic Museum Blueprints of the outer casing of Fat Man, the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki in World War II, can be easily purchased by the public. Diagrams of its inner workings, however, are still classified. The abrupt turnaround in the public image of Dr. Wen Ho Lee from villain to victim, from atomic spy endangering the nation's security to computer nerd unfairly put behind bars for downloading harmless minutia, is raising new questions about what constitutes a nuclear secret these days. More than half a century after the making of the atom bomb, millions of former secrets have been either declassified or posted willy-nilly on Internet sites, even as the nuclear club has grown to at least eight members, with many more wanabees in the wings. Combined with President Clinton's announcement on Friday that he would leave the decision on whether to pursue a national missile defense system to his successor -- a shield that China, Russia and the NATO allies have warned may set off another nuclear arms race -- Lee's case raises a troubling question: what's really secret anymore? The surprising answer is, a lot. Some restricted data is deemed so sensitive that Washington is engaged in a quiet effort to raise classifications from secret to top secret for 65 nuclear topics, making whole libraries of sequestered data less likely to slip into foreign hands. Though itself off limits, the list of high-risk topics, experts say, includes information that would let outsiders foil U.S. weapons, fire stolen arms, copy American bomb designs and manufacture nuclear weapons small enough to fit atop long-range missiles or into a terrorist's briefcase. Even the stack of blueprints for Little Boy, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima -- an extremely crude device by today's standards -- is now proposed to be made top secret. "We need to restore people's respect for classified information," said Dr. Albert Narath, a former director of the Sandia National Laboratory in Albuquerque, N.M. The problem, he added, is that Washington has such a "long history of classifying too much stuff that people have lost respect." The case of Lee, 60, a Taiwan-born naturalized citizen who was fired last year from the Los Alamos National Laboratory amid a spy inquiry, is a worrisome example of just how bewildering the nation's nuclear secrets policy has become. After he was arrested in December, the government asserted that Lee was dangerous because the computer files he downloaded illegally to an unsecure computer were the "crown jewels" of the nuclear arsenal. Some of his portable computer tapes are missing, and the government argued that Lee, if freed on bail, might give secrets to China or other nations. But his defense team later showed that the data Lee downloaded was classified as secret and confidential only after his dismissal from Los Alamos. And last month, a defense witness, John L. Richter, a former top nuclear weapons designer at Los Alamos, testified that perhaps 99 percent of the downloaded information had already been made public and would not be that useful to a foreign country. Asked if national security would be hurt if the missing tapes found their way into foreign hands, Richter replied, "I don't believe that it would have any deleterious effect at all." On Aug. 24, after that testimony, a federal judge reversed himself and said Lee could be released on bail after eight months in jail, though on Friday prosecutors won an appeal that delayed a final decision. Lee's guilt or innocence has yet to be determined. But Richter's assertion has fed the growing perception that many, if not all, nuclear secrets are out of the bag -- a view based partly on fact. Decades of memoirs and histories, and the fact that scientists talk for a living, have unveiled most basic principles. It is well known, for instance, how the high heat of a small atomic explosion in a thermonuclear weapon ignites hydrogen fuel in a far more powerful blast. In addition, the dribble of official declassifications during the Cold War later turned into a flood. Private experts who have tapped this gusher include Chuck Hansen, the author of "The Swords of Armageddon," a CD-ROM containing 2,503 pages and 345 diagrams that is a near-encyclopedia of what is known publicly about America's efforts to make nuclear arms. In Washington in recent years, the push for greater openness has coexisted uneasily with an equally intense desire to raise a wall around the nation's remaining nuclear secrets. That tension began with Hazel O'Leary, who as head of the Department of Energy from 1993 to 1997 was the main keeper of the nation's atomic secrets. Her pursuit of openness was widely praised and condemned, but behind the scenes she also promoted a secrecy drive known as "Higher Fences." "People think Hazel was declassifying promiscuously," said Steven Aftergood, a secrecy expert at the Federation of American Scientists, a private group in Washington. "In fact, she was trying to bring order and logic to the classification process." The rationale was that the bag of atomic secrets had grown so large that protection would be ensured only if the most serious topics were set aside for stringent safeguarding. So it was that, long before the Lee case made Washington hypersensitive about lax security, a push was underway to put key nuclear secrets under tighter lock. In a 1994 report, the National Academy of Sciences blessed the general idea. In 1997, Narath of Sandia led a Energy Department panel that called for 137 topics to be raised from secret to top secret classification, which would increase protections and sharply cut access. But the Defense Department, which deploys the nuclear arms made and maintained by the Energy Department, balked, citing the added cost of building new storage facilities, computer networks and specialist cadres. Defense Department officials also expressed an unwillingness to shoulder the added costs of providing top secret clearances. The price of a federal investigation for a secret clearance is about $100, experts say, whereas a top secret clearance runs about $5,000. Asked to ease the load, the Energy Department then winnowed the list of proposed top-secret topics to 65, officials said. Still, nothing happened. Recently, the deadlock ended after Congress shook things up. Rep. Thomas J. Bliley Jr., R-Va., chairman of the House Commerce Committee, asked Defense Secretary William S. Cohen in a Aug. 14 letter to explain why his agency had apparently failed to make "an adequate effort" to review the Energy Department's revised plan or boost security. Last Monday, the two feuding agencies signed a agreement to make joint recommendations by Dec. 1, and perhaps to help end the false impression of a nuclear sieve created by the Lee case. Will the new study end in another standoff between the bureaucracies? "I don't engage in dry holes," said Eugene E. Habiger, head of security at the Energy Department. "I engage in making things happen." ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************