***************************************************************** 09/28/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.229 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 DOE reschedules hearings 2 Attacks raise safety concern about proposed Nevada nuclear dump 3 103 US Nuclear Power Reactors Stand Risk of Terror Attacks 4 Local govts more vigilant after terrorist attacks 5 Editorial: One more reason to end nuke dump 6 Yucca lump-sum funding criticized by lawmakers 7 Daily Events Report 8 Minister's approval of nuclear facility causes outrage 9 NRC Will Hold Public Meeting October 2 in Tennessee to Discuss 10 New Laboratory to Support Waste Isolation Pilot Plant 11 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Friday, September 28, 2001 12 Governor Guinn's Nevada Protection Fund 13 Westinghouse, Mitsubishi in AP1000 Agreement; Cooperative Effort 14 A few more weeks to gather your wits about a 10,000-year toxic dump 15 Stale iodine discovered in fallout from Jacob radio fiasco 16 Castor Transports to Go Ahead 17 Nuclear Reactors Not Made to Withstand Airborne Terrorist Attacks 18 Safety checks demanded on German nuclear power stations 19 Unified Electrical Systems (UESR): It is not our duty to support NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 A Look at Weapons of Mass Destruction 2 Court takes a break 3 Experts take a fall 4 Army orders halt to all munitions burning at Sierra Army Depot 5 Hanford watchdogs threaten suit 6 John Gray: Staving off disaster 7 REID SECURES COMMITMENT FOR $46 MILLION IN NEVADA MILITARY 8 DOE appoints new members to SSAB 9 No nuclear blast if plane hits Y-12, says Brumley 10 Crews can train but not prepare for terrorist attack 11 What to do when the siren sounds 12 LOC critiques emergency plans 13 AC steps up training against weapons of mass destruction 14 UN CALLS FOR HELP AS PAKISTAN EXPECTS 1.5M REFUGEES IN DAYS 15 People living near ammunition and chemical depots worry about attack 16 Watchdog Groups File Notice of Intent to Sue Over FFTF **************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 DOE reschedules hearings Pahrump Valley Times By:Henry Brean, Asistant EditorSeptember 26, 2001 YMP sessions in PV, AV slated for two days in October The on-again, off-again Yucca Mountain hearings are back on again for Oct. 10 and 12 in Amargosa Valley and Pahrump. For the second time in less than a week, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham announced new dates and times for the hearings, which were originally slated for Sept. 12 and 13 but were postponed twice in the wake of the terrorist attacks in New York City and Washington, D.C. In a statement issued Friday, Abraham says the hearings now would be held on Oct. 10 at Longstreet Inn and Casino in Amargosa Valley and on Oct. 12 at the community center in Pahrump. Both hearings will run from 3-9 p.m. and will be preceded at 2 p.m. by a poster session, during which scientists and other project officials will be on hand to answer questions from the public. The U.S. Department of Energy was roundly criticized for its original plan to reschedule the Nye County's only two hearings to run simultaneously on Monday. Energy officials were also blasted for rescheduling the meetings so soon after the Sept. 11 attacks. Abraham says the decision to hold both hearings on Monday was made after it was learned that other public meetings and major sporting events had been scheduled for this week. "As President Bush made clear," Abraham explains in a letter to Sens. John Ensign and Harry Reid of Nevada, "our government does not intend to allow the terrorists to keep us from conducting the business of the American people." However, Abraham states that he decided to change the schedule once again late last week "in light of ... strong recommendations (from Ensign and Reid) to postpone these hearings to a later date." In addition to its less-than-popular decision to schedule the two hearings at the same time, DOE planned to hold the Pahrump hearing at the VFW hall on Homestead Road - a venue some believed woefully inadequate to handle the expected crowd. The Department is seeking public input on its Preliminary Site Suitability Evaluation for Yucca Mountain, which is the only site currently being studied as a permanent repository for 77,000 tons of high-level radioactive waste. Yucca Mountain is located in Nye County about 20 miles east of Beatty. Abraham had planned provide the President with a recommendation on the suitability of the site before the end of the year. The public comment period for the Preliminary Site Suitability Evaluation began in May and was due to expire on Oct. 5. DOE spokesman Joe Davis said the comment period would be extended to accommodate the hearings on Oct. 10 and 12, but the new deadline for comments has yet to be announced. ©Pahrump Valley Times 2001 ***************************************************************** 2 Attacks raise safety concern about proposed Nevada nuclear dump azcentral.com - Associated Press Sept. 27, 2001 19:20:00 LAS VEGAS - The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 have prompted the Department of Energy to take another look at the threat of a plane crash at a proposed nuclear waste repository in Nevada. "We're considering what needs to be done," said Joe Ziegler, a nuclear engineer with the department and senior technical adviser to the Yucca Mountain Project. Ziegler told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that project scientists have not analyzed a scenario involving an aircraft crashing into an aboveground building where spent highly radioactive nuclear fuel rods would be repackaged for placement deep inside the mountain. He said, however, that once the nation's 77,000 tons of radioactive waste is entombed 1,000 feet beneath the mountain's surface, an airplane crash would have little or no effect. Meanwhile, the Nevada Test Site on Tuesday began accepting low-level nuclear waste for the first time since the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. A shipment originating in Aberdeen, Md., arrived under tight security from Idaho, said Kevin Rohrer, a DOE spokesman. Another shipment is due to arrive on Thursday from Colorado, he said. A preliminary site evaluation released in July called the chances of an airplane crash at the site so remote that analyzing the consequences wasn't necessary. Steve Frishman, a geologist and consultant to the state's Nuclear Projects Agency, said the federal government cannot now dismiss a threat to Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as remote. "In light of current events, it points to a cavalier approach DOE has taken to screening out risks regardless of what the consequences are," Frishman said. The Arizona Republic azcentral.com. ***************************************************************** 3 103 US Nuclear Power Reactors Stand Risk of Terror Attacks allAfrica.com: Vanguard (Lagos) September 27, 2001 Washington D.c The 103 nuclear power reactors in the United States are vulnerable to terrorist attacks as regulatory bodies have failed to adopt adequate security measures, two watchdog groups have warned in the wake of the deadly suicide attacks on US cities. The Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Dubem Onyia yesterday said on a television programme in Abuja that the government had started the evacuation of Nigerians from Afghanistan to Pakistan. The assault has also heightened the risk of a US recession and a deeper downturn for an already deteriorating world economy, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said yesterday in a grim assessment of global prospects. And with the US still mobilising for its planned strike of Afghanistan, President George W. Bush has urged Afghans who were unhappy with the ruling Taliban to aid US led retaliation for the September 11 attacks. The Washington_based Nuclear Control Institute and the Los Angeles based Committee to Bridge the Gap cited "the extraordinary and unprecedented threat that now exists inside the United States in the wake of the (September 11) attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon." They said they had tried repeatedly over the past 17 years to persuade the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and commercial nuclear plant operators to improve their defences against possible terrorist strikes. The two groups outlined specific proposals to foil any terrorist bid to destroy US nuclear power plants, including immediate use of National Guard troops to deter attacks from land and water, deployment of anti-aircraft weapons against suicide airbone attacks, a thorough revetting of all plant employees and contractors to protect against sabotage by insiders. In a letter, they also urged the NRC to upgrade its security regulations to protect against the increased number and sophistication of attackers. In a brief response to the proposals, NRC Chairman, Richard Meserve conceded that the September 11 suicide attacks with hijacked airliners "show a need for a review of physical security provisions for nuclear power plants." But NCI President, Paul Levanthal retorted: "We do not have the luxury of time to allow the NRC and other federal agencies to engage in a prolonged bureaucratic review process." "Iran threatened attacks against US reactors as early as 1987, but recent trial testimony revealed that (Osama) bin Laden's training camps are offering instruction in 'urban warfare' against 'enemy installations,' including power plants. The United States has named Afghanistan_based bin Laden, a Saudi born militant leader, and his al Qaeda network as prime suspects for the recent attacks on US soil. "It is prudent to assume, especially after the horrific, highly coordinated attacks of September 11, that bin Laden's soldiers have done their homework and are fully capable to attack nuclear power plants for maximum effect." The terrorist assault on the United States has heightened the risk of a US recession and a deeper downturn for an already deteriorating world economy, the IMF said yesterday in a grim assessment of global prospects. "There is no doubt that the attack is having a negative effect on activity now in many regions of the globe and that it has increased what were already significant downside risks to the short-term global outlook, including for emerging market economies," IMF Chief Economist, Kenneth Rogoff said. Meanwhile, President Bush, Tuesday urged Afghans unhappy with the ruling Taliban to aid US_led retaliation for September 11 terror strikes he blames on the Islamic militia's "guest," Osama bin Laden. Bush also rejoiced at the regime's increasing diplomatic isolation, even as the White House stressed that ousting the Taliban from power was not the primary goal of the global war the President has vowed to wage on terrorism. "The mission is to root out terrorists, to find them and bring them to justice," Bush said during a joint appearance with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi after a "great discussion" at the White House. "One way to do that is to ask for the cooperation of citizens within Afghanistan who may be tired of having the Taliban in place or tired of having Osama bin Laden, people from foreign soils, in their own land willing to finance this repressive government," said the US President. Bush spokesman, Ari Fleischer said that any US military retaliation for the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon "is not designed to replace one regime with another." Copyright © 2001 Vanguard. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media ***************************************************************** 4 Local govts more vigilant after terrorist attacks Daily Yomiuri On-Line [CRIME-ACCIDENT] Yomiuri Shimbun Local governments nationwide have implemented various emergency measures in response to heightened security concerns following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. The Tokyo metropolitan government has moved to establish a system to help run the country's administration with the help of neighboring prefectures and cities in the event of a terrorist attack on the capital. Another municipality established a communications system with a U.S. Marine Corps base in the city. Meanwhile, security authorities have implemented measures to be better prepared for new forms of terrorist attacks, targeting nuclear plants and airports nationwide. === Ishihara wants better control "If this is not a war, what else is?" Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara asked the metropolitan assembly, articulating his determination to improve Tokyo's crisis control system. Ishihara emphasized the need for a backup system to help maintain the functions of central government ministries and agencies in the Kasumigaseki district of Chiyoda Ward in the event of a terrorist attack. Ishihara's concern is that a terrorist attack on the district would paralyze the country's major administrative systems. He called on four prefectures in the metropolitan area and three major cities to cooperate with Tokyo on the backup system. Meanwhile, the Iwakuni city government in Yamaguchi Prefecture has moved to establish an emergency communications system with a U.S. Marine Corps base in the city to handle a possible terrorist attack. N-plants under 24-hour guard In Ibaraki Prefecture, which has a number of nuclear facilities, 140 police officers, including 70 riot policemen, have been mobilized to patrol 21 nuclear facilities and their surrounding areas around the clock. In addition, due to concerns that Islamic extremists may carry out retaliatory attacks in response to possible U.S. military action, the prefectural government moved to station riot police at other commercial nuclear plants last Saturday. Meanwhile, the local detachment of the Japan Coast Guard has expanded its patrol areas, especially in the areas off Tokaimura and Hitachinaka, to detect possible terrorist attacks from the sea and air. It also maintains the same level of security maintenance during the night. Biological warfare a worry The Metropolitan Police Department and the Osaka prefectural police are considering measures against suicide terrorist attacks and attacks using small aircraft to disperse biological weapons. The MPD instructed the Tokyo metropolitan government to check the locks of all small airplanes at an airport in Chofu, western Tokyo, to prevent a terrorist from stealing an airplane. The MPD also instructed police stations to tighten their patrols at the Chofu airport and a heliport in Koto Ward, Tokyo. The MPD also has a special investigation squad standing by around the clock in case of attack by nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. At the U.S. Embassy and the prime minister's official residence, riot police wearing helmets and bulletproof vests stand guard. To combat a possible suicide attack by car, special armored patrol cars are stationed at key locations. Copyright 2001 The Yomiuri Shimbun ***************************************************************** 5 Editorial: One more reason to end nuke dump Las Vegas SUN September 27, 2001 The Nevada congressional delegation is on the right track in renewing attention to the terrorism dangers posed by the transportation of high-level nuclear waste. If a high-level nuclear waste dump is built at Nevada's Yucca Mountain, it would take an estimated 100,000 separate shipments by truck and train to send all of the waste here -- a frightening prospect after the Sept. 11 terrorism attacks. The Achilles' heel of Yucca Mountain always has been the dangers posed by transportation, whether from an accident or by an act of terrorism. And the ability of terrorists to orchestrate their attacks this month shows just how vulnerable the shipping of man's deadliest garbage along our highways and railroad tracks would be. It also deserves mentioning that Attorney General John Ashcroft acknowledged Tuesday that 20 people, including some who have ties to terrorists, have been charged with fraudulently obtaining driver's licenses to haul hazardous waste. Not exactly a comforting picture. Yucca Mountain is an unsafe location to store nuclear waste because of geologic reasons. And the recent terrorist attacks demonstrate that shipments of nuclear waste themselves could be tempting targets, another reason why the federal government should shut down the Yucca Mountain Project and safely leave the waste at nuclear power plants until promising technologies are developed that can render it less harmful. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 6 Yucca lump-sum funding criticized by lawmakers Las Vegas SUN September 28, 2001 By Benjamin Grove and Mary Manning The Department of Energy for the first time has asked Congress to consider paying for the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in one lump sum rather than doling out smaller annual budgets, according to an agency report. The proposal drew sharp criticism from Nevada lawmakers. Where would Congress get that kind of money -- the price tag for Yucca has been estimated at $58 billion -- during an economic slump and war time? they asked. "That's going to take an enormous amount of money away from other programs -- it will take money from education, from health care, from defense," Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said. "All the president's priorities will be cut down tremendously. Fifty-eight billion dollars is a tremendous amount of money." Congress, facing a dwindling surplus, is struggling to set the nation's budget. That's partly due to this year's tax cut, a sagging economy, increased Department of Defense spending and a $40 billion expenditure to pay for rebuilding and retaliation after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, plus $15 billion in airline aid. "There is no money available for a lump-sum payment, or any payment, to build Yucca Mountain," Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said. "The very notion that the Department of Energy is examining a lump-sum payment shows just how out of touch with reality they are." Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is the only site being considered by the DOE to bury the nation's high-level radioactive waste. The controversial project has not been approved by the president, Congress, or Nuclear Regulatory Commission, but has strong support among some lawmakers and the nuclear industry. Roughly 77,000 tons of nuclear waste, now piling up at the nation's nuclear power plants and Defense Department sites, would be hauled to Yucca on trucks and trains for several decades. The recommendation to pay, in one lump sum, the price of constructing Yucca was unveiled in an August 2001 report prepared by the Department of Energy. The House Appropriations subcommittee for energy and water requested the report, seeking proposals for a Yucca payment plan. The DOE paid consultant Booz-Allen &Hamilton Inc. was paid $486,000 to help develop proposals. The DOE earlier this month sent the 64-page document to House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rep. C.W. Young, R-Fla., but committee lawmakers and staff have not reviewed the report because the Sept. 11 attacks delayed budget negotiations, a committee spokesman said. Congress has set up a national nuclear waste fund to pay for Yucca studies and construction. For years, ratepayers who use nuclear-generated electricity have paid into the fund, now at about $11 billion. The nation's taxpayers also contribute because some Department of Defense waste would be stored at Yucca. Congress controls the fund. Each year since 1987 Congress has given the DOE money from the fund to study Yucca Mountain. Last year Congress budgeted $390 million. The DOE report outlines possible Yucca funding alternatives to the current pay-as-you-go system. The DOE will wait to recommend a specific funding scheme until the department makes its final recommendation on Yucca Mountain, perhaps later this year, DOE officials have said. One proposal in the report involves a scenario floated by pro-Yucca lawmakers earlier this year -- Give the DOE unrestricted access to the account by removing Congress' ability to set annual spending caps. Nevada's lawmakers in Congress oppose that. They also oppose the lump-sum scenario in which the DOE could request one payment in 2003. It is not clear exactly how many billions of dollars that would be. Among other uncertainties, the final design of the underground waste tomb has not been approved. The DOE official who authored the report declined to comment about it, but the report summarized the pros and cons of a lump sum payment. Among the pros, it said, a lump sum would "ensure greater certainty in the repository development schedule" the report said. Also, a lump sum would allow the DOE to offer contractors multi-year contracts, which could offer some cost savings, according to the report. The con: A lump sum would lessen congressional spending control. "This is just not going to happen," Reid spokesman Nathan Naylor said. "Sen. Reid will not abdicate congressional oversight over the largest public works project in the nation's history. To write a blank check would just be reckless." Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., also opposes any proposal that takes away the ability for Congress to set Yucca's budget annually, spokeswoman Traci Scott said. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 7 Daily Events Report U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Operations Center Event Reports For 09/27/2001 09/28/2001 ** EVENT NUMBERS ** 38259 38316 38321 38322 38323 38324 38325 !!!!!!!!! THIS EVENT HAS BEEN RETRACTED. THIS EVENT HAS BEEN RETRACTED !!!!!!! Power Reactor Event Number: 38259 FACILITY: HARRIS REGION: 2 NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/01/2001 UNIT: [1] [] [] STATE: NC NOTIFICATION TIME: 00:05[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] W 3 LP EVENT DATE: 08/31/2001 EVENT TIME: 23:08[EDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: JAMES ABRAHAM LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: STEVE SANDIN PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY MARK LESSER R2 10 CFR SECTION: DDDD 73.71 UNSPECIFIED PARAGRAPH UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT 1 HOUR SECURITY REPORT INVOLVED SAFEGUARDS SYSTEM DEGRADATION Safeguards system degradation related to detection of area boundary. Immediate compensatory measures taken upon discovery. The licensee will inform the NRC resident inspector. Contact the Headquarters Operations Center for additional details. ***** RETRACTION FROM JOHN WARNER TO LEIGH TROCINE AT 1419 ON 09/27/01 ***** The licensee is retracting this event notification. The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from the licensee: "This condition was promptly compensated for upon discovery. Harris Nuclear Plant performed a 1 hour notification due to this condition. Site personnel have determined that this issue is not reportable in accordance with NRC Generic Letter 91 03. As specified in Generic Letter 91 03, if these events are properly compensated upon discovery in accordance with Regulatory Guide 5.62 and NUREG 1304, they need only be logged. Therefore, Harris Nuclear Plant is retracting EN #38259 due to promptly compensating the condition in accordance with Regulatory Guide 5.62 and NUREG 1304." (Contact the NRC operations officer for additional information.) The licensee notified the NRC resident inspector. The NRC operations officer notified the Region 2 Incident Response Center (Jay Henson) and IAT (Roberta Warren). Fuel Cycle Facility Event Number: 38316 FACILITY: PORTSMOUTH GASEOUS DIFFUSION PLANT NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/25/2001 RXTYPE: URANIUM ENRICHMENT FACILITY NOTIFICATION TIME: 13:28[EDT] COMMENTS: 2 DEMOCRACY CENTER EVENT DATE: 09/25/2001 6903 ROCKLEDGE DRIVE EVENT TIME: 09:30[EDT] BETHESDA, MD 20817 (301)564 3200 LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 CITY: PIKETON REGION: 3 COUNTY: PIKE STATE: OH PERSON ORGANIZATION LICENSE#: GDP 2 AGREEMENT: N MONTE PHILLIPS R3 DOCKET: 0707002 SUSAN FRANT NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: RITCHIE HQ OPS OFFICER: CHAUNCEY GOULD EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: NBNL RESPONSE BULLETIN EVENT TEXT 4 HOUR 91 01 BULLETIN RESPONSE The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from Portsmouth personnel: "At 0930, uranium bearing material was observed in the interior spaces of a block wall in the X 705 recovery area the openings leading to the interior spaces of the block wall is a violation of administrative control #3 of NCSA 0705_076.A03 because the exact geometry or volume of the potential collection area is unknown. This is a loss of one leg of double contingency as defined in NCSE 0705_076.E03. The presence of an unknown (at this time) amount of uranium bearing material that was spilled (at some time in the facility's past) is a potential violation of passive design feature one of NCSA 0705_076.A03 which credits the physical integrity of X 705 system piping this would represent a loss of the second leg as defined in NCSE 0705_076.E03." "Measurements are being conducted and are ongoing to determine amount of material, which may affect this report." "SAFETY SIGNIFICANCE OF EVENTS: The safety significance of this event is potentially high (at this time) because the exact amount of Uranium bearing material that could have entered the opening in the block wall is unknown. Measurements to quantify the material are in progress. The apparent block wall construction (as evidenced by visual inspection of wall openings in the other areas of Recovery) indicates the potential for the presence of unfavorable geometry voids within and between the blocks compromising the exterior building wall." "POTENTIAL CRITICALITY PATHWAYS INVOLVED (BRIEF SCENARIO[S] OF HOW CRITICALITY COULD OCCUR): If 1) a significant amount of uranium bearing material entered the void spaces of the block wall, 2) the material has collected in the multiple voids resulting in a single unfavorable geometry configuration, 3) the material has a high enrichment and uranium concentration, and 4) the material would become sufficiently moderated, then a potentially critical configuration could result. Note that no spills or leaks of uranium bearing material from present X 705 systems has occurred at this time. The material in question has apparently been there for some time." "CONTROLLED PARAMETERS (MASS, MODERATION, GEOMETRY, CONCENTRATION, ETC.): Double contingency for inadvertent containers relies upon the physical integrity of X 705 piping to prevent a spill of an unsafe amount of material. An unsafe amount is defined by the concentration and enrichment of the material. Double contingency also relies upon administrative controls limiting the presence of unfavorable geometry or unsafe volume containers that could collect a spill or leak." "ESTIMATED AMOUNT, ENRICHMENT, FORM OF LICENSED MATERIAL (INCLUDE PROCESS LIMIT AND % WORST CASE OF CRITICAL MASS): Unknown at this time. Enrichment could be greater than 90% based upon historical operations. The form is most likely uranyl nitrate or UO2F2. Measurements for determination of mass and assay are currently in progress." "NUCLEAR CRITICALITY SAFETY CONTROL(S) OR CONTROL SYSTEM(S) AND DESCRIPTION OF THE FAILURES OR DEFICIENCIES: The openings leading to the interior spaces of the block wall is a violation of administrative control #3 of NCSA.705_076.A03 because the exact geometry or volume of the potential collection area is unknown. This is a loss of one leg of double contingency as defined in NCSE 0705_076.E03. The presence of an unknown (at this time) amount of uranium bearing material that has spilled (at some time in the facility's past) is a potential violation of passive design feature 1 of NCSA 0705_076.A03 which credits the physical integrity of X 705 system piping. This would represent a loss of the second leg of double contingency as defined in NCSE 0705_076.E03." "CORRECTIVE ACTIONS TO RESTORE SAFETY SYSTEM AND WHEN EACH WAS IMPLEMENTED: Samples of the material have been taken and DNA measurements will be taken to determine amounts of material and assay." The NRC Resident Inspector was notified and the DOE Representative will be notified. ***** UPDATE FROM JIM McCLEERY TO LEIGH TROCINE AT 1942 ON 09/27/01 ***** The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from Portsmouth personnel: "Conservative NDA analysis of the area near column A 16 indicates a total maximum mass of 225/ 113 grams 235U with an enrichment of 8.2% is present (preliminary NDA analysis reported less conservative values), which is less than the safe mass limit for uranium. Investigations to determine the extent of condition have identified three additional areas of potential concern in X 705 Recovery. These areas are: the wall near the A loop overflow column, the wall adjacent to the Calciner system, and the wall near the top of the B 38 storage columns. Each of these areas has received preliminary scans via NDA analysis to determine the potential for uranium material holdup in the block walls. Preliminary results indicate that the amount of material, if any, in the wall near the A loop overflow and near the Calciner are bounded by the amount quantified near column A 6. More detailed quantificative NDA scans for these two locations (to differentiate between surface contamination, uranium holdup, and background) are currently in progress and will be reported when available. Preliminary results indicate that no material is suspect in the wall near the B 38 storage column (near background readings). Additional NDA scans are currently in progress to locate any other potential areas of concern in the Recovery Area. "SAFETY SIGNIFICANCE OF EVENTS: The safety significance of this event is now low because the amount of uranium bearing material that entered the openings in the block wall is known to be less that 338 grams 235U which is less than the safe mass limit for uranium." Portsmouth personnel plan to notify the NRC resident inspector. The NRC operations officer notified the R3DO (Phillips) and NMSS EO (Holahan). Other Nuclear Material Event Number: 38321 REP ORG: UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/27/2001 LICENSEE: UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA NOTIFICATION TIME: 08:27[EDT] CITY: PHILADELPHIA REGION: 1 EVENT DATE: 08/29/2001 COUNTY: STATE: PA EVENT TIME: 12:00[EDT] LICENSE#: 37 00118 07 AGREEMENT: N LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION JOHN KINNEMAN R1 FRED BROWN NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: ROB FORREST HQ OPS OFFICER: JOHN MacKINNON EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: BAB2 20.2201(a)(1)(ii) LOST/STOLEN LNM>10X EVENT TEXT MISSING 21 MICROCURIE COBALT 60 TESTING SOURCE. On 08/29/01 it was discovered at the University of Pennsylvania Physics Department that a 21 microcurie cobalt 60 source was missing. An extensive survey and search of the Physics Department building was performed and the source was not found. All persons who had access to the source were questioned. The Radiation Safety Officer for the University of Pennsylvania notified NRC Region 1 office of this event. Other Nuclear Material Event Number: 38322 REP ORG: UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/27/2001 LICENSEE: UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN NOTIFICATION TIME: 09:58[EDT] CITY: MADISON REGION: 3 EVENT DATE: 09/09/2001 COUNTY: STATE: WI EVENT TIME: [CDT] LICENSE#: 48 09843 18 AGREEMENT: N LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION MONTE PHILLIPS R3 NRC NOTIFIED BY: RON BRESELL HQ OPS OFFICER: BOB STRANSKY EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: BAB2 20.2201(a)(1)(ii) LOST/STOLEN LNM>10X EVENT TEXT MISSING AM 241 SOURCES During renovation work in a laboratory, a contractor moved a workbench upon which five americium 241 anti static sources were being stored. The sources were individually contained in tubes, which apparently broke open upon striking the laboratory floor. Two of the five sources were recovered, but since the sources are extremely small (approximately 1 mm x 3 mm) and the contractor and custodial staff were unaware of their presence, the licensee believes that the three other sources were discarded in a sanitary landfill. The licensee estimates the activity of each source to be between 0.4 and 4 microCuries, and does not believe that these sources present a health risk to the general population. General Information or Other Event Number: 38323 REP ORG: MISSISSIPPI DIV OF RAD HEALTH NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/27/2001 LICENSEE: LONGVIEW INSPECTION NOTIFICATION TIME: 13:58[EDT] CITY: PASCAGOULA REGION: 2 EVENT DATE: 09/27/2001 COUNTY: STATE: MS EVENT TIME: [CDT] LICENSE#: MS784 01 AGREEMENT: Y LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION JAY HENSON/REGION 2 IRC FRED BROWN NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: B. J. SMITH HQ OPS OFFICER: LEIGH TROCINE EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: NAGR AGREEMENT STATE EVENT TEXT AGREEMENT STATE REPORT REGARDING AN OVEREXPOSURE DURING A RADIOGRAPHY EVENT On an unknown date, a Longview Inspection employee received an exposure of 4,500 mrem during a radiography event in Pascagoula, Mississippi. As a result, the individual's annual exposure increased to 5,270 mrem, which exceeded the annual limit of 5,000 mrem. The second radiographer at the scene of the event received approximately 300 mrem. An inspection is planned for next week. The Mississippi State Health Department notified the NRC Region 2 Office (Dick Woodruff). (Call the NRC operations officer for a State contact telephone number.) Power Reactor Event Number: 38324 FACILITY: BYRON REGION: 3 NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/27/2001 UNIT: [1] [] [] STATE: IL NOTIFICATION TIME: 19:39[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] W 4 LP,[2] W 4 LP EVENT DATE: 09/27/2001 EVENT TIME: 18:34[CDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: SCOTT FRUIN LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: LEIGH TROCINE PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY MONTE PHILLIPS R3 10 CFR SECTION: ASHU 50.72(b)(2)(i) PLANT S/D REQD BY TS UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N Y 98 Power Operation 98 Power Operation EVENT TEXT TECHNICAL SPECIFICATION REQUIRED SHUTDOWN DUE TO A LEAK IN A COMMON SAFETY INJECTION SUCTION HEADER The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from the licensee: "Unit 1 is required to shut down due to entry into Tech Spec 3.0.3 for both trains of SI (safety injection) pumps being inoperable (Tech Spec 3.5.2). The cause of both Unit 1 SI pump inoperability is due to a leak in the common suction header at a vent line on the common header." The licensee notified the NRC resident inspector. General Information or Other Event Number: 38325 REP ORG: CALIFORNIA RADIATION CONTROL PRGM NOTIFICATION DATE: 09/27/2001 LICENSEE: GEOTECHNICAL SERVICES NOTIFICATION TIME: 19:47[EDT] CITY: LONG BEACH REGION: 4 EVENT DATE: 09/27/2001 COUNTY: STATE: CA EVENT TIME: 08:00[PDT] LICENSE#: RAML #6290 30 AGREEMENT: Y LAST UPDATE DATE: 09/27/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION GREG PICK R4 PATRICIA HOLAHAN NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: ROBERT GREGER HQ OPS OFFICER: LEIGH TROCINE EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: NAGR AGREEMENT STATE EVENT TEXT AGREEMENT STATE REPORT REGARDING A STOLEN NITON GAUGE The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from the California Radiologic Health Branch, Department of Health Services: "This is 24 hour report [in accordance with] 10CFR20.2201(a)(1)(i) from State of California Radiologic Health Branch." "This is to report that an x ray fluorescence device has been stolen. [The] company is Geotechnical Services [in] Tustin, CA." "[The] device is a Niton S/N U2387NR1222. The operator's car was broken into some time between 7PM (9 26) and 8AM (9 27) in Long Beach. [A] police report [is] being filed, and [the] facility will run an add describing the device and offering a reward for its return." "These devices typically contain up to 50 mCi of Cd 109." (Call the NRC operations officer for state and licensee contact information.) ***************************************************************** 8 Minister's approval of nuclear facility causes outrage ABC News - Fri, 28 Sept 2001 6:57 AEST Environmental groups have slammed the Federal Environment Minister's approval of a nuclear irradiation facility at Narangba north of Brisbane. Senator Robert Hill approved the Steritech Gamma Irradiation and Decontamination Plant earlier this week, saying it was environmentally acceptable with a number of strict conditions. Friends of the Earth's Rebecca Duffy says she is concerned that a full Environmental Impact Statement was not carried out and that a number of safety issues have been left unresolved. "We actually think that it's absurd that Senator Hill can approve a nuclear radiation facility with the lowest level of assessment that he's chosen," Ms Duffy said. "We don't believe that this level of assessment can possibly take into consideration all of the possible impacts that a nuclear radiation facility will have." © 1999 Australian Broadcasting Corporation ***************************************************************** 9 NRC Will Hold Public Meeting October 2 in Tennessee to Discuss Doe Tritium Production Program Press Release - 2001 - 115 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001 E-mail: Web Site: No. 01-115 September 28, 2001 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) will hold a public meeting on October 2 with the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in Evensville, Tennessee, to discuss the DOE's planned tritium production program and requests from TVA for license amendments to permit production of tritium at the Watts Bar and Sequoyah nuclear power plants for use by the DOE. The Watts Bar facility is located near Spring City and the Sequoyah plant is near Chattanooga. The October 2 meeting will be held at the Rhea County High School Auditorium, located at 405 Pierce Road in Evensville, from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m., with an open house starting at 6 p.m. The United States has not produced tritium -- a radioactive form of hydrogen used in the fusion stage of nuclear weapons -- since 1988, when DOE closed a special production facility at its Savannah River Site. Current short-term tritium needs are being met by recycling tritium from dismantled nuclear weapons. The DOE is responsible for establishing the capability to produce tritium by the end of 2005, in accordance with a Presidential directive. For more information on the meeting, please contact Mark Padovan at 301-415-1423, or via e-mail at ***************************************************************** 10 New Laboratory to Support Waste Isolation Pilot Plant AmeriScan: September 27, 2001 LOS ALAMOS, New Mexico, September 27, 2001 (ENS) -- A new research program for the Department of Energy's (DOE) Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) will study the chemistry of materials that can affect underground radioactive waste storage sites. The program is a cooperative effort of Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) Carlsbad Operations and the Carlsbad Environmental Monitoring and Research Center of New Mexico State University to develop new research and laboratory capabilities to support WIPP's scientific needs. WIPP, located 26 miles east of Carlsbad, New Mexico, became the nation's first operating underground repository for permanent disposal of weapons related radioactive waste on March 26, 1999. "This project dovetails with DOE's intent to conduct more of its efforts in support of WIPP right here in Carlsbad, and make Carlsbad one of the few state of the art centers for repository science in the world," said Roger Nelson, chief scientist for the DOE Carlsbad field office. The new research program focuses on actinide chemistry, or the chemical behavior and properties of those elements that are heavier than radium. Actinide chemistry is important to understanding the long term performance of the WIPP repository. These radioactive exotic elements attempt to become more stable by throwing off particles and energy from their overcrowded nuclei. This actinide chemistry activity can be applied to weapons and energy production but it increases the challenge of handling these elements. The new laboratory collaboration seeks to understand the behavior of these elements to a degree never before achieved. The research program includes repository science investigations to support WIPP, reduce costs and ensure its safe and economical use far into the future. The team will use the mobile Contaminant Analysis Automation laboratory, which was developed by the DOE as a tool that can be sent to contaminated sites for quick analyses of hazardous materials. The automated lab lowers costs and reduces the time required to analyze environmental samples. The lab will be used to investigate the behavior of plutonium under many possible underground conditions, as well as developing new methods to package and treat radioactive materials to make them easier to handle. © Environment News Service (ENS) 2001. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 11 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Friday, September 28, 2001 State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects ADAMS - Items of Interest Recent Released Documents Added - Friday, September 28, 2001 These documents and others may be retrieved at the NRC PERR web site -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Item ID: 012700117 Accession Number: ML012570252 Document Date: 9/20/01 Title: 04/10/01, Meeting Summary With Westinghouse Electric Re: Staggered Engineered Safeguards Features (ESF) Testing. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DLPM/LPD4 Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700123 Accession Number: ML012630196 Document Date: 9/20/01 Title: 09/20/01, Rule, 10 CFR Parts 2, 19, 20, 21, 30, 40, 51, 60, 61, 63, 72, 73, and 75, Disposal of High-Level Radioactive Wastes in a Proposed Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. Author Affiliation: NRC/OCIO/IRDMD/RMB, NRC/SECY Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700182 Accession Number: ML012630180 Document Date: 9/20/01 Title: 09/20/01, Supporting Statement, for 10 CFR Part 63, Disposal of High-Level Radioactive Wastes in a Proposed Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. Author Affiliation: NRC/OCIO/IRDMD/RMB Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700118 Accession Number: ML012690346 Document Date: 9/26/01 Title: 10/18/01 NOTICE OF PUBLIC MEETING WITH VIRGINIA ELECTRIC TO DISCUSS ENVIRONMENTAL SCOPING PROCESS FOR THE NORTH ANNA POWER STATION, UNITS 1 AND 2, LICENSE RENEWAL APPLICATION (TAC NOS. MB1994 AND MB1995). Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700178 Accession Number: ML012690306 Document Date: 9/17/01 Title: Modification No. 002 to Task Order No. 001 Entitled "Support to Atomic Energy Committee of the Republic of Kazakhstan" Under Contract No. NRC-08-01-117. Author Affiliation: NRC/ADM/DCPM Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700175 Accession Number: ML012690280 Document Date: 9/6/01 Title: Modification No. 002, Task Order No. 010, Entitled, "Geological and Seismological Characteristics for Sitting And Design of Dry Cask Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installations, 10 CFR Part 72, Under Contract No. NRC-02-00-003. Author Affiliation: NRC/ADM/DCPM Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700064 Accession Number: ML012620459 Document Date: 9/13/01 Title: NRC Rulemaking to Adopt NFPA 805, "Performance-Based Standard for Fire Protection for Light Water Reactor Generating Plants." Author Affiliation: Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012700089 Accession Number: ML012690529 Document Date: 9/30/01 Title: NUREG/CR-6714, "Hanford Tank Waste Remediation System Pretreatment Chemistry & Technology." Author Affiliation: Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses, NRC/NMSS/FCSS, Southwest Research Institute Document/Report Number: NUREG/CR-6714 ***************************************************************** 12 Governor Guinn's Nevada Protection Fund GOVERNOR KENNY GUINN'S NEVADA PROTECTION FUND: ASSURING NEVADA'S VICTORY OVER YUCCA MOUNTAIN INTRODUCTION Calling the proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain "the single greatest threat to the health and safety of the people of this state," Governor Kenny Guinn formally proposed establishing a Nevada Protection Fund in his State of the State address on January 22, 2001. The Governor announced that he had included a multi-million dollar fund in the State's biennium budget "to fight the Department of Energy and those in Congress who are determined to make Nevada the nation's nuclear waste dump. The Governor also called on Nevada's local governments and the private sector to contribute to the endeavor. Click here for the full text of Governor Guinn's remarks. Taking up the Governor's challenge, the 2001 Nevada Legislature appropriated $4 million to be used to (1) mount legal challenges to the federal government's actions aimed siting a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain and (2) implement a public awareness campaign to make people in other states aware of the risks and impacts they will be facing from the transportation of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste should the Yucca Mountain project be approved. Following the Legislature's action, the Clark County Board of County Commissioners indicated that the County would contribute $1 million to the Fund. The Nevada Protection Fund is overseen by the Nevada Commission on Nuclear Projects, a statutorily established body that was created in 1985 to oversee the Department of Energy's Yucca Mountain program and to provide advice and guidance to the Governor and Legislature in matters related the federal program. Governor Guinn has designated the Executive Director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects as the Fund Administrator. The Commission, in its December, 2000 Report to the Governor and Legislature, recommend that the State provide resources to mount successful legal challenges to DOE's program and to provide information on nuclear waste transportation to states and communities along likely national waste transportation routes. Nevada and the nation are approaching a critical juncture with respect to the federal high-level radioactive waste program. During the next year, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) will, under the current schedule, issue a final environmental impact statement for the Yucca Mountain project and decide whether to formally recommend Yucca Mountain for development as a repository. Following DOE's actions, the President will have to decide whether to ask Congress to endorse the site recommendation and attempt to move ahead with the Yucca Mountain program. For Nevada, these decision points in the federal program represent both challenges and opportunities. The upcoming statutorily prescribed actions represent the first time the State will have the opportunity to formally challenge final decisions on Yucca Mountain's suitability and the legal, procedural, and technical processes that underlie those decisions. Just as importantly, the upcoming decisions will force DOE to acknowledge the extensive and potentially severe risks and impacts posed by the unprecedented spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste transportation campaign required to operate a repository in Nevada. The Fund is today being implemented by means of two parallel initiatives: A legal Contingency Fund and a Public Information Initiative. Information about each of these efforts can be found by clicking on the appropriate link. In addition, there are news articles and other information about the Nevada Protection Fund in the "News clippings" link to the right. + Governor Guinn's Nevada Protection Fund - Legal Contingency Fund Activities + Governor Guinn's Nevada Protection Fund - National Public Information Initiative + Governor Guinn's Nevada Protection Fund - Chronology ***************************************************************** 13 Westinghouse, Mitsubishi in AP1000 Agreement; Cooperative Effort to Support NRC Design Certification Friday September 28, 10:55 am Eastern Time Press Release SOURCE: Westinghouse Electric Company PITTSBURGH, Sept. 28 /PRNewswire/ -- Westinghouse Electric Company and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI) have reached an agreement calling for MHI to participate in the engineering and design certification activities of the AP1000, Westinghouse's advanced/passive pressurized water reactor. In partial fulfillment of the terms of the agreement, MHI will provide design and engineering resources to support the design completion of the AP1000. Once utilities and power companies purchase the AP1000, MHI will have the opportunity to provide select components for the 1000-megawatt reactor during plant construction. Charlie Pryor, president and CEO of Westinghouse, said the agreement with MHI is significant for two reasons. ``This arrangement further strengthens the mutually beneficial working relationship Westinghouse and Mitsubishi have developed over the last 70 years,'' he said. ``It also will facilitate certification by the NRC in a timely manner that should coincide with the preliminary site certifications that US utilities will need to make new plant construction a reality.'' The AP600, a smaller version of the AP1000, received design certification from the US NRC in December 1999. Like the AP600, the AP1000 is designed to be even more economical and safer than conventional nuclear power plants. Through the use of passive safety systems that rely on natural forces such as gravity to ensure safe operation, it uses fewer valves, less piping, control cable and pumps, and applies modular construction techniques to minimize construction time and costs. Currently, Westinghouse projects a construction time of about 36 months from the first concrete pour to the loading of fuel into the AP1000's reactor. Westinghouse Electric Company, wholly owned by BNFL plc, offers a wide range of nuclear plant products and services to utilities around the world, including fuel, spent fuel management, service and maintenance, nuclear automation, and advanced nuclear plant designs. Westinghouse supplied the world's first commercial pressurized water reactor nuclear power plant in 1957 and has designed the world's largest installed base of operating nuclear power plants. BNFL is a leading specialist in nuclear technology and a global supplier of nuclear fuel, products and services. Currently, around a third of BNFL's sales comes from the Westinghouse Electric business; a quarter comes from the recycling of UK and overseas customers' fuel; a further quarter of sales comes from operating the UK's Magnox power stations. The remainder of BNFL's business is in waste management and decommissioning, which is expected to grow significantly in the years ahead. SOURCE: Westinghouse Electric Company ***************************************************************** 14 A few more weeks to gather your wits about a 10,000-year toxic dump Las Vegas City Life Sunday, September 30, 2001 By Heidi Walters If you were in Amargosa Valley or Pahrump this week to attend the Department of Energy's Yucca Mountain hearings, and then wondered where all your fellow venting comrades were, here's your answer: The hearings were put off until next month. The DOE, under pressure from Nevada's delegation, agreed last week (after we went to press) to delay the hearings a bit more to allow people time to adjust to their scarier new world and grieve for the lives lost in the terrorist attacks. (If you did go to the hearing locations this week, however, you should have found a DOE rep ready to record your comments.) The new hearing dates are Oct. 10 in Amargosa at the Longstreet Casino, and Oct. 12 in Pahrump at the Veterans of Foreign Wars Hall at 4651 Homestead Road. The hearings run from 2 p.m.-9 p.m, beginning with an hour-long poster session. Copyright 2001 Las Vegas City Life ***************************************************************** 15 Stale iodine discovered in fallout from Jacob radio fiasco Irish Newspapers - Irish Independent Online - Date : Fri September 28th 01 THE Government was last night frantically trying to recover from a second day of embarrassment over the National Emergency Plan. Health Minister Micheal Martin was sent out to repair the damage caused by Junior Minister Joe Jacob's disastrous RTE radio interview with Marian Finucane. But in the course of an interview on Morning Ireland, Mr Martin was asked about the availability of iodine tablets which featured largely in Mr Jacob's responses the previous day. Non-radioactive iodine tablets reduce the uptake of radioactive iodine following post-nuclear exposure. Mr Martin said that iodine tablets were stocked in all health boards and there was sufficient stocks in all health boards. But a survey of health boards yesterday revealed that most health boards did not have any stocks of iodine tablets. While tablets had been issued some years ago, they had since passed their use by date and had been destroyed. A spokesperson for the Western Health Board said that the tablets had been tested but found to be ineffective and had been disposed of. The same situation is understood to apply to most of the other health boards. A statement by the Eastern Regional Health Authority confirmed that its large stock of iodine tablets had passed its use-by date but had been tested regularly and was still effective. The statement added: "There have been discussions in relation to distributing iodine to individual households so that each household will have its own supply readily to hand if ever needed in an emergency situation." But last night the Department of Health issued a separate statement aimed at reassuring the public about the availability of effective stocks of iodine tablets. The department statement said that the Department of Health was currently finalising the necessary arrangements for the purchase of new stocks of iodine tablets for predistribution in the event of a national nuclear emergency. The statement added: "Stocks of iodine tablets were distributed to and held by all regional health boards since 1991 as part of the National Nuclear Emergency Plan which is co-ordinated by the Department of Public Enterprise. "However, it has emerged that some health boards have disposed of these stocks as they were past their best-before date and these boards believed that they were ineffective." The statement pointed out that ingestion of iodine tablets may be effective in preventing thyroid cancer in certain populations, especially children exposed to radioactive fallout. The necessity of continued stocking of iodine tablets as part of the health input into the National Nuclear Emergency Plan was reviewed as part of an update of the overall Plan, according to the statement. It was recommended that new stocks of iodine tablets should be purchased and predistributed as a more effective counter measure. The Minister for Health and Children has accepted this recommendation and is making the necessary arrangements to restock these tablets, the statement added. There was no reference to the minister's earlier radio interview stating that sufficient stocks of tablets were already held by the health boards. Meanwhile, Tanaiste Mary Harney said the Government should embark on a public awareness campaign in the event of a national emergency as soon as it has gathered all the relevant information. While urging calm, Ms Harney said that in the light of the tragic events of September 11, the public needed to be kept informed on the emergency procedures being put in place. The defence forces were currently advising the Government on the new threat of biological warfare, something which had not been contemplated in the past, she added. Brian McDonald and Eilish O'Regan ***************************************************************** 16 Castor Transports to Go Ahead F.A.Z. - English Version F.A.Z. HANNOVER. Lower Saxony Interior Ministry officials said on Thursday they will go ahead with the planned transport of nuclear waste from a French reprocessing plant back to one of the state's storage plants, despite the recent terrorist attacks in the United States. Interior Minister Heiner Bartling said that unless military action against possible terrorists causes the security situation in Germany to deteriorate suddenly, the planned Castor nuclear waste transport from La Hague to a temporary storage plant in Gorleben will take place this year. Though the country's major police unions had advocated against resuming the transports, specialists said the Castor containers were relatively resistant to attacks. According to the calculations and tests, they would even hold up to an aircraft strike. Crash tests with the hardest part of the plane, the gearing mechanism, showed that the cooling fins of the Castor containers could be damaged, but not the walls or the lid. But staff at the Gorleben storage plant said they were not sure the containers would hold up to the sort of high-intensity heat that melted the steel girders of the World Trade Center in New York. Still, even if the walls were badly damaged, radiation spills would be relatively limited, the staff said, and a catastrophe would not necessarily ensue. Critics of resuming the transports, such as environmental groups and Rebecca Harms, chairperson of Alliance 90/The Greens in the state parliament, have so far been rebuffed by government officials. But that could change if internal German security becomes a priority. Both state interior ministers and the Federal Interior Ministry assume that if there is military action by the western world, a completely new threat to Germany will arise. About 30,000 police and Federal Border Guard officers were deployed the last time the transports made the La Hague-Gorleben trip three years ago. Officials said they would not be able to provide the same amount this time if the security situation in the country escalates. Officials also expressed concern over the possibility of attacks against Germany's nuclear power plants. Immediately following the terrorist attacks in New York, Lower Saxony's environment minister, Wolfgang Jüttner, admitted that German nuclear power plants would not be able to withstand a targeted airplane attack. If enormous pressure such as that of a big commercial aircraft were added to the high speed of the impact, the plants would "probably not hold out," he said. The result, he said, could be an uncontrolled meltdown.Sep. 27, 2001 © Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 2000 ***************************************************************** 17 Nuclear Reactors Not Made to Withstand Airborne Terrorist Attacks F.A.Z. - English Version By Dieter Schwöbel and Siegfried Thielbeer FRANKFURT. While German nuclear power plants are considered the best protected in the world, most experts agree that they could not withstand a targeted airborne terrorist attack such as when the jets crashed into the World Trade Center in New York. Security standards dating back to the 1970s stipulate that nuclear power plants must be secure against plane crashes. But these rules only take into account the possibility of accidents involving smaller aircraft, such as F-4 Phantom jet fighters, whose low-altitude maneuvers were a calculated risk. They merely aimed to prevent airplane parts from penetrating a plant's reinforced concrete shell. Crashes by bigger planes straying off course were considered unlikely. And flying below a certain altitude is forbidden in close proximity to nuclear power plants, in any case. Ever since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the United States, however, critics of the peaceful use of atomic energy are no longer alone in calling for a reevaluation of the dangers posed by such an attack. Lothar Hahn, the chairman of Germany's Reactor Security Commission, which advises the Environment Ministry, has warned "against the illusion of believing that it is possible to effectively protect reactors against events like those in New York or Washington." But, he adds, from a scientific standpoint, "no clear boundaries can be drawn between the probable and the improbable." The concrete protective shells of newer nuclear power plants are about 1.80 meters (5.11 feet) thick -- three times as strong as in older plants. Yet it is doubtful that they can withstand the impact of a fully fueled jumbo jet. Experts have thus conceded that they cannot estimate the consequences of a plane crash or attack. Meanwhile, the Federal Association of Citizens' Initiatives for Environmental Protection and other environmental protection groups have sketched horror scenarios and demanded the "immediate shutdown of all nuclear power plants." According to these groups, terrorists could seize control of planes shortly after taking off in Hamburg, Munich or Frankfurt, intentionally crashing them into the nearby Brokdorf, Stade, Biblis, Obrigheim or Isar plants within minutes. The few minutes of flight after a hijacking would practically rule out any countermeasures, they say, and whole regions could be radioactively contaminated, killing thousands of people. Similar concerns have, of course, also been plaguing policymakers. For example, the Social Democrats' state parliamentary group in Hesse has accused nuclear power plant operators of making light of the risks and have said the two reactor blocks at the state's Biblis plant pose a "great danger." The environment ministries in Baden-Württemberg and Schleswig-Holstein fear that the two states' eight reactor blocks could not withstand an attack and have commissioned reports. At the same time, the Environment Ministry has asked the nation's Reactor Security Commission to make a recommendation on if, and how, the plants' security can be improved. The results of the study are to be presented by late October to pave the way for legislation on greater restrictions or on refitting the plants. Mr. Hahn thinks preparations can be realistic against "minor occurrences" at best. He says strengthening the reinforced concrete cupolas over existing reactors makes little sense. Peter Butz of the Office for Plant and Reactor Security in Cologne agrees: "We have to start a step earlier and prevent terrorist attacks in the first place." Yet time also argues against strengthening the shells -- the Environment Ministry says this procedure would be "the equivalent of relicensing" and take years. Experts say that, at least in the newer plants, the reinforced concrete shells, called containments, can withstand the impact of a 20-ton Phantom jet fighter crashing vertically at 774 kilometers per hour (480 miles per hour). But the concrete mantle protecting plant Biblis A, which began operating in 1974, is only 60-80 centimeters (24 to 31 inches) thick. This is not enough to withstand the impact of a Phantom, according to its operating company, RWE Power. At least 10 of Germany's 19 nuclear power plants are equally inadequately protected against plane crashes, according to an internal security analysis the Environment Ministry performed in Feb., 2000. "No or inadequate protection against airplane crashes" was the verdict not only on the nuclear reactors Biblis A and B, but also on Obrigheim, Stade, Neckarwestheim 1, Unterweser, Brunsbüttel, Isar 1, Philippsburg 1 and Krümmel.Sep. 27, 2001 © Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 2000 ***************************************************************** 18 Safety checks demanded on German nuclear power stations (Uberprufung deutscher Atomkraftwerke gefordert) Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung - Germany; Sep 28, 2001 Following the terrorist attacks on the US, German MPs are increasingly concerned over security at the country's nuclear power stations. Dr Christian Ruck, an environmental spokesman for the Christian Social Union (CSU) party (which forms part of the opposition) has called upon the Social Democratic/Green coalition government to introduce a package of security measures for nuclear power stations, although he says Germany's stations are the world's safest. Dr Ruck calls for checks on buildings, security technology and staff, and improvements to early warning systems, and also favours the installation of new, safer reactor types, such as the high-temperature reactor where a core meltdown cannot take place. Meanwhile, environmentalists have criticised the 'withdrawal from nuclear power' agreed between the government and the energy sector, saying that the phasing-out programme does not take the major risks involved sufficiently into account. Abstracted from Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung All Material ***************************************************************** 19 Unified Electrical Systems (UESR): It is not our duty to support the nuclear energy industry Russia has 9 nuclear power plants (NPPs) in operation. The safety standards of the Soviet designed reactors have been highly questioned by international experts. During the last decade, the social issues at the Russian NPPs have become of major concern in line with the technical flaws. (St Petersburg:) The Russian nuclear energy company, Rosenergoatom, keeps expanding, while the service life of their nuclear stations will expire soon. Nuclear energy is more expensive than conventional energy. Russian energy utility comments for Bellona Web. Most of the Russian nuclear power plants are located in the European part of the country image: Rosenergoatom Rashid Alimov, 2001-09-28 14:20 Last Friday, the Russian Deputy Prime Minister Victor Khristenko presided over a meeting on organising the Administrator for the Trade System (ATS) into the wholesale market of electric power. A compromise was reached during the meeting between the company Rosenergoatom, controlling all nuclear power plants in the Russian Federation, and the Russian joint-stock company Unified Electrical Systems (UESR). The compromise involves that UESR will have 50% of the votes in the Supervisory Council. 50% is less, than UESR asked for (about 80%), but it is higher than the ATS regulation, prepared by Rosenergoatom, required (25%). The paperwork required to launch ATS should be completed in two months, and it is not clear, whether the armistice between the energy jumbos will be sustained. Today UESR covers 80% of the electric power market (the Federal Wholesale Market of the Electric Power (FOREM)). The remaining 20% belong to Rosenergoatom). Nuclear power plants produce about 15% of the total energy supply in Russia, while the thermal stations generate up to 60%. Conflict between Rosenergoatom and UESR In the beginning of September, Rosenergoatom stated that UESR, controlling 75% of the Russian energy infrastructure, limits the access of “cheap electric power from nuclear power plants to the wholesale market”. The company’s representatives also accused UESR of hampering Rosenergoatom’s export of electricity to Georgia and Ukraine. The press centre of Rosenergoatom released a statement saying that due to the artificially set grid limitations, the nuclear power plants failed to generate about 4 billion kWh of electric energy in the period from January to August 2001. The main reason for the limitations was allegedly the UESR’s monopoly on both sales and transportation of electricity, which was claimed to limit the access of cheap electric energy on the wholesale market. Rosenergoatom also stated that these limitations were set by UESR in an attempt to protect the thermal electric stations, owned by UESR. Rosenergoatom also threatened UESR with a trial, but the threat was never carried out. In an interview with Bellona Web, the head of the UESR press service, Yury Melikhov, said: - The company [Rosenergoatom] intentionally reduced the grid capacity for its nuclear power plants in order to raise the prices on electricity later. As concerning their threats, we are sure that they will not go to court, despite of the harsh PR-campaign. Furthermore, Rosenergoatom, when realising the futility of their claims, withdrew the plea that we allegedly hampered nuclear energy export to Georgia and the Ukraine. As to the accusations, they are far-fetched and baseless. It is necessary to remember that it is not UESR’s duty to sustain the production of nuclear energy. Background: new structure of Rosenergoatom According to the governmental decree N1207-r, Rosenergoatom will comprise the following state-owned power-producing plants: 1. Balakovo NPP (Balakovo, Saratov county). 2. Beloyarsk NPP (village of Zarechny, Sverdlovsk county). 3. Bilibino NPP (village of Bilibino, Chukotka autonomous area). 4. Kalinin NPP (Udomlya, Tver county). 5. Kola NPP (Polyarnye Zori, Murmansk county). 6. Kursk NPP (Kurchatov, Kursk county). 7. Leningrad NPP named for V.Lenin (Sosnovy Bor, Leningrad county). 8. Novovoronezh NPP (Novovoronezh, Voronezh county). 9. Smolensk NPP (Desnogorsk, Smolensk county). 10. Management of the Voronezh nuclear heat-producing power plant under construction (Shilovo, Voronezh county). 11. Management of the Kola NPP-2 under construction (Polyarnye Zori, Murmansk county). 12. Management of the Novovoronezh NPP-2 under construction (Novovoronezh, Voronezh county). 13. Management of the Rostov NPP under construction (Volgodonsk, Rostov county). 14. Management of the Kostroma NPP under construction (Buy, Kostroma county). 15. Management of the Bashkir NPP under construction (Aghidel, Republic of Bashkiria). 16. KurskTurboAtomEnergoRemont (Kurchatov, Kursk county). 17. State manufacturing company SevAtomRemont (Polyarnye Zori, Murmansk county). 18. State firm on corrective maintenance of the NPPs AtomEnergoRemont (Mytischy, Moscow county). 19. Corporation on adjustment, optimising and control over the NPPs AtomTechEnergo (Mytischi, Moscow county). 20. All-Russian Research Institute on the NPPs operation (VNIIAES, Moscow). The grid limitations Mr Melikhov persistently denounced the statements made by the Rosenergoaton about UESR not providing the energy production companies with equal access to the electricity grids. According to regular practice, nuclear power plants, as well as the other FOREM participants, have full and equal access to electrical networks of the integrated power system. Rosenergoatom intentionally decreased the generating capacity of the nuclear power plants in order to raise the prices and consequently earn the future excess profit. On the other hand, Rosenergoatom officials say they were not aware that the repairs on several power plants would be finished ahead of schedule, and consequently producing more kilowatts of energy than what was expected. The company’s officials also said that they substantially assisted the thermal stations in saving large amounts of fossil fuel. One can, however, hardly say that tonnes of oil were saved thanks to the nuclear power plants, because transferring energy produced in Rostov in the southern Russia to Arkhangelsk in north-west, which suffers from the shortage of fuel, is simply out of the question because of the long distance. Previously, Rosenergoatom have expressed their intention to reduce supplies of electric power produced by nuclear power plants to the FOREM market since July 16th. This threat was not fulfilled either. The reason for such a step was low payment capabilities of some customers. But the low payment capability were caused by Rosenergoatom itself, by lobbying an 54% increase in prices on electricity produced by nuclear power plants, in the first six months of 2001. UESR claimed earlier, that nuclear management itself had dispelled the myth about cheap nuclear energy. The 68% increase of the fares on nuclear power plants production in the year 2000 and of more than the double in 2001, resulted in the current price of nuclear power being higher than the energy produced by thermal plants owned by UESR. The energy production plan for the nuclear power plants for the last quarter of 2001, approved last week, suggests a production of 41,2 billion kWh. That is 3,1 billion more than the original plan provided by the government in May 2001. Failed export In compliance with the agreement between Rosenergoatom and RWE Trading GmbH (Germany), the supply of electricity to Georgia was supposed to begin in July 2001, but UESR refused to provide grid management services and energy transport. Mr Melikhov explained that the conflict began when Rosenergoatom failed to meet the requirements given by the export legislation. UESR says that the governmental decree issued 12.07.96 N793 stipulates that the energy export can be carried out only by UESR or by the de facto non-existing Ministry for the Foreign Economical Relations. But as the nuclear energy company sees it, UESR is mentioned in the decree, but that does not mean that it is the only possible exporter. The decree N793 reads in particular, “Rosenergoatom co-ordinates the activity of exporting electricity produced at the nuclear power plants and distributes foreign currency earnings between them”, and UESR “executes export - import of electrical energy (power).” Mr Melikhov says, Rosenergoatom offered export of its electricity at dumping prices, which is lower than internal Russian tariffs for nuclear power plant produced energy. The nuclear energy company officials claimed earlier that the prices UESR asked for while exporting electricity to Georgia were lower than proposed by Rosenergoatom. Nuclear kilowatts not so cheap after all The UESR press service representative says, the fares for electricity from nuclear power plants are low, and that allows nuclear lobbyist to speak about the “cheap nuclear energy”. A kilowatt of energy, produced at nuclear power plants costs from three up to ten kopecks. At thermal stations the cost exceeds ten kopecks, and at hydro plants it amounts to 15 kopecks. However, in reality the nuclear power plant’s fares are complemented by the taxes of Rosenergoatom, boosting the cost of nuclear electric power to between 23 and 28 kopecks per kilowatt. UESR believes the nuclear power plant’s fares are scheming. Neither the cost of building nuclear power plants, nor indispensable means for minimisation of the damage from a possible nuclear accident, nor the cost of decommissioning the nuclear power plants are included in the fares. And that is millions of dollars! In 5-10 years the service life of the majority of the nuclear power plants expires. They do not build new power plants, except for Rostov Nuclear Power Plant. Rosenergoatom tries to extract the excess profit, because they know, that their future will not be free of struggle,” Mr Melikhov says. Rosenergoatom grows through reorganisation On September 8th, shortly before the negotiations on creating ATS, the government approved Rosenergoatom reorganisation. In particular, Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant, being earlier in direct subordination to the Ministry for Nuclear Energy (Minatom), joined the concern. There is a great probability that Rosenergoatom slowly will transform into a giant. RBC news agency reported that on September 25th, Ashot Madoyan, the director of the Research Institute for Ecological Problems of Energy Industry said that the new structure of the company will comprise, apart from the Russian nuclear power plants, also the Armenian nuclear power plants. The Armenian nuclear power plants will become “half Russian.” Mr Madoyan said that the respective decision was taken at the intergovernmental level. He pointed out, that this way Armenia would partly pay off its national debt to the Russian Federation. The Armenian nuclear power plant (or Medzamor nuclear power plant), located near the country's capital Yerevan not far from the Turkish boarder, has two first generation VVER-440/270s (seismically improved VVER-440/230s) reactors put in operation in 1976 and 1979. The plant is built in a seismically active area, but designed to withstand an earthquake with a force of up to 9 points on the Richter scale. It actually withstood the Spitak quake (Richter point 7-8), but was nevertheless shut down and partially discharged of fuel early in 1989. In 1998, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) promised a 10m ECU loan to the plant given its shutdown by the year 2004. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 A Look at Weapons of Mass Destruction Las Vegas SUN September 27, 2001 A look at "weapons of mass destruction" - devices that have the potential of killing thousands: -Chemical weapons: These are considered the most likely to be used in a terrorist attack because they are easier to make and can kill people quickly. They include nerve agents such as sarin and VX, blister agents such as mustard gas, and cyanide. Making and storing them in any quantity still require the technical capability, roughly, of a pharmaceutical company, experts say. -Biological weapons: These cause disease. Anthrax is considered a likely candidate for an attack. Effects can be minimized with quarantines and quick medical care. -Radiological weapons: These spread radioactive material over a wide area. Unlikely to kill anyone quickly, they will instead cause long-term problems, such as cancer, in an affected population. They could also render an area uninhabitable for a long period. They don't have the mass, rapid killing effect that terrorists seek. -Nuclear weapons: No terrorist group is believed to be able to develop these, although there are fears that one could be obtained from Russia. Reports of suitcase-sized nuclear weapons have not been verified. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 2 Court takes a break The Pasko Case Gregory Pasko, an investigative journalist who worked for the Pacific Fleet's newspaper, was arrested on 20 November 1997 by the FSB and charged with high treason for his writing about the nuclear safety issues in the Russian Pacific Fleet. As the end of the Pasko-trial is closing in, the Court has decided to take a break until November 1, so that the phonetic experts can finalise their conclusions regarding Pasko's voice. Jon Gauslaa, 2001-09-28 14:18 While last week's expert interrogations brought up much dust, the present week has been calmer. The Court has mostly been occupied with carrying out various obligatory exercises. One of the interrogated witnesses did however, have a story to tell. -- They asked me to sign On September 24 the Court interrogated one of the persons, who signed the preliminary expert evaluation of the presence of state secrets in the materials that allegedly were confiscated at Pasko's flat in November 1997. The evaluation concluded that there was state secrets in the materials and was thus, important for the continuation of the case. The witness, who works at Pacific Fleet's headquarters, told the Court that although he had signed the evaluation, he took no part in it. The FSB had one day turned up at his place of residence with a ready-made document. He was asked to sign it and fulfilled the request. Thus, his explanation further fortified the impression that the case against Pasko was fabricated from its very start. For the record, it might be added that another person, who the Court interrogated in August, also signed the document. This person refused just to sign the document, and enclosed an opinion on the matter, which was in favour of Pasko. Court takes a break The rest of the week did not produce much of interest. The trial has now been in progress since July 11, 2001. The Court has been gathered for more than forty days. Tthroughout these days it has questioned more than fifty witnesses. In addition ten others have given their explanations on various matters. Thus, the end of the trial is closing in. The phonetic experts who have been given the task to evaluate whether it is Pasko who talks on the tape recordings of his telephone conversations have however, not yet produced their conclusion. Although Pasko says that it is his voice, an expert evaluation of the matter is still needed according to the Russian Criminal Procedure Code. If not, the Court's examination of the case could be declared incomplete, and if that happens the stage is set for yet another Pasko-trial in the Pacific Fleet courthouse. The Court does apparently not consider this as a dream scenario, and has therefore announced that it will take a break while it waits for the experts. It is reason to believe that the trial will resume on November 1, 2001. XXX Grigory Pasko was arrested in November 1997 on charges of espionage on behalf of the Japanese TV-station 'NHK'. He was acquitted of espionage in July 1999, but convicted of abuse of his official authority and freed under a general amnesty. Seeking a full acquittal, Pasko appealed the verdict, but so did the prosecution, insisting he was a spy. The Military Collegium of the Russian Supreme Court cancelled the verdict in November 2000, and sent the case back to Vladivostok for a re-trial Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 3 Experts take a fall The Pasko Case Gregory Pasko, an investigative journalist who worked for the Pacific Fleet's newspaper, was arrested on 20 November 1997 by the FSB and charged with high treason for his writing about the nuclear safety issues in the Russian Pacific Fleet. Although the Pacific Fleet Court's interrogations of the state secret experts were carried out behind closed doors, the experts were not able to hide their incompetence and lack of professionalism. Jon Gauslaa, 2001-09-27 22:30 The experts themselves refused to comment the events in Court publicly, in order to protect 'military secrets' from being disclosed. The information below does, however, only disclose the experts' incompetence and lack of professionalism. Such items of information are not classified by the secret military legislation the experts have based their evaluation on, and even less by the officially published Russian legislation. -- Why did you use the secret decree? After the first day of interrogations (September 19), defence attorney Ivan Pavlov told that the experts had concluded that approximately one third of the documents that allegedly were confiscated at Pasko's flat did contain state secrets. -- The experts were however, not able to substantiate this conclusion, which is both self-contradictory and without legal foundation, Pavlov said. When we pointed out this they could not give a single argument that could justify their conclusions. Throughout the interrogations, it became clear the main legal foundation for the experts' conclusions are the secret decree No. 055 issued in August 1996 by the Ministry of Defence. The commander of the expert brigade, Mr. Repin admitted that they were aware of the prohibition in Article 15 (3) Constitution against using secret legislation as normative acts in criminal cases, but they had still decided to use decree No. 055. This led one of the judges to ask: -- Comrade expert, you have prepared the guillotine, so please tell the Court why you have used this normative act, despite the fact that it is not officially published in accordance with the demands of the Constitution? The expert was not able to give any other answer than to turn the pages of their 48-page report and shrug his shoulders, while his glance roamed insecurely around the courtroom. Blame it on the computer After the court session on September 20, Pavlov's judgment was even more devastating for the experts. -- Today the experts showed their complete incompetence and lack of profesionalism, he said. They have neglected not only the Constitution, but also the law on state secrets. According to Pavlov, nothing of the alleged 'secret' items of information that the FSB claim to have confiscated at Pasko's flat is covered by article 5 in the law on state secrets, which together with article 7 of the law, give the main guidelines for which items of information that pertains to state secrets according to Russian legislation. Throughout the interrogations one of the experts had to admit that they perhaps had overused decree no. 055. Also a few other mistakes were admitted, like when Pavlov referred to one of the Bellona-reports on the nuclear waste problems in Nortwest Russia, and then quoted a 'secret sentence' from one of the documents that apparently were confiscated at Pasko's flat. -- I asked the expert why they had concluded that the sentence contains secret information, and the expert did actually acknowledged that their opinion on this issue was nothing but nonsense, told Pavlov. In general the experts' willingness to admit mistakes was however, close to zero. They tried to defend their position with all possible and impossible means, and seemed to put much of the blame for the errors and 'inaccuracies' in their report on the computor they had used. The machine was claimed to have had considerable technical problems when their evaluation was carried out. According to one of the provisions in decree No. 055, any item of information on losses of and defects on military equipment in the times of peace, pertain to state secrets. Thus, given that the said computor was military property, the experts at this point actually came quite close to disclose 'state secrets' themselves ... -- I pity the poor experts At the end of the interrogations, defender Anatoly Pyshkin said that the experts had no knowledge regarding the questions they had tried to answer. -- To be able to give proper answers, one needs knowledge both in scientific and juridical issues, which they simply did not have. Now and then the Court handed the experts a straw, which they grasped at. But they were never able to hang on. -- Throughout our examinations, it was actually difficult not to pity the poor experts, said Pyshkin. They are grown men, military officers, and there they stood blushing, almost with tears in their eyes, like stuttering schoolboys who had not done their homework. This happened almost every time we asked them a question. Sometimes both the judges and we had problems with holding back our laughter. So, when we declared that we had no more questions, the whole brigade of experts heaved a sigh of relief. Still much at stake Although the expert interrogations did not lack comical moments, Aleksandr Tkachenko of the Russian Pen-club, who participates in the trial as Pasko's 'public' defender, underlined that the core of the case is not at all laughable. -- The interrogations were depressing. They disclosed how determined the FSB, the procuracy and the fleet, probably on an order from Moscow, have been in their attempts to get Grigory convicted. -- The experts have signed a document, which apparently contains their conclusions, but each time they were asked a question they seemed to have no idea of what they were talking about, continued the human rights advocate. After having listening to the experts, I understand why we have so many disasters in our country, why submarines sink. -- The experts who have been here are only concerned with accusing people so that they can protect themselves, and this time they have chosen Grigory Pasko. xxx Grigory Pasko was arrested in November 1997 on charges of espionage on behalf of the Japanese TV-station 'NHK'. He was acquitted of espionage in July 1999, but convicted of abuse of his official authority and freed under a general amnesty. Seeking a full acquittal, Pasko appealed the verdict, but so did the prosecution, insisting he was a spy. The Military Collegium of the Russian Supreme Court cancelled the verdict in November 2000, and sent the case back to Vladivostok for a re-trial. The re-trial started on July 11, 2001. If convicted as charged, Pasko may face up to 20 years of forced hard labour. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 4 Army orders halt to all munitions burning at Sierra Army Depot order stops a 40-year practiceArmy orders halt to all munitions burning at Sierra Army Depot order stops a 40-year practice By Frank X. Mullen Jr. Reno Gazette-Journal September 28th, 2001 The Department of Defense ordered the Sierra Army Depot on Thursday to cease its 40-year practice of exploding millions of pounds of munitions in the open air on a hilltop 55 miles upwind of Reno. Opponents of the open demolition said the DOD’s order means clean air and fewer health risks for the people of northern Nevada and Lassen County, Calif. It was the Army’s practice to explode the obsolete bombs, land mines, rocket motors and grenades only when the wind was blowing west towards Nevada. “Pyramid Lake and the people of Nevada and northern California have won a great victory against a large and powerful institution because we worked hard and we worked together,” said Allan Mandell, chairman of the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe. “We are ecstatic that the Army finally listened to the communities and the coalition.” Jack Pastor, leader of Residents Against Munitions, a group of more than 1,200 residents who want the Army to halt open demolition, said Thursday’s order was a win “for us and all future generations in northern Nevada and California. We won’t be breathing poisons anymore.” Depot spokesman Larry Rogers said Army officials will begin discussions Monday on how to comply with the order. He said he doubts there will be any immediate impact on the 60 employees in the demolition area because stockpiles already at the depot will have to be shipped elsewhere. In previous interviews, Rogers said most of those employees would probably be transferred to the maintenance and storage areas of the base if the Army ceased demolition practices. About 400 other workers are employed in those other operations, he said. Lassen County officials this month denied the depot’s request for an exemption to clean air laws, but the Army appealed the decision. On Thursday, the DOD said it ended the demolition rather than challenge the local ruling and will find more environmentally friendly alternatives for destroying obsolete munitions nationwide. Lassen County’s air pollution ruling followed two years of protests against the base’s demolition operations in the wake of an investigation of base activities by the Reno Gazette-Journal. The newspaper’s probe unearthed records that showed the base sometimes violated its own guidelines for the munitions blasts, such as blowing up ordnance when the cloud cover was low or the wind was blowing faster than the guidelines allowed. Reid: Order “absolutely right” The base destroyed up to 52 million pounds of unwanted munitions per year and sent clouds containing toxins west to Nevada and northwest toward Susanville, Calif. In the weeks after the newspaper’s investigation was published in February 2000, opposition multiplied against the open burning/detonation activities. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev.; Washoe County health officials, the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe; the Nevada Division of Health; the Susanville Rancheria of Indians; Lassen County doctors and Nevada environmental groups joined the fight against the open burning. In November, the federal Environmental Protection Agency took the rare step of reopening the depot’s air pollution permit because the open burning was a violation of the Clean Air Act. “Lassen County was absolutely right to halt open burning,” Reid said. “I can’t believe it went on for as long as it did. The activity was stopped 20 years ago in other places and yet it was allowed to continue here.” Rogers has repeatedly said the base has never violated laws or rules and has never been a health threat to anyone. Previous air pollution exemptions for the base were granted on the basis of computer models showing no significant contamination of air, water or soil. No physical testing or analysis was done downwind of the base property and the base’s county permit exemption was routinely approved for years, officials said. Activist: “A major victory” “We will be breathing cleaner air and no longer have to deal with the immediate effects of the blasts and shock waves,” said Larry Beach, a neighbor of the depot who has been fighting to end the open demolition. “This is a major victory for us.” Over the last 10 years, about 28,000 tons per year of munitions have been detonated or burned in the open air at the depot. In 1995 alone, 53 million pounds of military explosives and 200 rocket motors were detonated or burned at the depot. The ordnance contains toxic and carcinogenic chemicals including lead, mercury, arsenic, antimony, beryllium, cadmium, nickel, and dioxins. The Army’s rules called for destroying the munitions when the wind blew in an easterly direction, toward the Pyramid Lake reservation and Reno’s north valleys. Pastor said halting open air disposal doesn’t end the contamination problem in the two states. He called for a disease study and environmental tests to determine if the decades of munitions burning polluted the air, soil and water along the California-Nevada border. This year, the EPA ranked the depot as California’s leading air polluter in 1999, the first time the depot was included on the pollution list. The base discharged 5.4 million pounds of toxic chemicals into the air in 1999, about 17 percent of the total released into the air statewide, the EPA said. “The toxins have landed somewhere,” Pastor said. “They don’t just vanish.” © 2001 Reno Gazette-Journal ***************************************************************** 5 Hanford watchdogs threaten suit The Seattle Times: By Linda Ashton The Associated Press RICHLAND — A pair of Hanford watchdog groups have notified the U.S. Department of Energy they plan to sue the agency to try to force it to permanently deactivate the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF). Heart of America and the Government Accountability Project are the two groups planning to file the lawsuit. Hope Williams, a spokeswoman for the Energy Department in Washington, D.C., said she had no immediate information about or response to the groups' plans. The FFTF is an experimental reactor built more than 20 years ago at the Hanford nuclear reservation. The large and versatile reactor was designed to research advanced forms of nuclear fuel for breeder reactors, which produce as much or more plutonium fuel than they consume. The government scuttled its program in the 1980s after deciding it had misjudged the nation's electricity needs, and the FFTF was placed on standby in 1992. The nuclear fuel was removed, but to permit a possible restart, the sodium-cooling system has been maintained at a cost of about $30 million a year. When the Bush administration took office, it put on hold a last-minute Clinton administration order to permanently shut down FFTF. Still pending is the Energy Department's 60-day review of a proposal to operate the reactor commercially. Advanced Nuclear & Medical Systems of Richland said it had assembled a team of nuclear-service companies that would like to operate the reactor to make medical isotopes. In their notice to the Energy Department, the Government Accountability Project and Heart of America Northwest said they thought there were conflicts of interest and legal deficiencies in the environmental study conducted for the proposal. The study was prepared by a contractor called Science Applications International, which Advanced Nuclear & Medical Systems listed as a team member in its proposal, the two watchdog groups said. The groups contend the study failed to address the consequences of possible accidents and terrorist attacks or the effects on the Columbia River of new radioactive waste that would be generated. The groups also contend the Energy Department is legally bound to shut down the FFTF under the court order governing cleanup at the reservation. seattletimes.com home ***************************************************************** 6 John Gray: Staving off disaster Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | The interaction of weak states and deadly new weapons could give birth to a tragic century John Gray Friday September 28, 2001 The Guardian It could have been incomparably worse. The instruments used on September 11 were pen-knives and passenger planes - and a willingness to die. The result was carnage on a scale that no similar atrocity comes close to matching. But what would have been the roll call of the dead if the suicide warriors had been equipped with new weapons of mass destruction, such as the designer poisons made possible by advances in genetic engineering? We have not yet begun to grasp what it means to live in a world where millions of people can be killed by a handful of fanatics armed with the contents of a test-tube. Partly this is because we have a reluctance to confront insoluble problems - and that's what this is beginning to look like. The spread of new weapons of mass destruction is a result of two forces, one of them unstoppable, the other very strong. The unstoppable force is the diffusion of scientific knowledge. The information needed to make biological weapons is practically free. Much of it can be found on the internet, and it can't be stopped from spreading further. As science advances, the techniques involved in making new weapons tend to become simpler, safer - and cheaper. This is a process with no obvious end point. The other force is the new weakness of the state. Over the past 20 years or so in many parts of the world, power has leaked away from governments, and passed into the hands of a ragbag of ethnic and religious militias, political organisations and criminal gangs. The Taliban regime is only one example of a much more widespread trend. In differing degrees, much of Russia and Africa and parts of Europe (such as Albania and most of former Yugoslavia) suffer from the same condition. A large portion of humankind lives no longer under the government of modern states - however repressive - but in something approaching anarchy. Reversing this trend is not impossible, but it is likely to take generations. The fragmentation of state power in much of the world makes controlling new technologies of mass destruction dauntingly difficult. In the past, the main aim of anti-proliferation policy was to prevent nuclear capability being acquired by ever more states. The effort had more success than many feared, with at least one state (South Africa) giving up a nuclear capability, and others abandoning programmes to develop it. Even so, the number of states with nuclear weapons has slowly increased. The danger of proliferation remains, but there is a larger and more intractable problem - that weapons of mass destruction will be acquired by groups which no state can control. That is the clear danger - the likelihood even - highlighted by the events of September 11. The reality we face is a semi-anarchical world in which unimaginably destructive weapons are becoming more widely available. If we are to have any prospect of coping with this situation, we will have to revise some deeply ingrained habits of thought. It is futile to imagine, as some liberals fondly do, that working to eradicate the causes of war is an adequate response. Many are rooted in long-standing conflicts over religion and territory. Such conflicts could well become more severe in years to come, if - as is increasingly the case in Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia - they become entangled with struggles over shrinking natural resources. Moreover, some enmities cannot be placated. Fundamentalist hostility to the United States does not come from resentment against its flaws. It is a hatred of what America is at its best - a society dedicated to pluralism and liberty. Liberals who fail to grasp this fact are denying the fundamentalist warriors who struck New York and Washington the only credit they deserve, as avowed enemies of liberal values. Whole debates - such as that between the missionaries for globalisation and their anti-capitalist opponents - have suddenly become largely irrelevant. Some policies that are widely supported across the political spectrum need to be urgently reconsidered. Take the "war on drugs". In terms of its effects on public health and law and order, criminalising drug use has been a disaster. In the context of the threats we are now facing, it is almost insane. Freezing terrorist funds is easier said than done. Many of the groups involved in terrorism, including the Taliban, which recently rescinded a ban on opium growing it had imposed last year under western pressure, get a sizable part of their funds from the drug trade. Legalising it would deal an immediate and serious blow to terrorism throughout the world. Yet it remains off the political agenda in the US and Britain. The problems we face in a world of deadly new weapons and weak states may not be fully soluble. The interaction of growing scientific knowledge with intractable human conflicts may be giving birth to a tragic century - not unlike the one that has so recently ended. The best we can hope for may be to stave off disaster. If we succeed in doing that, perhaps those who were killed on September 11 will not have died in vain. • John Gray is professor of European thought at the LSE. j.gray@lse.ac.uk Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001 ***************************************************************** 7 REID SECURES COMMITMENT FOR $46 MILLION IN NEVADA MILITARY CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS September 26, 2001 Washington, D.C. - United States Senator Harry Reid announced that Nevada will receive more than $46 million in funding for military projects in the FY 02 Military Construction Appropriations bill that passed the Senate today. "Nevada's air bases and defense facilities play an important role in our national security and overall military readiness," said Reid, a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee. "Funding in this bill will help the state*s premier military facilities develop modern infrastructure to meet today*s combat needs." The legislation also includes $6.15 million for the Navy to help fund the construction of a new drinking water treatment plant which will serve the City of Fallon and the naval air station. The plant, which will be constructed and operated jointly with Fallon, will use advanced drinking water technology to remove arsenic from the area*s drinking water. Earlier this year, Senator Reid secured $3.1 million in funding to begin assisting Fallon with its portion of facility construction. Design work on the facility is now underway. "A new drinking water facility in Fallon is of critical importance," Senator Reid said. "The money in this bill is a significant step in the effort to remove arsenic from the drinking water serving the Fallon community, including the civilian and military personnel at the naval air station." Funding for specific projects follows: + $19 million for acquisition of 220 acres of privately-owned land that is adjacent to the northern end of the runway at Nellis Air Force Base, NV. To assure the operational integrity Nellis AFB and its mission, as well as to ensure the safety of private citizens and their property. + $12.6 million for the construction of a Dynamic Battle Control Center at Nellis Air Force Base. The Dynamic Battle Control Center is a state-of-the-art command post that supports realistic war training exercises, including large-scale war games called "red flag." The control center will house intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance functions that permit real-time data acquisition and communications to accurately simulate operations that will be experienced in combat. + $8.5 million for the construction of a Supply and Warehouse complex at the Air National Guard Base in Reno to support one squadron of C-130 aircraft. The supply complex will be used for storage, receiving, shipping, issuing, training and administrative activities. + $6.15 million for the Fallon Water Treatment Facility for the Arsenic Treatment Plant: To design and construct a treatment plant that can remove arsenic from the groundwater to be in compliance with the current contamination levels. ***************************************************************** 8 DOE appoints new members to SSAB Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:55 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 : The Department of Energy has announced the appointment of seven area residents to fill vacancies on the Oak Ridge Site-Specific Advisory Board. The SSAB is a federally-chartered citizens' panel that provides recommendations to the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Environmental Management Program. "We're very pleased to welcome these new members," said Rod Nelson, assistant manager for the Oak Ridge Environmental Management Program. "The SSAB plays a crucial role in providing public input on environmental cleanup and waste management activities at the Oak Ridge Reservation, and we appreciate the generous commitment of time and effort these folks are making in serving on the Board." The new SSAB members are as follows: + Jeanne Bonner is employed by UT-Battelle at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. She has a degree in chemical engineering and experience in facility decontamination and decommissioning, radiochemical processing, hazardous waste operations, and emergency response. + Donna Campbell is returning to Board service after a two-year break. She joined the SSAB in 1995 as a charter member and served on the Board for four years. She is a librarian for Foster Wheeler Environmental Corporation in Oak Ridge and holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in biology and library science. + Heather Cothron is employed by Science Applications International Corporation as an engineer and project manager at ORNL. She holds a bachelor of science degree in biology and a master of science degree in chemical engineering and is a certified Project Management Professional. + Patricia Hill is an artist and teacher who has worked as an art director for the Boys &Girls Clubs of Knoxville, as a graphic artist at the Knoxville News-Sentinel, and as a teacher at the Apostolic Christian School in Knoxville. + Robert McLeod is a Registered Professional Engineer and Registered Professional Geologist with Robert S. McLeod and Associates. He has more than 30 years experience in engineering management and environmental work and has managed numerous DOE projects, including two remedial investigation/feasibility studies and the program to implement the DOE Hazardous Waste Remedial Actions Program. + Luis Revilla is Captain of the Fire Department at the Y-12 National Security Complex. He is a certified paramedic, fire fighter, fire inspector, and hazardous materials technician. He holds an associate of arts degree and is a graduate of the Donnellson Law Enforcement Academy. + E.W. Seals is a machinist with UT-Battelle at ORNL. He is treasurer of the Atomic Trades and Labor Council, which represents approximately 2,000 bargaining unit employees. SSAB meetings are generally held on the second Wednesday of each month at 6 p.m. at the Garden Plaza Hotel in Oak Ridge. SSAB meetings are open to the public, and notices are posted on the board's Web site: and through the board's 24-hour information line, (865) 576-4750. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 9 No nuclear blast if plane hits Y-12, says Brumley Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:55 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff What if the Department of Energy's warning sirens were sounded and it wasn't a test? Perhaps one of the federal agency's Oak Ridge facilities was the site of a malevolent attack. Let's say terrorists crashed a plane into the Y-12 National Security Complex, which is a nuclear weapons facility. What would happen? "The biggest concern people tend to have is, if a plane crashed [into Y-12], is that going to cause a nuclear explosion?" said Bill Brumley, the local manager for the National Nuclear Security Administration, the quasi-independent agency within DOE that oversees the nuclear weapons complex. "The physics say that's not going to happen." Brumley pointed out that Y-12 makes uranium components for nuclear warheads, adding that there is no plutonium or highly explosive material at the site. "Clearly there would be fatalities," Brumley added. "We believe all those would be caused by the [plane] crash and resulting fire." Brumley said Y-12 has conducted an investigation into what would happen if an aircraft, specifically a KC-135 military transport plane, crashed into the facility. He added that there are no Federal Aviation Administration restrictions regarding flying planes over DOE facilities. However, neither Brumley nor other DOE officials would speculate on the number of casualties that would follow a major incident at Y-12 or one of DOE's other local facilities. Brumley did say that the fires and devastation caused by a plane crash could result in an off-site plume. Jeff Cravens, director of DOE's Assessment and Emergency Management Division in Oak Ridge, said a release could range from a small event in which no one would be affected to an "absolute worst-case scenario" where the release would transverse the site boundaries and affect the general public. He would not venture a guess on how far-reaching the impact would be. "I don't think that would be to anybody's advantage," he said. In addition to Y-12, Oak Ridge is home to two other major DOE facilities: Oak Ridge National Laboratory, a research facility that's home to a nuclear reactor, and the Oak Ridge K-25 site, where uranium-235 was separated from uranium-238 through a gaseous diffusion process. All of DOE's facilities have been operating on a heightened state of security in light of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the United States. Those catastrophic attacks involved around 19 hijackers seizing control of four airplanes, crashing two into the World Trade Center twin towers in New York and one into the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. The fourth plane crashed in Pennsylvania. Though never the victim of such an attack, Oak Ridge has experienced a similar threat. In November 1972, three men hijacked Southern Airways Flight 49 and threatened to crash it into one of DOE's Oak Ridge facilities. The hijackers never fulfilled their threat, and about 48 hours after the aircraft was hijacked, the three men were apprehended on the ground after the plane finally landed in Havana, Cuba. So, what if something does happen at one of DOE's facilities? Bobby Davis, leader of DOE's local Emergency Management Team, said the federal agency's Oak Ridge Operations office has a comprehensive emergency management plan for the local facilities. "We've looked at a broad range of scenarios, ranging from fires, explosions, chemical spills Š and radioactive materials releases," Davis said. Measures for dealing with terrorist attacks are also reportedly included in the plan. In addition, each year, one of DOE's local facilities is the site of a major emergency response exercise. This May, the event was conducted at Y-12. It was the culmination of about four months of practice and involved a number of local and state agencies. Brumley said the exercise's scenarios varied from building to building, and the participants were unaware of situations before the exercise. Overall, he said the participants' performance was good. Brumley added that Y-12 is an "extraordinarily secure facility" and will be undergoing major modernization over the next several years. He said security measures have been taken into consideration for that project. "There is a 'design threat' to which we design our facilities to withstand," Brumley said, adding that the details of that "design threat" are classified. Much of the work at DOE's Oak Ridge facilities involves hazardous chemicals and radioactive materials. To warn the public in the event of a release of these materials, DOE has installed a series of emergency warning sirens. The sirens, which serve an area of approximately two miles around each site, have never been used for an actual emergency, according to Davis. DOE expects to begin testing the sirens monthly starting in early 2002. DOE officials said the agency works closely with the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency through a multi-jurisdictional emergency response plan. DOE also has mutual aid agreements with various agencies, including the city of Oak Ridge for fire response. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 10 Crews can train but not prepare for terrorist attack Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 10:31 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 by R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff Emergency crews can train for worst-case scenarios, but they can't prepare. "I don't think you can prepare," says Mack Bailey, Oak Ridge fire chief and designated emergency management coordinator for the city, when asked about local response plans to a possible terrorist attack on the Oak Ridge Reservation. "Our philosophy is to get all the training we can, but getting the people and the funds together to train for every pie-in-the-sky disaster scenario you can dream up is a real hard thing to do." Bailey notes that with at most a third of firefighters and only 25 percent of police officers on duty at any one time, mustering the manpower to deal with a terrorist attack might prove a bit tricky. "We've got 39 firefighters, but only 13 on duty," says Bailey, who contends most emergency workers would convene ready to serve, but notes that it's hard to "find everyone when everyone is going the other way" during an evacuation. Then there are the folks who don't train -- the public. "The hardest thing any emergency person has to deal with is an evacuation," says Bailey. The first option in the Oak Ridge emergency response plan is to "shelter in place" (see sidebar). The worst-case option is to evacuate. "The kind of society that we live in, we're so mobile -- we're one place, the kids are somewhere else and our spouse is another," says Bailey. "People aren't going to leave the city without their family, nor are they going to leave their things at home." Bailey should know -- he's been involved on both sides of the evacuation equation. When hurricane Hugo hit in 1989, Bailey was manager of St. Andrew's Public Service District in South Carolina, and was charged with assisting the voluntary evacuation of coastal counties. First thing Bailey did was locate his wife, son and two dogs, then pack them into his pickup truck with the wedding and baby photos and send them on their way. Bailey doesn't expect anything different from the citizens of Oak Ridge or Anderson County. "People are going to gather as a family unit, then leave," says Bailey. "And then -- without public transportation -- there's no way to manage the traffic." Still, there is a local emergency response plan which is folded into a broader multi-jurisdiction response by the Department of Energy and coordinated with the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency. However, that plan, which is still in draft form, has been criticized for being out of date (see related story). Depending on the size and scope of the emergency, the Federal Emergency Management Agency could also provide resources. According to Elgan Usrey, director of plans and programs for TEMA, living in Oak Ridge at least narrows down the scope of local emergency response. "Most of the time you don't know where the disaster is going to occur, so you can't do specific planning for it," says Usrey. "We know exactly where the DOE facilities are, and we can plan accordingly." "What we have to plan for is an airborne release of a hazardous or radioactive plume," says Bailey. "We have to plan for a plume as the concentrations rise, and then as time passes as the concentrations fall. "Basically our response will probably have to be after the fact," says Bailey, who noted that local firefighters either have obtained or are in the process of obtaining a Level III certification for dealing with hazardous and radioactive materials. Decontamination sites would be set up, though Bailey says he is skeptical the local equipment for decontamination would be adequate. "Basically we've got trucks with pumps, and throw-away overalls," says Bailey. Usrey said mutual aid agreements are in place to pull resources from surrounding districts. Bailey expressed concern that emergency response personnel pulled from other areas might not have the training necessary to deal with a DOE-related emergency. According to Usrey, previously designated shelters would be set up "outside the danger area" in Clinton, Harriman, Lenoir City and Knoxville. Residents would report to the closest shelters. Each Oak Ridge school is paired with a school or community center outside the city, and in the event of evacuation, students would be transported to partner locations. The DOE, the city and TEMA have a system of prerecorded announcements that can be broadcast with 30-second notice, and residents would be advised to tune to local emergency information radio and television stations (see box). All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 11 What to do when the siren sounds Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 10:31 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 + Go inside the nearest building + Close all doors and windows + Turn off or close all ventilation systems including -- air-conditioning -- attic fans -- furnaces -- fireplace dampers -- heating/cooling systems + Extinguish all pilot lights + Tune radio/television to an emergency broadcast system (see below) If no buildings are nearby: + Move away from the siren + Try to find an automobile for shelter and get inside + Tune radio to emergency broadcast station + If you are on water and can hear the sirens, leave the area by turning away from the sirens; then tune radio to an emergency broadcast station Emergency Information Stations Radio Television + FM 92.7 WATE + FM 97.5 WBIR + FM 100.3 WKXT + FM 107.7 WTNZ + AM 580 + AM990 + AM 1290 Advertising Information All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 12 LOC critiques emergency plans Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:55 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff Outdated. That's how members of the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee describe the Tennessee Emergency Management Agency's multi-jurisdictional plan for handling emergencies at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge facilities. Norman Mulvenon, chairman of the LOC's Citizens' Advisory Panel, said TEMA's plan, which is dated December 1997, is still in draft form and that some of the information is out of date. For one thing, Mulvenon said there have been changes in roadways since the plan was developed. Local Oversight Committee members Ken Roy and Roger Macklin agreed with Mulvenon that the plan needs to be updated and that a final version should be released. The three men are part of the LOC's emergency response committee, which has been meeting for the past year with federal, state and local emergency management officials regarding their roles with respect to emergencies on the Oak Ridge Reservation. Elgan Usrey, director of plans and programs with TEMA, acknowledged the plan is in fact still considered a draft document. The purpose of this plan, which is being funded by DOE, is to coordinate responses from state, local and federal agencies during an emergency. Originally, TEMA developed final response plans for each of DOE's Oak Ridge's facilities, according to Usrey. He said those plans were shelved when DOE wanted all the facilities included in one plan. Usrey said TEMA expects to release a final version of the plan in the next month or two. "Yes, the out-of-date information is being corrected," he added. All in all, the plan still works, Usrey said. It was used most recently in December 2000 to respond to a fluorine leak at the Oak Ridge K-25 site. As for other local emergency management plans, the LOC's emergency response committee has identified the following deficiencies: + Local governments have insufficient resources in terms of equipment and trained personnel for response to a major emergency. The needs vary by county, with Roane County most at risk of being unable to adequately respond. Officials with Roane County's emergency response program did not return calls for comment as of this morning. + DOE's plan concentrates on the possibility of a release of hazardous and/or radioactive substances to the public from one of its facilities. Other potential emergencies, such as wildfires and severe weather events, are not adequately addressed. Considering recent events, the Local Oversight Committee is concerned that DOE has not adequately planned for a massive attack by terrorists. The Local Oversight Committee was created in 1991 to represent those counties and communities affected most directly by DOE's activities in Oak Ridge. The Local Oversight Committee is funded by a grant from the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation's DOE-Oversight Division, which is in turn funded by the Department of Energy under terms of the Tennessee Oversight Agreement. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 13 AC steps up training against weapons of mass destruction Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 11:55 a.m. on Friday, September 28, 2001 by R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff As the face of terrorism changes, so does emergency management response. The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks have simply accelerated the process. "We were just beginning over the past several months to change our focus toward weapons of mass destruction, with an emphasis on biological warfare," said Robert Byrd, director of Emergency Services in Anderson County. "I expect now that we've seen this tragedy, we will focus tremendous energy on this project." Byrd and Mark "Hollywood" Whaley, Project Impact coordinator and deputy with the Anderson County Sheriff's Department, will attend training in weapons of mass destruction Oct. 1 to Oct. 3 in Washington, D.C. "Our training in this area is very minimal," said Byrd. "Right now I would say we're in an awareness phase -- but I expect we're fixing to turn that up and become very active with a particular emphasis toward prevention." Whaley heads up one of only four Project Impact operations in the state. Project Impact, funded by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, "brings communities together to solve their own problems" through education and implementation of proactive measures during natural and manmade disasters, said Whaley. "One event will overwhelm a local resource," said Whaley. "This training will make us aware of what the risks are and how we fit into the risk." All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 14 UN CALLS FOR HELP AS PAKISTAN EXPECTS 1.5M REFUGEES IN DAYS Daily Record Sunday, September 30, 2001 UNITED Nations experts yesterday warned that around 1.5 million Afghan refugees could arrive in Pakistan in the next few days and called for massive humanitarian aid. Around 50,000 people, fleeing the threat of US attacks, have already sneaked over unofficial border crossings. And in Chaman, an official crossing point, a further 20,000 mothers and children are waiting to escape. Melita Sunjic, of the United Nations' High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) said yesterday: "We have estimated that around 1.5 million people will try to escape into Pakistan. "Many are in desperate need. The refugee camps are overflowing and cannot take any more. We are looking at 100 possible sites for new camps. "These people are in very bad shape and are extremely weak. Many of them are sitting in the open. It is very hot and there is a lack of water. These people need all the help they can get." Tons of food, blankets, kitchen equipment and plastic sheets for shelter are being flown in by the UN, which is calling for millions of pounds to help launch a major humanitarian operation in Afghanistan. They estimate around 7.5 million people will need help to make it through the harsh Afghan winter, which will start to bite in the next few weeks. ***************************************************************** 15 People living near ammunition and chemical depots worry about attack prospects By Rex W. Huppke, Associated Press, 9/28/2001 08:46 NEWPORT, Ind. (AP) Wiping yellow shards of cheese off a slicer at Gidget's Deli, on the north side of the freshly mowed courthouse square, Linda Clawson's eyes grow wide as she describes her town's fear of a terrorist attack. With a population of about 700, flanked on all sides by rolling farmland, it seems an unlikely target. But Newport is only a few miles from an Army chemical depot that stores 2.5 million pounds of VX, the deadliest nerve gas ever created. And that's reason for concern in this town about 100 miles from Indianapolis. ''If we get bombed, this town's wiped out,'' Clawson said. ''If the alarm goes off, it takes 11 seconds for that gas to get here.'' Just enough time, some folks say, to start praying. Across the country, people in towns and cities that are home to ammunition and chemical weapon depots or nuclear power plants haven't been able to avoid the question: What if the terrorists who have lashed out at America come after us? Residents in Anniston, Ala., know all about the deadly substances held at a nearby chemical weapons incinerator, like sarin, which kills by paralyzing the lungs and other vital organs. They wonder who else knows. ''We would not even be on the terrorist map if it weren't for the stockpile out there,'' said Keith Howland, a salesman who also stars as Enviroman on a public-access television show. ''Right now, we're sitting ducks it's public information.'' Kay Bryan, who lives eight miles from the Umatilla Chemical Depot in northeastern Oregon, said a routine check of the Army's alarm system this week gave her quite a scare. ''I had my windows open, I was sound asleep and the sirens went off,'' she said. ''I jumped up and panicked and thought: 'Oh my God, I thought they said (Osama) bin Laden wasn't going to attack again.''' The Oregon depot holds 12 percent of the nation's chemical weapon stockpile. Security at military depots across the country has been increased since the Sept. 11 attacks. For example, hundreds of members of the 101st Airborne have been dispatched to the Newport Chemical Depot and to a rocket and nerve gas depot in Richmond, Ky. Richmond native Rachel Rose said she was glad to see the troops come, and she's noticed they've kept the depot gates closed since they arrived. ''That was the first time in my life I've ever seen the gates closed during the daytime,'' she said. ''It feels safer though, it's just not easy sitting so close to that much ammunition and nerve gas.'' Of course military sites aren't the only concern. Karen Herrick, who works at a flower shop near the Seabrook Station nuclear plant in Seabrook, N.H., said the attacks have been unnerving. She said local businesses and residents get instructions each year about evacuation routes should anything happen at the plant, but she usually throws them away. ''I can't say I'm afraid,'' she said, ''but I've been thinking about where my evacuation papers are.'' About 55 miles west of Phoenix, in Wintersburg, Ariz., is the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station, the nation's largest nuclear power plant both in size and output. But not everyone here is paranoid about recent events. Sitting in the shade of his mobile catfish stand, in clear view of the plant's bullet-shaped cooling towers, Thurman Payne said the terrorist attacks haven't changed the way he views the plant. ''The only thing I did different is hang up my flag,'' he said, nodding to an American flag flapping on the side of his stand. ''All that's happened after the attacks is that we're dealing with a new reality, no different than any other American.'' At the Wintersburg General Store, about three miles from the plant, store owner Ann Hollenstein echoed Payne's opinion. ''That plant does not bother me at all,'' she said. ''I think that plant is pretty much built to withstand more than the World Trade Center.'' Standing on a corner by the courthouse square in Newport, waving at the occasional car passing by, Dick McArty, who worked for 24 years as an electrician at the Newport Chemical Depot, said he knows the facility as well as anyone. ''It's secure as it is,'' he said, his eyes hidden behind tinted glasses. ''But with these terrorists, what the hell is secure? What's safe anymore?'' ***************************************************************** 16 Watchdog Groups File Notice of Intent to Sue Over FFTF Government Accountability Project Heart of America Northwest PRESS RELEASE Immediate Release For info, contact: Tom Carpenter: 206-292-2850 September 26, 2001 Gerald Pollet: 206-382-1014 WATCHDOG GROUPS FILE FORMAL NOTICE ON LAWSUIT OVER HANFORD FFTF REACTOR RESTART "Notice of Intent" Letter to Energy Dept. Cites Conflict of Interest in Environmental Study by Contractor and Failure to Address Terrorist Attack Scenario Seattle, WA: Two Hanford watchdog groups today put the Secretary of Energy on formal notice that they will sue the Department of Energy for continuing to consider restarting an experimental Hanford nuclear reactor, the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF). The Government Accountability Project and Heart of America Northwest today sent Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham an extensively documented "notice of intent to sue" over major conflicts of interest and extensive legal deficiencies of an environmental study on the reactor's restart performed for the Department of Energy (DOE) by SAIC, Inc. which has been revealed to be a partner with the company that proposed restarting and operating the reactor to the DOE. In the Notice of Intent to Sue letter to Abraham, the groups revealed: + The environmental study to determine the fate of the FFTF nuclear reactor was prepared by a contractor named Science Applications International Corporation, Inc. (SAIC) - - a company that subsequently was identified in documents which the DOE repeatedly refused to make public as a partner in a formal proposal submitted for purposes of "privatizing" and restarting the reactor for private profit. The evidence of this conflict of interest was provided by the groups as an attachment to the Notice of Intent, and is a letter dated June 21, 2001 from a company called Advanced Nuclear & Medical Systems (ANMS) to the DOE, where SAIC was identified by ANMS as a "team member." Contrary to legal requirements cited by the groups, SAIC not only was revealed to have a direct financial stake in the proposal, but is also a proponent for the restart proposal. DOE had also paid SAIC this year to assist in what the Secretary had promised to be "an independent review" of FFTF's potential for restart. Tom Carpenter, Director of the Nuclear Oversight programs at the Government Accountability Project stated, "We are very disturbed at the appearance of the conflict of interest in the ANMS proposal, which included SAIC as a partner. The public cannot give credence to the integrity of an environmental study and "review" prepared by a corporation which has a stake in the outcome of the decision - - in this case, a decision to start, or not-to-start the FFTF reactor." The groups also warned that the environmental study performed by SAIC is "not legally adequate to support any proposal to restart the FFTF Reactor, and is especially inadequate for authorization of further expenses towards implementing the privatization proposal." The groups charged that the SAIC study was a biased, incomplete and inaccurate assessment of the environmental and safety risks of restarting the FFTF nuclear reactor, and bereft of any analysis for waste disposal and costs. Below is a short list of some of the problems in the environmental impact study (also known as the PEIS): + The study failed to adequately address the consequences of realistic accidents. + The study failed to address the cumulative impacts to soil contamination and the Columbia River by adding new waste streams from FFTF operations to Hanford's existing waste problems - - among the worst in the nation. + The PEIS failed to address the possibility of a terrorist attack on the FFTF facility such as the tragedy on September 11, 2001 with the use of passenger airliners as guided missiles to destroy buildings. Such scenarios can no longer be described as "incredible" by DOE planners, and the potential consequences of an airliner strike or other credible terror attack on FFTF must be analyzed in the environmental impact analysis. An attack on FFTF, its associated plutonium-fuel and isotope processing facilities, the stored spent nuclear fuel, and the weapons-usable plutonium that is proposed to be imported to fuel the reactor, could result in irreversible radiological contamination of thousands of square miles, and massive loss of life and direct impacts on public health. + The Department is in violation of legally-binding deadlines imposed by the Hanford Clean-Up Agreement mandating a shutdown planning scenario. Gerald Pollet, Executive Director of Heart of America Northwest, stated, "The illegal delay of the shutdown of the FFTF reactor will waste over $30 million this year - - dollars we need to fund Hanford cleanup, and is a substantial irreversible commitment of resources. At a time of national crisis and a shifting of resources, the taxpayer can ill-afford to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on further delay or restart of a risky and aging reactor that will only add to our radioactive waste inventory - - and create new terrorist targets that need to be defended against. " The public interest groups also revealed for the first time today that the proposal for the privatization scheme for FFTF's restart actually requires the federal government to continue paying at least $40 million per year to subsidize making the reactor available for private company operations. - 30 - ***************************************************************** 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. 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