***************************************************************** 08/30/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.209 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 LETTERS: Dump here 2 Guinn, Reid slam decision to shift site of Yucca ... 3 Studies on Yucca Mountain frustrate NRC reviewers 4 Construction set for N. Korea nuclear plant -- 5 Unveiling of Big Rock's casks 6 Guinn plans fight to halt public hearing on Yucca 7 NRC Determines Inspection Finding for Oyster Creek Nuclear Plant 8 NRC finds Oyster Creek susceptible to attack 9 Daily Events Report 10 IAEA Daily Press Review 11 WNA NEWS BRIEFING 01.35 | 22 - 28 August 2001 12 USEC, PACE agree on pact - 13 New Nuclear Waste Transport Starts 14 USEC: Exelon visits part of peer review 15 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Thursday, August 30, 2001 16 Feds to ship nuke waste across Wyoming 17 DOE Continues Meetings with South Carolina Officials 18 EUROTECH, Ltd. and Waste Control Specialists, Inc. Team on EKOR(TM) 19 Governor, DOE decide to continue talks on plutonium shipments 20 Indian Point Reactor Sale Approved 21 Nevada plans to sue DOE over Yucca Mountain public hearings 22 Company displays casks to be used for nuclear waste storage NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 Nuclear weapon prevented World War III 2 Kazakhstan highlights nuclear test aftermath 3 Navy teaches Hunters Point kids to clean up toxic waste 4 Opposition mounts to nuclear treaty 5 OR man OK'd for compensation check 6 DOE group seeks to unite parties on land-use planning 7 Marin County executives indicted in nuclear testing sale 8 Oak Ridge Reservation 'roadmap': Let's start with agreeable areas 9 Confusion Reigns; Suncoast Casino Sends DOE Packing 10 Payments to ill uranium workers on track, source says 11 S.C. firm to design, build three research facilities at ORNL 12 DOE plans to form focus group to give input on land use 13 Thornberry gives update to city commissioners **************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 LETTERS: Dump here [Las Vegas Review-Journal] Thursday, August 30, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal To the editor: Re: Dennis Weber's letter to the editor on Aug. 26. Mr. Weber makes an interesting point in describing the current radioactive contamination of groundwater already present at the Nevada Test Site, in the same aquifer as Yucca Mountain, the proposed site of the country's nuclear waste repository. Mr. Weber quoted DOE's predictions that the contamination created by decades of nuclear weapons testing could spread to the Oasis Valley (and beyond) in less than 20 years. This is indeed a troubling prospect. However, could not this same "argument" be used to defend Yucca Mountain as the ideal site for long-term nuclear waste storage? If the area is already contaminated beyond redemption, with no technology available to clean up the radioactive groundwater that is flowing in our direction as we speak, why not designate the entire site for future nuclear waste disposal purposes? According to Mr. Weber, we are doomed anyway -- and the existing radioactive contamination will be a threat long before the 10,000-year storage timetable for Yucca Mountain becomes a factor. STEVE MICHAELSON LAS VEGAS This story is located at: http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Aug-30-Thu-2001/opinion/16882762.html ***************************************************************** 2 Guinn, Reid slam decision to shift site of Yucca ... LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL: NEWS: Thursday, August 30, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL Gov. Kenny Guinn told state lawyers Wednesday to explore grounds for a court injunction to block the Department of Energy from holding next week's hearing on the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project at federal offices in North Las Vegas instead of a neutral location. An Energy Department spokesman said the location of the Sept. 5 hearing had to be changed from the Suncoast to the National Nuclear Security Administration, off Energy Way in North Las Vegas, after Suncoast officials said the casino couldn't accommodate the expected crowd of hundreds. Guinn said, "I absolutely feel that is the wrong place to have it. It's not conducive to the public. "If they're going to relocate it, they ought to put it in a place like the Cashman Field Center where there is parking and public access," he said in a telephone interview. Guinn said his staff called Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham's office and the White House to complain about changing the hearing's location from an easily accessible site to a fenced location where security is tight and visitors are closely watched. "We're also trying to see if we can follow through and get an injunction to stop them from having the meeting there. I feel strongly about this," Guinn said. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said holding the hearing at the National Nuclear Security Administration facility would be "like having an election and holding the vote at the Democratic headquarters or the Republican headquarters. It would intimidate people." Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., issued a statement from Jerusalem, where she is on a congressional trip in the Middle East, saying, "I hope whenever the decisive hearings are held, Secretary Abraham will have the decency to attend them personally, and listen to the families who would be affected by this decision." Suncoast spokesman Tom Mikovits said the rooms the Energy Department had booked for the hearing hold only 300 people. "We just didn't have enough room," he said. He referred to a Suncoast statement that said in part that resort management could not hold the public hearing there "based upon attendance constraints, the consideration of the comfort of guests at the Suncoast and other contractual issues." A hearing on Yucca Mountain documents released earlier this year was held June 5 at the Suncoast. For that hearing, the Department of Energy paid the Suncoast $1,600 to use meeting rooms, according to Yucca Mountain Project spokesman Allen Benson. Benson said Suncoast officials cited security concerns when they informed Energy Department officials about their decision not to host the hearing. The new location for the 6 p.m. hearing on Sept. 5 -- the Great Basin Room at the National Nuclear Security Administration, 232 Energy Way in North Las Vegas -- has a capacity of 230, plus standing room for an additional 50. Up to 200 more seats are available in a nearby cafeteria, where the hearing could be watched on a television monitor, according to an administration spokeswoman. Reid said the subject of the Sept. 5 hearing -- recently released scientific documents about the ability of the site and engineered barriers to keep radioactive releases from violating federal safety standards -- is only part of the issue at stake. "You see, nuclear waste is a poison, and the one thing they haven't done yet is address transportation aspects. That's really going to be a problem," he said. Anti-nuclear activists bemoaned the Department of Energy's last-minute changes. "It just shows me that not only are they completely desperate to push this through by any means necessary, but they could care less about the project," said Kalynda Tilges, nuclear issues coordinator for Citizen Alert, a statewide environmental group. Susi Snyder, program director for the Shundahai Network, an international anti-nuclear organization, said she would feel intimidated to testify at the federal facility in North Las Vegas "especially since every time I go there I get stopped at the gate." "It's got no bus access, no public access. It discourages public participation," she said. webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 3 Studies on Yucca Mountain frustrate NRC reviewers LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL: NEWS: Thursday, August 30, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal Energy Department's work often puzzling, staff members say By STEVE TETREAULT DONREY WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Evaluators with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressed frustration Wednesday with work being done at the proposed Nevada nuclear waste repository because documentation from project scientists is unclear or lacking. NRC staff members have asked their counterparts on the Yucca Mountain Project for more information, clarifications or follow-up studies on hundreds of questions. They must analyze a license application to store 77,000 tons of radioactive spent fuel at the site 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. DOE's evaluation might be comprehensive, "but it isn't particularly auditable," NRC assessor Michael Lee said. Lee and others on an NRC team commented on their reviews for the Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste, a panel that reports to the five NRC commissioners on radioactive waste disposal. Carol Hanlon, a Yucca Mountain Project manager, said the discussions with NRC staff are part of a "rigorous process" to resolve questions about the proposed site. "We always view those kinds of comments as extremely helpful," said Hanlon, lead manager of the site recommendation team. "They allow us to understand where our future products can be clarified, and they're also raising issues we already know about so there are no surprises." If Yucca Mountain is chosen, the Energy Department hopes to have the issues resolved by the time licensing forms are submitted to the NRC in 2003. Lee, addressing four advisory panelists, said he is unclear how the Energy Department has analyzed a long list of features and processes in repository management. "This is important because it is hard to figure out how these relate to the larger performance assessment process that is of interest to all of us," Lee said. "The work has been done, but the documentation hasn't been developed." NRC staff member Tim McCartin said evaluators were puzzled by an experiment on the degradation of waste-shielding barriers. "There's a lot of information; however it's sometimes hard to understand the results," McCartin said. And NRC staff member James Firth said some "back and forth" in terms of getting information was necessary before one experiment involving storage canisters could be duplicated. NRC and Energy Department scientists have held more than 20 meetings in the past year and a half to review groundwork for an Yucca Mountain application. The NRC staff has submitted more than 300 requests for follow-up on key technical issues, said Milton Levenson, an advisory board member. Technical issues involving Yucca Mountain's natural features and ways the Energy Department will build protection against radiation releases are to be solved by the time a license application is submitted in 2003. The NRC is to give Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham a report by November with preliminary comments on whether DOE's groundwork is sufficient to support a license application. Abraham will consider the report with others before deciding whether to recommend Yucca Mountain as a repository site. NRC staff member Jim Anderson said Yucca Mountain managers have responded to about 70 of the requests so far, but only a few have been reviewed. "I definitely think DOE is being responsive," Anderson said. Advisory board member B. John Garrick asked to be kept informed. "The commission is very interested in this," he said. "When we see several hundred agreements in a short time, you can't help but wonder what we're getting into and how it's going to play out." webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 4 Construction set for N. Korea nuclear plant -- The Washington Times August 30, 2001 By David R. Sands THE WASHINGTON TIMES The U.S.-led international consortium building two nuclear power plants for North Korea will begin excavation work for the first light-water reactor next month, the agency's executive director said this week. Charles Kartman, the veteran U.S. diplomat who now heads the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), told a Washington gathering of Korea experts Tuesday excavation work will begin in September and KEDO could be prepared to pour the foundations for the coastal site in northern North Korea in about a year. The $4.6 billion KEDO project, to which Japan and South Korea are major contributors, is the centerpiece of a deal worked out under the 1994 Agreed Framework with North Korea to supply the beleaguered communist state's energy needs in exchange for a halt to its suspected nuclear weapons development program. "The public image [of KEDO] is that the project has been beset by problems," said Mr. Kartman. "It certainly remains a difficult task, but the project is well under way and the construction schedule is now moving on." The construction milestone has been reached despite considerable Republican skepticism in Congress and a lengthy "policy review" earlier this year by President Bush of the Clinton administration's recent rapprochement with the North. But both Mr. Kartman and skeptics of the North Korean project say the construction milestone puts renewed pressure on Pyongyang to live up to its end of the bargain by moving toward full compliance with the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as the first reactor nears operation. Officials at the International Atomic Energy Agency have said they will need at least three years to conduct the inspections necessary to confirm North Korea's compliance. If Pyongyang continues to deny IAEA inspectors access, the prospect looms of a clash as the power plant nears completion. "The worry for many of us is that big projects like this take on a life of their own, that there will be a lot of pressure to go ahead even if the North Koreans balk" said Victor Gilinsky, a Washington-based energy consultant and former member of the National Regulatory Commission under Presidents Ford, Carter and Reagan. Mr. Gilinsky said the U.S. approach should be: "If they pretend to cooperate with the IAEA, then we should just pretend to build the plant." Said Mr. Kartman: "There remains a whole litany of things that [North Korea] must comply with before the light-water reactors can be ready. The task should be to begin earlier with those things to avoid delays in the future." Buffeted by logistical, financing, labor, and political delays, the first of the two proposed reactors is already at least some five years behind the 2003 opening date envisaged in the 1994 accord. Official support for the project has waxed and waned as U.S.-North Korean relations have endured numerous ups and downs over the past seven years. President Bush's open skepticism of his precedessor's North Korea policy and efforts by Republican lawmakers to substitute a conventional energy plant for the agreement's nuclear reactors led many to predict a collapse of the effort this year. "President Bush's insistence on verification will make it very unlikely that the nuclear reactors will ever be completed in North Korea," House International Relations Committee Chairman Henry J. Hyde, Illinois Republican, predicted in a speech earlier this year. Henry Sokolsky, executive director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center and a senior nonproliferation official in the Pentagon under the first President Bush, said crucial parts of the proposed accord with North Korea remain in dispute even now. Pyongyang, he noted, recently argued that it had only promised to begin talks on IAEA compliance when a significant portion of the first reactor had been completed, not that it would actually be in compliance by then. But Secretary of State Colin L. Powell in June reaffirmed the administration's support for the project. The Bush administration's proposed fiscal 2002 budget also includes $95 million to purchase the 500,000 metric tons of heavy fuel oil promised to North Korea annually until the reactor comes on line. Alex Wagner, a research analyst for nonproliferation issues at the Arms Control Association, said the creation of a consortium to build the nuclear plant had proven effective in insulating it to some extent from domestic political pressures. Calling the excavation announcement "a significant milestone," Mr. Wagner said he believed the KEDO partners would be able to apply the brakes to the project if North Korea refused to hold up its end of the bargain. ***************************************************************** 5 Unveiling of Big Rock's casks Traverse City Record-Eagle -- www.record-eagle.com August 30, 2001 Public views objects that will store radioactive fuel rods in future By Record-Eagle staff writer CHARLEVOIX - Consumers Energy officials showed the public Wednesday how a whole lot of concrete and steel is going to help eventually return the decommissioned Big Rock nuclear power plant site to trees and grass. Plant officials unveiled a thick concrete pad about the size of a basketball court and one of eight, 19-foot-tall concrete-and-steel casks that will store radioactive fuel rods from the plant. The rods are currently stored in water in the spent fuel pool inside Big Rock's large containment sphere. After 35 years of operation, Big Rock, one of the nation's oldest nuclear power plants, shut down in 1997. Since then, plant employees have worked to return the facility to a natural state, with a goal that by 2005, the only remaining vestige of the plant on the 580-acre site will be the dry fuel storage area. Moving the fuel rods into dry storage is a key moment in the decommissioning process, because it will allow for dismantlement and removal of the highly recognizable containment sphere and building, said Big Rock spokesman Tim Petrosky. The radioactive materials are expected to remain in dry storage on-site until 2012 - if a national nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev., is ready as expected, that is. Big Rock's storage area is licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for 20 years, but is designed to last for up to a century, said Mike Bourassa, dry fuel storage project manager. "Even if the (Yucca Mountain) repository isn't the real deal by 2010, this facility can sit here and sit here and sit here," he said. Loading of fuel rods from the plant into the storage units is expected to begin early next year, with the completion of cask-loading by the end of 2003. Racks of 441 fuel rods will be removed from the spent fuel pool with special machinery and placed inside stainless steel cylinders, then into heavily shielded transfer casks. A total of 63 such bundles will then be prepared for the half-mile transfer to the storage site. The bundles are placed in the concrete containers, with each weighing 167 tons when loaded. Specialized "air-palettes" will then help lift the casks, and heavy machinery will move and place them on the storage area pad. Calling the eight casks fortified is an understatement, according to Petrosky. "They are designed to withstand tornado-force winds of up to 360 mph, burning temperatures of 2,000 degrees and a drop on sharp objects from 20 feet, and flooding," he said. Though the casks have no moving parts, they will be routinely maintained and monitored for security throughout their time on-site, including regular radiation-level checks, Petrosky said. "You don't just do it and walk away," he said. More than 450 dry fuel storage canisters are in use throughout the United States, according to Petrosky. But an anti-nuclear group based in Washington, D.C., claims dry fuel storage isn't as safe as Big Rock would like the public to believe. Kevin Kamps, a "nuclear waste specialist" at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, said there are concerns about whether casks can be safely unloaded In a Resource Service press release designed to coincide with the Big Rock open house, Kamps said the NRC from 1996 to 1999 halted cask loading to examine safety issues and evaluate the process, but that it allowed loading to resume in 1999. Transporting the waste to Yucca Mountain - a site the grassroots Resource Service group does not believe is suitable - will also be fraught with potential dangers, Kamps states. "Nuclear power must be phased out and replaced with safer, cheaper, cleaner ways to meet our electricity needs: conservation, efficiency and renewable sources such as wind, solar and fuel cells," he said. Keith Matheny is the reporter for Antrim, Charlevoix and Emmet counties. He can be reached at (231) 536-0345, or at tcrekeith@yahoo.com ***************************************************************** 6 Guinn plans fight to halt public hearing on Yucca Las Vegas SUN August 30, 2001 By Mary Manning Gov. Kenny Guinn says he plans to go to court today or Friday to stop a public hearing on Yucca Mountain unless the Energy Department agrees to provide the public with a reasonable opportunity to comment on the project. "It's in the hands of our legal team, but we should have something in today," Jack Finn, Guinn's spokesman, said. However, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which would have jurisdiction, may not consider the case before the first scheduled hearing Wednesday, state legal experts say. If the court cannot consider the case before the first hearing, the state would then protest what it perceives to be an insufficient period for public comment, said Bob Loux, Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects executive director. The Suncoast resort on Wednesday canceled its contract to house the first of three scheduled public hearings next week on the proposed repository for the nation's high-level nuclear waste. Suncoast attorney Barry Lieberman said the resort could not accommodate the crowd expected to attend the hearing, which was scheduled at 5 p.m. Wednesday. The resort's meeting rooms can seat up to 300 people, although the hearings could draw thousands, DOE and state officials say. The governor said he plans to file a request for an injunction to stop the hearing process unless the DOE moves the initial hearing to an accessible facility, and suggested Cashman Center on Las Vegas Boulevard. DOE spokesman Allen Benson said the agency is moving the hearing to its National Nuclear Security Administration on Losee Road in North Las Vegas as an alternative to the Suncoast. The DOE's auditorium can seat 200 with room for another 200 people in a cafeteria. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Guinn said that was unacceptable. "I totally disagree with that location," the governor said. "They ought to make it a neutral place, with easy access and plenty of parking." The DOE's North Las Vegas complex is surrounded by a chain-link fence topped with barbed wire. Armed guards patrol the grounds. The location is not on a public transportation route. "It's hard to get in and out of there because of the security," Guinn said. "We want to make sure the people of Nevada get a chance to present their concerns." The senator's spokesman Nathan Naylor said, "It is not socially acceptable to hold a hearing behind barbed wire fences." Guinn on Wednesday called DOE Undersecretary Robert Card for a more definitive answer on the hearing schedule. Guinn said Card didn't return his telephone calls. Nevada officials are unhappy with the DOE decision to schedule the public comment period so soon after the agency completed the Yucca Mountain Preliminary Site Suitability Evaluation, which was released Aug. 21. The agency is not required to notify the public within any specific time period, Loux said. "We may have to wait until after the hearing to take legal action," he said. today. The DOE also has scheduled hearings in Pahrump and Amargosa Valley on Sept. 12 and 13, respectively. The DOE is not required to conduct any more hearings before the site is recommended to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, Benson said. "I can't answer whether we will schedule any more hearings at this time," he said. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., who criticized the DOE for scheduling the hearings before the final environmental impact studies are released for public review, said the hearings should be postponed. "If the DOE is genuine in their desire to include the people of Nevada in the decision making process, then they will agree to either postpone these hearings, or commit to holding further hearings at a later, more appropriate time, such as following the release of the final environmental impact studies," Berkley said from the Middle East, where she is on a congressional trip. "The hearings will not fulfill the law before I have to make my decision to veto the Yucca Mountain Project," Guinn said. Complaints from Nevada's congressional delegation regarding public access to the hearings prompted the DOE to broaden the scope of the meetings by offering the proceedings to three Nevada cities -- Reno, Elko and Carson City. An Internet webcast of the proceedings also is in the works, DOE spokesman Joe Davis said Tuesday. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 7 NRC Determines Inspection Finding for Oyster Creek Nuclear Plant to Be of Low to Moderate Safety Significance Press Release - Region I - 2001- 055 - UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS, REGION I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 No. I-01-055 August 29, 2001 CONTACT: Diane Screnci (610)337-5330/ e-mail: dps@nrc.gov Neil A. Sheehan (610)337-5331/e-mail: nas@nrc.gov The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has determined that an inspection finding for the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant pertaining to security should be characterized as "white," meaning it is an issue of low to moderate safety significance but one which may require additional NRC inspections. The plant, located in Lacey Township, N.J., is operated by AmerGen Energy Company. The inspection finding is based on NRC assessment of a security exercise conducted at the plant in May. An NRC team observed and evaluated four force-on-force drills at that time and determined that during one of those exercises, the response strategy was insufficient to successfully thwart an adversary force. During a regulatory conference with NRC staff to discuss the finding in August, plant managers contended the problem was the result of artificialities introduced during the drill. However, NRC staff, after careful consideration, found that artificialities were not a sufficient basis for a change in the assessment because, among other reasons, they are largely within the company's control. Under the agency's significance determination process, NRC officials classify certain conditions at nuclear power plants as being one of four colors which delineate increasing levels of severity, beginning with "green" and progressing in severity to "white," "yellow" or "red." Any finding of white or above could result in additional inspections. ***************************************************************** 8 NRC finds Oyster Creek susceptible to attack PressPlus - The Press of Atlantic City Online, covering southern New Jersey, Gaming, Gambling, Entertainment, Casinos, Headliners, Beaches, Boardwalks and Fishing - August 30, 2001 - 12:12 AM The nuclear plant failed to thwart a simulated terrorist attack. The NRC has downgraded the plant’s security rating. By JACK KASKEY Staff Writer, (609) 272-7213 LACEY TOWNSHIP — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Wednesday downgraded the security rating of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant because operators failed to properly deter a simulated terrorist attack. In a series of four drills at the plant in May, an NRC team simulated various attacks on the plant, said Neil Sheehan, an NRC spokesman. The nuclear plant’s security failed to thwart the adversary force during one of the drills. “We don’t take this lightly,” Sheehan said. “One of the things we are looking at is their ability to thwart invaders who could possibly damage the reactor core.” As a result, the NRC has classified plant security as “white,” meaning it is an issue of low to moderate safety significance. Under the agency’s new color-coded ranking system, conditions at nuclear plants are classified as green, white, yellow or red, with green being the best and red being the worst. Oyster Creek security will carry the white ranking for at least a year, with more inspections and drills likely, Sheehan said. Sheehan said he couldn’t detail specifics of the drills. But he said plant managers have disputed the white determination, contending the security breech was caused by “artificialities” introduced during the drill. Plant managers said such factors included the failure of the NRC drill coordinator to simulate a door alarm that would have alerted security to the plant infiltration. Also, glare on a fire-door window required a security person to move out of his protected position, the managers complained. The NRC, however, determined the artificialities did not merit a change in the white finding. Sheehan noted that plant security was aware of the drills, but not of the exact scenarios. GPU last year sold the Oyster Creek plant for $10 million to AmerGen Energy Co., a firm jointly owned by Exelon and British Energy. AmerGen spokeswoman Debra Lynn Piana could not be reached for comment late Wednesday afternoon. Oyster Creek opened in 1969 and is the nation’s oldest commercial nuclear power plant. It is located in central Ocean County about 30 miles north of Atlantic City. E-mail this story to a friend Copyright © 2001 South Jersey Publishing Co. All rights ***************************************************************** 9 Daily Events Report U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Operations Center Event Reports For 08/30/2001 08/31/2001 ** EVENT NUMBERS ** 38249 38250 38251 38252 38253 Power Reactor Event Number: 38249 FACILITY: COOK REGION: 3 NOTIFICATION DATE: 08/30/2001 UNIT: [1] [2] [] STATE: MI NOTIFICATION TIME: 06:23[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] W 4 LP,[2] W 4 LP EVENT DATE: 08/29/2001 EVENT TIME: 22:55[EDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: SCOTT RICHARDSON LAST UPDATE DATE: 08/30/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: LEIGH TROCINE PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY JOHN MADERA R3 10 CFR SECTION: AINA 50.72(b)(3)(v)(A) POT UNABLE TO SAFE SD UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N N 0 Cold Shutdown 0 Cold Shutdown 2 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT DISCOVERY OF ABNORMALLY LOW ESSENTIAL SERVICE WATER FLOW TO DIESEL GENERATORS The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from the licensee: "This is Scott Richardson calling from the DC Cook Nuclear Plant with an [8] hour non emergency notification in accordance with 10CFR50.72(b)(3)(v) for 'Any event or condition that at the time of discovery could have prevented the fulfillment of the safety function of structures or systems that are needed to: (A) Shut down the reactor and maintain it in a safe shutdown condition . . . . . . ' " "While performing an Essential Service Water (ESW) surveillance test on Unit 2, it was noted that the ESW flow to each Diesel Generator was abnormally low. This condition could have prevented the Diesel Generators from fulfilling their safety function. This condition was caused by sand and sediment in the ESW system and impacted both units." "Subsequent system flushes and valve cycling [have] eliminated the low flow condition in both Unit 1 and 2 Diesel Generators." "We will continue to monitor ESW system performance. Further investigation of this event is in progress to determine the root cause of the low flow anomaly." "Unit 2 will be [shutting] down [and] going to [Cold Shutdown] beginning in the next 3 hours." (Refer to event #38253 for additional information.) The licensee plans to notify the NRC resident inspector. General Information or Other Event Number: 38250 REP ORG: TEXAS DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH NOTIFICATION DATE: 08/30/2001 LICENSEE: WASHINGTON GROUP INTERNATIONAL, INC. NOTIFICATION TIME: 10:34[EDT] CITY: BAYTOWN REGION: 4 EVENT DATE: 08/23/2001 COUNTY: STATE: TX EVENT TIME: [CDT] LICENSE#: TX 02662 004 AGREEMENT: Y LAST UPDATE DATE: 08/30/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION GAIL GOOD R4 JOHN HICKEY NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: JAMES H. OGDEN, JR. HQ OPS OFFICER: LEIGH TROCINE EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: NAGR AGREEMENT STATE EVENT TEXT AGREEMENT STATE REPORT REGARDING A DAMAGED RADIOGRAPHY CAMERA AT WASHINGTON GROUP INTERNATIONAL, INC., IN HOUSTON, TEXAS The following text is a portion of a facsimile received from the Texas Department of Health: "Damaged Equipment 30 Day Report[ ]August 30, 2001" "1. Event Report Identification No.[:] Incident 7793" "2. License Number[:] Texas License 02662 004" "3. Licensee[:] Washington Group International, Inc." "4. Event time, date, location[:] 5:00 a.m., July 26, 2001, Job Site Cvaerner Calpine, 8605 FM 1405, Baytown, Texas 77520" "5. Event Type[:] Damaged Equipment Radiographic camera (Exposure device)" "6. Notification[:] 30 day report" "7. Event Description[: ...] On August 23, 2001, the licensee notified the Agency of a damaged radiographic camera which occurred on July 26, 2001. The device, containing 43 curies of Iridium 192, was damaged by a radiographer applying excessive force to the selector ring while attempting to connect the drive assembly. The device was returned to [its] transportation overpack and returned to storage as damaged. After disassembly, cleaning, and inspection, no visual signs of damage were detected and the gauge was reassembled. Upon reassembly, it was noted that there was play in the selector ring. A new storage cover was installed and the camera was returned to service. To prevent a recurrence: the radiographer involved was retrained on the equipment and informed to immediately notify the radiation safety officer of damaged equipment; both radiographers were reprimanded for failure to follow company Operating, Safety, and Emergency Procedures; all other exposure devices were inspected to see if the same problem existed none exhibited this problem; this incident was discussed at the licensee's biweekly safety meeting; and the 'old' device cover was sent for evaluation. No abnormal exposures were detected as a result of this incident." (Call the NRC operations officer for state contact information.) Power Reactor Event Number: 38251 FACILITY: MONTICELLO REGION: 3 NOTIFICATION DATE: 08/30/2001 UNIT: [1] [] [] STATE: MN NOTIFICATION TIME: 11:50[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] GE 3 EVENT DATE: 08/30/2001 EVENT TIME: 09:58[CDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: PFEFFER LAST UPDATE DATE: 08/30/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: CHAUNCEY GOULD PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY JOHN MADERA R3 10 CFR SECTION: ACOM 50.72(b)(3)(xiii) LOSS COMM/ASMT/RESPONSE UNIT SCRAM CODERX CRITINIT PWR INIT RX MODE CURR PWR CURR RX MODE 1 N Y 100 Power Operation 100 Power Operation EVENT TEXT LOSS OF OFFSITE RESPONSE CAPABILITY The loss of the Public Prompt Notification System(PANS) was discovered during the performance of a surveillance test. The Wright County Civil Defense was notified and is standing by to perform route alert if necessary. The NRC Resident Inspector will be notified along with state and local agencies. Other Nuclear Material Event Number: 38252 REP ORG: DOMINION NOTIFICATION DATE: 08/30/2001 LICENSEE: DOMINION GENERATION NOTIFICATION TIME: 11:55[EDT] CITY: MT. STORM REGION: 2 EVENT DATE: 08/03/2001 COUNTY: STATE: WV EVENT TIME: [EDT] LICENSE#: GLG 1105 AGREEMENT: N LAST UPDATE DATE: 08/30/2001 DOCKET: PERSON ORGANIZATION MARK LESSER R2 FRITZ STURZ NMSS NRC NOTIFIED BY: DAVE SUMMERS HQ OPS OFFICER: BOB STRANSKY EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY 10 CFR SECTION: NINF INFORMATION ONLY EVENT TEXT MISSING NUCLEAR GAUGE A Texas Nuclear gauge, Model 5197 (S/N B847), has been discovered to be missing from the Mt. Storm coal generating station. The gauge contains 100 mCi of Cs 137 and was purchased under a general license. The vendor notified the Mt. Storm facility on 8/3/2001 that the gauge had never been returned. The gauge was last inventoried in August of 1982. All attempts to locate the gauge have been unsuccessful. Power Reactor Event Number: 38253 FACILITY: COOK REGION: 3 NOTIFICATION DATE: 08/30/2001 UNIT: [] [2] [] STATE: MI NOTIFICATION TIME: 14:09[EDT] RXTYPE: [1] W 4 LP,[2] W 4 LP EVENT DATE: 08/30/2001 EVENT TIME: 12:48[EDT] NRC NOTIFIED BY: COBB LAST UPDATE DATE: 08/30/2001 HQ OPS OFFICER: CHAUNCEY GOULD PERSON ORGANIZATION EMERGENCY CLASS: NON EMERGENCY JOHN MADERA 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 2 N Y 3.3 Startup 0 Hot Standby EVENT TEXT INDIVIDUAL ROD POSITION INDICATORS(IRPI) BECAME UNRELIABLE AND INOPERABLE As the unit was shutting down per management direction from problems encountered with the ESW system (Refer to event #38249 for additional information.), several Individual Rod Position Indicators became unreliable and inoperable as a result of changing RCS temperatures. At 1248 on 8/30/01, more than one IRPI per group became inoperable which is beyond Cook TS 3.1.3.2. Action statement. This would require entry into TS 3.0.3 which requires initiating action within one hour to place the unit in a mode in which the specification does not apply. At that time Unit 2 was in mode 2@3.3% power and was expected to enter mode 3 at which time 3.1.3.2 would no longer be applicable. At 1347 the unit was shut down in mode 3 and exited both TS 3.1.3.2 and 3.0.3. The NRC Resident Inspector was notified. ***************************************************************** 10 IAEA Daily Press Review IAEA Daily Press Review Date 2001-08-30 Number 165 1. Non-proliferation President Bush vows to begin work on missile shield despite economic slowdown. Scientists say US planned MD causes risk for allies. Kazakh President appeals for international aid to overcome disastrous legacy of nuclear weapons testing, warns of nuclear threat from terrorist groups. India, Australia to hold dialogue on defence. China expounds views on nuclear issues at international conference on 'Greeting a Nuclear-free World in the 21st Century' held in Kazakhstan. (DAW; FT; NYT - 30/8) Australia; China; India; Kazakhstan; United States of America 2. Nuclear power New prospects for NPP Temelin: Czech utility CEZ could be sold to Western European company; Temelin debate may thus become internal EU affair. Thermonuclear reactor development programme approved in Russia; Kazakhstan to take part in project. Minatom gives permission to mine Russia's 'most promising uranium deposit' at Khiagdinsky.. Slovak NPP Bohunice-1 receives long-term licence. More Spanish NPP units recommended for new 10-year licences. Japan Nuclear Fuels formally asks Aomori prefecture and Rokkasho-mura villagers for 'co-operation' to build MOX fuel production plant in the village. (DP; NUC; NW; R - 28, 29/8) Czech Republic; France; Japan; Russian Federation; Slovakia; Spain 3. Chernobyl Forest mushrooms in parts of Germany are still affected by caesium-137 linked to Chernobyl accident; its content in mushrooms from Eastern Europe is much lower. (SDZ - 30/8) Chernobyl; EUROPE 4. Radiation, health Nationwide German study planned on alleged links between Germany's nuclear power programme and cancer incidence. Locals still suffering 10 years after closure of nuclear test range in Kazakhstan. (FT; NW - 30/8) Germany; Kazakhstan 5. Radwaste, fuel Russia to remove spent nuclear fuel from 21decommissioned submarines in 2001. Decision on Russian nuclear waste storage facility in Krasnoyarsk postponed. Protesters delay German nuclear waste convoy to France. (FT - 29/8) Germany; Russian Federation 6. UN Enforcing embargo, UN blocks 43 food contracts within framework of oil-for -food programme, Iraq claims. (DAW - 30/8) Iraq 7. Miscellaneous Virus which prompts cancer cells to self-destruct while sparing healthy cells has been developed by researchers. Article suggests China will become superpower in 25 years. (BBC; DAW - 30/8) China; United Kingdom ***************************************************************** 11 WNA NEWS BRIEFING 01.35 | 22 - 28 August 2001 World Nuclear Association | News Briefings | Nuclear Energy News | News Briefing 01.35 A weekly summary of international news relevant to the nuclear energy industry. [NB01.35-1] Calls for the European Union (EU) to show 'realism on the nuclear issue' and to maintain 'essential' funding of research into new technologies such as nuclear fusion, were to be discussed on 28 August by the European Parliament's committee on industry, external trade, research and energy (ITRE). The committee - which is debating responses to the European Commission's green paper on energy supply - heard that nuclear energy was one of four areas in which the EU and member states could be 'masters of their own destiny' in tackling both security of supply and environmental protection. A draft ITRE report is available on the European Parliament's website (http://www.europarl.eu.int/meetdocs/committees/itre/20010827/434215en.pdf). (NucNet News, 267/01, 28 August; see also News Briefing 01.24-14) [NB01.35-2] Kazakhstan: Kazatomprom has reportedly reached an agreement with China National Nuclear Corp (CNNC) to supply uranium to China over the next three years. Specific details of the agreement were not released. Kazatomprom and CNNC are reportedly also discussing a proposed joint venture to develop a uranium mine in southern Kazakhstan. (FreshFUEL, 27 August, p5; Ux Weekly, 27 August, p2) [NB01.35-3] Applications from US nuclear utilities/power generating companies to conduct an Early Site Permit (ESP) scoping study of potential sites for the deployment of new nuclear power plants in the US are being sought by the Department of Energy (DOE). Some US$700 000 is expected to be made available by DOE to conduct the initial scoping study. The DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology - through the Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee (NERAC) - has been working with the nuclear industry in an attempt to identify the issues and barriers affecting future near-term deployment of new nuclear power plants. (Ux Weekly, 27 August, p2; Dow Jones Newswires, 27 August; see also News Briefing 01.14-11) [NB01.35-4] Brazil: A decision on whether to complete construction of the Angra-3 nuclear power reactor could be taken by the National Council for Energy Policy (CNPE) when it next meets at the end of September or in October. An additional US$1.7 billion would be needed to finish the reactor, which is about 30% complete and for which 70% of the plant's imported equipment has already been supplied, feasibility studies suggest. (NucNet News, 263/01, 23 August; see also News Briefing 01.32-8) [NB01.35-5] Japan: The executive committee of the town of Miyama in Mie prefecture is expected to submit a bill in September allowing a referendum to take place on whether to 'pre-approve' the town as a possible site for a new nuclear power plant. If the bill is approved, and the referendum held, it will be the first time in Japan that a community has decided on a nuclear plant siting in such a way prior to any decision being taken by a utility with regard to potential sites. (NucNet News, 265/01, 24 August; see also News Briefing 96.31-2) [NB01.35-6] US: Entergy Corp plans to raise output of the Vermont Yankee reactor by 10% over the next three years and to sell the additional 50 MW of electricity into the open market. Entergy's deal to purchase the plant is expected to close in spring 2002. The company has yet to make a decision on extending the operating licence of the 540 MWe BWR. (Nucleonics Week, 23 August, p3; see also News Briefing 01.34-2) [NB01.35-7] Canada: 'Blanket approval' for the restart of the Ontario Power Generation's (OPG's) Pickering A nuclear power plant has been recommended by regulatory staff at the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC), subject to 'identified improvements' being completed. CNSC staff has also recommended that they be given authority to approve the start-up of the plant's four reactors on an individual case-by-case basis. OPG has 'tentatively targeted' the restart for December 2001 or early January 2002, followed by a return to service in the first quarter of 2002. (NucNet Business News, 72/01, 24 August; see also News Briefing 01.34-12) [NB01.35-8] Electricite de France (EDF) hopes to be able to restart Cattenom-3 by early September 2001, following approval from French nuclear safety authority, DSIN, on 13 August for fuel reloading at the reactor. Unprecedented fuel damage occurred during the reactor's last operating cycle. To obtain reload permission, EDF agreed to scrap 64 fuel assemblies that had finished their second or third 18-month cycle, and reload only first-cycle or fresh assemblies or those from earlier operating cycles. (Nucleonics Week, 23 August, p5; see also News Briefing 01.29-12) [NB01.35-9] Czech Republic: Temelin-1 was reconnected to the Czech national grid on 24 August. The reactor is now operating at over 50% capacity and is expected to reach full capacity of 981 MWe by the end of 2001. Temelin-2 is anticipated to start operating in 2002. (Ux Weekly, 27 August, p2; see also News Briefing 01.34-7) [NB01.35-10] US: The decision to restart Browns Ferry-1 has been delayed by Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). The company says it needs to complete environmental impact studies related to a feasibility assessment for operating licence extensions for all three Browns Ferry reactors. Should the decision be made to restart the reactor, TVA estimates that five years work would be needed. (FreshFUEL, 27 August, p5; Nuclear Market Review, 24 August, p2; see also News Briefing 01.34-5) [NB01.35-11] Japan: A miniature nuclear power reactor, measuring six metres by two metres, has been developed by the Central Research Institute of Electrical Power Industry (CRIEPI). The 200 KWe 'Rapid-L' reactor - conceived as a power source for lunar colonies - could be fitted into the basement of an office building or apartment block, where it would have to be housed in a solid containment building. A system to automatically shut the reactor if it overheats is being tested. The Rapid-L reactor has no control rods to regulate the nuclear reaction: instead reservoirs of molten lithium-6 (an effective neutron absorber) would serve as the reactor's coolant and automatically control its nuclear reactions. (New Scientist, 25 August, p4; Ux Weekly, 27 August, p3) [NB01.35-12] Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd (JNFL) has asked the Aomori prefectural government and the Rokkasho Village office for permission to build a plant for processing mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel in the village. If such approval is given, JNFL must then obtain permission from the central government. Construction of the 120 billion yen (US$850 million) MOX plant is tentatively scheduled to begin in April 2004, with operations expected to commence in April 2009. The plant would have an annual processing capacity of some 130 tonnes. Meanwhile, Japan's Federation of Electric Power Companies (FEPCO) will spend around 600-700 million yen (US$4.1-5.0 million) over a one-year period, starting in October 2001, to gain public support for the use of MOX fuel in 16-18 of Japan's nuclear power plants by 2010. (Ux Weekly, 27 August, p3; Nuclear Market Review, 24 August, p3; see also News Briefings 01.32-12 and 01.23-1) [NB01.35-13] US: A proposed underground nuclear fuel repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, would meet recently finalised environmental protection standards, the US Department of Energy (DOE) has concluded in its preliminary site suitability evaluation report. The DOE's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCRWM) concluded that doses to the public and repository workers during both the operational and post-closure periods would fall below the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) 15 mrem per year individual dose limit and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC's) proposed 25 mrem per year standard. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham is expected to decide by the end of 2001 whether to recommend the site to President Bush. The full DOE report is available on the Yucca Mountain Project website (http://www.ymp.gov/timeline/psse/index.htm). (NucNet News, 262/01, 22 August; Ux Weekly, 27 August, p3; SpentFUEL, 27 August, p1; Nuclear Market Review, 24 August, p3; see also News Briefing 01.24-3) [NB01.35-14] US: President Bush is expected to drop plans to dispose of 100 tonnes of plutonium extracted from US and Russian nuclear weapons. The rising cost of the operation is said to have led to opposition in the White House, as have doubts about the technology needed to turn 50 tonnes of each country's plutonium into fuel for nuclear power reactors or rendering it unusable by mixing it with nuclear waste. (International Herald Tribune, 22 August, p1; The Times, 22 August, p11; see also News Briefing 98.36-6) [NB01.35-15] Germany: Utility E.On has withdrawn its application for an interim storage facility for spent fuel at its Stade nuclear power plant, Germany's federal radiation protection agency, the BfS, announced. The BfS said that as the plant was scheduled to shut down in 2003 and spent fuel would be sent to France for reprocessing, there was no need for an interim storage facility at the site. (NucNet News, 266/01, 24 August; see also News Briefing 00.02-8) [NB01.35-16] US: A technique known as pyroprocessing has been developed at the Department of Energy's (DOE's) Argonne National Laboratory-West for reprocessing nuclear waste. The process would first separate uranium-238 from the rest of the nuclear waste. This U238, which makes up 96% of nuclear waste, could be stored in existing facilities for low-level waste (LLW). Plutonium and other related materials - which make up 1% of nuclear waste - would be broken down into less radioactive materials that could be burned in reactors or put through particle accelerators to make them less radioactive. Any remaining wastes would only be radioactive for 300 years, compared with the 100 000 years that current nuclear waste remains radioactive. The process has so far only been developed on a laboratory scale. (Ux Weekly, 27 August, p4) Previous News Briefing NB01.34 ***************************************************************** 12 USEC, PACE agree on pact - The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Thursday, August 30, 2001 The pact will run through Nov. 15, when officials from both sides hope a permanent contract will be in place. By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650 Union workers and U.S. Enrichment Corp. officials have reached a temporary agreement they hope will lead to a new contract by mid-November. The seven-point pact was signed late Wednesday afternoon by bargainers for USEC and Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers (PACE) Local 5-550. It lasts until Nov. 15 and calls for: --A 4 percent hourly wage increase retroactive from July 31 when the old five-year contract expired. --No strike. --No layoffs of hourly workers. --Union permission for workers to volunteer for overtime if they wish. --All other terms and conditions unchanged from the old contract. --USEC to outline an approach for the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant to be self-sustaining. --Both sides to reach a permanent contract, or hourly wages will revert to the old contract. "We see this as a turning point for a new relationship with the union in which we can work together to ensure the long-term success and sustainability of the plant," USEC spokeswoman Elizabeth Stuckle said. Besides pledging no layoffs, USEC agreed to outline how to settle the contract, said David Fuller, president of the local PACE. "They're obviously interested in innovative and money-saving ideas within the plant itself," he said. "I think they hope to establish a new relationship whereby there's more of a partnering atmosphere and attempting to look for new ways of doing business that would be more advantageous to the plant as a whole." USEC agreed to return to the union in 30 days with an outline on how to accomplish those goals, Fuller said. The company also pledged to have a contract proposal between Oct. 1 and Nov. 15 for the union to accept or reject, he said. "If we accept it, we'll have a new contract in place," Fuller said. "If we don't, we'll revert to the status we're at now — with an expired contract and the 4 percent raise removed." The two sides had been deadlocked since Aug. 2 when the union soundly rejected the last contract offer. Calling wage and benefit provisions substandard, Fuller said the union staunchly opposed language that the contract would expire after a year if USEC did not achieve any of three major goals related to buying Russian uranium. After resuming for a day, negotiations broke off for three weeks until Wednesday. Fuller said the tone changed in that bargainers sought each other's needs. "All I can say is both sides kept probing for a way to achieve something that we could live with," Fuller said. "We weren't prepared to take a one-year contract. This way, we've extended some to try to allow them to gain information they might need, but by the same token, we still have bargaining power either to strike or work day-to-day." Stuckle and Fuller said the Russian issue was not a part of the agreement, but Fuller said the extension gives USEC time to learn more about the federal government's stance on the Russian deal and the overall U.S. uranium enrichment business. Both sides hope by September, the Bush administration will finish reviewing whether the Paducah plant — the nation's only uranium enricher — should remain in business and if USEC should continue being sole agent for the Russian uranium. USEC says blending the cheaper Russian material with the more expensive plant-enriched uranium holds down costs and preserves the life of the plant, whose technology is expensive and outdated. Controlling the flow of the Russian material helps stabilize market prices, the company says. Nuclear power plants to whom USEC sells argue if the company remains exclusive agent and gets lower prices for the Russian uranium, it will monopolize the market and raise prices, forcing power bills to go up. "Nothing in our agreement depends on the Russian deal," Fuller said. "On the other hand, events will probably unfold over the next 75 days that will shed light on those questions and give the company some sure knowledge of how they could proceed with a full contract settlement." ***************************************************************** 13 New Nuclear Waste Transport Starts Las Vegas SUN August 29, 2001 FRANKFURT, Germany- A transport of nuclear waste set out by rail from western Germany for reprocessing in France Wednesday morning without any disturbance from anti-nuclear protesters, police said. The shipment from the Biblis plant in Hesse state was expected to cross the border later Wednesday, bound for France's La Hague reprocessing plant in Normandy. Greenpeace protesters had blocked rail tracks heading out of the Biblis plant Tuesday evening by chaining themselves to the rails. Police ended that protest after several hours. Protests regularly mark transports of atomic waste out of Germany by anti-nuclear activists, who argue that shipping the nuclear material endangers the public. Germany sends spent nuclear fuel from 19 power plants abroad for reprocessing under contracts that oblige it to take back the resulting waste for storage. After a break of several years, waste shipments resumed in March. In June, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder and leading energy companies signed an agreement to shut down Germany's nuclear power plants. The pact limits nuclear plants to an average of 32 years of operation, with the first plant scheduled to shut down in 2003. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 14 USEC: Exelon visits part of peer review The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Thursday, August 30, 2001 Rumors had been flying around the plant that the nuclear power company was planning to buy USEC. By Bill Bartleman bbartleman@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650 A team of technical experts from Exelon Nuclear is at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant this week as part of a nuclear industry exchange program to review operations and make recommendations for improving efficiency. Rumors among employee groups that Exelon's visits are part of a plan to buy the U.S. Enrichment Corp., which operates the plant, are incorrect, USEC spokeswoman Elizabeth Stuckle said. The rumors intensified this week as Exelon officials are making their second visit this month. Exelon President and Chief Nuclear Officer Oliver Kingsley Jr. toured the plant Aug. 3 with Nick Timbers, USEC president and chief executive officer. Also fueling the sale rumors is the fact that USEC and union production employees have been involved in tense negotiations for a new contract to replace one that expired July 31. The union has soundly rejected one contract, but reached a temporary agreement on Wednesday that will last until Nov. 15. John Driskill, president of the Security Police and Fire Professionals of America, Local 111, said concerns about the future of the plant, contract negotiations with the production union and rumors of a possible sale worry employees. "We've got all this stuff going on, and these people are here looking at the plant," he said. "We don't ever seem to be able to get in a comfortable mode of operation." Exelon operates 10 nuclear stations and 17 reactors that produce 17,000 megawatts of power for suppliers in Pennsylvania and other East Coast states. Exelon is a potential large customer for the nuclear fuel produced at the Paducah plant. USEC officials say Kingsley's visit was arranged because he is an expert in nuclear power production, but had never been to a plant that produces nuclear fuel. Stuckle said the visit by the five Exelon technicians is a followup to Kingsley's visit and has nothing to do with selling the plant. "Mr. Kingsley was very complimentary of the Paducah plant and its efficiency, but he offered to do what is called a 'best practice peer review,'" Stuckle said. "The reviews are frequent in the nuclear industry and involve sending teams in from each other's facility to give a fresh look at its performance and efficiency." Although the production of nuclear fuel in Paducah differs from the production of power in nuclear plants, Stuckle said there are similarities in handling radiation and waste materials, and in operating the plants. "Each facility learns a better way of doing things, and this allows others to benefit from what they have learned," Stuckle said. She said technical officials from the Paducah plant have done similar reviews for other companies. The Exelon team will list recommendations to help make the Paducah plant more efficient, Stuckle said. "Even though we have been complimented on our high efficiency, we are continuing to look for ways to increase performance and efficiency. "It is a very positive story in the fact that the industry does this, and that the teams share information on the lessons they have learned and on best practices." ***************************************************************** 15 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Thursday, August 30, 2001 ADAMS - Items of Interest Recent Released Documents Added - Thursday, August 30, 2001 These documents and others may be retrieved at the NRC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Item ID: 012410212 Accession Number: ML012340186 Document Date: 8/21/01 Title: 08/21/01 meeting with General Electric on Review of ECCS Suction Strainer Hydrodynamic Load Methods. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410336 Accession Number: ML012400273 Document Date: 8/16/01 Title: 08/28/2001 Notice of Meeting with Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc., Framatome ANP Richland, & Framatome Cogema Fuels on Licensing Plans & Schedules for Blended Uranium Project. Author Affiliation: NRC/NMSS/FCSS Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410454 Accession Number: ML012410010 Document Date: 8/28/01 Title: 09/19/2001 - Notice of Public Meeting with General Electric (GE) Representatives to Discuss Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR) and RIP50 OPTION 2. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410179 Accession Number: ML012340092 Document Date: 8/10/01 Title: Comment (267) submitted by Sheldon Nicholl opposing the NRC proposed rules PR-1, 2, 50, 51, 52, 54, 60, 70, 73, 76 and 110 regarding Changes to Adjudicatory Process. Author Affiliation: - No Known Affiliation Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410169 Accession Number: ML012340067 Document Date: 8/10/01 Title: Comment (27) submitted by Scott A. Bauer on Proposed Rule PR-50 regarding Decommissioning Trust Provisions. Author Affiliation: Arizona Public Service Co Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410069 Accession Number: ML012330070 Document Date: 8/17/01 Title: Environmental Non-Routine Event Report for Exelon Generation Company, LLC, LaSalle County Station re fish kill that occurred in LaSalle cooling lake. Author Affiliation: Exelon Generation Co., LLC, Exelon Nuclear Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410096 Accession Number: ML012330215 Document Date: 8/10/01 Title: Follow up to discussions concerning termination of Atlas trust with transfer of lands & water rights to DOE. Author Affiliation: State of UT, Dept of Environmental Quality Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410143 Accession Number: ML012330365 Document Date: 8/16/01 Title: Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCRWM) Quality Assurance (QA) Audit Observer Inquiries from Audits M&O-ARP-01-01 & M&O-ARP-01-02. Author Affiliation: US Dept of Energy (DOE) Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410350 Accession Number: ML011990140 Document Date: 8/6/01 Title: SECY-01-0150 - MOU and Interagency Agreement Between the U.S. Department of Energy and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission on the Review of Incidental Waste Determinations for the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory Author Affiliation: NRC/EDO Document/Report Number: SECY-01-0150 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 012410455 Accession Number: ML012410163 Document Date: 8/29/01 Title: SRM-SECY-01-0150 - "Memorandum of Understanding & Interagency Agreement Between the U. S. Dept of Energy & the U. S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission on the Review of Incidental Waste Determinations for the Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Lab." Author Affiliation: NRC/SECY Document/Report Number: SRM-SECY-01-0150 ***************************************************************** 16 Feds to ship nuke waste across Wyoming Casper Star-Tribune Casper, Wyoming Thursday, August 30, 2001 BY JASON MARSDEN and DUSTIN BLEIZEFFER Casper Star-Tribune CASPER, Wyo. (AP) - Security is high and security clearances hard to obtain over a pending trans-Wyoming shipment of spent nuclear fuel assemblies from a defunct New York plant cleanup site to the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. U.S. Department of Energy officials plan to ship 125 spent nuclear fuel assemblies by rail sometime after Sept. 1 from West Valley, N.Y., to the federal lab in Idaho for temporary storage, pending designation of a permanent national nuclear waste repository, an agency spokesman said. Monitored by satellite and guarded by armed federal agents, the train's transit should take about four days, said DOE spokesman Joe Davis from his office in department headquarters. The shipment's exact timing is "classified," he said, due to efforts to maintain extremely high security for the journey. The fuel assemblies are left over from uranium-reprocessing plant operations between 1966 and 1972 that the Energy Department is now cleaning up. Assemblies consist of rectangular bundles of 14-foot solid metal rods encased in eight inches of steel and girded by balsawood shock absorbers, all inside a nearly impenetrable cask. Two casks, each on a separate rail car, will accommodate all 125 assemblies, said DOE spokesman Tim Jackson at INEEL Tuesday. The specially designed casks are able to withstand severe impacts, drops, fire and immersion without releasing radiation to the environment, Davis noted. The casks are certified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission based on rigorous testing. After leaving the Empire State, the train will pass through parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and Wyoming before reaching its destination at the southeastern Idaho research laboratory jointly operated by the Energy Department and Bechtel BWXT Idaho LLC. U.S. Transportation Department officials overseeing hazardous-material shipments by rail could not be reached for comment. State officials, however, said the shipment is classified as "safeguarded," a lower degree of security than that applied to "secure" shipments such as nuclear warheads. The "safeguarded" classification means the route the train will take, along with its destination and cargo volume, may be made public, although exact shipping dates are secret, said Scott Ramsay, radiological services supervisor for Wyoming Emergency Management Agency. The governor in each state involved in the shipment appoints a representative to manage that information. That person is left to decide who should be allowed to know the details of a shipment. In Wyoming, that contact person is Steve Jerard, commercial carrier officer for the Wyoming Highway Patrol. In a phone interview Tuesday, Jerard said he has chosen not to share shipping dates of the West Valley shipment with the general public. Only Gov. Jim Geringer and a limited number of emergency management personnel will be told, he said. "There's some security reasons for that," he said, adding that the potential for protest demonstrations is one of those reasons, but not among the most vital. Ramsay said Wyoming has a good safety record when it comes to the transportation of radioactive materials. "We've had uneventful transportation with the radioactive materials. It's been really safe," Ramsay said. "Over the years there's been a couple of minor transportation accidents, but there's been no major issues with releases," of radiation, he said. According to Ramsay, about 60 railcars of radioactive waste from Fernald, Ohio, recently passed through Wyoming to get to EnviroCare in Utah. Also within the last year, spent nuclear fuel from the Foreign Research Reactor traveled through the state by truck to Idaho. GE Nuclear also sent two other shipments of spent nuclear fuel by truck through Wyoming to a laboratory in the East, Ramsay said. Another 108 truck shipments of radioactive waste of military origin traveled through the state, bound for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant project in New Mexico, Ramsay said. The U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Railroad Administration issued a safety compliance oversight plan to cooperating state and federal agencies and the railroad industry three years ago. The document notes that no "accidents or incidents" have occurred during 40 years of shipping spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. U.S. Council for Energy Awareness figures estimate more than 2,000 such shipments by truck and rail since about 1970. The plan drafted by the agency's hazardous materials specialists outlines precautions ranging from planning and pre-shipping track inspections through local preparedness assistance along designated routes. "We have good coordination with safety agencies and governments all along the route, and we don't expect any trouble," Jackson said. Once the shipment arrives at the Idaho facility, the fuel assemblies will be placed in dry storage in a specifically constructed facility. INEEL has custody of other spent nuclear fuels both in dry and underwater storage, including some from the Three Mile Island plant in Harrisburg, Pa., the site of a 1979 meltdown attributed to equipment failure and human error. Under a 1995 agreement between Idaho and the Energy Department, nuclear waste must be removed Idaho by 2035. Meantime, debate continues in the nation's capital on whether to proceed with construction of the proposed permanent waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev., now under study. Communities along the train's route should not be concerned about radiation doses from the fuel assemblies, Jackson stressed, noting the vastly higher amounts emanating from the atmosphere, common appliances and even natural-source food and water. Expected radiation exposures for an individual maintaining a constant 6.6 feet distance from the train will range from 2.3 to 8.2 millirems, he said. That is 40 to 180 times less than an average Wyoming resident absorbs from the high-altitude atmosphere and geological background levels. On the Net: U.S. Department of Energy "How SAFE are radioactive material transportation packages?" site: http://www.sandia.gov/tp/SAFE-RAM/RECORD.HTM ***************************************************************** 17 DOE Continues Meetings with South Carolina Officials energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release RELEASE DATE: August 29, 2001 [Print Friendly Version] WASHINGTON, DC – In addition to last week's positive meetings with Lt. Governor Bob Peeler and Speaker David Wilkins, Department of Energy (DOE) officials from Washington and the Savannah River Site met with Governor Jim Hodges and Rep. Lindsey Graham in South Carolina today to address South Carolina's concerns regarding the disposition of plutonium materials. DOE reiterated that there is every opportunity to reach agreement with the state of South Carolina before mid-October and avoid a financial impact to South Carolina and the rest of the DOE complex resulting from the continued storage of the material at Rocky Flats. As DOE has noted in discussions with South Carolina over the last several months, the Department has a clear strategy to dispose of plutonium materials at Savannah River Site. In the interest of good faith and to address the state's concerns, DOE held a discussion today that will continue with bipartisan dialogue. The Department will meet with any South Carolina elected official concerned about the plutonium disposition program. The DOE and its Savannah River Site facility are working together to address South Carolina's concerns and to develop a strategy that helps ensure the continued viability and mission of the facility. Media Contact: Joe Davis, 202/586-4940 Release No. R-01-151 ***************************************************************** 18 EUROTECH, Ltd. and Waste Control Specialists, Inc. Team on EKOR(TM) PROJECT [PR Newswire] Thursday August 30, 11:01 am Eastern Time Press Release FAIRFAX, Va., Aug. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- EUROTECH, Ltd. (Amex: - news) and Waste Control Specialists LLC (WCS) announced that they have signed a cooperative agreement to evaluate the use of Eurotech's nuclear encapsulating EKOR(TM) technology on waste streams being processed by WCS. WCS plans to promptly begin tests using EKOR on certain wastes that can use macroencapsulation technology to comply with RCRA, TSCA, and/or radiological criteria. WCS President Eric Peus said, ``Eurotech's revolutionary EKOR technology may allow WCS access to opportunities we were previously unable to reach. EKOR can strengthen our penetration of the DOE market.'' Don Hahnfeldt, Eurotech's President, stated, ``The opportunity to team with WCS will demonstrate the contribution of EKOR to safely manage and dispose of difficult waste streams. We are enthusiastic about working with WCS to resolve many of DOE's nuclear waste problems.'' Eurotech, headquartered in Fairfax, Virginia, is publicly traded on the American Stock Exchange (symbol EUO) and commercializes technologies from all over the world. Its Nuclear & Environmental Technology Solutions Division has been marketing EKOR since its debut at the Waste Management 2001 Conference in March and has several demonstrations ongoing at various U.S. Department of Energy sites. EKOR's resistance to aging due to irradiation or chemical attack combined with its adhesiveness and excellent permeability and leachability properties makes it a logical choice for encapsulation of any type, including surface spray or batch mixing. WCS is a Texas-based waste management firm that offers innovative and cost-effective solutions for the safe treatment of certain radioactive and hazardous materials. WCS operates a state of the art facility in Andrews County, Texas, that has received permits for the treatment, storage, and disposals of certain radioactive, hazardous and toxic materials. WCS was awarded a U.S. Department of Energy Broad Spectrum contract in 1998, establishing the Andrews facility as a regional treatment facility for broad categories of federal inorganic mixed waste. EUROTECH Ltd. works with scientists, engineers and research institutes in Russia, Israel and other countries to develop and commercialize innovative technologies that have widespread or critical application. For more information, visit on the Internet. Certain information and statements included in this release constitute ``forward-looking statements'' within the meaning of the Federal Privates Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors which may cause the actual results, performance, or achievements of the company to be materially different from any future results, performance, or achievements expressed or implied in such forward-looking statements. CONTACT: Dawn Van Zant of ECON Investor Relations, Inc., +1-800-665-0411, for EUROTECH, Ltd. SOURCE: EUROTECH, Ltd. - - ***************************************************************** 19 Governor, DOE decide to continue talks on plutonium shipments Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 1:13 p.m. on Thursday, August 30, 2001 by Kim Baca Associated Press AIKEN, S.C. (AP) -- Originally, Gov. Jim Hodges had planned to watch state troopers practice roadblocks Wednesday in front of the Savannah River site. Instead, he spent the day talking to agency officials and U.S. Rep. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., about how the two sides can work together on making sure plutonium brought to the site near Aiken doesn't find a permanent home in the state. Hodges said he's prepared to roll up his sleeves to work something out by mid-October, when the first shipment of plutonium is scheduled to leave the Rocky Flats site in Colorado. "For South Carolina, we need a clear answer on how the plutonium will be processed and be shipped out," said Hodges, who held a news conference at the gate of the site with Graham and Energy Department Assistant Secretary Jessie Hill Roberson. Hodges decided to call off the roadblock exercises Monday after receiving a letter from Energy Undersecretary Robert Card, who said the department would delay shipments. Roberson says she's confident the two sides can resolve the issue. "No plutonium material will come into the state without a planned path out," she said. However, Hodges, who had threatened to lie down in front of trucks to stop shipments, said he's still prepared to order roadblocks if no agreement can be reached. "I'm prepared to protect South Carolina," he said. Under the Clinton administration, South Carolina and the federal government had an agreement to bring 50 tons of weapons-grade plutonium beginning mid-October to SRS, where it would be converted into fuel for commercial power plants or immobilized in glass rods for storage in Nevada. But now Hodges is worried that the Bush administration may change their mind and provide no federal money to process the radioactive metal once it gets to the state The facilities at SRS are not designed for permanent storage and leaving plutonium here could cause a health risk for residents, Hodges said. "We would be foolish to accept it without some long-term commitment from the federal government to get this out," he said. Graham and other South Carolina leaders also became concerned after a recent article in the New York Times quoted unnamed sources as saying the Energy Department might abandon the project to convert plutonium from nuclear weapons into fuel for nuclear power plants. "We're going to find out how all this started and how to fix it," said Graham, who thinks there is political support in Washington to put money back into budget for the project. "The game plan can only work if there is money in place," Graham said. U.S. Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C., who supports Hodges' stance, said any decision by the Bush administration to end the program is based on finances. "This is a budget decision. There's no law that says it's got to come to Savannah River. We were on course down there. They are the ones reneging on the policy and making it a budget problem with their budget cuts," he said. Those budget decisions make the 1997 promise to only move the plutonium to South Carolina temporarily ring hollow, Hollings said. "Tell them to take the material and put it on the White House lawn instead of Little League games," Hollings said. "Maybe we'll get the next president to move it off." All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 20 Indian Point Reactor Sale Approved Las Vegas SUN August 29, 2001 ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) - State utility regulators approved the sale Wednesday of Consolidated Edison's Indian Point 1 and 2 nuclear plants to Entergy Nuclear Point 2 LLC. Included in the transaction are the Indian Point 2 reactor, which is operational, and the retired Indian Point 1 reactor. The defunct reactor building is used to store nuclear fuel. Also included are three gas turbines, various ancillary facilities and the property in the town of Buchanan in Westchester County where the Indian Point plants are located. The Toddville Training Center in the Town of Cortlandt, in Westchester County, was also included in the sale. The state Public Service Commission said Con Ed will receive $502 million for its assets plus $107 million for nuclear fuel and fuel oil. However, Con Ed will transfer $430 million to Entergy to cover decommissioning costs. Under terms of the transaction, Entergy will have responsibility for decommissioning Indian Point, disposing of spent nuclear fuel and restoring the Buchanan site when the nuclear plant is no longer operational. Also under the sales agreement, Entergy will sell all of the electricity generated at Indian Point 2 to Con Ed through 2004. Con Ed also retains options for the future purchase of Indian Point-generated power for the remainder of the decade. PSC approval was the last governmental hurdle the Indian Point sale had to pass. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission signed off on the deal earlier this week. Entergy Corp., of which Entergy Indian Point 2 LLC is a division, is based in New Orleans. Entergy already owns the former New York Power Authority nuclear plant at Indian Point and NYPA's Fitzpatrick nuclear plant in Oswego County near Lake Ontario. Counting Indian Point 2, the company owns nine nuclear plants around the country and earlier this month made a bid on a tenth, the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 21 Nevada plans to sue DOE over Yucca Mountain public hearings Las Vegas SUN August 29, 2001 LAS VEGAS (AP) - Nevada plans to ask a court to block the Energy Department from holding a series of public hearings on a proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the meetings are being held prematurely. The public meetings are one of the last steps before a recommendation on the site is made to President Bush. The state will look to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal to block the Energy Department hearings because the final environmental impact studies have not been released by the agency, Loux said. "We don't think they (public hearings) can take place until an environmental impact statement is done," Loux said. "If you don't know the impact, it's impossible to have public comment." Loux added that if the state can't get a court injunction to stop the meetings, "we'll sue after the fact and force them (DOE) to hold more meetings." DOE officials said the meetings remain on schedule, though the agency was scrambling to find a place to host the first of the three after the Suncoast hotel-casino canceled its contract with the agency. Suncoast attorney Barry Lieberman said the resort does not have enough space to accommodate the thousands of people who are expected to turn out for the first hearing, Sept. 5. The DOE's Nevada Operations Office in North Las Vegas is being considered as an alternative, DOE spokesman Allen Benson said. Gov. Kenny Guinn, a Republican, and Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said holding the hearing at the DOE office is unacceptable. "To have the hearing at the DOE intimidates the public," Loux said. "There is barbed wire fencing and guards." Loux called for a delay in the three public hearings on the project because he said a study to be aired at the meetings is flawed. The DOE's Preliminary Site Suitability Evaluation report, released last week, has "no legal or substantive basis" for evaluating Yucca Mountain as the national repository for 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste, said Loux, who heads the state agency created to oppose the repository. "We think that the DOE's evaluation disqualifies the site," he said. During the meetings, DOE officials are expected to outline the project and residents will have the opportunity to testify. Public hearings also are scheduled Sept. 12 in Pahrump and Sept. 13 in Amargosa Valley near the site, about 90 miles north of Las Vegas. Complaints from Reid prompted DOE officials to broaden the scope of the public hearings by offering the proceedings by teleconference to three other Nevada cities - Reno, Elko and Carson City. An Internet webcast of the proceedings also is in the works, DOE officials said. Reid has called three, three-hour hearings inadequate to address what he called "intense public interest and concern" about the proposal. "These are the last public hearings scheduled before the secretary of energy's recommendation to the president," Reid said Tuesday. Nevada's four-member congressional delegation and virtually all of its state lawmakers are opposed to the Yucca Mountain site. Yucca Mountain is the only place in the nation being studied for nuclear waste burial. Since 1982, the DOE has spent some $7 billion in site studies. The project is expected to cost $58 billion over 100 years. Abraham is expected to recommend to President Bush by the end of this year whether the site is suitable to begin accepting nuclear waste in 2010. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 22 Company displays casks to be used for nuclear waste storage Las Vegas SUN August 30, 2001 CHARLEVOIX, Mich. (AP) - Consumers Energy officials showed the public how lots of concrete and steel will be used to return the site of the decommissioned Big Rock Point nuclear power plant to trees and grass. On Wednesday, officials displayed a thick concrete pad about the size of a basketball court and one of the eight concrete-and-steel casks, each 19 feet tall, that will store radioactive fuel rods from the plant. The rods are presently stored in a water pool inside Big Rock's large containment sphere. After 35 years of operation, Big Rock, one of the nation's oldest nuclear power plants, shut down in 1997. Employees have worked since then to return the 580-acre site on the shore of Lake Michigan to a natural state. The goal is that by 2005, the only remaining vestige of the plant will be the fuel storage area. Moving the fuel rods into dry storage is a key point in the decommissioning process, because it will allow for removal of the turquoise containment sphere and building, Big Rock spokesman Tim Petrosky said. The radioactive materials are expected to remain at the site until 2012, assuming a national nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, Nev., is ready by then. Big Rock's storage area is licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for 20 years, but is designed to last a century, said Mike Bourassa, dry fuel storage project manager. "Even if the (Yucca Mountain) repository isn't the real deal by 2010, this facility can sit here and sit here and sit here," he told the Traverse City Record-Eagle. Loading of fuel rods from the plant into the storage units is expected to begin early next year and be completed by the end of 2003. Racks of 441 fuel rods will be removed from the spent fuel pool with special machinery and placed inside stainless steel cylinders, then into heavily shielded transfer casks. Some 63 such bundles then will be prepared for the half-mile transfer to the storage site. The bundles are placed in the concrete containers, with each weighing 167 tons when loaded. Heavy machinery will move and place the casks on the storage area pad. The eight casks "are designed to withstand tornado-force winds of up to 360 mph, burning temperatures of 2,000 degrees and a drop on sharp objects from 20 feet, and flooding," Petrosky said. There will be routine security monitoring and radiation level checks, he said. More than 450 dry fuel storage canisters are in use throughout the United States, he said. An anti-nuclear group based in Washington, D.C., says dry fuel storage isn't as safe as Big Rock officials contend. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission halted cask loading from 1996-99 to examine safety issues but allowed it to proceed, said Kevin Kamps of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. Transporting the waste to Yucca Mountain - a site the group considers ill-suited for nuclear storage - would be dangerous, Kamps said. "Nuclear power must be phased out and replaced with safer, cheaper, cleaner ways to meet our electricity needs: conservation, efficiency and renewable sources such as wind, solar and fuel cells," he said. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Nuclear weapon prevented World War III Pravda.RU Aug, 29 2001 The first nuclear explosion was carried out in the USSR 52 years ago – on August 29, 1949. That explosion changed the entire post-war history. The nuclear bomb test during the cold war period put the USSR on the position of one of 2 superpowers. The USA were the pioneers in inventing the new lethal weapon. Having created the weapon of huge power the US government tried to have the new organization of the world after the war, in total compliance with its international interests to be more precise. The interests themselves were determined at the meeting between Winston Churchill and Harry Truman in March of 1946 at which the USSR was called the major enemy of the West. The US soon made up the list of 200 Soviet cities which were supposed to be eliminated with the help of nuclear bombs. The USSR had to face the real threat of destruction. The US still consider the deaths of thousands of civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August of 1945 to be justified, the States have not apologized in front of the Japanese nation despite the claims for that on the part of the Japan’s authorities. These facts are like an excuse for the USSR to have the nuclear weapon of its own as well. It was actually the only way to survive under the conditions of the post-war world. A group of physicians with leader Igor Kurchatov did a lot of research in the field of nuclear power back in 1943. Kurchatov presented the nuclear bomb to the Soviet administration in the middle of the summer of 1949. The bomb was tested in the republic of Kazakhstan, not far from the town of Semipalatinsk. The participants of the test were taken 30 kilometers away from the epicenter of explosion, to the earth-houses with light chinks and a shower which was necessary for the decontamination of the clothes. Those people recollect now the explosion could be compared with thunder. The whole sky was lit with a bright flash and took the crimson color. The protection measures did not prevent the participants of the nuclear test from a considerable radiation treatment. Many of those people died of the radiation sickness afterwards. The radiation contaminated the territory of hundreds of kilometers around and the people inhabiting that area had to pay for the test with their health too. The radiation reached the Altay and Novosibirsk regions. At that time it was announced on the radio there were considerable construction works performed in the country and the up-to-date technology explosions were needed for that. The nuclear testing area had a strange and vague story as well. The ground itself was built by prisoners – the people from jails where sent there and they did not come back. After the explosion there were several hospitals established – the children’s hospital, the hospital for women and the oncological one. Former prisoners said the hospitals studied the influence of radiation on human organism. Many historians say the development of nuclear weapon in the USSR helped to keep the world away from the World War III. The nuclear bombs and missiles became the obstacle which could not be surmounted either in the USSR or in the USA. The second nuclear bomb blasted in 1951. The USSR started producing dozens and hundreds of other bombs afterwards. Russia moves nuclear weapons, U.S. says America has put nuclear weapons back on the agenda RIA 'Novosti' Pravda.RU:Main ***************************************************************** 2 Kazakhstan highlights nuclear test aftermath BBC News | MEDIA REPORTS | Thursday, 30 August, 2001, 16:23 [Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev] President Nazarbayev seeks money for the clear-up Kazakhstan has marked the 10th anniversary of the closure of the Soviet nuclear test site at Semipalatinsk with a drive to remind the world of its lasting impact on the environment and the health of local people. Semipalatinsk, in the northeast of the Central Asian state, was the scene of more than 500 nuclear explosions between 1949 and 1989. All the tests up to 1962 were carried out on or above ground. Hundreds of thousands of people in Kazakhstan were subjected to radiation: the aftermath is undermining our future, the health of our children Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev The country's president, Nursultan Nazarbayev - who presided over the site's closure in 1991, as the Soviet Union itself neared its end - used a gathering of former world leaders on Wednesday to appeal for funds to cope with the aftermath. Appeal fund His audience, including Soviet ex-President Mikhail Gorbachev and former German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher, heard him appeal for more than $1bn to tackle the environmental and health impact of Semipalatinsk and other nuclear sites dotted around his vast country. "Hundreds of thousands of people in Kazakhstan were subjected to radiation in one way or another: the aftermath of the nuclear tests is undermining our future, the health of our children," he said in a speech broadcast on national television. "It is very difficult to bear alone the whole expense of resolving problems of global importance." Launch The anniversary also gave Mr Nazarbayev an opportunity to launch his latest book, entitled The Epicentre of Peace and devoted to the cause of nuclear disarmament. The title, he told a news conference, reflected Kazakhstan's role in giving up its own weapons as the Soviet Union collapsed. "It was from our country - the place that once was the epicentre of nuclear threats - that a new peace process, the voluntary and conscious liberation of humanity from the most dangerous threat, started," he said. This process embodied "the fight of the Kazakh nation and leadership for liberation from the nuclear complex and its infrastructure". Memorial In Semipalatinsk itself, Wednesday's anniversary was marked by the unveiling of a memorial to all those - estimated by the UN at about 100,000 over three generations - who have suffered as a result of radiation from the tests. [Explosion at Semipalatinsk test range] The range is dead - but its legacy lingers Named Stronger than Death, it comprises a 30-metre-high black slab bearing a silhouette of a nuclear mushroom cloud, accompanied by a white marble sculpture of a mother covering her child with her body, and a black granite figure of a man with genetic mutations caused by radiation. A Russian TV report marking the anniversary reminded viewers that the effects were not yesterday's problem. "The impact is still there: there is no let-up in the number of new-born children with hereditary diseases," Bulat Ismailov, a professor at the national cancer institute, said. The TV reporter highlighted the case of a child who is receiving treatment for illnesses caused by radiation. "Kuanesh has a cleft palate: he can hardly talk, but he dreams that once he is cured he will start learning his native languages." Dilemma But the problems bequeathed by Semipalatinsk have left Kazakhstan with a dilemma. Its nuclear authorities think one way of raising money to fund the clear-up could be to invite imports of nuclear waste. Scientists believe waste imports are necessary in order to raise money for the national programme to rehabilitate polluted areas Kazakhstan Today news agency Earlier this month, the chief researcher at the National Nuclear Centre, Zhabag Takibayev, proposed using the Degelen mountains around Semipalatinsk to store high-radioactivity waste from domestic nuclear reactors. He also backed calls from the national nuclear energy company, Kazatomprom, to change the law to allow imports of low- and medium-radioactivity waste for burial in Kazakhstan, a step which proved controversial when it was taken by Russia in July. "Scientists believe waste imports are necessary for Kazakhstan in order to raise money for the national programme to bury its own radioactive waste and rehabilitate polluted areas," the Kazakhstan Today news agency commented at the time. BBC Monitoring, based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages. ***************************************************************** 3 Navy teaches Hunters Point kids to clean up toxic waste We can't make this stuff up | August 29, 2001 | SFBG News By A.C. Thompson The U.S. Navy isn't exactly known for its public relations savvy. This is the military operation, after all, that managed to turn a VIP submarine cruise into an international scandal. But it tries hard – even fighting to win the hearts and minds of schoolchildren. In late May, for example, the navy bussed 350 grade-schoolers to the contaminated Hunters Point Shipyard and taught them the ABCs of toxic waste cleanup. They even let the kids, all of whom were from Hunters Point, don white haz-mat suits and goggles for the lesson. The heartwarming little tale is relayed in a slick, eight-page navy brochure that was sent to the Bay Guardian last week. The fifth graders "got to try on protective clothing and dig for pretend contamination in specially constructed sandboxes," the mailer explains. So. The navy trashes the environment, lies about the nuclear research it did in Hunters Point, drags its feet for years when it comes to cleaning up the mess, but, as an alleged public service, is happy to teach children how to run a Superfund site. Charming. "We thought it was a ridiculous P.R. stunt," said Saul Bloom of Arc Ecology, a nonprofit green group. On the other hand, at least the Navy is letting kids know about the biological dangers of the stuff – PCBs, pesticides, industrial solvents – lying around the ex-base. Uh, maybe not. "We didn't go into that level of detail," said Richard Mach, the navy's environmental coordinator for Hunters Point. "We didn't have time." SF Bay Guardian ***************************************************************** 4 Opposition mounts to nuclear treaty Asia Times: August 30, 2001 atimes.com By Bob Burton CANBERRA - The battle over a nuclear cooperation treaty that Australia signed with Argentina is far from over, as critics on Monday shifted their efforts to a Senate panel whose approval is needed before the accord can take effect. At a hearing before an Australian Senate panel, local critics urged the rejection of the treaty with Argentina - which provides for nuclear waste from a proposed reactor in Sydney to be imported into Argentina - because this would be a breach of the South American country's constitution. The Sutherland Shire Council, the local suburban Sydney council where the proposed research reactor would be located, told the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties hearing that the treaty should be rejected on legal and moral grounds. "We are concerned that this may be an attempt to subvert the constitution of Argentina," Councillor Ken McDonnell told the committee. The proposed treaty has been negotiated in order to allow the Argentine company, INVAP, to commence work on a US$169 million contract for the construction of a new reactor at the research facilities of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisations (ANSTO). Three weeks ago, Argentina's Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Trade Dr Adalberto Giavarini, signed the "nuclear cooperation in peaceful uses of nuclear energy" agreement with Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer. However, before the treaty can come into effect, the parliamentary committee must review and report on the accord. The executive officer of the international law section of the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Shennia Spillane, assured the committee that the treaty could allow the Australian government to sue Argentina for compensation in the event that INVAP breached the contract or the contract was frustrated by the actions of the Argentine government. Spillane confirmed that the treaty was there as a "fallback arrangement" should any political changes to the complexion of the Argentine government lead to challenges to the contract. "It gives us an extra insurance policy," Spillane said. Steven McIntosh, the government and public affairs of ANSTO, bluntly told the committee that one clause of the treaty prevented the Argentine government from frustrating the completion of the contract. "As I read it, [it says] the Argentine government will not hinder the contract," McIntosh told the committee. McIntosh told the committee that concerns about the legality of the importation of spent fuel rods into Argentina were misplaced. ANSTO, he said, had been given an assurance "at presidential level that the importation of spent fuel does not breach the constitution". Section 41 of the Argentine Constitution prohibits the entry into Argentina of "present or potential dangerous wastes and of radioactive wastes". While the Australian government does not dispute the constitutional provision, it argues that the spent fuel rods from the proposed reactor would be classified not as nuclear waste but as material for reprocessing which would then returned to Australia. But the legal adviser to the Sutherland Shire Council, Tim Robertson, rejects the argument. INVAP, he told the committee, does not have access in Argentina to fuel reprocessing technology capable of reprocessing the spent fuel from the proposed reactor. "If the spent fuel from Australia is only to be conditioned [for disposal as waste] ... then there is no doubt in my opinion that it will be received in Argentina as radioactive wastes. The receipt of such wastes will be a breach of the Argentine Constitution," Robertson submitted to the committee. "The parties to this agreement cannot, by labelling the spent fuel as a resource, avoid the provisions of a constitutional guarantee that would otherwise treat it as waste." The Australian government also cannot take comfort from the possibility that no legal challenge may arise or would take years to get a hearing, Robertson said. "Any person may enforce these constitutional guarantees," he submitted. McDonnell is appalled at the haste with which the government is attempting to have the treaty ratified before an election, due before the end of the year, is called. "The recent Senate inquiry into the need for a new reactor called for the Australian National Audit office to investigate many of the outstanding issues related to the tender and contract documents," O'Donnell said. Yet, he added, the government is not pushing the treaty through with a minimum of 15 sitting days to allow for full public consultation. The spokesperson for Sydney People Against a New Nuclear Reactor, Leah Mason, rejected claims that the group was simply opposed to a nuclear reactor in the backyard of residents but were happy to take the benefits of the medical isotopes it would produce. "The waste from the reactor will last for thousands of generations," she argued. McDonnell said, "I didn't worry about the reactor for the first 20 years [I lived there]," he said. The turning point came when ANSTO officials told the council that they had never had an accident at the existing nuclear reactor when just weeks before, a potentially serious accident had been narrowly averted. "There's a real inter-generational issue here that's got to be recognized," he told the Senate committee. (Inter Press Service) ©2001 Asia Times Online Co., Ltd. Building B - 5th Floor, 102/1 Phra Arthit Road, Chanasangkhram, Bangkok 10200, Thailand ***************************************************************** 5 OR man OK'd for compensation check Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:36 p.m. on Thursday, August 30, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff The Department of Labor will soon be making one of the first payments locally through the job-sickened nuclear workers compensation plan. Shirley White, office manager for the compensation plan's Oak Ridge resource center, confirmed Wednesday that a 64-year-old Oak Ridge man has been recommended to receive $150,000 and medical expenses through the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. White said the man has asked that his name not be revealed, but she did say that he was a former worker of the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Kentucky and Oak Ridge National Laboratory for a total of 35 years. He filed his claim on July 31. The compensation program was passed in October 2000 and went into effect at the end of July. It provides compensation and medical expenses to workers who are seriously ill because they were exposed to beryllium, silica or radiation while working for the Department of Energy, its contractors or its subcontractors in the nuclear weapons industry. To assist people in filing claims for the program, the Labor Department and DOE opened resource centers in several locations. White said things have been running smoothly at the Oak Ridge office since it opened a month ago. "We've had a steady flow of people coming in on a daily basis," said White. She added that the resource center has also been doing some outreach programs, including working with employees from Nuclear Fuels Services facility in Erwin. The Oak Ridge resource center, which is open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, is located in Suite C-103 of Jackson Plaza, 800 Oak Ridge Turnpike. For more information, call (865) 481-0411. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 6 DOE group seeks to unite parties on land-use planning Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:39 p.m. on Thursday, August 30, 2001 Leah Dever, manager of the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Operations office, discusses detail on the agency's new land-use planning process during a press conference Wednesday. Also pictured is U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-3rd District. -- Photos by Lynn Freeny/DOE by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff Dev Joslin says he has high hopes for the Department of Energy's new process for future land-use planning on the Oak Ridge Reservation. His group, the Advocates for the Oak Ridge Reservation, along with the Tennessee Conservation League and the Southern Environmental Law Center asked DOE earlier this year to refrain from making individual land-use decisions without completing a comprehensive environmental impact statement that takes into consideration the impact of those decisions on the 34,242-acre reservation. Now, Joslin and several other community members are participating in DOE's recently created focus group, which is supposed to devise a comprehensive plan for land use. Joslin said he hopes the group can create some unity between the parties promoting development and those working to preserve the environment. "We've got to get past this 'us vs. them' thing," he said. In addition to Joslin, the other members of the focus group are Steven Alexander, senior contaminant biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; Paul Boyer, Oak Ridge city manager; Steve Buxton, Oak Ridge Heritage Association; Pete Craven, Oak Ridge businessman; Scott Davis, executive director for the Tennessee chapter of the Nature Conservancy; Ray Evans, Oak Ridge City Council member; Steve Griffith, manager for the Mideast region of the Tennessee Valley Authority; Tony Grande, deputy commissioner for the state of Tennessee Economic and Community Development Department; and Parker Hardy, president of the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce. Also serving on the group are Robert Kennedy, with Friends of Oak Ridge National Laboratory; Ralph Lillard, businessman and member of the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce; Marty Marina, executive director for the Tennessee Conservation League; Dave McKinney with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency; David Mosby, Oak Ridge City Council member; Bill Pardue, member of the Oak Ridge Chamber of Commerce Board; Joe Valentino, executive director for the Oak Ridge Convention and Visitors Bureau; Marshall Whisnant, Oak Ridge Planning Commission; and Lawrence Young, president of the Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee. DOE officially announced the creation of the focus group and the land-use planning process during a press conference Wednesday morning at the visitor overlook for the Oak Ridge K-25 site. Wamp flanked by Leah Dever, right, and Pat Parr, left, with Oak Ridge National Laboratory, discusses the DOE land-use plan. Leah Dever, manager of DOE's Oak Ridge Operations office, said the new process should not impact projects currently underway, including the modernization of Oak Ridge National Laboratory or the possible transfer of the American Museum of Science and Energy and its associated property to the city of Oak Ridge. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 7 Marin County executives indicted in nuclear testing sale ContraCostaTimes.com Posted at 7:06 p.m. PDT Wednesday, August 29, 2001 By David Kravets ASSOCIATED PRESS SAN FRANCISCO -- A federal grand jury has indicted three executives of a Marin County electronics firm, accusing them of illegally selling gear to India that could be used to make nuclear weapons, prosecutors said Wednesday. The indictment charges that the executives of Berkeley Nucleonics Corp. of San Rafael conspired to sale and sold nuclear pulse generators to India without the federal government's permission between 1999 and 2000. The generators emit electrical pulses and can be used to calibrate radar and nuclear instruments with military applications. The firm is among a growing number of companies under fire for exporting to blacklisted countries. The list of export violators in recent years includes big-named companies like IBM, Dell Computers, Compaq, Gateway and Alcoa. Not long ago, export sanctions applied to just a small number of countries, but the list has broadened during the past five years to include 50 countries. India and Pakistan were added after they conducted nuclear tests in 1998. Named in the Marin County indictment were company president David Brown, marketing director Richard Hamilton and Vincent Delfino, Berkeley Nucleonics' former operation manager. Each were charged with one count of conspiracy and one count for selling. In an interview, Hamilton said the company did not know about the restrictions on exports to India, which were imposed during the Clinton administration when India and Pakistan refused to agree to nonproliferation treaties. "We did not have the resources to know about it at the time," Hamilton said. He said the company had a history of selling such devices to India. Steven Bauer, attorney for Nucleonics, declined to comment on the indictments. But he said the government changes which countries are banned from U.S. exports without notifying the public. "They're changed, and nobody tells anybody," Bauer said. Neither Brown nor Delfino were available for comment. A court appearance has not been set, said Matthew Jacobs, a Justice Department spokesman, who declined further comment. The government began building its case in 1999 after agents of the Commerce Office of Export Enforcement posed as exporters in a sting operation, according to court documents. The indictment accuses the company of shipping the devices to India's Bhaba Atomic Research Center and the Nuclear Power Corp., both divisions of India's Department of Atomic Energy. ***************************************************************** 8 Oak Ridge Reservation 'roadmap': Let's start with agreeable areas Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 12:45 p.m. on Thursday, August 30, 2001 Our View: If the planned "roadmap" for development of some Oak Ridge Reservation properties winds up angering both sides equally, it will probably have proven an effective and improved approach over too much of what has gone before. U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-3rd District, and local Department of Energy officials on Wednesday announced a plan that will address developing parts of the reservation, and protecting other parts, and we hardly expect the fighting to subside. But, if clear rules and purposefulness exists in this procedure, and it is inclusive as promised with the input of everyday citizens, local business and government leaders, and environmentalists, then the dynamic will have been well served. The outcome will probably be better than if any side were to prevail, absent the strong and rightful influence of the other. We fully expect sides will be fiercely drawn, once this process begins, over issues such as industrial development vs. preservation. So, why not put the hardest work off for a while and start with areas where agreement and cooperation might be more possible? For example, the gates long ago came down in Oak Ridge and the Cold War more recently ended. So, can we get both sides, all sides, to agree on a goal of de-mystifying Oak Ridge? Let's make it a more open and friendly place instead of a daunting and mysterious one. These could involve some pretty easy and non-controversial steps too, or at least less controversial. For example, in all that tens of thousands of acres of pristine reservation woodlands, why not find a little more room for designated camping, hiking, boating and other outdoor recreational activities? Can anyone really find fault with that? In short, let's begin the process of integrating with the vast expanses of land which heretofore have served more like barriers to the outside, and even to the community. Let's fiercely protect that which needs protection -- whether for environmental or national security reasons -- and develop responsibly that which can help build a stronger, healthier community. Oak Ridge and Washington will get a lot of help in the effort. People here harbor a lot of strong feeling, and good sense, about how things ought to proceed responsibly. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 9 Confusion Reigns; Suncoast Casino Sends DOE Packing Aug. 29, 2001 Kangaroo Court Countdown Alert Confusion Reigns; Suncoast Casino Sends DOE Packing Seven Days to Yucca Mountain Hearing in Las Vegas NOTE: The U.S. Department of Energy is holding a Sept. 5 hearing in Las Vegas on the government’s intention to establish a high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Public Citizen will issue "Kangaroo Court Countdown Alerts" each day until the hearing. For more information about Yucca Mountain and nuclear waste, visit www.citizen.org/cmep. With just one week remaining until the Department of Energy’s (DOE) scheduled Yucca Mountain site recommendation hearing in Las Vegas, the DOE is looking for a venue to hold the event. Although the DOE’s Web site continues to list the Suncoast Casino as the location for a Sept. 5 hearing, the casino has declined to host the event. It is unclear where the DOE will try to hold the controversial hearing; the agency has not said it will cancel or reschedule it. Also on Wednesday, Public Citizen sent a letter to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham urging the department to cancel the agency’s three September hearings in Nevada, all of which were called on short notice, until the agency addresses outstanding technical and regulatory issues and provides the public with more notice. The letter is available at http://www.citizen.org/cmep/RAGE/radwaste/DOESRhearings.htm "Clearly, the Department of Energy lacks a basis for consideration of site recommendation at this time," wrote Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program. "To prematurely hold hearings now makes a mockery of the process for public participation mandated by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and dangerously undermines public confidence in the DOE as a fair and unbiased arbiter of the Yucca Mountain repository proposal." The DOE’s close-minded determination to plow forward with site recommendation hearings at the expense of meaningful public participation is characteristic of the agency’s conduct surrounding the Yucca Mountain project, which has been marred by contractor scandals and governmental investigations. The DOE now appears to be more concerned with sidestepping widespread public dissent than with the integrity of its process for evaluating the Yucca Mountain nuclear dump proposal. The Suncoast Casino’s decision to deny the DOE access to hold the hearing indicates the extent of public opposition to the Yucca Mountain repository proposal and the DOE’s highly flawed process. The Las Vegas Chamber of Commerce, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors, and the Nevada Resort Association have passed resolutions opposing the storage of nuclear waste in Nevada. Critical Mass Home ***************************************************************** 10 Payments to ill uranium workers on track, source says Denver Post.com Denver Post staff and wire services --> Thursday, August 30, 2001 - Sick uranium workers who already have been approved for government compensation will get their money. The Bush administration said this week it will ask Congress if more study is needed to determine whether some workers who contracted illnesses after working in Cold War-era nuclear weapons programs qualify for compensation. But a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Scott McInnis, R-Grand Junction, who has been active on the compensation issue, said any changes would have to be approved by Congress. Blain Rethmeier said the administration will not be able to stop any benefit payments that have already been approved. "Anyone who's filed a claim and been accepted will get their money," Rethmeier said. "Any sort of postponement of payment is not going to happen." The studies will look at whether exposure to uranium and silica dust in the mines caused the illnesses. It could be six months to a year before the research is finished. The results could affect future claims. The victims are concentrated in the Rocky Mountain West. In July, there were 71 Colorado claimants - miners, "down-winders" or their survivors - with IOUs worth $6.5 million. There are also claimants in Utah (191), Nevada (68), Arizona (47) and New Mexico (42). Critics say any delay means more eligible workers will die before payments arrive. "They've been stonewalling, and it's a crying shame," said Ed Brickey, president of the Colorado Uranium Workers Council. "We have people who are dying because of where they worked." All contents Copyright 2001 The Denver Post or other copyright ***************************************************************** 11 S.C. firm to design, build three research facilities at ORNL KnoxNews: Business Thursday, Aug 30 By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer OAK RIDGE -- A South Carolina company will design and construct three new research facilities near the entrance to Oak Ridge National Laboratory, marking the first phase of a $300 million face-lift that ultimately may involve more than a dozen buildings. The $70 million project, undertaken by Colliers Keenan Inc. of Columbia, S.C., is the first privately funded venture in ORNL history and required the transfer of about six acres of federal property. The private investment, plus projects funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and the state of Tennessee, will "literally transform Oak Ridge National Laboratory over the next five to six years," ORNL Director Bill Madia said in a Wednesday afternoon ceremony. Construction is expected to begin in November on the three buildings -- Computational Sciences Building, Engineering Technology Facility and Research Office Building. They will be connected by an atrium to form a 274,000-square-foot complex. UT-Battelle, which manages ORNL, staged a contract competition to attract private investment to the modernization effort at the federal laboratory. There reportedly were seven bids.Madia said Colliers Keenan's proposal "stood out with distinction" and was "clearly the best in class." The South Carolina development firm will finance construction of the facilities, which then will be leased to the federal contractor -- UT-Battelle -- for laboratory activities. The new buildings are expected to replace a number of deteriorated, 50-yearold structures on the research campus. Buddy Hill, project manager for Colliers Keenan, called ORNL "one of the great scientific assets of this country," and he praised Madia's leadership in the modernization project. "It's not ever day that we come across people who dream on this scale," he said. Hill said Colliers Keenan also plans to become involved in the community, and as part of that pledge, the company announced a $150,000 grant to Roane State Community College's Oak Ridge campus. Although this use of private investment is unique to the federal operations in Oak Ridge, Hill said Colliers Keenan has much experience in these types of public-private partnerships. The company reportedly has done similar projects for the Centers for Disease Control and the Federal Aviation Administration. Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 -----End Of Story-----or twig1@knoxnews.infi.net. News-Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 12 DOE plans to form focus group to give input on land use KnoxNews: Business Thursday, Aug 30 By Frank Munger, News-Sentinel senior writer OAK RIDGE -- The U.S. Department of Energy announced Wednesday a new approach to land-use planning on the government's Oak Ridge reservation, promising to gather input from diverse groups and to balance the economic and environmental needs. Leah Dever, DOE's Oak Ridge manager, said a comprehensive plan for the 34,000-acre federal reservation will be developed over the next five to six years. Besides evaluating options for potential DOE missions of the future, the plan will address industrial development and ecological preservation. A focus group, involving about 20 individuals from the community and various organizations, has been appointed to discuss concerns and make recommendations. "Obviously, getting to this point wasn't easy,'' Dever said at a Wednesday ceremony. She apparently was referring to the persistent controversy regarding proposed uses of federal land, often pitting commercial and industrial interests against conservationists and environmental researchers. U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-Tenn., who joined Dever at the morning event, said it's important to make way for new technological and industrial investments without trampling nature in the process. He urged the different factions to come together and work to enhance the assets that make Oak Ridge "the envy of other communities'' in the region. "There's synergy when people come together,'' the congressman said. Oak Ridge Mayor David Bradshaw agreed and said the broad-based focus group is a good start, making sure that DOE decisions are based on local recommendations. "We either can celebrate together or blame ourselves,'' he said. "DOE has opened the door to the community.'' Marty Marina of the Tennessee Conservation League, one of the groups that has challenged DOE on development projects, said the new approach should be productive. "The league is always for solid public process, and I think that's what was missing here. There were segments of the community that had an expertise that weren't being listened to,'' said Marina, who will serve on the land-use focus group. Frank Munger can be reached at 865-482-9213 or twig1@knoxnews.infi.net. Copyright 2001 The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 13 Thornberry gives update to city commissioners Amarillo Globe-News: 08/29/01 U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry told Amarillo city commissioners Tuesday that he hears nothing but positive statements in Washington about the Pantex Plant's new contractor, BWXT.

The federal government will fund the plant additional money to update buildings.

"They've been doing so much work and all the money goes to weapons, and not their buildings," Thornberry said.

He also discussed the V-22 Osprey and said several entities have studied the aircraft.

"There's no reason the V-22 can't be very successful," said Thornberry, R-Clarendon.

Thornberry stopped in Amarillo to update commissioners about issues in Washington affecting Amarillo. He will visit other Panhandle cities through Thursday.

"I thought it was very informative," Mayor Trent Sisemore said. "I always welcome any good news about the V-22 project and Pantex."

Also, commissioners approved the final reading of ordinances approving the service plan and levying assessments for the Brennan Boulevard and The Colonies public improvement districts.

2001 Amarillo Globe-News ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************