***************************************************************** 06/21/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.155 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 A bad idea gathers steam 2 The time is right for nuclear power 3 Nuke waste train begins journey 4 CEZ: nuclear plant trips up the Germans 5 EBRD funding for Ukrainian nuclear reactors depends on IMF 6 NRC to Meet with Southern Nuclear Officials to Discuss Safety 7 Nev. nuclear dump looks more likely 8 NRC Proposes $3,000 Fine Against Puerto Rico Company for 9 NRC Renews License for Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1 for an 10 Train with radioactive cargo to pass through here 11 Yucca Mountain concerns continue - Las Vegas View Neighborhood 12 NRC pushes for final Yucca design 13 Nuke waste train begins journey 14 Scientists: DOE slow to release Yucca report 15 Safety at Perry plant questioned again 16 McInnis confident miners will get their money soon 17 Cameco, the world's largest uranium supplier 18 UK's HSE says British Energy's nuclear decommissioning plans 'realistic' 19 DPRK Urges IAEA to be Impartial in Nuclear Inspection 20 HSE publishes review of British Energy's decommissioning strategy 21 HSE report on progress with British Energy safety management 22 NU-Led Millstone Faulted 23 NRC to Meet with Progress Energy/CP&l Officials to Discuss Safety 24 Conn. orders CL&P to return $21.1 mln to customers 25 Supplemental money for Paducah cleanup cut in half 26 NUCLEAR WASTE DIVISION 27 NRC leaders push safety for nuclear plants 28 Bent Shocks Party With Nuclear Talk 29 NRC to meet with Virginia Power Officials to Discuss Safety 30 NRC to Meet with Progress Energy/CP&L Officials to Discuss Safety 31 NRC to Meet with Virginia Power Officials to Discuss Safety 32 NRC to Meet with Duke Energy Officials to Discuss Safety NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 Bill Addresses Radiation VictimsBill Addresses Radiation Victims 2 Federal officials contact nuclear workers 3 Beryllium workers witness denies try to force mistrial 4 Welcome to Atomic City 5 Review of Oak Ridge Operations Office Nuclear Criticality Safety 6 Bill Addresses Radiation Victims 7 Fluor, Lockheed to negotiate Hanford contract 8 Hanford receives funding boost 9 N. Korea Nixes Nuclear Inspection 10 Federal officials contact nuclear workers 11 Nuclear bombs 'could have detonated on test flights' 12 Payments to NTS workers outlined 13 Welcome to Atomic City 14 Defense rests its case in lawsuit over beryllium 15 US Government Urged to Abandon Nuclear War Plan 16 HSE publishes report on performance of atomic weapons 17 U.S. labor department to brief IAAP workers 18 Sick-worker payment plan faces doubts 19 Iraq close to building nukes - defector 20 N-bombs 'could have gone off by accident' 21 Energy's dark cloud holds a silver lining and Bid Gilley good riddance 22 Quotes scientist on health studies 23 British Atom Bombs Could Have Caused 25 Hiroshimas 24 Agency approves fine against DOE **************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 A bad idea gathers steam In Biblis, Germany, a train with spent nuclear fuel leaves the nuclear power plant. Germany and much of Europe have pledged to phase out nuclear power. Why is the Bush Administration bucking the trend? Don’t let energy fears prompt surge in nuclear plants By Seth Dunn SPECIAL TO MSNBC WASHINGTON, June 20 — Over the past six months, the nuclear power industry has launched an aggressive lobbying and advertising campaign, suggesting that its recent stagnation has ended. The media has, in turn, largely obliged, with headlines like “Nuclear Power Stages a Comeback” and “Nuclear Industry Resurgent.” Policymakers, too, have joined in: the recently-unveiled Bush energy policy intends to increase the share of nuclear power in the U.S. electricity mix. Photojournalist Gary Knight spent half a year documenting the often-alarming conditions within the nuclear power industry in Europe and the former Soviet Union. AMID THIS self-promotion, reportage and pandering, two basic questions have been left out of the public debate. First, is the nuclear power business really poised for a major comeback? And second, will the Bush energy plan make a difference either way? A review of global trends in nuclear power provides a useful starting point. After an upswing in the 1970s and 1980s, the world’s nuclear generating capacity has hit a plateau. From 1990 to the end of 2000, nuclear power averaged an annual growth of 0.6 percent, a rate slower than all other energy sources except coal. PHASE-OUT Globally, around 435 nuclear reactors are connected to the grid, totaling about 350 gigawatts. But roughly 30 gigawatts of capacity have been taken offline since 1970. And the number of construction starts for new nuclear reactors has slowed to a trickle. While a few plants are being pursued in China, Japan, and South Korea, other developing countries — Cuba, Turkey, and Taiwan — have stopped work on or halted orders for new plants. Meanwhile, Germany and Sweden have pledged to phase out nuclear power, while France has placed a moratorium on new projects. Is it time to start building nuclear power plants again? Yes. Nuclear power is essential to meeting future energy needs. No. Nuclear power has been proven unsafe. It's a threat to human health and to the environment. Don't know Voice your views on MSNBC.com's Environmental News discussion board. Vote to see results Is it time to start building nuclear power plants again? * 4728 responses Yes. Nuclear power is essential to meeting future energy needs. 71% No. Nuclear power has been proven unsafe. It's a threat to human health and to the environment. 25% Don't know 4% Voice your views on MSNBC.com's Environmental News discussion board. Survey results tallied every 60 seconds. Live Votes reflect respondents' views and are not scientifically valid surveys. As in Western Europe, no new reactors are being built in North America, nor are there plans to add more. The main question is how quickly the shutdown of existing plants will proceed. Shutdowns in the United States have been slowed by the consolidation of nuclear operators and unusually high electricity prices. These prices led operators to run plants harder, which, combined with improved plant efficiency, pushed U.S. nuclear generation to a record high in 2000. Rising efficiency and declining production costs have raised hopes within the industry that it can finally become competitive — fulfilling the “too cheap to meter” promises of the 1970s. The Bush energy policy features a figure-provided by the Nuclear Energy Institute — suggesting that the per-kilowatt cost of nuclear power is lower than those of solar, wind, coal, and even natural gas fired electricity. But this is misleading accounting, ignoring the high capital cost of installing a nuclear plant and the sizable hidden subsidies provided to the industry over the past three decades. According to a recent study by the International Energy Agency, the capital cost of a nuclear plant is around $2,000 per kilowatt, versus $1,200/kW for coal and $500/kw for a combined-cycle gas plant. And when debt write-offs, government subsidies, and externalities such as radiation risks and waste disposal expenses are factored in, the true cost of nuclear power may be twice as much. MICROPOWER OVER MEGAPOWER Nuclear advocates argue that new plants will be cheaper because they will be bigger. But the trend since the 1970s has been toward smaller, mass-producible power units such as gas turbines and-looking ahead-wind turbines, solar photovoltaics, microturbines, and fuel cells. As the Economist noted in a recent cover story on nuclear power, “It is micropower, not megapower, that the market favors, thanks to the far smaller financial risk involved.” Indeed, the trend toward more competitive electricity markets does not bode well for nuclear. Between 1974 and 1998, industrial nation governments spent $159 billion on nuclear research, and today most of them still spend half of their energy R&D budgets on a mature industry. But those subsidies are apt to come under increasing scrutiny in coming years, and as they are trimmed the true cost of nuclear power will emerge. NUCLEAR TRASH CAN It’s unlikely that renewing the [Price-Anderson] bill will cause Wall Street to look favorably on a business it has largely written off. Will the Bush policy keep nuclear power on life-support? The plan proposes to renew the Price-Anderson Act, which limits the industry’s liability for nuclear catastrophes. Vice President Cheney acknowledges that without this renewal, nobody will invest in nuclear power. But it’s unlikely that renewing the bill will cause Wall Street to look favorably on a business it has largely written off. What have caught investors’ fancy are fuel cells and others in the modern ET, or “energy technology,” family, whose stocks jumped 20 percent after announcement of the new policy. These new technologies, not nuclear nostalgia, will meet the nation’s need for clean, reliable, and affordable power. The Bush plan also aims to establish a national repository for nuclear waste. But the one existing repository, in Nevada, is incomplete and mired in dispute, and other states have yet to volunteer — perhaps Texas or Wyoming? — to bury huge amounts of radioactive materials that will remain dangerous for 100,000 years. From the perspective of future generations, this is neither a compassionate nor a conservative policy. CALCULATE THE TRUE COST Finally, the new plan proposes to streamline the licensing of nuclear power plants. One of Cheney’s favorite lines in stumping for nuclear has been the government’s “failure” to grant a single license for a new nuclear power plant over the past decade. Pretty tricky, Dick, but this is because utilities placed no orders, deeming nuclear too risky. And it is hubris to believe that the licensing process has been the main impediment to starting new nuclear plants. It has been, and will continue to be, the true and rising cost of nuclear power — which many Americans are unwilling to shoulder, and which a sound energy strategy, focused on energy efficiency and micropower, would make entirely unnecessary. ***************************************************************** 2 The time is right for nuclear power Without nuclear power plants, how will America meet the needs of the energy-hungry new economy? The time is right for nuclear power A high-tech economy requires reliable energy By Joe Colvin SPECIAL TO MSNBC WASHINGTON, June 20 — The release of the Bush energy plan and its goal of energy independence for the United States outlined a key role for nuclear energy — the nation’s second largest source of electricity. And no wonder. Nuclear energy plays a crucial role in the nation’s diverse mix of electricity sources and our 103 operating nuclear plants provide electricity for one of every five homes. In addition, nuclear energy is our nation’s largest emission-free source of electricity, accounting for more than 69 percent — more than twice that of hydropower. In the United States, the nuclear energy industry’s future is bright because its record of meeting society’s electricity needs safely, reliably and economically is unsurpassed. LISTEN TO Sen. Pete Domenici, Republican of New Mexico, speak about the importance of energy supplies and even the most casual follower of recent events in California and the energy sector can understand quickly the troubling situation in which we find ourselves. “Reliable, affordable electricity is America’s lifeblood,” Domenici says. “Without it we have no future in terms of prosperity, growth and jobs.” SAFE, RELIABLE, LOW-COST For all the talk about the nation’s energy woes in recent months, the widely respected Domenici presents an articulate case for a diversified energy strategy that uses nuclear energy to strengthen the United States and improve the lives of people worldwide. “We want the poor countries of the world to become rich countries,” Domenici says. Of the United States, he warns, “We cannot afford to lose the nuclear energy option until we are ready to specify with confidence how we are going to replace 22 percent of our electricity with some other source offering comparable safety, reliability, low cost, and environmental attributes.” Domenici observes, quite rightly, that economic growth and electricity are inextricably linked. A nation cannot enjoy the former without the latter. THE ONLY ANSWER Is it time to start building nuclear power plants again? Yes. Nuclear power is essential to meeting future energy needs. No. Nuclear power has been proven unsafe. It's a threat to human health and to the environment. Don't know Voice your views on MSNBC.com's Environmental News discussion board. Vote to see results Is it time to start building nuclear power plants again? * 4728 responses Yes. Nuclear power is essential to meeting future energy needs. 71% No. Nuclear power has been proven unsafe. It's a threat to human health and to the environment. 25% Don't know 4% Voice your views on MSNBC.com's Environmental News discussion board. Survey results tallied every 60 seconds. Live Votes reflect respondents' views and are not scientifically valid surveys. California, the world’s fifth-largest economy, is a case in point. Amid this winter’s electricity woes, Intel chief executive Craig Barrett said there was “not a chance” that the state’s second-biggest company by market value would expand its operations in California. “Will I build my new facilities in Oregon and Arizona and New Mexico and Ireland, and even Hudson, Massachusetts, or Israel, where I can get an assured supply of power? Absolutely, yes, and that’s where my expansion is going,” Bloomberg News reported. Barrett went on to say that while some judge nuclear energy to be politically incorrect at this time, “Nuclear power is the only answer.” Suffice it to say that just in the few months since Barrett’s assessment, nuclear energy has become more politically acceptable. How else to explain that within the space of a few days in March, Vice President Richard Cheney and others were discussing the need for nuclear energy in a diversified mix of electricity sources? The positive comments about nuclear energy have continued. FAVORABLE RECEPTION Public opinion polls over the past three months also have indicated a favorable reception toward nuclear energy. Most notably for Californians, a recently released statewide Field Poll showed that 59 percent of those surveyed support building new nuclear power plants in the state. Having spent 40 years working with nuclear technology, including a naval career on nuclear-powered submarines, it is heartening for me to see policymakers, business leaders and the public at large rediscovering the benefits that nuclear energy provides to society. The men and women who are running nuclear power plants at record levels of safety and reliability want fervently to help sustain not only their local communities but to show the way technologically for other nations to improve their quality of life. In the United States, the nuclear energy industry’s future is bright because its record of meeting society’s electricity needs safely, reliably and economically is unsurpassed. Consider that for the past two years, the 103 reactors that operate in 31 states have produced record amounts of electricity — 755 billion kilowatt-hours in 2000. The industry’s average capacity factor-a measurement of efficiency from round-the-clock operation for an entire year-reached an impressive 90 percent last year. Operating so efficiently during the 1990’s, these same power plants generated the electricity equivalent to adding 22 new 1,000-megawatt power plants to the electrical grid. In fact, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported in March that just the increase in electricity produced at nuclear power plants over the past two years would have been enough to meet the power needs of all residential consumers in California. Hand in hand with these reliability gains have come economic efficiencies that position nuclear energy as a crucial source of stable, low-priced electricity for consumers and our high-tech economy. In 1999, the latest period for which full-year data is available from the Utility Data Institute, U.S. nuclear power plants surpassed coal-fired power plants as the lowest cost electricity production. Production costs at nuclear power plants averaged 1.83 cents per kilowatt-hour, lower than coal at 2.07 cents/kwh and far ahead of natural gas at 3.52 cents/kwh even before the past year’s price spikes in gas. ENVIRONMENTAL BENEFITS Nuclear power plants do not emit carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases linked to the threat of global climate change. Significantly, the industry’s increased generation of affordable electricity has been achieved without building any new power plants, preserving land for other uses. But nuclear energy’s environmental benefits extend far beyond that. It is by far our nation’s largest source of emission-free electricity. Nuclear power plants do not emit carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases linked to the threat of global climate change. Nor do they emit the nitrous oxides that contribute to the regional haze, or smog, problems that afflict residents in metropolitan regions during the summer. Air-quality concerns; maintaining stable, modest electricity prices; and outstanding plant performance — all of these factors are converging to make nuclear energy a vital part of our nation’s energy future. As good as that may be for the industry, it’s far better for U.S. consumers. ***************************************************************** 3 Nuke waste train begins journey thestar.com.my > News > World Thursday, June 21, 2001 ESENSHAMM (Germany): A shipment of highly radioactive nuclear waste began its journey to the British treatment plant of Sellafield yesterday after police cleared protesters from a railway station where they were attempting to block it. The rail convoy began rolling at around 4am local time under heavy police protection from Unterweser nuclear power plant in this north-western town with two sealed containers of nuclear waste, police said. It was expected to cross the French border yesterday evening and reach a French port on the North Sea where it will be loaded onto a ship for Britain. Police and border guards said protesters blocking Oldenburg rail station were cleared in the early morning hours. Demonstrators raised banners reading "Thanks to E.ON, leukaemia in Sellafield," referring to the E.ON energy group which operates the Unterweser plant. Germany has no nuclear waste treatment centres of its own, requiring it to export the spent fuel elements abroad. The nuclear safety office at the end of May approved the transport of 24 additional shipments of nuclear waste from four German power plants to treatment centres in France and Britain.--AFP More @ thestar.com.my: ***************************************************************** 4 CEZ: nuclear plant trips up the Germans Welcome to CommentWire by Datamonitor Catalyst: E.ON has said it will not buy Czech electricity firm CEZ if the deal includes its nuclear assets. 20/06/2001 16:47:00 (CommentWire) - The German public's hostile attitude to nuclear power would make an acquisition more trouble than it was worth. So EDF, which is expanding aggressively and already generates 70% of its electricity from nuclear power, is now the favorite. However, British Energy might well be interested in CEZ's nuclear plant, possibly leaving the distribution assets available for E.ON. German power giant E.ON has said that it will not be interested in buying the 65% of Czech electricity generator and supplier CEZ that the government is selling off, unless it can avoid buying the Temelin nuclear power plant. Nuclear power is being phased out in Germany and is highly unpopular among Germans, so E.ON would face a PR backlash if it were to import power from Temelin. However, it would still be interested in distribution: it already has interests in the Czech gas and electricity distribution sector and is keen to extend these operations to include telecoms and cable services. It is highly unlikely that the Czech government will agree to separate the assets. So although E.ON has not yet made a final decision, it is only likely to buy into the firm if it can join a consortium where it can take control of the distribution assets while a partner controls the nuclear assets. As a result, the clear favorite to take the CEZ stake is French generator EDF, which has considerable strength in nuclear power, given 70% of its power is generated in this way, as well as an aggressive international expansion policy. However, UK nuclear generator British Energy is also known to be interested, having already expanded into Canada where it operates eight nuclear reactors as part of Bruce Power. British Energy would be primarily interested in the nuclear plant, given its lack of interest in distribution - so it could make a suitable partner for E.ON. Source: Datamonitor - 20/06/2001 16:47:00 CommentWire is available to license for distribution on your website. If you are interested in a CommentWire feed please email eContent@datamonitor.com (c) 2001 Datamonitor. All rights reserved. Republication or ***************************************************************** 5 EBRD funding for Ukrainian nuclear reactors depends on IMF KPnews.com -- News about Ukraine Category: NATION 21 Jun 2001 The Associated Press KYIV, June 20 - The president of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development said Wednesday the bank will revive talks on financing two nuclear reactors in Ukraine if the International Monetary Fund gives a positive review after its current mission to Ukraine. EBRD President Jean Lemierre said the final decision on aid for completing construction of the Rivne and Khmelnytskyi reactors will come after Ukraine fulfills four conditions, the Interfax news agency said. Those include the final closure of the Chernobyl nuclear power zplant, a report on adequate nuclear safety at the plants, confirmation by other sponsors that they will help with the construction, and evidence of the government's solvency. EBRD is expected to lend $215 million in a project that is estimated at $1.4 billion by western experts. The remaining part is expected to be sponsored by other financial institutions, foreign and Ukrainian governments. Chernobyl was site of world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986, when its reactor exploded, sending a radioactive cloud over much of Europe. Ukraine closed down Chernobyl's last reactor in December and appealed for western help in completing the Rivne and Khmelnytskyi reactors to compensate for electricity lost by closing Chernobyl. Lemierre spoke during a visit to Kiev, where he met with President Leonid Kuchma and Prime Minister Anatoliy Kinakh, participated in a foreign investment forum, and signed a Er 5 million ($4.25 million) loan to the MicroFinance Bank dealing for small loans. EBRD activity in Ukraine has reached $1.1 billion over the past ten years. © 2000 SputnikMedia.net ***************************************************************** 6 NRC to Meet with Southern Nuclear Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at Hatch Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 20 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-020 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Southern Nuclear Operating Company officials on Wednesday, June 27, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the Hatch nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 1:00 p.m. in the Visitors Center Auditorium at the plant site near Baxley, Georgia. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to Southern Nuclear, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/HAT1/hat1_chart.htmland www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/HAT2/hat2_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 7 Nev. nuclear dump looks more likely Denver Post.com Denver Post Washington Bureau Chief --> Thursday, June 21, 2001 - WASHINGTON - Prospects for housing the nation's nuclear waste in Nevada may have improved significantly Wednesday. Senate Energy Committee chairman Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., told reporters he is ready to support use of the remote Yucca Mountain waste site if an Energy Department study finds the site safe. The use of the Yucca Mountain site, about 90 miles from Las Vegas, has been a major issue for Colorado lawmakers. They have been divided over whether the state's highways, especially its mountain passes, should be used to transport nuclear waste from the east. Bingaman's statement is important because it indicates that not all Senate Democrats are ready to line up behind their party leaders and keep the nation's nuclear wastes out of Nevada. Shortly after Democrats took control of the Senate early this month, Majority Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota proclaimed the Nevada site dead. His statement assumed that all Democrats would follow the lead of the party's assistant majority leader, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, and oppose the Yucca Mountain site. But Bingaman's declaration suggests that some Democratic defections are likely. Moreover, Bingaman noted that the measure cannot be stopped on procedural grounds and will have to be called up for a floor vote. Yucca Mountain is the only site being studied for the nation's growing volume of nuclear waste, and Republicans have been trying for years to win passage of legislation mandating it be opened. Speaking to reporters at a breakfast meeting, Bingaman called for letting "the science determine whether we use Yucca Mountain." If the current study on the safety of the mountain endorses the Nevada site, Bingaman predicted it will become the repository for the waste. Separately, Bingaman called this week's decision by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to control wholesale electric sales in 11 Western states, including Colorado, "a major step in the right direction." He said it should help resolve California's energy crisis. The senator also predicted that two of New Mexico's best-known politicians are likely to be on the ballot next year. Republican Sen. Pete Domenici, ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, will run for a sixth term, Bingaman said. And former Energy Secretary Bill Richardson is running for governor. "He will be a very hard to beat in a primary and will be a very strong candidate in the general election," Bingman said. Richardson served as a member of the U.S. House from New Mexico before he joined the Clinton administration, serving first as its United Nations ambassador and then as Energy Department head. All contents Copyright 2001 The Denver Post or other copyright ***************************************************************** 8 NRC Proposes $3,000 Fine Against Puerto Rico Company for Violation of Radioactive Material Safety Requirements Press Release Region II - 2001 - 21 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-021 June 21, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has proposed a $3,000 civil penalty against Turabo Corporation of Caguas, Puerto Rico, for violations of NRC safety requirements related to the storage of licensed radioactive material. NRC inspectors conducted an inspection on April 17 of this year, at the company's Caguas facility and at temporary job sites near Caguas and Cieba. They found that the company had failed to maintain required control or constant surveillance of licensed radioactive material. The inspection found that a storage room housing two portable soil moisture density gauges, each containing about eight millicuries of cesium-137 and 50 millicuries of americium-241, was unlocked and not under constant surveillance. NRC officials said the potential existed for unauthorized access to the gauges while they were improperly secured but that no radioactive material was lost. The NRC staff held a predecisional enforcement conference with company officials in Atlanta prior to proposing the civil penalty and says that adequate corrective actions have been taken. The company has 30 days in which to either pay the penalty or to protest its imposition. ***************************************************************** 9 NRC Renews License for Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1 for an Additional 20 Years Press Release 2001 - 073 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001 E-mail: opa@nrc.gov Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. 01-073 June 21, 2001 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has renewed the operating license for Unit 1 of the Arkansas Nuclear One nuclear power plant near Russellville. It is operated by Entergy Operations, Inc. The Commission unanimously approved the license extension following a review of staff recommendations. Entergy submitted an application to the NRC on January 31, 2000, to renew the license for Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1, which expires on May 20, 2014. The NRC conducted an extensive review of the license renewal application in accordance with Parts 51 and 54 of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations. The NRC's environmental review, under Part 51, is described in a site-specific supplement to the NRC's "Generic Environmental Impact Statement for License Renewal of Nuclear Power Plants," (NUREG-1437, Supplement 3). In this Final Environmental Impact Statement, issued on April 12, the staff concluded that there were no impacts that would preclude renewal of the license for environmental reasons. In the "Safety Evaluation Report Related to the License Renewal of Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1," (NUREG-1743) issued in June, the staff concluded that there were no safety concerns that would preclude license renewal, because the licensee had demonstrated the capability to manage the effects of plant aging. In addition, the NRC conducted two inspections of the plant to verify information submitted by the licensee. On May 16, the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards -- an independent body of technical experts which advises the Commission -- issued its recommendation that the operating license for Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1, be renewed. That recommendation is contained in the "Report on the Safety Aspects of the License Renewal Application for Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1." Copies of these documents and others relating to the license renewal will be available at: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA/reports/renewal.htmon the agency's web site. A copy of the staff's recommendation on the renewal of Arkansas Nuclear One, Unit 1, which contains the license conditions for the facility, will be available at the same web site as well as in the NRC Public Document Room at the agency's One White Flint North Building, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland; telephone 1-800-397-4209 or (301) 415-4737. NRC renewed the operating licenses for both units of the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant near Lusby, Maryland, for an additional 20 years on March 23, 2000, and renewed the operating licenses for the three units of the Oconee Nuclear Station near Seneca, South Carolina, for an additional 20 years on May 23, 2000. The agency is currently reviewing license renewal applications for Hatch Units 1 and 2, operated by the Southern Nuclear Operating Company, near Baxley, Georgia; Turkey Point Units 3 and 4, operated by Florida Power & Light Co., near Florida City; Virginia Electric & Power Co.'s Surry Units 1 and 2, near Surry, Va., and North Anna Units 1 and 2, 40 miles northwest of Richmond; and Duke Power Co.'s McGuire Units 1 and 2, near Charlotte, North Carolina, and Catawba Units 1 and 2, near Rock Hill, South Carolina. ***************************************************************** 10 Train with radioactive cargo to pass through here Published Thursday, June 21, 2001, in the Akron Beacon Journal. Shipment's route from New York state to Idaho includes Akron, suburbs, surrounding counties BY Beacon Journal staff writer A train carrying two giant casks filled with potentially deadly radioactive waste is likely to rumble through the Akron area later this summer. The 100-ton containers, with steel walls 9 inches thick, will be holding highly radioactive waste from nuclear power plants from West Valley, N.Y. The waste will be transported across Ohio and nine other states to a federal site in Idaho, where it will be stored. The one-time shipment worries Ohio environmentalists, but state officials are confident that it will be safe. On its four-day trip, the train will most likely travel on the CSX Transportation line crossing Portage, Summit, Wayne and Medina counties and passing through the heart of Akron and several of its suburbs. There appears to be little that can be done by local or state officials to halt the train, which will cross Ohio from Youngstown to Fostoria, where it will change carriers and proceed to Indiana. Precautions taken ``Yes, we're satisfied that the plan is complete and we have done what we can do to prepare,'' said Dick Kimmins, a spokesman for Ohio's Emergency Management Agency, part of the Department of Public Safety. That preparation includes working with federal officials to train and equip emergency response units -- police, fire and safety crews -- in 12 Ohio counties along the preferred rail route. Information on radiation and devices to measure radiation levels will be provided, he said. Kimmins said such radioactive shipments are safe and far more common than people realize, although such waste is typically moved by truck, rather than rail. The shipments are also interstate commerce and cannot be blocked under the U.S. Constitution, he said. The shipment route is not yet finalized, and the U.S. Department of Energy must still complete contracts with rail companies, said Ken Morgan, an Energy Department spokesman in Dayton. But the route that takes the shipment through Akron was analyzed by the federal Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee and selected last fall by the Energy Department over 11 other routes. The public will not be notified when the shipment takes place for security reasons, but safety officials along the route will be notified in advance. Radiation crews will be aboard the train -- it will be carrying no other cargo -- and the shipment will be tracked by satellite. Environmentalists wary But the threat of an accident involving such highly radioactive waste troubles environmentalist Chris Trepal of the Earth Day Coalition in Cleveland. Such a shipment is ``a very risky proposition,'' she said. ``It's a bad decision, and local and state officials need to say no to the Department of Energy. . . . This is something we need to fight.'' Shipping such wastes through heavily populated urban areas such as Akron is a mistake, she said, and the waste should be kept in New York to minimize the risk until a permanent federal storage site is built. Trepal questioned whether local fire and police departments have enough training and equipment to deal with radioactive waste in case of an accident. ``The experts may say the casks are safe,'' she said, ``but we're worried about human error. What if that happens?'' What will be shipped are 125 spent fuel assemblies from nuclear power plants that have been stored in a water-filled pool at West Valley. They need to be removed to complete a $1.6 billion cleanup of the site about 30 miles south of Buffalo, said West Valley spokesman John Chamberlain. The federal government is paying 90 percent of the cleanup cost; New York is paying the balance. The used fuel assemblies are bundles of finger-width rods either 7 feet or 14 feet long that contain fuel pellets. They have been loaded via robotic arms into two special casks for the rail ride. The casks, approved by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, are 20 feet long and 7 feet in diameter. They weigh 75 tons empty and 100 tons filled. The two casks will be on different cars of the train. Special impact-limiters, with steel shells filled with balsa wood, will be installed at each end of the casks to act as shock absorbers. Less than chest X-ray The radiation exposure to a person standing 3 feet from a sealed cask for an hour is less than that from one chest x-ray, Chamberlain said. In the case of an accident opening the cask, high levels of radiation could be released, he said, ``but it's not instant death . . . but there would be a lot of radiation.'' Emergency crews would seal off the area to minimize exposure and to call in trained and equipped federal Energy Department personnel, he said. The radioactive waste is a result of the first commercial effort to reprocess used uranium from nuclear power plants. From 1966 to 1972, Nuclear Fuel Services Inc., a private company, operated a plant on 150 acres at West Valley. Its first waste came from power plants in Michigan and New York. The company halted reprocessing in 1972 and in 1976 notified New York state that it intended to withdraw from the site. At that time, 750 used commercial assemblies were there. In 1980 Congress authorized the Department of Energy to clean up the site. It hired Chamberlain's company, West Valley Nuclear Services, to conduct the cleanup. From 1983 to 1986, 625 of the assemblies were returned by truck to the utility companies that owned them in New York, New Jersey, Illinois and Wisconsin. Destination: Idaho The radioactive waste to be shipped this summer will be stored at the Energy Department's Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory near Pocatello, Idaho. The laboratory receives spent nuclear fuel from the Navy and is one of three sites designated to store nuclear waste until a permanent underground facility is built. The other sites are in Washington and South Carolina. The pro-nuclear U.S. Council for Energy Awareness, in Washington, D.C., has said the safety record for shipping nuclear fuel is outstanding. More than 2,000 shipments from America's nuclear power plants have been made by truck and rail in 30 years -- with only eight accidents, none of which resulted in radioactive releases, the council said. The federal government is required to provide a permanent storage facility for radioactive wastes, and the Department of Energy has been studying an underground site at Nevada's Yucca Mountain, about 70 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Such a facility would cost $13 billion and take 15 years to plan, design and build. Bob Downing can be reached at 330-996-3745 or ***************************************************************** 11 Yucca Mountain concerns continue - Las Vegas View Neighborhood Newspapers June 16, 2001 Greg Getty speaks out against the Yucca Mountain supplemental draft environmental impact statement at the Pahrump Community Center June 7. --> Yucca Mountain concerns continue By MARK WAITE VIEW STAFF WRITER Comments made during a public hearing on the Yucca Mountain supplementary draft environmental impact statement at the Pahrump Community Center June 7, ranged from requests to extend the public comment period to suspicions the nuclear waste site managers changed the decision because the project won't work, to fear by one speaker of an outright nuclear megablast. The draft EIS for the plan to store 77,000 tons of nuclear waste was issued Aug. 13, 1999. U.S. Department of Energy EIS Document Supervisor Jane Sommerson said that elicited 11,000 comments. Sommerson said comments received after the preliminary EIS have resulted in some changes. Scientists have been conducting tests on the heat generated by the nuclear waste. The EIS states the hotter nuclear waste will heat the adjoining rock up to 200 degrees. The plan is to blend hotter and cooler material in a cooling tank. It also includes a plan to leave as much as half of the nuclear waste, up to 40,000 tons, outside to cool as long as 50 years before placing it in the mountain. Besides concerns over temperature, plans were revised for moisture control. The spaces between the emplacement drifts will be widened to allow moisture to flow through and a drip-shield of corrosion-resistant titanium added over the waste packages. The hearing was another chance for opponents of the project to express their views. Lisa Gue said no one will have a chance to comment on the transportation plan and noted the state of Colorado designated its own preferred route. Robin Sweeney, with the DOE, said the transportation routes won't be pinned down until four years before the waste is scheduled to be shipped in 2010. Susi Snyder, with the Shundahai Network, said the EIS dealt with earthquake potential, but not volcanic eruptions and especially human intrusion. Shundahai Network is an international anti-nuclear organization that supports environmental justice and sustainable energy as an alternative to nuclear energy. Joe Ziegler, with DOE, said it's possible a well driller could tap into the waste packages, the DOE is talking about a post-closure monitoring period of the site of from 100 to 325 years. The site will fill up with nuclear waste in just 26 years. Ziegler said the fuel can't be shipped unless it's at least five years out of the reactor, 10-year-old fuel will be shipped first. The average age of the spent nuclear fuel will be 26 to 27 years, he said. "It seems like you're picking the site and asking the guidelines to fit," said Kalynda Tilges with Citizen Alert. Citizen Alert was founded in 1975 and works to assure public participation in issues affecting people of Nevada, particularly nuclear weapons and nuclear waste. Don Hancock said the DOE is in a rush to put together the documents, with a schedule to meet in order to issue the site recommendation this year. "The reason to do this document is because Yucca Mountain doesn't work," Hancock said. "In reading the supplemental environmental impact statement, these people just don't know what they're doing," Helen Van Ronk said. The nuclear waste will be stored outside for up to 50 years where temperatures can reach 150 degrees in the summer, she said. "They want to put in a dry storage area with 200 acres of cement." Van Ronk mentioned there was a 7.1 magnitude earthquake in 1932, and a 5.2 earthquake in 1994 that caused $1 million in damage to DOE facilities in Mercury. "Looks like we might be due for another one any time now," she said. Piper Weinberg of Shundahai Network, said the EIS disrespected the original inhabitants, the Western Shoshone Indians. The concept of environmental justice -- in which projects with environmental impacts aren't just placed in poor neighborhoods -- should be enforced in this case, she said. The EIS should quantify impacts on downwinders, those who drink the water, cancer rates and accident possibilities, Weinberg said. The DOE also hasn't given replies to comments in the EIS process, Weinberg said. Sommerson said the written comments will be published in the final EIS. "Is this design going to have to sprawl as Las Vegas is doing or the test site is doing?" Weinberg asked. Willie Fragosa said he's had visions of the holocaust from World War II. "We have a nuclear holocaust being put on the people of the United States and all around the world. This time the trains are coming to us," Fragosa said. Scientists can put a man on the moon and find a cure for AIDS, he said. "We should take another couple hundred years to figure this out." "People feel defeated. Why bother fighting, it's a done deal," Tilges said. "That makes me feel like for 20 years we've been the victims of psychological warfare if we can be defeated by words." Greg Getty remarked, "If ever nuclear waste comes together, it will simultaneously explode in a megablast." ***************************************************************** 12 NRC pushes for final Yucca design [Las Vegas Review-Journal] Thursday, June 21, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal Assistant project manager unable to give precise date By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL The Nuclear Regulatory Commission wants the Department of Energy to stop dragging its feet on finalizing a design for the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. NRC staff member Bret Les- lie voiced the agency's concern at the close of Wednesday's meeting in Las Vegas of the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, asking project managers to pin down the date when a specific design, not a flexible one as described in recent documents, will be available. An assistant project manager, Steve Brocoum, said the design would be included in a site recommendation evaluation document that "will come out in the next several weeks." "I can't give you a precise date. It's just like when you can't give a precise date when a rule will be finalized," Brocoum said as he sat in front of the board. The board is a panel of presidential appointees that makes recommendations to Congress and the energy secretary on the technical aspects of the proposed repository. In a later interview, Leslie said the NRC staff is compelled by law to wrap up its review and comments by Oct. 1 on a design that would be sufficient for inclusion in a license application. "We are concerned about when we will see this information," Leslie said. "The comment we offer will be a function of the time we have to review it," he said, referring to the site recommendation. He also said errors in some calculations related to how a repository would perform should have been reported when they were discovered in the fall, months before the NRC staff pointed them out to project officials in May. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham is expected to review a set of site evaluation documents, along with a final environmental impact statement and other scientific and engineering reports, for a site recommendation decision by the end of the year. A supplement to the impact statement, which was put out for review last month, described a flexible design, one that includes variable design features and operational parameters. Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site being studied to entomb 77,000 tons of the nation's most lethal nuclear waste, most of it metal-encased spent fuel pellets from commercial power reactors. Whether a so-called hot design or a cold design is followed depends on how the decaying waste is spaced inside the volcanic rock ridge in a system of engineered barriers. A hot design would mean the surrounding rock would reach temperatures above the boiling point -- 212 degrees Fahrenheit -- during the 10,000-year regulatory period for a repository. A cold design would put the temperatures at roughly 185 degrees Fahrenheit, according to project scientists. This story is located at: http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Jun-21-Thu-2001/news/16372893.html ***************************************************************** 13 Nuke waste train begins journey Thursday, June 21, 2001 ESENSHAMM (Germany): A shipment of highly radioactive nuclear waste began its journey to the British treatment plant of Sellafield yesterday after police cleared protesters from a railway station where they were attempting to block it. The rail convoy began rolling at around 4am local time under heavy police protection from Unterweser nuclear power plant in this north-western town with two sealed containers of nuclear waste, police said. It was expected to cross the French border yesterday evening and reach a French port on the North Sea where it will be loaded onto a ship for Britain. Police and border guards said protesters blocking Oldenburg rail station were cleared in the early morning hours. Demonstrators raised banners reading "Thanks to E.ON, leukaemia in Sellafield," referring to the E.ON energy group which operates the Unterweser plant. Germany has no nuclear waste treatment centres of its own, requiring it to export the spent fuel elements abroad. z The nuclear safety office at the end of May approved the transport of 24 additional shipments of nuclear waste from four German power plants to treatment centres in France and Britain.--AFP 1995-2001 Star Publications (Malaysia) Bhd (Co No 10894-D) Managed by I.STAR Sdn Bhd (Co No 422871-T). ***************************************************************** 14 Scientists: DOE slow to release Yucca report Today: June 21, 2001 at 11:09:14 PDT By Mary Manning LAS VEGAS SUN A scientific storm is brewing between federal agencies that could delay developing Yucca Mountain as a high-level nuclear waste repository. Independent scientists, who must review mountains of information about Yucca Mountain gathered by the Energy Department over the past 20 years, said Wednesday that the delay in receiving a new report may hamper progress at the site. Nuclear Regulatory Commission geologist Bret Leslie warned the DOE that it must prove Yucca Mountain is safe for a repository, and withholding information is not the way to do it. Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site under study to permanently contain 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste. At a meeting of a technical review board -- a group of independent scientists charged with overseeing the DOE's research -- Leslie noted that the DOE has not released a new study that fills in missing information, and the NRC will need time to review it. The two-volume report looks at an alternate design for a repository and reportedly uncovers new information about Yucca Mountain. Previously the Energy Department had relied on a design that allowed the rock to heat above water's boiling point. The alternative would keep the rock cooler but take more space and require more time to fill. Among the new information, DOE scientists said, calculations show that radiation in ash released during a volcanic eruption through the repository would be 20 times higher than expected for the first 1,000 years. The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board is meeting in Las Vegas through today to preview portions of the 1,300-page report. The DOE has asked the NRC to complete its review by Oct. 1, but has not said when the full report will be available. Federal law requires NRC scientists to study the DOE's work before it can apply for a license. The NRC must approve a repository before construction could begin. DOE's assistant project manager Steve Brocoum said that scientists are analyzing the missing and incorrect information, but because studies at the site are ongoing, there are no deadlines for releasing the information. However, he said after the meeting, copies may be available to the public later this month or next. Daniel Bullen, a mechanical engineering expert and chairman of the board's joint panel, said that the DOE has to show enough scientific details to satisfy reviewers that a Yucca Mountain repository will work. Other scientists reviewing portions of the DOE's latest report received few answers to their questions Wednesday. The DOE's track record with keeping the NRC informed has not been good, Leslie said. The DOE did not inform the NRC until May about eight major errors in its earlier scientific work at Yucca Mountain. DOE scientists had discovered missing information, miscalculations and mistakes last year, but did not inform the NRC at the time, he said. The NRC sent a letter on May 4 to the DOE demanding an explanation for the errors. "How will the DOE inform interested parties of such errors?" Leslie said. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 15 Safety at Perry plant questioned again 06/20/01 By JAMES LAWLESS NORTH PERRY- Two weeks after the owners of the Perry nuclear power plant paid an $80,000 fine for federal irregularities, the plant is the target of an allegation that workers there were ordered twice into areas where monitors showed high radiation levels. The Union of Concerned Scientists, a nuclear-safety advocacy group, filed the charges Friday with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on behalf of an anonymous tipster who said the incident happened during the plant's refueling in March. "This is yet another allegation of less than stellar radiation protection practices at Perry," said David Lochbaum, a Union of Concerned Scientist engineer. "This is a nuclear plant with a history of unlawfully retaliating against workers raising radiation protection concerns." NRC spokesman Jan Strasma said yesterday that the agency has received the allegation and is investigating. Todd Schneider, a spokesman for FirstEnergy Corp. which owns the plant, said his company has not been notified of the allegation. "But, we run a safe plant," he said. Earlier this month, FirstEnergy agreed to pay an $80,000 fine to NRC, while refusing to admit its guilt, in intimidating a witness in an earlier incident involving safety questions. NRC warned the Perry owners they could face more serious penalties if similar problems arose again. E-mail: jlawless@plaind.com Phone: 440-602-4776 © 2001 cleveland.com. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 16 McInnis confident miners will get their money soon By GARY HARMON U.S. Rep. Scott McInnis, R-Colo., said he was confident House negotiators will preserve $84 million in immediate spending for sick uranium miners if Western senators get their chamber's support of the measure. McInnis and Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell, also a Republican, are working to get the money for miners who hold IOUs from the government, many for more than a year now, under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act. The pressure now is on the Senate to attach the money for the miners, McInnis said. "There are more senators with obvious connections" to the issues, McInnis said, from Campbell to Sens. Pete Domenici of New Mexico and Orrin Hatch of Utah, both Republicans. Domenici and Campbell serve on the Senate Appropriations Committee. Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, an influential Democrat, also is pressing for the spending measure. Domenici, McInnis said, has agreed to place money for the miners on a supplemental appropriations bill now before the Senate. Once the spending is placed in the bill by the Senate, Campbell said on Saturday the question was whether it would be erased in a conference committee, which resolves differences between House and Senate versions of bills. After meeting Wednesday morning with House appropriators, McInnis said he believed the spending would win House support. "I think I can keep it on the House side in conference committee," he said. To do that, though, he said the spending might have to be shifted from emergency funding to mandatory spending, even though "the fact that these people are dying is as much an emergency as the fact there's a flood in some state," he said. "We'll pursue both angles simultaneously and see which one works out." McInnis also has pursued a proposal to make the payments automatic as entitlements, a method originally preferred by the White House, but not necessarily by legislators. Miners are to be paid from a trust fund, but that fund ran dry in May 2000 and the Justice Department began sending IOUs to miners whose claims had been approved. Miners who suffer from radiological diseases are eligible for $100,000 payments under the 1990 act and $50,000 more under changes approved last year by Congress. {M4Gary Harmon can be reached via e-mail at gharmon@gjds.com. ***************************************************************** 17 Cameco, the world's largest uranium supplier On today's Canada's Business Report... Wednesday June 20, 3:30 pm Eastern Time Press Release SOURCE: Canada's Business Report; Cameco Corporation On today's Canada's Business Report... Cameco, the world's largest uranium supplier TORONTO, June 20 /CNW/ - Bernard Michel, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Cameco Corporation is live on Canada's Business Report today on the Company In Profile feature. Michel will discuss their recent first quarter results, their partnership with British Energy over the Bruce Power reactors and the future of nuclear power in the United States. Cameco, with its head office in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is the world's largest uranium supplier. The company's uranium products are used to generate electricity in nuclear energy plants around the world, providing one of the cleanest sources of energy available today. Cameco's shares trade on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges. Executive produced by Canada NewsWire, Canada's Business Report provides listeners with the most comprehensive Canadian market information and analysis on radio. The half-hour weekday program airs on 15 stations coast to coast including CFRB 1010 in Toronto and can be heard live on the Canada NewsWire Web site beginning at 5:06 p.m. (ET) at www.newswire.ca/cbr. Copyright 2001 Canada NewsWire. All rights reserved. All the ***************************************************************** 18 UK's HSE says British Energy's nuclear decommissioning plans 'realistic' [AFX News - UK] Story Filed: Thursday, June 21, 2001 8:28 AM EST LONDON, Jun 21, 2001 (AFX-UK via COMTEX) -- The Health and Safety Executive said that plans by British Energy Generation Ltd and British Energy Generation (UK) Ltd -- units of British Energy PLC -- to decommission their nuclear power plants are realistic and reasonable. In a published review of British Energy's plans, the HSE's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) said: "Overall, NII regards BE's strategy to be appropriate at this time, being consistent with both national and international guidance and flexible enough to accommodate lessons learned from other licensees." The review covers the technical, and some financial, aspects of British Energy's strategy for decommissioning its seven Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (AGR) power stations -- Dungeness B, Hinkley Point B, Heysham 1, Hartlepool, Torness and Heysham 2 -- and the Sizewell B Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) station. The review said: "NII considers the technical aspects of BE's proposals to be practicable, feasible and realistic and, on the basis of information presented, proposals for timing of final dismantling, which have been reduced to 85 years after cessation of operations, are reasonable. NII will seek further evidence from BE on justification for the timing of final dismantling before the next review. "BE's management plan for decommissioning and its implementation plan need further development," it said. "NII would not expect these plans to be fully developed yet but will expect progressively more detail as the end of generation and the start of decommissioning approaches." It went on: "Proposals for Sizewell B are less well developed than those for the AGR fleet. This is not unreasonable, as decommissioning is not scheduled for another 35 years and NII will monitor plans for Sizewell B regularly as part of the review process. "BE has a soundly-based process for establishing the cost of decommissioning, but some of the base costings are now rather dated. NII expects BE to have revised its costing base by the time of the next review." bam Copyright 2001. AFX News Ltd. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 19 DPRK Urges IAEA to be Impartial in Nuclear Inspection Source: Xinhua News Agency Story Filed: Thursday, June 21, 2001 11:55 AM EST PYONGYANG, Jun 21, 2001 (Xinhua via COMTEX) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Wednesday rejected the demand of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to verify the accuracy and state of completion of the initial report on the country's nuclear materials. The DPRK also urged the IAEA to be neutral and impartial in its nuclear inspections. According to the accord signed by the two countries in 1994, the DPRK must stop its own nuclear power program, in return, a consortium funded by the United States, Japan and South Korea will build two light-water reactors in the DPRK. The verification of the initial report will be discussed only after most of the light-water-reactor power projects are completed. However, the construction of the projects has been delayed and the groundwork has not yet started, said a commentary carried by the official Korean Central News Agency. The IAEA's demand for verifying the initial report violates the DPRK-U.S. accord, and reveals the intention of the IAEA to cater to the U.S. hostile policy toward the DPRK, said the commentary. The commentary strongly criticized IAEA Director General Mohamed Baradei for issuing a report on June 11 that urged the IAEA to take action as soon as possible to verify the initial report. Baradei's proposal was made at a time when the United States was calling for an early "special inspection of the nuclear-related facilities" of the DPRK, the commentary said, adding that the IAEA should abide by the principle of neutrality and impartiality. If the IAEA has a true will to solve the DPRK nuclear issue, it should blame the U.S. for delaying the construction of the two light-water-reactor projects instead of hastily calling for verifying the initial report, the commentary said. The DPRK has been sincere in guaranteeing the IAEA inspection over the nuclear freeze and will continue to fulfill its commitment in the future, the commentary noted. Copyright 2001 XINHUA NEWS AGENCY ***************************************************************** 20 HSE publishes review of British Energy's decommissioning strategy UK Government: [M2 Communications Ltd.] Story Filed: Thursday, June 21, 2001 12:18 PM EST Jun 21, 2001 (M2 PRESSWIRE via COMTEX) -- The Health &Safety Executive (HSE) has published a report on its review of the strategy of British Energy Generation Limited and British Energy Generation (UK) Ltd - referred to as BE - for decommissioning their nuclear licensed sites. The review, undertaken by HSE's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII), considers the technical - and some financial - aspects of BE's strategy for decommissioning its seven Advanced Gas-cooled Reactor (AGR) power stations - Dungeness 'B', Hinkley Point 'B', Heysham 1, Hartlepool, Torness and Heysham 2 - and the Sizewell 'B' Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) station. It compares BE's strategy with national and international guidance, and considers the underlying assumptions made and whether the plans submitted are comprehensive and appropriate. Key findings of the review include: Overall, NII regards BE's strategy to be appropriate at this time, being consistent with both national and international guidance and flexible enough to accommodate lessons learned from other licensees; NII considers the technical aspects of BE's proposals to be practicable, feasible and realistic and, on the basis of information presented, proposals for timing of final dismantling, which have been reduced to 85 years after cessation of operations, are reasonable. NII will seek further evidence from BE on justification for the timing of final dismantling before the next review; BE's management plan for decommissioning and its implementation plan need further development. NII would not expect these plans to be fully developed yet but will expect progressively more detail as the end of generation and the start of decommissioning approaches; Proposals for Sizewell 'B' are less well developed than those for the AGR fleet This is not unreasonable, as decommissioning is not scheduled for another 35 years and NII will monitor plans for Sizewell 'B' regularly as part of the review process; BE has a soundly-based process for establishing the cost of decommissioning, but some of the base costings are now rather dated. NII expects BE to have revised its costing base by the time of the next review. Commenting on the review, Laurence Williams, HM Chief Inspector of Nuclear Installations, said: "This strategy is extremely important even though we do not expect any of BE's power stations to be decommissioned for many years. This is because the strategy can influence the segregated fund set aside to cover the costs of decommissioning activity. "NII has had very good co-operation from BE throughout the review and I am particularly pleased at the agreed reduction in decommissioning timescales from 135 years to 85 years after the end of operation. On the basis of the information we have now about the likely availability of a radioactive waste disposal site and the national priorities for the use of such a site, NII believes 85 years is a realistic timescale." Copies of 'A review by the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate of the British Energy plc's strategy for decommissioning of its nuclear licensed sites' are available free from: Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre, HSE, Room 004, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ (Tel: 0151 951 4103/Fax: 0151 951 4004/e-mail: nsd.infocentre@hse.gsi.gov.uk). The report is also available on HSE's website at www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/beqqr.pdf Notes to Editors 1. The review was undertaken in accordance with the 1995 White Paper 'Review of Radioactive Waste management Policy: Final Conclusions' (Cm 2919, Department of the Environment, HMSO, 1995, ISBN 0 11 08539 5). This stated that the Government would ask all nuclear operators to draw up strategies for the decommissioning of their redundant plant and that HSE would review those strategies on a quinquennial (five yearly) basis, in conjunction with the environment agencies. 2. The report reviews the decommissioning strategy described by BE in documents submitted to NII on 30 September 2000. It considers the technical adequacy of this strategy and the costs associated with its implementation which form the basis of the financial arrangements for BE's decommissioning programme. 3. The report also contains a brief financial review which considers whether BE has made adequate arrangements for financial provisions to meet it long term nuclear liabilities, in line with Cm 2919. 4. Similar quinquennial reviews of other licensees' decommissioning strategies are currently being undertaken by HSE. HSE expects to report on BNFL and Magnox Electric in the near future. PUBLIC ENQUIRIES: Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre, HSE, Room 004, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ M2 Communications Ltd disclaims all liability for information provided within M2 PressWIRE. Data supplied by named party/parties. Further information on M2 PressWIRE can be obtained at http://www.presswire.neton the world wide web. Inquiries to info@m2.com. Copyright 1994-2001 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD ***************************************************************** 21 HSE report on progress with British Energy safety management audit UK Government: [M2 Communications Ltd.] Story Filed: Thursday, June 21, 2001 12:23 PM EST Jun 21, 2001 (M2 PRESSWIRE via COMTEX) -- The Health &Safety Executive (HSE) today released a report on progress following a safety management audit of British Energy Generation Limited (BEGL) and British Energy Generation (UK) Limited (BEG(UK)L). The audit was undertaken by HSE's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) in 1999 and its findings were published in January 2000. NII made 103 recommendations for action by BEGL and BEG(UK)L, aimed at ensuring that the two companies maintained or improved the capability to discharge their responsibilities as nuclear site licensees. Today's report states that NII is largely satisfied with progress to date. Six recommendations have been formally closed-out, though this is not a true reflection of the amount of work undertaken by the two companies and the progress they have made towards resolving the concerns raised in NII's original audit report. NII always anticipated that closing-out recommendations would take time. The licensees first needed to fully consider the issues and then devise, develop and implement effective solutions. The rate of progress at this stage, in terms of the number of recommendations closed-out, is not unexpected and is comparable with other major NII audits and team inspections. A key requirement for close-out is that BEGL and BEG(UK)L must provide NII with evidence of achievement. NII expects soon to receive the licensees' responses to the bulk of the recommendations. NII will assess the responses and decide if close-out is warranted, or if further work is required (either by the licensees or NII). Given the need for both licensees to demonstrate the success of changes and improvements in key areas and for NII to review the evidence of achievement, close-out of all 103 recommendations is unlikely to be achieved until well into 2002, today's report states. Commenting on today's report, Laurence Williams, HM Chief Inspector Nuclear Installations, said: "The management of safety is essential for the continued operation of British Energy's nuclear power stations. NII's audit of the company's safety management systems in 1999 showed that significant improvements were necessary and we expected it would take time to implement all our 103 recommendations. "We have given BE time to bring their systems up to the required standard and although progress has been slower than we would have liked it has not been unreasonable given that some of the problems cannot be cured quickly. We have made it clear that we will not sanction any further reductions in safety-related staff until the audit findings are satisfactorily closed-out. "Principally, we will be looking to BE to demonstrate adequate progress in managing change and controlling resources and commitments. Overall, BE has made good progress but we do not envisage close-out of all 103 recommendations much before the end of 2002. Meanwhile NII will continue to monitor closely operations at the power stations and at the company's headquarters to ensure safety is maintained." Copies of 'Progress report on NII's safety management audit of BEG and BEG(UK)L - June 2001' are available free from: Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre, HSE, Room 004, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ. The report is also available on HSE's website at http://www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/beguk.pdf Notes to Editors 1. All nuclear power stations are licensed by HSE under the Nuclear Installations Act 1965 (as amended). NII is the part of HSE responsible for regulating licensed sites. BEGL and BEG(UK)L are subsidiary companies of British Energy plc. BEGL is the licensee operating the power stations at Dungeness 'B', Hartlepool, Heysham 1 and 2, Hinkley Point 'B' and Sizewell 'B'. BEG(UK)L is the licensee for Hunterston 'B' and Torness power stations in Scotland. 2. In 1999, NII undertook a safety management audit of BEGL and BEG(UK)L to review their ability to discharge the responsibilities imposed upon nuclear licensees in the light of staff reductions. The audit report, 'Safety management audit of British Energy Generation Limited (BEGL) and British Energy Generation (UK) Limited (BEG(UK)L - 1999' was published by HSE in January 2000 (see press notice E014:00 of 27 January). Public Enquiries: Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre, HSE, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ M2 Communications Ltd disclaims all liability for information provided within M2 PressWIRE. Data supplied by named party/parties. Further information on M2 PressWIRE can be obtained at http://www.presswire.neton the world wide web. Inquiries to info@m2.com. Copyright 1994-2001 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD ***************************************************************** 22 NU-Led Millstone Faulted ctnow.com By AL LARA The Hartford Courant June 20, 2001 Nearly three months after its sale, the new owner of the Millstone nuclear power complex in Waterford is still dealing with a legacy of troubled operation under the management of Northeast Utilities. In its annual report card, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission gave the operators of the 870-megawatt Millstone Unit 2 reactor some bad grades for failing to correct problems that contributed to system failures last summer. The larger 1,154-megawatt Millstone Unit 3 passed its annual assessment with flying colors. The problems at Unit 2 were covered by multiple redundant backup systems, and officials at the NRC and Millstone have already agreed on a mitigation plan. The NRC will further discuss the assessments in a final public meeting at the plant on July 17. This spring NU sold its interest in Millstone to Virginia-based Dominion Resources Inc. for a record $1.3 billion. Dominion retained most of the operating staff. Millstone spokesman Pete Hyde said a team of plant staff from different disciplines has been assembled to examine the NRC's concerns. Industry experts from other nuclear power plants were also brought to Millstone to review its operation, and changes have been made to staff training. No changes were made in personnel. "We are taking their assessments extremely seriously, and we have taken steps to improve the problems," Hyde said. Last summer, an incorrectly installed part contributed to the failure of the Unit 2 reactor's high-pressure safety injection system, a safety system delivering coolant water to the reactor. Also last summer, a turbine-driven auxiliary feedwater pump failed during a test. A subsequent test found that the pump was never repaired. Under the NRC's reactor oversight program, regulators rate operating problems with color-coded "performance indicators," or grades. Last year reactors nationwide earned more than 1,000 "green" marks, indicating very low safety significance, according to Curtis Cowgill, a chief of reactor projects for the NRC. The problems at Millstone Unit 2 earned it two "white" performance indicators, the next level, representing "a low to moderate safety significance," Cowgill said. About 50 white performance indicators were meted out to reactor facilities nationwide. Only one performance indicator each was handed out nationwide for the next two more serious levels of safety significance, yellow and red. Cowgill said inspectors also identified "a trend of human performance errors" identified at Unit 2. They found that staff failed to correct a recurrent lifting of pressure relief valves in some reactor systems, and they repeatedly set voltage settings incorrectly on an emergency diesel generator. The NRC assessment of Unit 2 does not include an April 29 incident in which an electrician inadvertently disconnected an electrical contact that triggered a series of events that briefly shut down the reactor. It also does not discuss the continuing search for two missing fuel rods from the Unit 1 reactor. The rods are the subject of a final report from Millstone officials to the NRC that is expected later this month. Despite the problems, the NRC will conduct only routine inspections at the plant through May 31, 2002. It was under the management of Berlin-based Northeast Utilities that Millstone had its most troubled years of operation, including 1996, when all three reactors were shut down because of operation and management problems. Unit 2 remained shut down for two years, and Unit 1 never restarted. "Things have improved greatly at the plant, and we're operating much better than we have in years," Hyde said. "Are we operating as well as we could have? No. But you never stop looking for ways to improve." ©2001 MyWay Corp. ***************************************************************** 23 NRC to Meet with Progress Energy/CP&l Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at Brunswick Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 15 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-015 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Progress Energy/CP&L officials on Tuesday, June 26, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the Brunswick nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 12:00 noon in the Brunswick Technical Training Center Auditorium at the plant site near Southport, North Carolina. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to CP&L, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/BRU1/bru1_chart.htmland www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/BRU2/bru2_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 24 Conn. orders CL&P to return $21.1 mln to customers Wednesday June 20, 2:52 pm Eastern Time NEW YORK, June 20 (Reuters) - The Connecticut Department of Public Utility Control (DPUC) said Wednesday the electric customers of Connecticut Light and Power Co. (CL&P) will receive $21.1 million in benefits for over-earnings by the utility. The DPUC said in a statement the customers will benefit on a non-cash basis in the form of reduced stranded costs. Stranded costs, which are recovered from customers through rates, represent investments, deferred expenses and long-term commitments for power that were approved by the DPUC under full regulation, but which may be above market value in a competitive market. The 1998 legislation that enacted Connecticut's retail electric competition mandated DPUC calculation of the company's approved stranded costs for recovery through rates. The department originally approved $3.5 billion in stranded costs for CL&P, but that amount has been reduced by about half, primarily from the sales of the company's generating facilities. Additionally, proceeds from land sales and any other moneys deemed appropriate by the Department may be used to reduce those costs. CL&P, a unit of diversified energy giant Northeast Utilities (NYSE:NU - news) of Hartford, Conn., is a regulated utility that distributes electricity to 1.1 million customers in Connecticut. CUSTOMER SAVINGS The department will require CL&P to decrease its distribution/transmission rates by $21.1 million. These rates represent the amount customers pay for CL&P to bring the service to them. The $21.1 million is a decrease from the $24.4 million contained in the DPUC's draft order in May. The decrease takes into account the risk CL&P took on in case of an unexpected outage at its nuclear units. At the same time, the department will require CL&P to increase, by an equal amount, the generation service charge, which is the amount customers pay for their energy. Since the department set the generation service charge, presently at $0.055 per kilowatt hour for CL&P's residential non-heating customers, the cost of generating electricity has risen, primarily due to increases in the price of fossil fuels, which is a deterring factor to competition. The DPUC emphasized this decision will not change customers' bills. Customers will receive the benefit of a reduction to their stranded cost obligation. Further, the department's proposed balancing of lower distribution rates and an equally higher generation service charge is designed to provide an incentive for increased electric retail competition in Connecticut. It will be easier for Energy Services Companies (ESCOs) to compete in Connecticut if CL&P must charge more for the power it sells. If CL&P's costs are high enough, some ESCOs can profitably sell power and CL&P customers can switch to new energy providers. In a ruling on February 5, 1999, the department set CL&P's allowed return on equity at 10.3 percent. In Connecticut, if a utility company earns more than its allowed return for six consecutive months, the department takes action to investigate and find a mechanism to return the over-earnings to customers. The decision approves an earnings sharing mechanism for future excess earnings. Under the mechanism, future earnings above 10.3 percent will be shared 50 percent to customers and 50 percent to shareholders. All ratepayer benefit will be in the form of reduced stranded costs and the company receives an incentive to operate in a cost-effective manner. The annual reduction to stranded costs, the adjustment to rates and the earnings sharing mechanism will remain in place until the company's next rate case, the DPUC said. --Scott DiSavino, New York Power Desk, +646-223-6072, fax +646-223-6079, e-mail scott.disavino@reuters.com ***************************************************************** 25 Supplemental money for Paducah cleanup cut in half The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Thursday, June 21, 2001 WASHINGTON--The House on Wednesday cut in half the amount of supplemental money that will be spent this year on cleanup work at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant. President Bush last month recommended an additional $18 million for the Paducah plant. House appropriators cut the additional Paducah funding to $9 million and transferred the other $9 million for cleanup work at the U.S. Department of Energy's facilities in Oak Ridge, Tenn., according to U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield, R-Hopkinsville. The funding was added to the more than $60 million that was approved in the original 2001 budget. The supplemental budget still must be approved by the Senate and efforts will be made to restore the Paducah funding, Whitfield said. Meanwhile, Whitfield said while cleanup funding for Paducah was being cut for this year, it was being increased for next year. The Energy &Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee increased cleanup funding for the 2002 fiscal year by $10 million, to a total of $72.2 million. Although that is more than the 2001 budget, it is short of the $100 million that was requested by Gov. Paul Patton. "This just shows how difficult the appropriations process really is," Whitfield said. However, the budget has a long way to go before it becomes law. It must be approved by the Energy Committee and the full House before it will go to the Senate for consideration. In addition to the $72.2 million approved for cleanup work, the budget legislation contains funding for other work at Paducah: --$10 million for work on the depleted UF6 conversion plant. --$10.7 million for depleted UF6 cylinder maintenance. --$13.3 million for an on-site low-level waste disposal cell. --$2.4 million for security and safeguards. ***************************************************************** 26 NUCLEAR WASTE DIVISION [Comprehensive Planning] 500 South Grand Central Parkway - Las Vegas, NV 89155-1741 Phone (702) 455-5175 - Fax (702) 382-4593 Third Floor, Suite 3012 - Office Hours: 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. M - F Planning Manager: Dennis Bechtel COMMUNITY MEETING On Wednesday, June 27th, at 3:00 P.M. & 6:00 P.M. (2 Sessions), there will be a PUBLIC FORUM on the proposed Nuclear Waste Facility at Yucca Mountain at the County Government Center (Commission Chambers) Come hear the facts, and MAKE YOUR OPINION HEARD Citizen responses will be included in the Official Final Impact Report, so Public Participation is Vital For more information, please contact Jenney Sartin, Public Information Officer, Nuclear Waste Division of Comprehensive Planning, 702.455.4181 Clark County's Comments on the Yucca Mountain Draft Environmental Impact Statement PDF File of the Supplement to the Draft Envirnmental Impact Statement for a Geological Repository for the Disposal of Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste at Yucca Mountain, Nye County, Nevada (5.06 MB File). The Clark County Nuclear Waste Division Yucca Mountain Draft Environmental Impact Statement Low-Level Radioactive Waste Update Evaluation Routes from an Intermodal Facility Preliminary Concerns with Yucca Mountain Draft EIS Presentation to Chamber of Commerce Update on Nuclear Waste Activities Radioactive Waste Transportation in Nevada Clark County's Nuclear Waste Program In the interest of informing the public about the County's Program, this section is devoted to providing some basics about study objectives and their importance to the citizens of our communities. Why should Clark County be invovled? What are the possible effects? What is Clark County's program intended to do? History of the High-Level Nuclear Waste Storage Program? Yucca Mountain Hotline - INFORM - 455-5820 Links to other Nuclear Waste Websites: Eureka County Yucca Mountain Website Inyo County Environmental Issues State of Nevada Nuclear Waste Project Office U.S. Representative Shelley Berkley's "Proposed Nuclear Dump Site" Page U.S. Representative Shelley Berkley's "Members of Congress Voting Record" Page U.S. Representative Shelley Berkley's "Yucca No! Op-Ed on Yucca Mountain" ***************************************************************** 27 NRC leaders push safety for nuclear plants JS Online: Conference addresses resurging interest in nuclear energy By LEE HAWKINS JR. of the Journal Sentinel staff Last Updated: June 20, 2001 Top officials from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission visited Milwaukee this week to promote the importance of safety at nuclear power plants amid an industry renaissance that could lead to more nuclear plants being built across the nation over the next few years. NRC Chairman Richard A. Meserve said regulators and plant operators must continue to set and meet safety benchmarks while adopting an industry "safety culture." In his remarks, Meserve discussed the differences and similarities between "safety goals" and "safety cultures," two widely used terms in the nuclear industry. Meserve and NCR Commissioner Jeffrey S. Merrifield spoke as part of the annual meeting of the American Nuclear Society, an international educational organization dedicated to nuclear science and technology. The conference, which began Monday and concludes today at the Midwest Express Center, attracted nuclear advocates from as far away as Japan and Germany. The event took as its theme "Safety Culture and Its Relationship to Economic Value in a Competitive Market." The conference took place against a backdrop of renewed efforts to build nuclear power plants in the United States. The heightened attention to nuclear power comes as the nation faces a variety of energy problems, including power shortages in California, and as wholesale prices for natural gas and coal soar. While faced with the challenge of finding a storage site for thousands of tons of spent radioactive fuel produced by nuclear plants, advocates say nuclear power has many advantages. Among them are a lack of greenhouse gas emissions and the development of new technologies that have brought greater efficiencies to nuclear power. Safety goals, Meserve said, refer to goals that nuclear regulatory agencies set to define their regulatory philosophy and interpret the level of risk they deem acceptable. Safety culture, Meserve said, also deals with regulatory philosophy, but can be much broader. The term mainly reflects how agencies like the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission approach safety issues. "We speak, for example, to the need for nuclear plant licenses to establish a culture to promote the safe operation of nuclear power stations," Meserve said. The two are interrelated, he said, and can greatly help the nuclear industry reach its safety objectives. "Although there are clearly aspects of safety goals and safety culture that do not bear on one another, the two subjects do have a relationship: The way in which safety goals influence regulatory activities can have an impact on the development and maintenance of an important safety culture," Meserve said. "Elements of safety culture include management emphasis on safety as the highest priority," Meserve said. That includes training for all staff, at all levels, to ensure that each employee at a nuclear power plant understands his or her responsibilities for ensuring safety operations, he said. He also called for "conservative, safety-conscious decision-making; a philosophy of continuous improvement, including critical self-assessment and a questioning attitude; and in the event that problems do arise, a willingness to address problems promptly and effectively." Appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on June 21, 2001. , Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. All rights reserved. Produced by ***************************************************************** 28 Bent Shocks Party With Nuclear Talk Newsday.com | News June 21, 2001 by Dionne Searcey Staff Writer Bruce Bent says voters should expect a different kind of Nassau County executive if he is elected, but he recently has shocked even long-time political observers by suggesting that nuclear power may have a role in Long island's energy future. When the issue arose at a meeting with representatives of the Green Party late last month, Bent didn't go so far as to advocate the construction of new nuclear generating plants here. He wouldn't rule out nuclear energy as a possibility for Long Island, where residents mobilized in the '70s and '80s to keep the Shoreham Nuclear Power Station from opening on Brookhaven's north shore. "Nassau has a problem because of the Shoreham situation and I understand that, and it's something that has to be considered because of the psychological aura of Shoreham,” Bent, the Republican nominee for county executive, said in an interview last week. "But does that mean you stop looking at it? No.” Few, if any, political candidates have touched this political hot potato since the Shoreham fight. Stanley Klein, a political science professor at C.W. Post Campus of Long Island University, noted that talking about nuclear energy on Long Island "is like standing in a fire and putting oil on it.” "Anybody who's been in politics any length of time at all would recognize the tremendous problem one would create by espousing nuclear energy,” Klein said. Lisa Tyson, associate director of the Long Island Progressive Coalition, said, "It's horrifying to think that someone who wants to be county executive wants to bring nuclear power to Long Island, or is even talking about it as an option.” Her group fought the Shoreham plant. At the Green Party meeting, which was called to screen candidates for endorsement for county executive, Bent raised the nuclear power issue in response to a general question about energy, party members said. Bent recalled the Greens asking him to comment specifically on nuclear energy. "What I said was France has produced 80 percent of their energy using nuclear power since the end of the Second World War,” Bent said. "They encapsulate their waste in glass. There's no degradation to the environment whatsoever.” One Green Party member who attended the private meeting said Bent's comments were not well received. "Immediately as he was saying that, people's eyes were rolling,” said the party member, who asked not to be identified. "I mean, half the room helped shut down Shoreham.” Thursday the Green Party endorsed Democrat Thomas Suozzi, the mayor of Glen Cove, in the county executive's race. Bent, a multimillionaire from Plandome and the inventor of the money market mutual fund, is touting his credentials as a businessman and as a political outsider. He says his background makes him the best candidate to mop up Nassau's fiscal crisis. Bent said he didn't regret talking about nuclear power to the Green Party. "I'm not a politician; I'm a businessman,” he said. "I am not going to pander to one group or another.” He added that his political enemies were blowing his remarks out of proportion; for instance, he stressed that county executives have virtually no power over energy decisions. "They say Bent is going to blow up the world with nuclear energy,” Bent said. Suozzi and Assemb. Thomas DiNapoli (D-Thomaston), who are expected to face each other in a Democratic primary for county executive, both said they opposed nuclear power for Long Island. "Even just broaching the idea... It's not worth the energy,” said Suozzi, who called Bent's views "extreme.” Anthony Santino, Nassau Republican Party spokesman, said it doesn't take a stand on policy issues. John V.N. Klein, a Nassau attorney and former Suffolk County executive who held office during the heydey of the Shoreham plant protests, said Bent's ideas aren't so far-fetched, "in these days of growing energy dependence and shrinking capacity.” Copyright © Newsday, Inc. Produced by Newsday Electronic ***************************************************************** 29 NRC to meet with Virginia Power Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at North Anna Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 16 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-016 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Virginia Power officials on Tuesday, June 26, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the North Anna nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 1:00 p.m. in the main auditorium of the North Anna Nuclear Information Center at the plant site near Mineral, Virginia. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to Virginia Power, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/NA1/na1_chart.htmland www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/NA2/na2_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 30 NRC to Meet with Progress Energy/CP&L Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at Harris Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 17 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-017 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Progress Energy/CP&L officials on Wednesday, June 27, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the Harris nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 1:00 p.m. in Room 228 of the Harris Administrative Building at the plant site southwest of Raleigh, North Carolina. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to CP&L, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/HAR1/har1_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 31 NRC to Meet with Virginia Power Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at Surry Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 18 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-018 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Virginia Power officials on Thursday, June 28, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the Surry nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 10:00 a.m. in the Surry Nuclear Information Center Auditorium at the plant site near Surry, Virginia. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to Virginia Power, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/SUR1/sur1_chart.htmland www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/SUR2/sur2_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 32 NRC to Meet with Duke Energy Officials to Discuss Safety Performance at Oconee Nuclear Power Plant Press Release Region II - 2001 - 19 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 Web Site: http://www.nrc.gov/OPA No. II-01-019 June 20, 2001 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404)562-4416/e-mail: kmc2@nrc.gov Roger D. Hannah (404)562-4417/e-mail: rdh1@nrc.gov The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with Duke Energy officials on Wednesday, June 27, to discuss the results of NRC's annual assessment of safety performance at the Oconee nuclear power plant. The meeting will be held at 10:00 a.m. in Building #8003 (World of Energy) at the plant site near Seneca, South Carolina. The public is invited to observe the meeting. NRC officials will be available after the meeting to answer questions. The NRC will hold a second meeting with state and local government officials after the first meeting. That second meeting is also open to the public. A letter sent from NRC Region II to Duke Energy, which addresses plant safety performance during the previous year and forms the basis of the meeting discussion, is available from the Region II Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC web site at www.nrc.gov/OPA/ppr. Current information for the plant is available at www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/OCO1/oco1_chart.html, www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/OCO2/oco2_chart.htmland www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/OCO3/oco3_chart.html. ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Bill Addresses Radiation VictimsBill Addresses Radiation Victims washingtonpost.com: By Robert Gehrke Associated Press Writer Wednesday, June 20, 2001; 8:00 PM WASHINGTON –– Ill uranium miners and residents sickened by radioactive fallout from nuclear tests are a step closer to long-awaited compensation from the government. Money to pay government IOUs worth $84 million will be included in the version of a $6.5 billion spending bill going Thursday to the Senate Appropriations Committee. "Our people don't have to wait very long," said Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M. It was unclear, however, how soon checks could arrive if the spending were to be approved. Lori Goodman, a spokeswoman for the group Dine CARE, which represents sick Navajo Indians who worked in the uranium mines, remained wary: The allocation still must be approved by the Senate, agreed by the House and signed by the President Bush. "It's hard to get all excited about it anymore," she said. "We've been waiting, and we'll be cheering when it does happen." The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed in 1990 to provide cash payments of $100,000 to uranium miners and $75,000 to "down-winders" – residents exposed to radioactive fallout caused by nuclear weapons tests in Nevada. Many of the uranium mines were in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona and many of the miners were Navajos. The down-winders lived in southern Nevada and Utah and northern Arizona, where fallout settled from nuclear weapons tests near Las Vegas. Last year, the act was expanded to cover more people, but no new money was added. Starting in May 2000, qualifying claimants received letters informing them the program was out of money. Several have died from their illnesses awaiting payments. "In a situation that has added insult to injury, the federal government has been issuing worthless IOUs for months," said Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., in a statement. "It is high time we appropriate the funds necessary for compensating the uranium workers who dedicated their lives to helping us win the Cold War." The Bush administration has proposed spending $97 million next year and $710 million over the next decade to pay RECA claims, but that money would not be available until the next fiscal year, which begins in October. Despite lobbying from southwestern members of Congress, Bush did not include the $84 million in his request for supplemental appropriations, which would be available much sooner. Domenici and Bingaman persuaded Sen. Robert Byrd, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, to add the money to the Senate bill. It was one of the few departures from the president's request, said Domenici, who was grateful for Byrd's consideration. The money will come out of a surplus in a loan program designed to help oil and gas companies hurt by foreign imports. The Senate vote could come as early as next week. Domenici said he expects Senate negotiators to persuade House conferees to include the money in the version of the bill to go to the president. On the Net: Justice Department's Radiation Exposure Compensation Program: http://www.usdoj.gov/civil/torts/const/reca/index.htm © 2001 The Associated Press ***************************************************************** 2 Federal officials contact nuclear workers DesMoinesRegister.com | News By Register Staff Report 06/21/2001 AMES Nearly 1,000 people who might have been exposed to dangerous chemicals while working on nuclear weapons research in Ames will be contacted by federal experts over the next two weeks as part of a medical surveillance program. Workers from the Ames Laboratory and 222 people who have worked in Gilman Hall during the late 1940s and early '50s will be contacted for the study, a Department of Energy official said. The employees helped refine uranium and beryllium for use in the government's nuclear weapons program. When inhaled, beryllium fumes or particles can inflame or scar the lungs and can cause lung disease. The government acknowledged for the first time in 1999 that thousands of workers were made sick while making nuclear weapons, and it announced a plan to compensate many of them for medical care and lost wages. Initial beryllium screenings will include a blood test and brief health questionnaire. Those determined to have been exposed will undergo more testing, U.S. Department of Energy officials said. A similar study is under way in Middletown for workers at the former Iowa Army Ammunition Plant, where employees assembled and tested nuclear weapons components. AMES Copyright © 2001, The Des Moines Register. ***************************************************************** 3 Beryllium workers witness denies try to force mistrial toledoblade.com Article published June 20, 2001 Regional News ASSOCIATED PRESS GOLDEN, Colo. - An occupational health historian who testified on behalf of former nuclear facility workers who say they were sickened by beryllium denied he violated a gag order. A state judge threw out David Egilman’s testimony Monday after being told the Brown University professor made comments about the case on his web site and threatened to deliberately cause a mistrial. Judge Frank Plaut threatened to punish the plaintiffs by removing their lead lawyers. But he denied the defense motion for a mistrial in the case, in which 55 people are suing Brush Wellman, Inc. of Cleveland. Beryllium is used in a variety of products, despite growing evidence that breathing the tiniest amount can bring on an incurable, wasting lung ailment. Mr. Egilman’s site accuses Brush Wellman’s law firm of criminal activity and makes references to a company medical director being educated in Nazi Germany. Portions of its content were read by Judge Plaut in the courtroom. Mr. Egilman said he did not violate the order because he required a password for access to the web site. He said defense lawyers hacked into the site. The jury did not hear discussion about the site and was told to disregard his testimony. The workers say Brush Wellman conspired with the federal government to conceal the dangers of beryllium for 50 years because it was needed to make nuclear weapons at the Rocky Flats facility. It is the first of 76 lawsuits filed against Brush Wellman by 200 beryllium victims across the country. The jury’s verdict is expected to influence whether settlements should be made in other cases. In 1999, The Blade documented a 50-year pattern of misconduct by the federal government and the beryllium industry. Among the findings: Government and industry officials knowingly allowed workers to be exposed to unsafe levels of beryllium dust. The series sparked major safety reforms. About 1,200 people nationwide have contracted beryllium disease, a fatal lung ailment, since the 1940s, including at least 75 present or former workers at the Brush Wellman plant near Elmore. ©2001 The Blade. Privacy and Security Statement. By using this service, ***************************************************************** 4 Welcome to Atomic City Energy crisis jumpstarts a much-needed debate on the promise and paradox of nuclear power By Mark Trahant MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR ATOMIC CITY, Idaho, June 20 — I grew up near What Could Have Been. This little town was built in the desert, a promised oasis and a tribute to a new technology. Its name was as bold as its future: Atomic City. A few miles away, at the Atomic Energy Commission site, the federal government was researching the peaceful atom — a power source that would be too abundant and too cheap to even meter — and everyone expected the world to be changed forever. Flip a switch anywhere and let there be light. It was so easy to see the dream; our future was limitless. Of course, things didn’t turn out the way we thought. Like it or not, we need to re-think our attitudes on nuclear power; weigh promises and consequences, and search for consensus. ATOMIC CITY, Idaho, is now a 20th-century ghost town, little more than a reminder of What Could Have Been. The aging structures and unpaved roads also are warnings about questions raised during the nuclear age, and the paradox of applying a technology of war to peaceful purposes: How could a limitless power source instead become a lethal aggregation of waste that lasts forever? How much risk can we live with, when we know accidents are bound to occur? Are we brilliant enough to engineer nuclear technology that will last longer than all of human history — and accept the consequences if we figure wrong? A NECESSARY CONVERSATION ***************************************************************** 5 Review of Oak Ridge Operations Office Nuclear Criticality Safety Self-Assements June 2001 Office of Independent Environment, Safety and Health Oversight U.S. Department of Energy Washington, DC 20585 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2 1.0 INTRODUCTION 5 2.0#9BACKGROUND 5 3.0 BRITISH NUCLEAR FUELS LIMITED 6 4.0#9BECHTEL-JACOBS COMPANY 6 5.0#9CONCLUSIONS 10 6.0#9FOLLOW-UP VISIT RESULTS 10 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ANSI American National Standards Institute BJC Bechtel Jacobs Company BNFL British Nuclear Fuels Limited D&D decontamination and decommissioning DOE U.S. Department of Energy EH Office of Environment, Safety and Health EH-2 Office of Independent Environment, Safety, and Health Oversight ETTP East Tennessee Technology Park LMES Lockheed Martin Energy Systems NCSA Nuclear Criticality Safety Approval NCSE Nuclear Criticality Safety Evaluation ORO Oak Ridge Operations Office ORPS DOE Occurrence Reporting and Processing and System EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Background On September 30, 1999, a criticality accident occurred in a uranium processing facility in Tokai-Mura, Japan. This accident was one of the factors cited by the Deputy Secretary in his November 11, 1999, memorandum that established the DOE Nuclear Criticality Safety Improvement Initiative. As part of this initiative, the Deputy Secretary directed all DOE sites to perform self-assessments of their criticality safety programs. The self-assessments were to evaluate the site nuclear criticality safety program against a set of specific criteria, that were derived from requirements delineated in American National Standards Institute (ANSI) 8.19 Standard and DOE Policy 450.5, Line Management Oversight of Environment, Safety and Health. Also as part of the Nuclear Criticality Safety Improvement Initiative, the Deputy Secretary directed the Office of Environment, Safety and Health (EH) to review the site self-assessments and to conduct additional site reviews where warranted. The EH Office of Independent Environment, Safety, and Health Oversight (EH-2) was assigned to conduct the reviews. The Oak Ridge Operations Office, Bechtel Jacobs Company, and BNFL, Inc. programs were selected for additional review because their respective criticality safety self-assessments reported significant widespread deficiencies in their criticality safety programs relative to the assessment criteria provided by the Deputy Secretary. In addition, these self-assessments did not address all information specifically required by the Deputy Secretary's memorandum and did not specifically assess the risk of a criticality accident. EH-2 conducted a field review from August 7-11, 2000 of the nuclear criticality safety self-assessments performed by two contractors under the purview of the Oak Ridge Operations Office (ORO). The EH-2 team focused on facilities and activities operated by BNFL, Inc. and Bechtel-Jacobs Company. Results BNFL, Inc. is responsible for decontamination and decommissioning (D&D) of three facilities at the East Tennessee Technology Park (ETTP): K-33, K-31 and K-29. Although work remains to be accomplished in completing planned corrective actions BNFL has performed an adequate self-assessment, taken appropriate interim actions, and developed an adequate corrective action plan. The EH-2 team did not identify any safety issues at BNFL facilities. Bechtel-Jacobs Company at Oak Ridge is responsible for waste management and D&D activities for the balance of facilities at ETTP, the Molten Salt Reactor Experiment facility, portions of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Y-12 National Security Complex, the Portsmouth and Paducah sites. The contractor's self-assessment indicates that there were systemic weaknesses in the Bechtel Jacobs Company nuclear criticality safety program and related management systems. A total of 74 findings and 40 observations were identified by the company's self-assessment. The corrective actions developed to address these self-identified findings and observations are responsive. During this review, the EH-2 team identified two Safety Issues in nuclear criticality safety activities managed by the Bechtel Jacobs Company. These Safety Issues are shown in Table ES-1. Conclusions Although deficiencies are evident in the Bechtel Jacobs Company and BNFL, Inc. criticality safety programs, the criticality accident risk remains low at the present time because few activities are being conducted that involve significant quantities of fissile material or that impact fissile storage areas. There is a potential that this reduced risk of a criticality is generating the incorrect perception, particularly in the Bechtel Jacobs Company facilities, that the likelihood of a criticality accident is so remote that deficiencies in controls can be tolerated. Oak Ridge Operations Office management and their contractors need to resolve deficiencies in their line management oversight programs and criticality safety programs before proceeding with decommissioning activities of uranium processing facilities and equipment that historically contained higher enrichments of uranium (greater than five percent) in the gaseous diffusion process plants. These areas pose an increased risk for a criticality accident due to higher enrichment levels or potential for introduction of moderating materials. Follow-up Review Results The EH-2 team conducted a follow-up visit on April 24, 2001. The EH-2 team focused on the progress toward addressing deficiencies identified at Bechtel Jacobs Company facilities during the August 2000 review. A number of corrective actions to criticality safety controls in the K-25 vault have been completed. The Bechtel Jacobs Company also commissioned two internal reviews of their criticality safety program that identified additional weaknesses and included recommendations. Bechtel Jacobs Company personnel are in the process of developing corrective action plans for these two internal reviews. Bechtel Jacobs Company management also committed to provide the Oak Ridge Operations Office with a Criticality Safety Improvement Plan. This plan is intended to provide for long-term resolution of identified issues and weaknesses and strengthen the overall criticality safety program prior to conducting decommissioning activities in former fissile material areas where higher enrichments might be encountered. Also, the Bechtel Jacobs Company added a significant number of nuclear criticality safety staff to support its five sites. However, the Bechtel Jacobs Company Criticality Safety Supervisor position remained unfilled at the time of the follow-up visit. A senior nuclear criticality safety engineer from the subcontractor providing nuclear criticality safety services is filling this position on an interim basis. EH-2 will continue to monitor the effectiveness of corrective actions, the improvement program and the implementation of criticality safety controls. Table ES-1 – Safety Issues DOE Order 414.1A, Quality Assurance, establishes a process for addressing and tracking Safety Issues identified by independent oversight evaluations. As used in that Order, the term "Safety Issue" refers to deficiencies in safety programs or weaknesses in safety management systems that require formal tracking and corrective action. The DOE Office of Environmental Management, as the responsible program secretarial office, is required to develop a corrective action plan to address the Safety Issues identified during this EH-2 review. + Safety Issue #1 addresses management's failure to correct longstanding criticality safety deficiencies in Bechtel Jacobs Company facilities. The EH-2 team identified problems in the nuclear criticality safety postings, controls, and evaluations at the East Tennessee Technology Park K-25 facility. Similar criticality safety deficiencies have been recognized for a least four years and were known to the Bechtel Jacobs Company when they took over the contract in 1998 but have not been corrected. + Safety Issue #2 addresses inadequacies in the Bechtel Jacobs Company self-assessment, which was not effective in identifying a number of problems in the nuclear criticality safety program. The self-assessment did not identify deficiencies in areas such as nuclear criticality staffing, field verification of criticality safety controls, fissile material accountability, occurrence reporting, and unreviewed safety question determinations. REVIEW OF OAK RIDGE OPERATIONS OFFICE CONTRACTOR NUCLEAR CRITICALITY SAFETY SELF-ASSESSMENTS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1.0 INTRODUCTION ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- As part of the Nuclear Criticality Safety Improvement Initiative, the Deputy Secretary directed the Office of Environment, Safety and Health (EH) to review the site self-assessments and to conduct additional field reviews where warranted. The EH Office of Environment, Safety, and Health Oversight (EH-2) performed a field review that examined nuclear criticality safety programs of the Bechtel-Jacobs Company (BJC) and British Nuclear Fuels, Limited (BNFL) during August 7-11, 2000. The purpose of the field review was to provide timely feedback to line management regarding criticality safety risks and the need for additional improvements. The EH-2 comments on the Oak Ridge Operations Office (ORO) Nuclear Criticality Safety Self-assessment Corrective Action Plan were communicated in a separate report. Section 2 of this report provides the background that led up to conducting this review. Sections 3 and 4 discuss the results for the BNFL and BJC programs respectively. The EH-2 team identified two Safety Issues involving the BJC program that are summarized as (1) failure to promptly correct criticality safety deficiencies and (2) inadequacies in the criticality safety self-assessment. Section 5 provides the conclusions. Section 6 presents the results of an EH-2 Team follow-up visit that was conducted on April 24, 2001. The follow-up visit focused on ORO and BJC efforts to resolve safety issues and weaknesses identified during the August 2000 visit and enhance the nuclear criticality safety program at BJC facilities. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2.0 BACKGROUND ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- On September 30, 1999 a criticality accident occurred in a uranium processing facility in Tokai-mura, Japan. This accident was one of the factors cited by the Deputy Secretary in his November 11, 1999 memorandum that established the DOE Nuclear Criticality Safety Improvement Initiative. As part of this initiative, the Deputy Secretary directed all DOE sites to perform self-assessments of their criticality safety programs. The self-assessments were to evaluate the site nuclear criticality safety program against a set of specified criteria, that were derived from requirements delineated in American National Standards Institute (ANSI) 8.19 Standard and DOE Policy 450.5, Line Management Oversight of Environment, Safety and Health. Also as part of the Nuclear Criticality Safety Improvement Initiative, the Deputy Secretary directed EH-2 to review the site self-assessments and to conduct additional reviews where warranted. The ORO, BJC, and BNFL programs were selected because their respective criticality safety self-assessments reported significant widespread deficiencies in their criticality safety programs relative to the assessment criteria provided by the Deputy Secretary. In addition, these self-assessments did not include an analysis of nuclear criticality safety staffing needs through the next five years or an assessment of risks, although such information was specifically required by the Deputy Secretary's memorandum. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3.0 BRITISH NUCLEAR FUELS LIMITED ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Although work remains to be accomplished in completing planned corrective actions, BNFL has performed an adequate self-assessment, taken appropriate interim actions, and developed an adequate Corrective Action Plan. BNFL's use of the outside experts was a proactive step that enhanced their self-assessment. The EH-2 team did not identify any additional Safety Issues. The BNFL self-assessment identified a number of deficiencies with the nuclear criticality safety program. Specifically, the need for additional criticality safety staff and the identification of nuclear criticality safety controls and the flowdown of those controls into work planning documents. Corrective actions have been identified to hire additional criticality safety staff, revise work planning procedures, and evaluate the tracking and trending of nuclear criticality safety issues. A number of opportunities for improvement were identified in the areas of training, implementation of nuclear criticality safety analyses, and the integration of nuclear criticality safety with other safety management programs. BNFL has made improvements as outlined in their Corrective Action Plan. Current and projected nuclear criticality safety staffing levels appear adequate. Currently, BNFL has four contracted nuclear criticality safety staff, one of whom is a trainee. BNFL plans to add one more experienced individual to the contracted nuclear criticality safety staff in anticipation of beginning operations in other facilities. Their goal is to have five fully qualified criticality safety engineers before commencing decontamination and decommissioning (D&D) operations in the K-29 Facility. BNFL also plans to conduct a follow up assessment, using outside experts, to gauge the effectiveness and pace of corrective actions. BNFL has ensured that it seeks feedback from workers and their supervisors on the appropriateness of proposed controls and on options for eliminating difficulties with implementing existing controls. However, continued BNFL management attention will be needed to ensure that the planned corrective actions are fully and effectively implemented so that BNFL will be able to monitor future D&D activities in buildings that previously processed higher enriched uranium and pose inherently higher risks. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4.0 BECHTEL-JACOBS COMPANY ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The BJC self-assessment and the results of this EH-2 review indicate that there were systemic weaknesses in BJC's nuclear criticality safety program and related management systems. A total of 74 findings and 40 observations were identified by the BJC self-assessment. The majority of the root causes for the findings were management related such as improper resource allocation; policies not adequately defined, disseminated, or enforced; inadequate administrative control; and defective or inadequate procedures. The EH-2 team identified two Safety Issues that require formal corrective action plans according to DOE Order 414.1a, Quality Assurance. SAFETY ISSUE #1: Bechtel-Jacobs Company management has not corrected longstanding criticality safety deficiencies at the East Tennessee Technology Park (ETTP). The EH-2 team identified problems in the nuclear criticality safety approval (NCSA)/nuclear criticality safety evaluation (NCSE) in Vault 1X at the ETTP K-25 facility during a tour on August 8, 2000. Subsequent analysis of the NCSA/NCSE indicated several significant problems with the posted criticality safety controls for the storage array and the evaluation of potential accident conditions as well as the BJC response to the identified problems. All of the problem areas discussed below are violations of specific provisions of the mandatory standards ANSI/ANS-8.1 and 8.19, which are required by DOE Order 420.1, Facility Safety. + BJC did not promptly take action to correct the criticality safety problems. The specific problems with the Vault 1X NCSE (i.e., inadequate analysis of accident conditions and controls in the NCSEs and inconsistencies between NCSE in Vault 1X) and similar problems in other NCSEs have been recognized for at least four years but not adequately corrected. The previous contractor, Lockheed Martin Energy Systems (LMES), identified deficiencies with this NCSE (NCSA/E-1326) during a 1996 assessment for ETTP. The 1996 LMES assessment concluded that there were many examples of NCSA/NCSEs not adequately demonstrating double contingency, including NCSA/E-1326. This information has been available to BJC since it took over the contract in 1998, and BJC acknowledged the need to review and revise NCSA/NCSEs in their self-assessment. However, BJC has not corrected the problems at ETTP. BJC approved NCSA-1459 in September 1999 to replace NCSA/E-1326 but it had not been implemented at the time of the field review. In addition, an active NCSA/NCSE (1316), identified as deficient in the 1996 LMES assessment, was not revised. + The posted controls derived from NCSA/E-1326 permitted a potentially critical array to be established. The posted criticality safety limits did not control enrichment or mass of individual containers. Spacing was maintained with administrative controls only. With the enriched uranium material potentially available at the K-25 Facility, it is possible to load the array according to the posted limits with highly enriched uranium and initiate a criticality accident with only a minor spacing violation (e.g. human error, fire fighting, seismic events). + The NCSE that provided the basis for the controls (i.e., NCSE-1326) did not analyze all credible normal and abnormal conditions. NCSE-1326 did not evaluate enrichments above 20 percent using nominal six-inch diameter bottles or spacing violations such as those caused by fire fighting, seismic events, or simple operator errors. Some of the as-found storage conditions were not addressed within the scope of the NCSE. For example, the EH-2 team found an array that contained 13 six-inch nalgene bottles without established controls on enrichment. Therefore, the as-found conditions had not been adequately analyzed by the active NCSE and thus the potential risk of a criticality accident is higher than that assumed by the evaluation. + The controls specified by NCSA-1326 were inconsistent with the basis criticality safety evaluation (NCSE-1326). The NCSA controls for the storage operations were inconsistent with the parameters analyzed in the NCSE and omitted controls that were assumed by the NCSE. For example, the NCSE stated that the maximum diameter of bottles was a nominal five inches, and that enrichment would not exceed 20 percent U-235. However, the NCSA permitted nominal six-inch diameter bottles containing uranium of any enrichment. These inconsistencies indicate that the flow down of the evaluation to the controls was not adequate and that verification and surveillance processes were not sufficient to detect discrepancies. + BJC management did not post the area or notify workers of the criticality safety problems so that they could perform their expected functions without undue risk. No actions were taken to alert workers of the criticality safety problems with the nuclear criticality safety controls or evaluation since the identification of the problems four years ago. The areas were not posted to warn workers, management controls were not in place to restrict operations until adequate criticality safety controls were established, and no occurrence notifications were made. Although some actions were taken after the EH-2 team discussed the specific problem with BJC staff, the area was not posted to warn operators of the deficient controls, even during the time before BJC completed its initial evaluation of the safety of the as-found condition. SAFETY ISSUE #2: The criticality safety self-assessment performed by BJC did not identify the following program weaknesses: + Lack of qualified nuclear criticality safety staff + Inadequate field verification of the NCSAs and NCSEs that govern current facility operations + Inability to determine the amount of fissile material in specific areas + Inadequate processes for identifying and reporting criticality safety deficiencies to DOE + Lack of a process requiring Unreviewed Safety Question Determinations for criticality safety deficiencies The EH-2 team identified weaknesses in the nuclear criticality safety program that were not identified in the BJC self-assessment. The Corrective Action Plan for this Safety Issue needs to address each of the following problem areas. + Lack of qualified nuclear criticality safety staff. The self-assessment and the associated Corrective Action Plan did not address the need to formally qualify the BJC nuclear criticality safety staff to the equivalent of DOE Standard 1135-99. BJC currently has two nuclear criticality safety staff to direct and monitor the nuclear criticality safety activities of its subcontractors. One engineer has five years of experience in Nuclear Safety Analysis, two of which are directly related to nuclear criticality safety. The other has no nuclear criticality safety work experience. In addition, the self-assessment and Corrective Action Plan did not address the need to fill the nuclear criticality safety supervisor position on a permanent basis. At the time of the assessment, an individual who had significant collateral duties was filling the nuclear criticality safety supervisor position on an acting basis. The shortage of experienced and qualified nuclear criticality safety staff is a factor in the continuing weaknesses in NCSAs/NCSEs and the failure to identify and correct weaknesses in a timely manner. + Inadequate field verification of the NCSAs and NCSEs that govern current operations The BJC self-assessment did not accurately evaluate the criticality risk because it was not based on a field validation of the adequacy on NCSAs/NCSEs. For example, the self-assessment includes statements such as "no violations of double contingency" and "no immediate safety concerns" that are not fully supportable in light of recognized problems. For instance, the assertion about "no double contingency violations" is not supportable since BJC had not completed walkdowns of many of the operations. In addition, previous assessments provided clear indicators that at least two active NCSA/NCSEs did not adequately demonstrate double contingency (see discussion under Safety Issue #1). BJC had 42 active NCSA/NCSEs at two Oak Ridge projects (28 at ETTP and 14 at Oak Ridge National Laboratory). Based on previous assessments, at least two of these (NCSA/NCSE 1326 and 1316) were inadequate with respect to application of the double contingency principle. Although the self-assessment identifies NCSA/NCSEs as a problem area, the Corrective Action Plan did not specifically identify the need to walk-down and field verify existing NCSA/NCSEs. Thus, the NCSAs/NCSEs did not provide full assurance that current facility conditions were adequately analyzed and that the facility was operating within established controls. + Inability to determine the amount of fissile material in specific areas BJC took five days to locate fissile content data for three of the bottles stored in Vault 1X because of the lack of an effective fissile material inventory system. Such a system is needed to determine the amount of fissile material in the vault and to confirm that the total fissile content of all thirteen nalgene bottles in the array was low (less than 700 grams). Without information of the fissile material content, BJC was not able to quickly determine compliance with mass or enrichment limits (if established) and evaluate the significance of nonconforming/inconsistent NCSAs and NCSEs. Previous ORO assessments also identified the lack of a fissile material inventory system as a weakness. For example, the Facility Representative report covering the period from October 1999 through March 2000 indicated significant deficiencies in the Waste Information Management System database (findings FRP-00-001 and FRP-00-002). However, the self-assessment and the Corrective Action Plan did not contain information about the deficiencies in the fissile material inventory and associated tracking systems. + Inadequate processes for reporting criticality safety deficiencies to DOE The BJC process was not timely in reporting criticality safety deficiencies to the DOE Occurrence Reporting and Processing and System (ORPS). Some BJC personnel indicated that the observed problems with Vault 1X NCSA/E were not a reportable event because the presence of the six-inch diameter bottles did not violate the posted criticality safety controls. However, DOE reporting requirements specify that a major discrepancy between the evaluation and the controls would be a significant event that warrants reporting via ORPS. On August 25, 2000, 14 days after the EH-2 team identified the problem to BJC, BJC filed a formal Occurrence Report, ORO-BJC-K25WASTMAN-2000-016, Violation of Nuclear Criticality Safety Procedure. The occurrence report focused solely on the failure to implement the new NCSA/E-1459 on schedule. It did not address deficiencies in the existing controls, surveillances, or quality control that resulted in the deficient NCSE and NCSA controls. + Lack of a process requiring Unreviewed Safety Question Determinations for criticality safety deficiencies BJC initiated an Unreviewed Safety Question Determination for the criticality safety deficiencies associated with NCSA/NCSE-1326 only after prompting by the EH-2 team. The current process does not include NCSEs as part of the Facility Authorization Basis. However, the NCSE is the safety basis for the operation and the derivative NCSA is the implementing document for the criticality safety controls assumed to be present by the Authorization Basis. DOE Order 5480.21, Unreviewed Safety Questions, indicates that the discovery of an inadequate safety basis and inadequate controls would lead to a positive Unreviewed Safety Question Determination because the frequency of a criticality accident would be higher than that assumed by the Authorization Basis for normal operating conditions. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 5.0 CONCLUSIONS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The overall conclusions for the two contractor programs are summarized as follows: + In general, the BNFL self-assessment is adequate and BNFL is making significant improvements in its program. Completion of these improvements is essential to facilitate safe D&D activities, particularly in areas where higher enriched materials are expected. + Significant weaknesses were evident in the BJC criticality safety program, including two Safety Issues. Safety Issue #1 addressed management's failure to take effective and timely corrective actions when problems were identified at BJC facilities. Safety Issue #2 addressed inadequacies in the BJC self-assessment. Although significant deficiencies are evident, the overall risk is reduced at the present time because few activities are being conducted that involve significant quantities of fissile material or that affect fissile storage areas (e.g., structural modifications). However, the BJC and ORO programs need significant improvement to ensure adequate nuclear criticality safety controls are in place before D&D activities begin that remove or disturb equipment or facilities containing fissile material where higher enriched uranium (greater than five percent) is expected in the gaseous diffusion process buildings. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 6.0 FOLLOW-UP VISIT RESULTS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The EH-2 team conducted a follow-up visit on April 24, 2001. The EH-2 team focused on the progress toward addressing deficiencies identified at Bechtel Jacobs Company facilities during the August 2000 review. The EH-2 team's follow-up visit verified that BJC has completed a number of corrective actions to criticality safety controls in the K-25 vault. BJC also commissioned two internal reviews of their criticality safety program subsequent to the August 2000 EH review. One of these internal reviews assessed all active nuclear criticality safety evaluations and analyses, including field verification of the adequacy of criticality safety controls. The field verification found no violations of the double contingency principle in the field. The other internal review was a comprehensive review of the criticality safety program. Both internal reviews identified a number of additional weaknesses and made several recommendations. However, neither review found any unsafe conditions from a criticality safety perspective. BJC is in the process of developing corrective action plans for the two internal reviews. BJC is also scheduled to provide a Criticality Safety Improvement Plan to the DOE Oak Ridge Operations Office. This plan is intended to provide long-term resolution of the issues and weaknesses identified by the EH-2 and the internal reviews, and strengthen the overall criticality safety program in advance of decommissioning activities in former fissile material areas where higher enrichments might be encountered. Also, BJC added a significant number of nuclear criticality safety staff to support the five sites for which BJC is responsible. However, the Bechtel Jacobs Company Criticality Safety Supervisor position remained unfilled at the time of the follow-up visit. A senior criticality safety engineer from the subcontractor providing criticality safety services is filling this position on an interim basis. EH-2 will continue to monitor the effectiveness of corrective actions, the improvement program and the implementation of criticality safety controls. ***************************************************************** 6 Bill Addresses Radiation Victims June 20, 2001 WASHINGTON (AP) - Ill uranium miners and residents sickened by radioactive fallout from nuclear tests are a step closer to long-awaited compensation from the government. Money to pay government IOUs worth $84 million will be included in the version of a $6.5 billion spending bill going Thursday to the Senate Appropriations Committee. "Our people don't have to wait very long," said Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M. It was unclear, however, how soon checks could arrive if the spending were to be approved. Lori Goodman, a spokeswoman for the group Dine CARE, which represents sick Navajo Indians who worked in the uranium mines, remained wary: The allocation still must be approved by the Senate, agreed by the House and signed by the President Bush. "It's hard to get all excited about it anymore," she said. "We've been waiting, and we'll be cheering when it does happen." The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed in 1990 to provide cash payments of $100,000 to uranium miners and $75,000 to "down-winders" - residents exposed to radioactive fallout caused by nuclear weapons tests in Nevada. Many of the uranium mines were in Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona and many of the miners were Navajos. The down-winders lived in southern Nevada and Utah and northern Arizona, where fallout settled from nuclear weapons tests near Las Vegas. Last year, the act was expanded to cover more people, but no new money was added. Starting in May 2000, qualifying claimants received letters informing them the program was out of money. Several have died from their illnesses awaiting payments. "In a situation that has added insult to injury, the federal government has been issuing worthless IOUs for months," said Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., in a statement. "It is high time we appropriate the funds necessary for compensating the uranium workers who dedicated their lives to helping us win the Cold War." The Bush administration has proposed spending $97 million next year and $710 million over the next decade to pay RECA claims, but that money would not be available until the next fiscal year, which begins in October. Despite lobbying from southwestern members of Congress, Bush did not include the $84 million in his request for supplemental appropriations, which would be available much sooner. Domenici and Bingaman persuaded Sen. Robert Byrd, chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, to add the money to the Senate bill. It was one of the few departures from the president's request, said Domenici, who was grateful for Byrd's consideration. The money will come out of a surplus in a loan program designed to help oil and gas companies hurt by foreign imports. The Senate vote could come as early as next week. Domenici said he expects Senate negotiators to persuade House conferees to include the money in the version of the bill to go to the president. On the Net: Justice Department's Radiation Exposure Compensation Program: All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 7 Fluor, Lockheed to negotiate Hanford contract This story was published Wed, Jun 20, 2001 By John Stang Herald staff writer Fluor Hanford and Lockheed Martin Services Inc. have won approval from the Department of Energy to negotiate a five-year extension of Lockheed's contract. Fluor, the Hanford Nuclear Reservation's lead contractor for cleanup work, must get DOE approval on major subcontractors. With that hurdle cleared Tuesday, talks on the extension's price and scope are to begin soon. Lockheed has 577 employees and oversees computer support and other information services at Hanford. Its existing five-year contract ends Sept. 1. Darrell Graddy, Lockheed general manager at Richland, expects to have a five-year extension nailed down by then. The cost of Lockheed's work over the next five years depends on what actually is done but is tentatively estimated at $300 million to $400 million. DOE also gave Fluor approval to extend its telephone infrastructure contract with Qwest by three years. That contract is worth an estimated $9.5 million over three years. "We look forward to a long-term relationship with (Lockheed) and Qwest with the clear objectives of increased innovation, reduced costs, reduced infrastructure mortgage and improved alignment of planning," said Fluor President Keith Thomson. Lockheed is one of Hanford's four surviving "enterprise" companies. In 1996, Fluor and five of its subcontractors took parts of the old Westinghouse Hanford and two of its subcontractors, and spun them off into six "outside-the-fence" subcontractors. The idea was that these "enterprise" companies would mostly work at Hanford while trying to build up business outside of the site. In 1996, Lockheed had slightly more than 500 employees. Since then, Fluor has reabsorbed several inside-the-fence and outside-the-fence subcontractors -- mostly to improve coordination and cut costs. Fluor recently decided not to extend DynCorp Tri-Cities Services' contract and will reabsorb it and its site landlord duties. The two companies reached an impasse in their negotiations, at least partly over cost-cutting measures. With Hanford's annual budgets tightening, there is immense pressure to cut costs. DOE, Lockheed and Fluor have agreed to trim overhead and other costs as much as possible, Graddy said. Their tentative target is to save $31 million to $43 million over the next five years. Graddy said cost reductions might come from Lockheed using its partnerships with various computer software and hardware companies. Also, Lockheed may do its on-site work either through Fluor or contract directly with the other prime contractors -- depending on which is more cost-efficient, Graddy said. And DOE, Fluor and Lockheed have agreed to split Lockheed's personnel security and some correspondence support work from the company. DOE plans to contract that work -- valued at about $1.5 million a year -- to small companies with an eye on minority- and women-owned firms. About 20 jobs could be affected. About 80 percent of Lockheed's revenue comes from Hanford and 20 percent from non-Hanford work, Graddy said. He declined to reveal the firm's annual revenue. About 120 Lockheed employees work on non-Hanford projects. Graddy said Lockheed's long-term goals are to expand the Richland office's work to cover the West Coast, add 1,000 jobs, mostly in Richland, and seek $1 billion in annual revenue. Copyright 2001 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 8 Hanford receives funding boost This story was published Thu, Jun 21, 2001 By Les Blumenthal Herald Washington, D.C., bureau WASHINGTON -- A House subcommittee has agreed to increase funding to clean up Hanford and other Department of Energy nuclear sites by almost $700 million in the next fiscal year, U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., said Wednesday. The additional funding, coupled with $180 million included in a supplemental spending bill the House was considering late Wednesday, will almost make up the $1 billion shortfall in cleanup funding included in the Bush administration's budget proposal. Hastings and others had been critical of the administration for proposing a $56 million cut in Hanford cleanup funding at a time when an extra $400 million was needed to meet the deadlines in DOE's cleanup agreement with Washington state and the Environmental Protection Agency. Washington state Attorney General Christine Gregoire had threatened to sue the department if adequate funding to meet the deadlines was not provided by Congress. The additional $700 million for cleanup in the fiscal year starting Oct. 1 was approved Tuesday by the House energy and water appropriations subcommittee. Details of the subcommittee's bill are usually a closely guarded secret until the full House Appropriations Committee considers the measure. That action could come within the next week. While Hastings' office was unsure exactly how much of the $700 million would be spent at Hanford, the congressman said he was satisfied with the new overall funding level. "Congress recognized in its budget that an increase was needed for the cleanup program, and the subcommittee has stepped-up and provided a dramatic increase over the administration's original request level," Hastings said. Of the $180 million in the supplemental bill, Hastings said about $53 million was headed for Hanford. That includes $18.3 million for continued work on the K Basins, the Plutonium Finishing Plant and the F Reactor; $10 million for tank farm operations; and $25 million for a vitrification plant. The latter will convert highly radioactive waste currently stored in underground tanks into solid, glasslike logs suitable for long-term storage. Those funds can be spent in either the current fiscal year or the next one. "This is all very positive news for keeping the cleanup momentum on course with needed funding increases next year," Hastings said. Copyright 2001 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 9 N. Korea Nixes Nuclear Inspection Today: June 21, 2001 at 8:50:26 PDT SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea will not allow U.N. monitors to inspect its nuclear program until the United States speeds up construction of two nuclear reactors promised to the communist state, an official news report said Thursday. Under a 1994 agreement with Washington, North Korea froze its nuclear program, which U.S. officials suspected was being used to develop weapons. The North said its nuclear program was only for peaceful purposes and it did not have the ability to build atomic bombs. The International Atomic Energy Agency wants to assess that claim. The U.N. nuclear agency said verification may take two to three years and its experts must start work immediately so that construction of the nuclear reactors can proceed. "This is in contravention of the (North Korea)-U.S. agreed framework and an affront to the (North)," North Korea's official news agency, KCNA, reported. Construction of the nuclear reactors that Washington promised to build in return for the freeze on the North's nuclear program also has been delayed by funding problems and political tensions. U.S. officials have said the reactors will not be completed until 2008, five years behind schedule. Because of the delays, North Korea said it has no reason to allow verification by the IAEA. It has also demanded compensation for the delays, which Washington has rejected. U.S. experts said that before the accord, North Korea was suspected of having enough plutonium to make one or two atomic bombs. The Bush administration wants verification that North Korea was not building atomic bombs and has said the nuclear problem will be a key topic when it reopens dialogue with North Korea. The North's official news agency, monitored in Seoul, accused the IAEA of acting at the behest of the United States in pushing for immediate inspections. North Korea is among 187 nations committed to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which allows IAEA to make sure nuclear technology is used for peaceful purposes. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 10 Federal officials contact nuclear workers DesMoinesRegister.com | News By Register Staff Report 06/21/2001 AMES Nearly 1,000 people who might have been exposed to dangerous chemicals while working on nuclear weapons research in Ames will be contacted by federal experts over the next two weeks as part of a medical surveillance program. Workers from the Ames Laboratory and 222 people who have worked in Gilman Hall during the late 1940s and early '50s will be contacted for the study, a Department of Energy official said. The employees helped refine uranium and beryllium for use in the government's nuclear weapons program. When inhaled, beryllium fumes or particles can inflame or scar the lungs and can cause lung disease. The government acknowledged for the first time in 1999 that thousands of workers were made sick while making nuclear weapons, and it announced a plan to compensate many of them for medical care and lost wages. Initial beryllium screenings will include a blood test and brief health questionnaire. Those determined to have been exposed will undergo more testing, U.S. Department of Energy officials said. A similar study is under way in Middletown for workers at the former Iowa Army Ammunition Plant, where employees assembled and tested nuclear weapons components. AMES Vilsack seeks advice on air quality standards Gov. Tom Vilsack asked researchers at Iowa State University and the University of Iowa to make recommendations on air quality standards near livestock confinements. Vilsack said the schools have "a public responsibility to help resolve this debate. "We need sound science to determine good public policy," Vilsack said. "I've heard compelling arguments from both sides, but now is the time to determine the true impact to Iowans" health and safety." Most directly affected by new regulations would be giant hog confinement facilities, where thousands of animals are raised under a single roof and lagoons contain liquid manure. Critics complain those operations foul air and water and destroy the pristine character of rural life. Backers argue that they are part of an evolving livestock industry, and note that the economic consequences are huge. Iowa is the nation's biggest hog-producing state, with about a quarter of the country's hogs. DAVENPORT Missing inflatable duck found in yard It was a tough case to crack, but Davenport's inflatable duck caper has been solved. An inflatable duck - 20 feet tall and bright yellow - used to advertise a fund-raiser was found Wednesday. It had been missing since June 10. The duck is used to promote the annual Great Quad City Duck Race, in which 10,000 rubber ducks will be unleashed July 1 on the Mississippi River. Each duck belongs to a sponsor who will win a raffle if his or her bird crosses the finish line first. Proceeds will benefit the Boys &Girls Club of the Mississippi Valley and the Friendly House neighborhood center. Davenport police said theft charges will not be filed because sponsors of the event did not want to pursue the matter. The $4,000 duck was found Wednesday in a yard after a telephone tip from a local radio station. IOWA CITY Professor wants punishment overturned A University of Iowa physics professor who was disciplined for accusing two colleagues of being frauds has asked a judge to overrule his punishment. Louis Frank wants to overturn a state Board of Regents decision to punish him for violating the university's ethics policy. The sanction includes what amounts to a fine of $13,516. Frank contends in court documents that the regents' decision "is the product of reasoning that is so illogical as to render it wholly irrational." The case stems from comments that Frank, the Carver/James Van Allen Professor of Physics, made about two of his colleagues in a December 1999 newspaper article. The regents decided that Frank should lose for one year the support above and beyond his base salary that comes from holding a named academic chairmanship. In addition, he will have a letter of reprimand placed in his personnel file. A faculty judicial commission determined that there was "clear and convincing" evidence Frank accused Robert Mutel, a physics and astronomy professor, and John Fix, a former Iowa physics professor, of scientific fraud. RALSTON Worker is injured in cooperative explosion A man injured in an explosion at a soybean oil processing plant in Ralston remained hospitalized Wednesday. A Carroll County Sheriff's department spokeswoman said Bryant Kirton, 32, of Ogden was injured in Tuesday's blast at InterWest, which is owned by West Central Cooperative. Kirton was taken to a hospital in Carroll, then flown to Iowa Methodist Medical Center in Des Moines, where he was in critical condition with multiple injuries, a hospital spokeswoman said. Carroll County Sheriff Douglas Bass said Kirton had been hired by West Central to do remodeling. Three other people who were in the plant were not injured. The cause of the explosion in a storage tank is under investigation. The tank exploded about 3 p.m., leaving a hole in the side of the metal building and damage to the roof. West Central, one of the state's largest grain co-ops, is a leading maker of alternative fuels, lubricants and cleaners. The company's complex in Ralston processes more than 6 million bushels of soybeans a year. GREENVILLE Man, boy killed in vehicle collision Two northern Iowans were killed Tuesday in a two-vehicle collision on a Clay County road near Greenville. The Iowa State Patrol said Anthony Wayne Alspach, 37, of Spencer and Damon Nelson, 10, of Sioux Rapids, were riding in a vehicle driven by Dennis Patten, 33, of Sioux Rapids, when it was hit broadside shortly before 6 p.m. by a vehicle driven by Marcia Wilson, 44, of Webb. Alspach and Nelson were killed. Wilson Patten and two passengers in his car, Hope Nelson, 3, of Sioux Rapids, and Gage Krieger, 3, of Rossie, all were treated for minor injuries at Spencer Municipal Hospital. COLESBURG Body found in home is identified A Colesburg man found dead in his burning home apparently set the fire before shooting himself, authorities said. The victim, Richard Walter Bond, 35, was identified through dental records. Police and a rescue team responded to a fire at his house on Monday. An autopsy performed by State Medical Examiner Julia Gooden determined that Bond died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. DAVENPORT Air show director hospitalized after crash The director of the Quad-City Air Show was hospitalized with back injuries on Wednesday after the helicopter he was piloting crashed. Ken Hopper, 44, said he hopes to be released from the hospital today. Even though he cracked three vertebrae and will be wearing a brace, Hopper hopes to attend the opening day of the air show Friday. Hopper was flying the helicopter near Eldridge about 8 p.m. Monday. His 12-year-old daughter was a passenger. The engine quit about 15 feet above the ground as the helicopter began to climb, Hopper said. "Everything looked good and sounded normal, but when I went full power, there must have been a vapor lock or something. It just went quiet," Hopper said. His daughter escaped injury. Hopper has directed the air show for 13 years. ***************************************************************** 11 Nuclear bombs 'could have detonated on test flights' Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Jeevan Vasagar Thursday June 21, 2001 The Guardian Nuclear bombs supplied to the RAF in the 1950s could have exploded by accident in test flights because they contained so much fissionable material, according to a report in New Scientist magazine today. Up to a dozen of the weapons, based on a design codenamed Violet Club, were supplied to RAF bases including Finningley in South Yorkshire, Scampton in Lincolnshire and Wittering in Cambridgeshire between 1958 and 1960. Rushed into service as a stop-gap while Britain developed its own H-bomb, the gigantic devices risked going critical when armed. Each bomb held around 70kg of uranium 235, enough to create a 500 kiloton explosion [equal to 500,000 tons of TNT]. By comparison, the weapon which devastated Hiroshima had a force of 15 kilotons. The danger came when the weapons were armed and placed on "dummy run" flights to test operational readiness, according to New Scientist. Each weapon, made by the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston, was packed with 450kg of steel balls while on the ground to separate the sections of uranium so it could not form a critical mass. But the RAF feared there was a "risk of catastrophe" once this safety mechanism was disabled. In a memo dated January 12 1959, a group captain wrote: "A high yield nuclear explosion would be possible if the weapon were jettisoned or in the event of a crash on return or an accident in de-bombing." The RAF originally stored the bombs in separate buildings to minimise the risks, but later they were kept only six feet (1.8m) apart. The bombs also took too long to arm. In the event of a nuclear attack, the RAF was meant to be able to launch a nuclear-armed aircraft within 15 minutes but the group captain's memo warned that removing the metal balls took 20 minutes. It meant that aircraft carrying Violet Club took up to 90 minutes to take off. The evidence was uneathed from the public records office in London by Lesley Wright, a lecturer in statistics at John Moores University in Liverpool, David Wright of the University of Manchester, and Nicholas Hill, a physicist and historian. Ms Wright suggested the unwieldy weapon was imposed on the RAF because the government wanted Britain to be one of the "big three" nuclear powers with the US and the Soviet Union. "This is a prime example of how the pursuit of superpower status and fear overcame rational decision making." In the paper on which the New Scientist article is based, the academics quote a Foreign Office official who underlined how nuclear capability was linked to national prestige. "According to Sir Michael Perrin, [Ernest] Bevin [foreign secretary] said: "This won't do at all, we've got to have this ... I don't mind for myself, but I don't want any other foreign secretary of this country to be talked at or to by a secretary of state in the United States as I have just had ... We have got to have this thing over here whatever it costs. "Sir Michael remembers Bevin adding 'We've got to have the bloody union jack flying on top of it'." An MoD spokesman said the Violet Club bombs were supplied as a kit for Vulcan bombers "which could be assembled and deployed in a national emergency". The MoD insisted there was no risk of an accidental explosion because all necessary precautions were taken in transport and storage. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001 ***************************************************************** 12 Payments to NTS workers outlined Today: June 21, 2001 at 10:36:56 PDT By Mary Manning LAS VEGAS SUN The Departments of Labor and Energy have scheduled town hall meetings at the end of June in Las Vegas to explain how hundreds of Nevada Test Site workers can receive compensation for exposure to radiation and hazardous materials. Thousands of workers helped conduct more than 1,000 above-ground and underground nuclear weapons experiments at the Test Site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas, from 1951 to 1992, and up to 600 may be eligible for compensation, the DOE has estimated. Las Vegas is one of more than 25 communities where the town hall meetings are scheduled through July, Peter Turcic, chief of the compensation program for the Labor Department, said. The meetings are scheduled for 7 p.m. on June 28 and 1 p.m. on June 29 at Texas Station hotel-casino, Turcic said. Congress approved a new law in October that pays a lump sum of $150,000 and covers the medical expenses of workers who became ill from exposure to radiation, the metal dust beryllium used in nuclear weapons or silica as a result of working in the government's nuclear weapons industry. The Labor Department has primary responsibility under the law, Turcic said. Those attending the town hall meetings will receive a packet of information, including forms for applying to receive compensation, he said. A resource center will be set up in Las Vegas for workers who cannot attend the hearings, he said. Workers can receive information and copies of the forms necessary to apply for benefits at the center. The first compensation checks could be sent later this year. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao announced Monday that she has hired former Assistant Secretary of Energy David Michaels as a consultant to the program. Michaels held a daylong hearing in February in Las Vegas, where more than 500 Test Site workers described how they had been exposed to radiation from the nuclear blasts and dust and beryllium particles inside the tunnels. "This is our first opportunity to meet with workers and explain the law in detail," Chao said. "It's critical that people know how to fill out these forms properly." All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 13 Welcome to Atomic City Energy crisis jumpstarts a much-needed debate on the promise and paradox of nuclear power By Mark Trahant MSNBC CONTRIBUTOR ATOMIC CITY, Idaho, June 20 — I grew up near What Could Have Been. This little town was built in the desert, a promised oasis and a tribute to a new technology. Its name was as bold as its future: Atomic City. A few miles away, at the Atomic Energy Commission site, the federal government was researching the peaceful atom — a power source that would be too abundant and too cheap to even meter — and everyone expected the world to be changed forever. Flip a switch anywhere and let there be light. It was so easy to see the dream; our future was limitless. Of course, things didn’t turn out the way we thought. Like it or not, we need to re-think our attitudes on nuclear power; weigh promises and consequences, and search for consensus. ATOMIC CITY, Idaho, is now a 20th-century ghost town, little more than a reminder of What Could Have Been. The aging structures and unpaved roads also are warnings about questions raised during the nuclear age, and the paradox of applying a technology of war to peaceful purposes: How could a limitless power source instead become a lethal aggregation of waste that lasts forever? How much risk can we live with, when we know accidents are bound to occur? Are we brilliant enough to engineer nuclear technology that will last longer than all of human history — and accept the consequences if we figure wrong? A NECESSARY CONVERSATION These questions remain unresolved. Most of us know we don’t like the radioactive byproducts of nuclear power. But we leave it at that. The nuclear age, at least in this country, has all but disappeared. Sure, we have some fights, but mostly we’ve given up on the conversation about how to use nuclear power or what to do with radioactive waste. We’ve let it go because the answers are hard and consensus is elusive. Like any paradox, nuclear power leaves us with solutions that conflict with our values, technology, or our health. It’s much easier to not talk about it, to not seek consensus or to not effect a new policy. The very promise of nuclear energy has become its own ghost town in our minds. Now we have a new energy crisis — and a presidential administration bent on again harnessing the atom. I don’t know about the wisdom of that, but I am grateful that President Bush is pushing us toward a conversation we need to have. Like it or not, we need to re-think the idea of nuclear power, weigh its promises and consequences, and search for consensus. THE PROMISE OF NUCLEAR POWER “Occasional pages of history do record the faces of the ‘Great Destroyers’ but the whole book of history reveals mankind’s never-ending quest for peace, and mankind’s God-given capacity to build,” President Dwight Eisenhower told the United Nations in 1953. “It is with this book of history, and not with isolated pages, that the United States will ever wish to be identified. My country wants to be constructive, not destructive. It wants agreement, not wars, among nations. It wants itself to live in freedom, and in the confidence that the people of every other nation enjoy equally the right of choosing their own way of life.” Thus began the recognition of the peaceful atom, the notion that this terrible thing could be harnessed and used to build a better society. So Atomic City was built, homeowners were promised a new electric source that practically free, and nuclear power plants began to sprout like a new crop. But the paradox was not far behind, a trap that catching rhetoric and asking uncomfortable questions. What about the radioactive waste — such as the growing piles of discarded contaminated clothing that people wore when working near things nuclear. How would we dispose of the tools that are toxic for thousands of years to come? What about spent nuclear fuel rods, once used in reactors and now stored in pools waiting for a solution? Our answer so far is the most arrogant proposition of all time: To build a nuclear waste repository in the Nevada desert that must stand twice as long as the pyramids. Is our knowledge of the next 10,000 years that secure? Do we even know what will happen in a decade or two? The government states it this way: “For 10,000 years after the repository is closed, people living near Yucca Mountain are expected to receive little or no increase in radiation exposure. … Subject to uncertainties.” BURIED CONTAMINATION Now we have a new energy crisis — and a president bent on again harnessing the atom. I don’t know about the wisdom of that, but I am grateful that Bush is pushing us toward a conversation we need to have. A couple of years ago, a radioactive blob bubbled away in a million-gallon holding tank on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington state, affecting the groundwater and contaminating the Columbia River. No one knew why, exactly. The U.S. Department of Energy said in the harsh talk of government that the agency had “incentivized the contractor to develop and execute an aggressive plan to mitigate the level rise in tank 241-SY-101.” In other words, DOE would spend more money and private contractors would figure this out. But our policy decisions about nuclear waste are based on assumptions, some scientific, some economic, that require us to move ahead. It doesn’t seem to matter what we don’t know. Our nuclear conversation essentially stopped when the energy industry stopped building power plants. Most folks assumed nuclear power was not safe and left it at that. Congress, and the rest of government, concentrated on forcing Nevada and other western states to accept various sorts of nuclear waste with as little debate as possible. Even now, the Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste site in Nevada is supposedly a study, not a reality, yet the infrastructure is already being built. If you only look at nuclear power, its expense and consequences, it would be so easy to let it be no more. But the paradox remains. If not nuclear, will we continue to heat up our planet with fossil fuels or to kill off species with hydroelectric dams? And even if you are against all things nuclear, what will we do with our millions of tons of radioactive waste? LET’S START TALKING The very promise of nuclear energy has become its own ghost town in our minds. That’s why this conversation is so important. We don’t have good options, but there are some things we ought to try. The Idaho Falls Post-Register, for example, suggests new experiments with re-processing nuclear fuels, turning waste into something that can be used. “Re-processing was halted because of proliferation concerns,” the newspaper said. “It’s a moot issue. Most of the nuclear nations have re-cycled materials.” It’s not enough just to say: “no more nukes.” Now we need to figure out what are our alternatives and weigh whether they’re worth the effort. We need to explore a new path to What Could Be. Mark Trahant is a journalist and an expert on the American West. He is a member of Idaho’s Shoshone-Bannock Tribe and is chairman of the Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education. Your ***************************************************************** 14 Defense rests its case in lawsuit over beryllium Rocky Mountain News: Local By Ann Imse, News Staff Writer Beryllium producer Brush Wellman Inc. ended its defense Wednesday without confronting evidence that it colluded with the federal government in the late 1970s to stop OSHA's attempt to tighten safety standards for beryllium. Some 32 people with chronic beryllium disease and their spouses have sued Brush Wellman, claiming it is responsible for causing the illness, which saps the ability to breathe. They say the company conspired with the federal government to conceal the dangers of beryllium because it was needed to make nuclear weapons throughout the Cold War. The plaintiffs say Brush Wellman knew workers who breathed less than the federal standard of 2 micrograms of beryllium per cubic meter of air were becoming ill. They also say the company conspired to prevent the Occupational Safety and Health Administration from raising the standard in the 1970s by threatening to halt the supply of beryllium to the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant. The only other producer had just dropped out of the business. Defense attorneys said Brush Wellman had good reason to believe the existing safety standard prevented beryllium disease. They also tried to shift blame to Rocky Flats, saying it allowed its workers to breathe amounts of beryllium higher than the standard. The first part of the case, determining Brush Wellman's liability for the first eight plaintiffs, will go to final arguments today in Jefferson County District Court. Damages, if any, will be determined in a second phase. On Wednesday, the defense read to the jury a 1984 Department of Energy inspection of the Rocky Flats beryllium shop that found inadequate ventilation, poor housekeeping, erratic training and respirators fitted every four years instead of yearly as required. Fifteen of 17 test cloths smeared against walls found excessive amounts of beryllium, the report said. Defense attorneys also tried to show that the plaintiffs in this first phase -- four Rocky Flats beryllium disease victims and their spouses -- failed to meet Colorado's two-year statute of limitations. They were diagnosed, and filed workers' compensation cases against Rocky Flats many years before the case against Brush Wellman was filed in 1996. June 21, 2001 2001 © The E.W. Scripps Co. ***************************************************************** 15 US Government Urged to Abandon Nuclear War Plan Thursday, June 21, 2001, updated at 08:10(GMT+8) A US environmental organization has called on the Bush administration to get ride of its nuclear war plan aimed at Russian, China and other potential rivalries, and drastically whittle down its nuclear arsenal, presumably with more than 8,000 warheads at present, to a few hundred. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), in a study released on Tuesday, also called for shifting nuclear war planning to a civilian-military command under the oversight of U.S. Congress. Under its nuclear attack plan, which was codified into a Single Integrated Operation Plan (SIOP) in 1960, the United States has directed thousands of nuclear warheads against numerous targets in Russia, China and some other Cold War "enemies," including factories, command bunkers and military bases. According to the latest issue of Times magazine, 10 years after the Cold War came to an end, the United States now still possesses 5,400 warheads loaded on intercontinental ballistic missiles on land and at sea, an additional 1,750 nuclear bombs and cruise missiles ready to be launched from B-2 and B-52 bombers, a further 1,670 nuclear weapons classified as "tactical." Under the latest SIOP, approved by President Bill Clinton in 1997, more than 2,000 warheads remain on constant alert on land- and-sea-based missiles, which can take off within 30 minutes once Russia, Chian or some other nations launch a surprise nuclear attack against the United States. The NRDC's two-year study shows that a U.S. strike at Russian missile silos and other nuclear forces would kill 8 million to 12 million Russians. Another study concludes that a single U.S. Trident missile submarine, which carries 192 nuclear warheads, could inflict more than 50 million casualties if the missiles hit Russian cities. In its latest study report, the NRDC complains that the U.S. nuclear weaponry stockpile is too large and should be cut off sharply. "At this stage in the disarmament process, a U.S. stockpile numbering in the hundreds is more than adequate to achieve the single purpose of deterrence," the NRDC said in the report. Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved | ***************************************************************** 16 HSE publishes report on performance of atomic weapons establishment under new management UK Government: [M2 Communications Ltd.] Story Filed: Thursday, June 21, 2001 12:18 PM EST Jun 21, 2001 (M2 PRESSWIRE via COMTEX) -- The Health &Safety Executive (HSE) today published a report reviewing the first 12 months operation of the Atomic Weapons Establishments (AWE) sites at Aldermaston and Burghfield, Berkshire, under a new management contractor. This honors a commitment given by HSE when the sites were relicensed in April 2000. The report, by HSE's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII), states that inspection activities have confirmed that the licensee's safety performance continues to be satisfactory. Many areas of good practice and innovative thinking have also been identified, including: progress on waste management and decommissioning; and reduced radiation doses to workers, with further targets set. Areas for further development and improvement have, inevitably, been identified as a result of HSE's routine inspections over the last 12 months. Issues raised in the report will be progressed as part of normal regulatory business and NII will continue to report quarterly to the Local Liaison Committee. However, the report concludes that in NII's judgment the management systems put into place and those being developed at AWE should, if adequately implemented, deliver a satisfactory level of safety performance in the future. Announcing today's report, Laurence Williams, HM Chief Inspector of Nuclear Installations, said: "In view of the public concern at the time of relicensing Aldermaston and Burghfield in April 2000, I promised to report on the new contractor's safety performance after it's first year of operation. "This report gives details of our assessment and, overall, we are satisfied that from a health and safety point of view, the change of contractor at AWE has been successful. Safety standards have been maintained and, in my opinion, are improving. We are not complacent, however, and NII will maintain close regulatory scrutiny of the contractor to ensure the public and workforce are adequately protected." Copies of 'Relicensing of the Atomic Weapons Establishment Sites to AWE plc - Report on the performance of AWE plc as a licensee twelve months after the relicensing of Aldermaston and Burghfield on 1 April 2000', are available free from Nuclear Safety Directorate Information Centre, HSE, Room 004, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ (Tel: 0151 951 4103/Fax: 0151 951 4004). The report will also be available on HSE's website at www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/licensee.pdf Notes to Editors 1. The Nuclear Installations Act 1965 (as amended) requires that any site used by a corporate body for prescribed activities with nuclear materials must be licensed. Such activities are conducted at the AWE sites at Aldermaston and Burghfield. 2. Both sites are owned by the Ministry of Defence (MoD), who managed operations until 1993. As a government department, MoD was not subject to the civil nuclear licensing regime. Since 1993 the sites have been managed by civilian contractors. The first, Hunting-BRAE Ltd, was initially exempted from licensing, but was brought under the regime in July 1997, when HSE issued nuclear site licences for Aldermaston and Burghfield. Standard licence conditions apply to all nuclear safety issues arising at the two sites, except for matters associated with the design of nuclear weapons (which remain with MoD). 3. Hunting-BRAE Ltd's contract expired on 31 March 2000. After a tendering exercise, MoD appointed AWE ML, a consortium formed by British Nuclear Fuels plc, Lockheed Martin and Serco, as the new management contractor. 4. Despite the change in contractor, the sites continued to be operated by AWE plc and MoD decided that AWE plc should be the licence holder in all future contracts. AWE plc employs the scientific and operational staff and is in day-to-day control of activities on the sites. AWE ML owns all the shares in AWE plc, with the exception of one Special Share retained by the Secretary of State for Defence. 5. In view of public concerns over the change in contractor, HSE offered to issue safety performance reviews at three months and 12 months. This was announced by the Secretary of State for Defence in a House of Commons Written Answer on 29 March 2000. 6. A report on HSE's three month review was published in July 2000. This concluded that health and safety had been successfully managed during the change of contractor and licensee. The purpose of today's report is to review AWE plc's safety performance over the first 12 months under its new management contractors. Performance has been reviewed continuously over the period as part of the routine regulatory oversight, augmented by an additional team inspection at the end of the period. 7. Two Inspectors from the Environment Agency worked with the HSE review team to ensure that where HSE and the Agency have joint interests, the opportunity was taken to explore and report on matters of mutual concern. PUBLIC ENQUIRIES: Information Centre, Nuclear Safety Directorate, HSE, Room 004, St Peter's House, Balliol Road, Bootle L20 3LZ (Tel: 0151 951 4103 / Fax: 0151 951 4004 / email nsd.infocentre@hse.gsi.gov.uk). http://www.hse.gov.uk/press/press.htm M2 Communications Ltd disclaims all liability for information ***************************************************************** 17 U.S. labor department to brief IAAP workers The Hawk Eye Newspaper June 21, 2001 Iowa Time: 12:21 AM Local News: 6/21/2001 By Dennis J. Carroll The Hawk Eye U.S. Department of Labor officials will brief former Middletown nuclear weapons workers on how to apply for compensation benefits during meetings July 17 in Burlington. The meetings will be held at 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. at Memorial Auditorium, the department said. The department is charged with administering the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act passed by Congress last year. The program was proposed by former Energy Secretary Bill Richardson to compensate former nuclear weapons workers, or their survivors, who suffered health problems or even died because of their exposure to radiation and other hazardous materials. Former workers or their survivors -- if they were under 18 years old when the worker died -- can begin applying for the compensation benefits on July 31. The compensation package includes a lump sum payment of $150,000 and medical costs incurred after applying for the benefits. The diseases covered are limited to those that may have been caused by exposure to radiation, beryllium or silica, which caused silicosis among uranium miners. Kristina Venske with the University of Iowa health research team surveying former Iowa Army Ammunition Plant workers, said AEC workers who have tested positive for beryllium sensitivity but have not contracted the disease will qualify for medical expense coverage but not the $150,000. Venske said IAAP claimants must: • Be able to prove they were AEC workers. • Show documentation of their diagnosis. • If they are survivors of AEC workers, have a birth certificate to show they are a relative of a worker and have the worker's death certificate. She said the compensation program does not cover relatives of workers who may have been made ill by hazardous materials the workers brought home from the plant on their clothing or in some other way. Venske said her researchers will help former workers fill out their compensation forms and document their disease diagnoses. However, she said, health reports from private physicians will also be accepted. Anyone wishing information on the compensation program can find detailed information and claim forms on the Internet at http://www.dol.gov/dol/esa/public/regs/compliance/owcp/eeoicp/main.htm. Former workers may also contact the Department of Labor toll-free at (866) 888-3322. The compensation is to be paid with federal money through state worker compensation programs. Venske also said former IAAP workers made ill by exposure to hazardous materials not associated with AEC work may be eligible for state worker compensation, although not through the federal program. The Atomic Energy Commission assembled and dismantled nuclear weapons and in later years test-fired components of those weapons at the plant from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. The labor department recently announced that special offices will be set up at nine locations around the country to help former nuclear weapons workers file their claims. The Hawk Eye 800 S. Main St., Burlington Iowa 52601 319-754-8461 Front Desk · 319-754-6824 FAX · 1-800-397-1708 Toll Free ***************************************************************** 18 Sick-worker payment plan faces doubts Savannah NOW: Local News - 062101 loc 9 SavannahNOW - Savannah Morning News For some people, the assurance that the federal government finally plans to compensate sick nuclear-weapons workers was enough.-->Web posted Thursday, June 21, 2001 By Brandon Haddock Morris News Service AUGUSTA -- For some people, the assurance that the federal government finally plans to compensate sick nuclear-weapons workers was enough. For others, a payment will be the only proof. "If they ever give us anything, I'll believe it when I see it," said Eloise Roberts, a former Savannah River Site worker who attended a public meeting Tuesday in North Augusta about the federal plan to compensate sick workers at SRS and other nuclear-weapons sites. More than 400 people attended the two meetings about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. The act, which will take effect July 31, will provide lump-sum payments of $150,000 to some current and former sick workers. Eligible workers also will receive compensation for medical expenses from the date their claims were filed. Many people who attended Tuesday's meetings indicated that they might file claims because of cancer. Such claims will be screened using guidelines developed by the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services, said Jeffrey Nesvet, a deputy associate solicitor for the U. S. Department of Labor. If the department finds a 50 percent or greater chance that a person's cancer was caused by nuclear-weapons work, then that employee or survivors would become eligible for benefits, Nesvet said. Some studies suggest that a few SRS workers also might qualify for benefits because of beryllium sensitivity. The condition, similar to an allergy, can develop into chronic beryllium disease, an inflammation of the lungs caused by exposure to beryllium, a metal used in weapons production. In addition, the Energy Department must help employees found to suffer from work-related illnesses not covered by the federal program, such as asbestosis, Energy Department officials said. The agency will help those workers file state workers' compensation claims, said Jeff Eagan, a special assistant in the Energy Department's Office of Environment, Safety and Health. But some attendees questioned whether help truly was on the way. They noted the Energy Department's historic denials that anyone was sickened from weapons work, and the difficulty many employees have faced in receiving complete medical records from the agency and its contractors. "I don't see any hope for sick people, period," said Freddie Fulmer, an Aiken, S. C., resident who suffers from a multitude of diseases he says were caused by his work at SRS."This is just a way to make people happy, to have another meeting. I have been to meetings like this since 1999." Eartha Rogers worked at SRS for more than 14 years and said she was unjustly fired shortly after she was diagnosed with lupus. She plans to file for benefits, but said she is skeptical because officials will determine how much exposure employees suffered, something she says they won't accurately do. "I can't tell you how many nights I stayed late while they cut our clothes off and scrubbed us down after working," she said. Federal officials urged critics to give the program a chance. An Energy Department spokesman acknowledged that some workers' medical records were incomplete, but said that shouldn't prevent anyone from applying for help. "I'm glad the issue is being addressed, and I would encourage people to apply through whatever program through which they can receive benefits," said Bill Taylor, an Energy Department spokesman at SRS. Curtis Young, who attended the Tuesday evening meeting, suffers from heart maladies and other conditions, problems he says are a result of working at SRS for more than 30 years. He said he is glad the compensation plan now exists, but wishes more people qualified. "There should be no question about it," Young said."The government should compensate people for all those years of exposure." The Labor and Energy departments will open a resource center in North Augusta to help people seeking to file claims, Eagan said. The center will be open before July 31, he said. © 2001 Savannah Morning News. All rights reserved. PRIVACY POLICY ***************************************************************** 19 Iraq close to building nukes - defector The Jerusalem Post Newspaper : Online News From Israel - News Article [The Jerusalem Post Internet Edition] 30 Sivan 5761 12:55Thursday June 21, 2001 By Janine Zacharia WASHINGTON (June 21) - Iraq has all the basic components necessary for a nuclear bomb, but it is unclear whether it has acquired the fissile material to power it, the former head of Iraq's nuclear weapons program said yesterday. Describing Iraq's nuclear weapons program as "more or less complete," Dr. Khidhir Hamza, who defected from Iraq in 1994, told the American Enterprise Institute that no sanctions or inspectors could thwart the well-concealed Iraqi program. "The basic bomb components are there in Iraq. The casting is there. One of the casting furnaces was taken out but another one was built... The fuse components are there. Explosives are there. And the initiator for the nuclear reaction is there. So bomb-wise, Iraq is finished. It has the full technology to make a nuclear bomb," Hamza said. Hamza said he understood that Iraq now has a much better bomb design than the one he was involved in producing, "but the bottleneck remains the supply of fissile material." If Iraq has managed to purchase such nuclear-ready material, he said, "Iraq has a nuclear weapon by now. If it [has] not, it will have within a short time a nuclear weapon. I expect, another year." Citing German intelligence estimates, Hamza said Iraq is said to have 1.3 tons of low-enriched uranium and 12 tons of natural uranium, which in their processed form would supply enough material for roughly six bombs. Now, he said, scientists are focused on adapting the bombs to missiles that can transport them. With continued sanctions making smuggling difficult, Hamza speculated that Iraq is also pursuing a program to develop the technology to produce its own fissile material primarily through what is known as "diffusion." "Iraq has the material right now, has the technology right now, to go into uranium enrichment if it wants," he said. Israel bombed an Iraqi nuclear reactor in 1981. Hamza said the Iraqi nuclear program is so well disguised and dispersed - in hospitals, schools, and small buildings in industrial complexes - that even if UN inspectors, absent since 1997, returned, they would never be able to detect it. And since most of the material necessary for the bomb is already inside Iraq, sanctions, he said, can do little to prevent Saddam Hussein from acquiring a nuclear weapon. "The program is now harder to target, probably impossible to target," he said. © 1995-2001, The Jerusalem Post - All rights reserved, ***************************************************************** 20 N-bombs 'could have gone off by accident' ISSUE 2218 Thursday 21 June 2001 By Robert Uhlig, Technology Correspondent UP to a dozen nuclear bombs stored at British military bases in the late 1950s were highly dangerous and probably useless because they could have exploded accidentally once they were armed. According to recently declassified Royal Air Force papers, the 500-kiloton weapon, codenamed Violet Club, was of such poor design and contained so much radioactive material that the RAF considered there was "a risk of catastrophe" if the bomb was armed. Despite the fears, Violet Club was rushed into service in 1958 so that Britain could match Russian and American claims of having a nuclear weapon with a megaton capability. David Wright of Manchester University said: "It was a case of early spin, but Violet Club was dangerous, very difficult to operate and the air force was very unhappy about it." Working with Lesley Wright of John Moores University in Liverpool and David Wright, a military and space historian, Mr Wright uncovered the declassified documents at the Public Records Office in London. He said each Violet Club bomb contained 70kg of uranium 235, enough to create a 500-kiloton explosion that would be equivalent to 25 Hiroshima blasts. Up to a dozen of the weapons were stored at RAF bases in South Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Cambridgeshire between 1958 and 1960. According to the declassified documents, the RAF was concerned that each bomb contained so much radioactive material that it risked going "super-critical". Nuclear weapons use an explosion to force together two masses of radioactive material - uranium or plutonium - so that they implode in a fraction of a second. Mr Wright said: "There was so much fissile material in Violet Club that there was no need for an implosion and you could have had a super-criticality accident." The unwieldy bomb was stored in parts. It was packed with 450 kg of steel balls to keep the separate masses of uranium apart. In the event of a nuclear attack being launched, Violet Club would have been assembled in the aircraft and the steel balls removed. Mr Wright added: "Once the balls were dropped there was no method of de-arming the bomb and there was a risk of producing the supercritical mass. You could not then return safely. You came back very carefully with the weapon, with a lot of people holding their breath." A Ministry of Defence spokesman said: "Violet Club was never fully cleared by the RAF but a small number were issued for use in an emergency." ***************************************************************** 21 Energy's dark cloud holds a silver lining and Bid Gilley good riddance The Oak Ridger Online - Opinion - Our Views 06/21/01 Story last updated at 10:58 a.m. on Thursday, June 21, 2001 Our Views Here is how our own Rep. Zach Wamp reads some of the recent political winds in Washington, and we think he reads them well. What changed, Rep. Wamp said during a meeting Monday with The Oak Ridger, between the time when President Bush first proposed his budget and this week, when his own party appeared poised to spend even more than Mr. Bush proposed for energy, was quite simply a worsening energy crisis. Republicans and Democrats alike, no doubt fearful of being asleep at the switch during any threat of power brownouts or long lines at gasoline stations, voted to spend $1.2 billion more next year than Mr. Bush proposed for energy and water programs. Rep. Wamp was recently appointed to the important Energy and Water Subcommittee, from where it is clearly easier to read political winds, and to affect their direction. If the congressional muscle flex on energy holds, as Mr. Wamp believes it will, Oak Ridge will benefit in a major way with full funding during a second critical year for the Spallation Neutron Source now under construction, a new Mouse House, and a host of cleanup projects. This funding deserves to pass because it moves America incrementally toward stepped-up energy research and away from the kinds of surprises and hardships that sweep the nation during energy woes. Bid Gilley good riddance Gov. Don Sundquist cuts through the legal niceties that too often surround scandals like the one currently rocking the University of Tennessee and provides some refreshing leadership. The simple fact is, UT President J. Wade Gilley abruptly stepped down from his post, after tarnishing both the school and himself by his behavior, and should not be moved into some cushy, payoff position as a consultant to the school. He should go, and the sooner the better. Gov. Sundquist says UT and the state of Tennessee, and notably its taxpayers, need not be burdened by any added costs. That is especially true for one whose reckless behavior becomes more shameful by each new revelation that surfaces. The full damage he has inflicted upon UT cannot yet be estimated. Our own Sen. Randy McNally, who heads the Senate Education Committee, is properly gathering together the record to assure that Tennessee avoids going down this road again. The quicker UT can distance itself from Mr. Gilley, the better. Enough damage has been inflicted already upon the university. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 22 Quotes scientist on health studies The Oak Ridger Online - Opinion - Your Views 06/21/01 Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 10:56 a.m. on Thursday, June 21, 2001 Your Views The Oak Ridge community faces some difficult issues in regards to potential public health impacts from exposure to radiation and contaminants from the Department of Energy facilities -- not to mention the Tennessee Valley Authority and other polluters in the area, as well as historical exposures from the government's nuclear weapons testing program. Some of the difficulties communities face were discussed by Dr. Timothy Joseph, senior scientist at DOE Oak Ridge Operations, in an article published in Environmental Health (October 1999, p. 22, http://www.bigchalk.com). In this article, Dr. Joseph raises the very important question, "Can science be properly managed by the federal government in a public arena saturated with conflicting agendas and predetermined ideas about outcomes?" He discusses the challenge government managers and politicians face in deciding how to respond to public outcry to do something about the environmental and health problems, particularly since "science and politics may have different destinations. Science wants to prove that a correlation does or does not exist. Politics wants to solve the problem. . . Which leads us to a discussion of the never-ending-study syndrome we seem to have in Oak Ridge, which has been a concern expressed by community stakeholders because of the millions of dollars spent studying Oak Ridge without ever reaching a final conclusion or closure. According to Dr. Joseph, "Often, a lengthy and expensive project will conclude that further study is needed ... "When science is unable to prove a correlation, it can only conclude that a correlation could exist." However, he points out "that same conclusion often can be drawn before the study is begun, and the need should be addressed at that time." He states that "a concern can be addressed and studied for years with millions of dollars but never solved. Concerns can, however, be answered. "The answer may be that a multimillion dollar study will likely provide a definitive cause and effect, and that the study, though expensive, has value. "Or, the answer may be that the use of this tool will only bring us a little closer to understanding the complexity of the problem because the tool simply can't yield conclusive results either way. Thus, the benefit does not justify the cost of this particular study. ... Susan Arnold Kaplan Knoxville All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 23 British Atom Bombs Could Have Caused 25 Hiroshimas Wednesday June 20 2:15 PM ET LONDON (Reuters) - While researching its own nuclear bomb in the late 1950s, Britain held enough nuclear explosives to cause hundreds of Hiroshima blasts, declassified Royal Air Force papers showed Wednesday. Up to a dozen fission weapons were supplied to RAF bases between 1958 and 1960 -- each with the explosive capacity of 25 Hiroshima bombs, the New Scientist magazine said. The bombs held around 70 kilograms of uranium-235 each -- enough to create a 500-kilotonexplosion -- but were packed with 450 kilograms of steel balls in order to separate the sections of uranium and avoid a blast. Yet the papers showed the RAF still had safety concerns. ``A high-yield nuclear explosion could be possible if the weapons were jettisoned, or in the event of a crash on return, or an accident in de-bombing,'' one memo, dated January 1959, said. The Ministry of Defense, however, said there was no risk of an accidental explosion. - | Copyright © 2001 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or ***************************************************************** 24 Agency approves fine against DOE Amarillo Globe-News: Texas News: 06/21/01 Agency approves fine against DOE By DEON DAUGHERTY Morris News Service The state's environmental agency approved on Wednesday a $5,000 fine against the Department of Energy for its delay in reporting groundwater contamination from the Pantex Plant in Amarillo. On March 3, 2000, Pantex officials reported low levels of trichloroethylene, known as TCE, contamination in the Ogallala Aquifer - nine months after first learning of it. No contamination has been detected in the area's drinking water wells, but Pantex has provided water to six families. TCE is an industrial solvent and a likely carcinogen linked to liver and kidney damage, birth defects and childhood leukemia. The fine is based on two violations: facility officials failed to notify the state of "any noncompliance which may endanger human health or safety or the environment or concerning a release of solid waste which may cause an endangerment to the public drinking water supplies," and failed to provide all analysis data for groundwater wells at the plant's burning grounds within 90 days. Pantex has since provided notification of the release of the "hazardous constituents to groundwater" and provided analysis of the groundwater monitoring well as required by the TNRCC. No other corrective action is needed at this point. However, responding to a question from TNRCC chairman Robert Huston, Tom Greimel of the TNRCC's enforcement division, said Pantex also is taking remedial action against any future problems. The fine was agreed upon by Pantex and the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission. Wednesday's vote cemented the deal. Pantex already has paid the fine. ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************