***************************************************************** 04/19/02 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 10.99 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POLICY 1 North Korea agrees to resume contacts with Japan - 2 Study shows supporters of nuclear energy outnumber opponents in Finn 3 Report: Russia to build 10 nuclear reactors abroad in next decade 4 US: Editorial: Senate tosses out flawed energy idea 5 US: Entergy considering new nuclear plant in Mississippi 6 US: Enercon teams on nuclear power plant proposal NUCLEAR REACTORS 8 US: NRC probes particles from FirstEnergy Ohio reactor 9 US: NRC to Meet With Amerenue To Discuss Safety Performance at 10 US: Atomic Safety & Licensing Board to Hold Hearing April 23 in 11 US: NRC to Hold Meeting April 30 at NFS Nuclear Fuel Plant to Discus 12 US: Washington Nuke Plant Probed 13 Chinese-made nuclear plant put into commercial use 14 US: NRC Dispatches Inspector to Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station 15 Lithuanian premier reiterates closure of nuclear plant depends 16 Lithuanian official unaware of Belarusian plans to buy nuclear 17 Romania: Bulgarian president says two nuclear plant reactors to 18 Nuclear reactor temporarily shut down after short-circuit in Ukraine 19 US: N-plants' owner pledges action 20 US: Kansas nuclear plant gets a glowing review 21 US: Davis-Besse alone has woes 22 US: Expert closer to cause of Vermont Yankee leak 23 US: Lawsuit claims Connecticut Yankee plan would ruin historical sit 24 Nuclear reactor temporarily shut down after short-circuit in NUCLEAR SAFETY 25 US: Radiation found on 4 workers 26 US: NRC Revises Regulations on Medical Uses of Radioactive Material 27 US: NRC Announces Workshops on Medical Uses of Radioactive Material 28 US: Radioactive Particles Found on Nuclear Workers 29 US: More NTS survivors to receive compensation 30 US: Nuclear Terror: US Ships High-Radiation Device to China by Mista 31 US: Probe of radioactive particles on worker clothes NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 32 US: Plutonium production delays cited 33 US: Plutonium: On the road to nowhere? 34 US: Feds Doubt Plutonium Conversion Plan News Home - 35 US: NRC to Meet with Company to Discuss Cleanup of Lakehurst, NJ., 36 US: Fatal crash on likely nuclear waste route 37 US: Tauzin Delivers Statement On Yucca Mountain 38 US: Most lawmakers at hearing back Yucca nuke dump 39 20% rise in Sellafield Irish Sea dumping 40 Sellafield debate sparks racist slur on Green MEP 41 British minister claims Sellafield can't close 42 MEPs warn of terror risk to Sellafield 43 British Deny Radwaste Deal with Russia 44 US: Yucca engineering hurdles remain high 45 US: WASTE SHIPMENT DATE REQUESTED 46 US: Nevada is competing with calamities all over 47 US: How fast must waste go? 48 US: Yucca director plans visit 49 US: Yucca hearing flows against Nevada 50 US: Worries grow over waste trucked in 51 US: Radioactive Shipments on Roads, Railways and Waterways Would 52 US: Counterinitiative Seeks to Block Plan to Hike Nuclear-Waste Tax 53 US: Nevada Fights N-Waste Site -- Utah of Little Help 54 US: Big agreement means excavation of nuclear waste to start. 55 US: State asks for nuclear waste ruling 56 US: Nev. Governor Faces Long Odds to Block Yucca Nuclear Dump 57 US: County officials support transport, storage of nuclear waste in 58 US: NRC voices doubt over plutonium conversion plan being fought by 59 US: Plutonium production delays cited 60 US: Yucca debate rarely truthful 61 US: Pressure mounts for inquiry into Ranger uranium mine. 62 US: Rio rebuffs coal, uranium critics 63 US: Hearing reveals support for Yucca NUCLEAR WEAPONS 64 US: Doubts Are Cast Over Plan for Converting Warheads 65 US: The problem of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons 66 Comment: The Soviet threat was a myth 67 Tactical nukes would hinder China 68 N-sub project is Navy’s worst kept secret 69 Pakistan: Official says nuclear installations "well-protected" US DEPT. OF ENERGY 70 INEEL cleanup agreement 71 INEEL issues CD with lessons on energy 72 Reaction skeptical on faster cleanup 73 Portsmouth: National Sacrifice Zones - 74 Feds Doubt Plutonium Conversion Plan 75 DOE pit 9 INEEL agreement statement 76 Energy Secretary Applauds Governor Engler’s “NextEnergy” Initiative 77 Regulator questions SRS plan ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 North Korea agrees to resume contacts with Japan - Japan Today Japan News - News - Japan's Leading International News Networknational Editorial comments: editor@japantoday.com Paul Eckert Friday, April 19, 2002 at 09:30 JST SEOUL North Korea said on Thursday it will resume contacts with Japan after a long hiatus in the latest sign Pyongyang is gingerly spreading its diplomatic wings. The announcement that Red Cross officials from North Korea and Japan will hold talks in Beijing later this month came after the U.S. ambassador to South Korea said Washington was still awaiting Pyongyang's word on restarting dialogue. A South Korean emissary who went North early this month said Pyongyang was willing to restart long-frozen talks with Japan and receive the U.S. special envoy on Korean affairs. "We have not heard from them yet directly on that subject, but as we've said we're prepared to meet any time, any place," U.S. ambassador Thomas Hubbard told a news conference in Seoul. Hubbard, who has long experience negotiating with North Korea, said the United States hoped contacts would pave the way for talks on outstanding questions, including missile proliferation and a 1994 nuclear agreement. "What we're looking for is a first general meeting with the North Koreans and then hopefully we can agree on a formula for ongoing negotiations," he said. U.S. President George W Bush has branded North Korea part of an "axis of evil" for trying to develop and proliferate weapons of mass destruction. But during a February visit to Seoul, Bush called for talks and said he had no intention of attacking the North. When Bush took office, he put dialogue with the North on hold and reviewed predecessor Bill Clinton's policy. Bush then resumed the call for dialogue in June. The governor of Russian President Vladimir Putin's hometown said after talks in North and South Korea the United States should tone down its rhetoric if it wants to start talks. Vladimir Yakovlev held talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il and dined with him on Monday, the most sacred date in the North Korean calendar — the "Day of the Sun" marking the 90th anniversary of late state founder Kim Il-sung. "The American side should probably take a softer approach to North Korea and it's probably wise for the administration not to use aggressive expressions," Yakovlev, the governor of St Petersburg, told a news conference. Next year brings a set of key deadlines South Korea fears could spark crises without renewed U.S.-North Korean talks. Western countries helping to provide two nuclear reactors to the North under the 1994 Agreed Framework pact want Pyongyang to allow agreed International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) checks. "North Korea needs to begin the process of coming to terms with the IAEA soon if the project is going to continue without delay," Hubbard said. Japan shares U.S. concerns about North Korea's nuclear program and its ballistic missile development and sales. But it is the question of Japanese which Tokyo says were abducted by North Korean agents that is the main stumbling block to a normalization of ties between Japan and North Korea. Tokyo accuses North Korea of kidnapping 11 Japanese in the 1970s and 1980s to train as spies or to teach agents Japanese. North Korea denies kidnapping but last month the North's Red Cross said it was ready to discuss "those missing." "The talks will discuss a series of humanitarian issues including investigation into those missing and the home-visit of Japanese women in the DPRK (North Korea)," the official KCNA news agency said on Thursday. Announcing the April 29-30 talks in Beijing, top Japanese government spokesman Yasuo Fukuda said: "We hope the talks will make an important step toward resolving humanitarian issues." Japan began talks with North Korea in 1991 but the North Koreans stormed out after Tokyo raised the abductions. Full-scale normalisation talks resumed in 2000, but these also failed. South Korea, whose special envoy Lim Dong-won breathed life into the allies' North Korea diplomacy with his recent trip to Pyongyang, has moved to maintain momentum with Pyongyang. On Thursday, the South's Unification Ministry said it would ship 200,000 tons of fertilizer to North Korea by the end of this month, as Kim Jong-il had requested during Lim's visit. South Korea's Agricultural Ministry said North Korea had asked Seoul for 300,000 tons of rice and the ministry was willing to meet the request. "We are actively seeking to do it," said Deputy Agriculture Minister Ahn Jong-wun. The rice aid is a mix of humanitarian gesture and a practical step to reduce a huge domestic rice stockpile that has depressed grain prices in an election year. (Reuters News) © Reuters 2001 ***************************************************************** 2 Study shows supporters of nuclear energy outnumber opponents in Finnish Parliament HS Home 19.4.2002 - National Coalition Party most pro-nuclear According to a fresh survey, supporters of nuclear energy in the Finnish Parliament outnumber opponents 94 - 88. The Finnish Parliament has 200 members. The survey, conducted by the radio news service of Finland's public service broadcaster YLE, found that support for the construction of a fifth commercial nuclear reactor was greatest among the Parliamentary group of the conservative National Coalition Party, where supporters outnumber opponents 40 - 4. As for the Parliament's Social Democrats, 28 are in favour of nuclear power and 17 are opposed. In the opposition Centre Party opponents of nuclear power outnumber supporters 25 - 19. The MPs of the Left Alliance are largely anti-nuclear, with 15 opposing a new facility and four in favour. In the Parliamentary group of the Swedish People's Party only two MPs are in favour of a new nuclear power plant, and ten are opposed. All 11 Parliamentarians of the Green League are against a new plant. Under Finnish law, nuclear power plants must be authorised by Parliament. The Christian Democratic Party could prove to be decisive: five of the party's representatives in Parliament are in the anti-nuclear camp, while five others remain undecided. Helsingin Sanomat ***************************************************************** 3 Report: Russia to build 10 nuclear reactors abroad in next decade Thu Apr 18, 3:34 PM ET MOSCOW - Russia plans to build 10 nuclear reactors in foreign countries over the next decade, Deputy Atomic Energy Minister Bulat Nigmatulin told Interfax news agency on Thursday. "Russia is already building five nuclear reactors abroad, including in China, Iran and India," he was quoted as saying. "In the future, we can expect to build another five nuclear reactors." He did not name which other countries might be interested. The cost of building a nuclear reactor is about dlrs 800 million to dlrs 900 million, Nigmatulin said. Russia's dlrs 800 million deal to build a nuclear reactor in the Iranian city of Bushehr has angered the U.S. administration. The United States has warned it could help Iran build nuclear weapons. However, Moscow has refused to drop the deal, saying the light-water reactor couldn't be used for developing a nuclear bomb and would remain under international control. (mb) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 4 Editorial: Senate tosses out flawed energy idea Las Vegas SUN April 19, 2002 On Thursday the Democratic-led Senate wisely rejected President Bush's plan to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska. Drilling in those environmentally sensitive lands would be harmful, and the amount of oil that could be tapped would not appreciably decrease the nation's dependence on foreign oil. Rather than trashing the environment -- whether it's drilling in ANWR or trying to dump nuclear waste in Nevada -- Congress should adopt an energy policy that would incorporate sensible measures, such as increasing the fuel economy of cars and trucks. But most Republicans haven't looked at conservation and clean sources of energy -- such as solar, wind and geothermal -- because green power's supporters aren't big campaign contributors for GOP politicians. Until the GOP cuts its blind allegiance to the oil, coal and nuclear power industries, a national energy policy that recognizes the value of the environment will be impossible to attain. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 5 Entergy considering new nuclear plant in Mississippi - 4/18/2002 - ENN.com Thursday, April 18, 2002 By Associated Press NEW ORLEANS — Entergy Corp. has notified the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission that it is considering building a nuclear power plant in Port Gibson, Miss. Entergy officials said the company will take at least three years to decide whether to build the plant. Entergy Nuclear, a subsidiary of the New Orleans#150based utility, this week became the third company to notify the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) of plans to seek an "early site permit" for a new nuclear plant. President Bush last year called on energy companies to resurrect the nuclear power plant construction business, which has been dormant since the mid-1980s after the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island. The company said nuclear energy is an alternative to natural gas, which fuels most of the country's newest power plants. "Having (the nuclear) option available is in the best interest of our power consumers, Entergy, and the nation's energy independence," the company said. Entergy officials began considering building a nuclear plant a year ago after a severe shortage of natural gas sent the price of natural-gas-generated electricity soaring. Entergy officials have said a new nuclear plant becomes economically viable when the price of natural gas consistently tops $5 per million British thermal units. Although prices in south Louisiana topped $10 per BTU last year during the shortage, they fell back after supplies strengthened. In recent weeks, natural gas has been trading around $3 per million BTU. Economic conditions of the power market will be the main factor in deciding whether to build the plant, the company said. Entergy spent the past nine months studying seven of its existing nuclear plant sites, including Waterford III near Hahnville and River Bend near St. Francisville, to determine which site had the best conditions for building a new reactor, Entergy Nuclear spokesman Carl Crawford said. Entergy already has one nuclear plant at Port Gibson. Transmission lines linking that plant to the region's power grid have enough capacity to handle another reactor because original plans called for two units at the site, Crawford said. The second unit was started but later abandoned. The application will take about a year to prepare and cost the nuclear subsidiary about $9 million, including a $5.4 million application fee from the NRC, Crawford said. The federal Department of Energy has offered to pay for as much as 50 percent of the application cost, he said. The rest will be covered by Entergy Nuclear. Customers of the parent company's regulated electricity utilities, which include Entergy New Orleans and Entergy Louisiana, will not pay for any of the application charges. Exelon, a Chicago-based power utility and the nation's biggest nuclear plant operator, became the first company to start the early site permit application process on March 20. Dominion Resources, based in Richmond, Va., followed two weeks later. Copyright 2002, Associated Press Copyright © 2001 Environmental News Network Inc. ***************************************************************** 6 Enercon teams on nuclear power plant proposal - 2002-04-18 - East Bay Business Times Enercon Services Inc., a nuclear services firm, has been selected by Entergy Nuclear Potomac Co. to be part of its team to prepare an early site permit at the Grand Gulf Nuclear Station site near Port Gibson, Miss., for a potential nuclear power plant. Under the contract, Enercon, which is based in Tulsa and has offices in Oakland, will conduct extensive engineering and environmental studies of the potential effect of a plant on the site, including evaluations of hydrology, meteorology and ecology of the area using current data as well as data from nearly 20 years of operation. The preparation of the early site permit application will take a year and includes evaluating suitability based on population, transportation routes and potential environmental effects from construction and operation of a new plant. The application will be submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in June 2003. The commission will review it for at least two years. Enercon also maintains offices in Albuquerque, N. M., Atlanta, Dallas, Houston and Midland, Texas, Oklahoma City, Okla., Pittsburgh, Raleigh and Wilmington, N.C., Washington, D.C., Mt. Arlington, N.J., and Richland, Wash. Entergy Corp., the parent of Entergy Nuclear, is headquartered in Mississippi. It is the third largest domestic power generator, with more than 30,000 megawatts of generating capacity, about $10 billion in revenue and 2.6 million customers. Copyright 2002 American City Business Journals ***************************************************************** 7 Report: Russia to build 10 nuclear reactors abroad in next decade AP Thu Apr 18, 3:34 PM ET MOSCOW - Russia plans to build 10 nuclear reactors in foreign countries over the next decade, Deputy Atomic Energy Minister Bulat Nigmatulin told Interfax news agency on Thursday. "Russia is already building five nuclear reactors abroad, including in China, Iran and India," he was quoted as saying. "In the future, we can expect to build another five nuclear reactors." He did not name which other countries might be interested. The cost of building a nuclear reactor is about dlrs 800 million to dlrs 900 million, Nigmatulin said. Russia's dlrs 800 million deal to build a nuclear reactor in the Iranian city of Bushehr has angered the U.S. administration. The United States has warned it could help Iran build nuclear weapons. However, Moscow has refused to drop the deal, saying the light-water reactor couldn't be used for developing a nuclear bomb and would remain under international control. (mb) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. ***************************************************************** 8 NRC probes particles from FirstEnergy Ohio reactor USA: April 19, 2002 WASHINGTON - Four people who worked recently at the FirstEnergy Corp.'s Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio were found to have carried microscopic radioactive particles on their clothing to outside locations, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said. The NRC is investigating the incident in which Davis-Besse radiation protection personnel were notified on March 22 that radioactive particles were found on a worker's sleeve at the Onconee nuclear facility in South Carolina. That worker had last worked at Davis-Besse. During the mid-February shut-down at the 25-year-old plant in Oak Harbor, Ohio, Davis-Besse engineers discovered deep corrosion on the top of the reactor vessel. "The licensee's investigation to date has determined that a total of 13 discrete particles were recovered from four individuals, their clothing, residences and hotel rooms in Ohio, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia," the NRC said in a statement issued Wednesday. The four people had worked on steam generators at Davis-Besse, which shut down in mid-February for a refueling outage. The particles, according to the NRC, "are believed to be byproducts of the fission process with relatively low levels of activity." Preliminary findings by FirstEnergy, the NRC said, indicate there should be no adverse health effects from the particles. FirstEnergy has presented the NRC with a plan to spend $16 million to patch the 150-ton reactor vessel head capping the 925-megawatt power plant. During an April 10 hearing, NRC officials raised concerns, noting that such a repair job has never been attempted on a nuclear power plant. REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 9 NRC to Meet With Amerenue To Discuss Safety Performance at Callaway NRC: Press Release Region IV - 2002 - 22 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region IV 611 Ryan Plaza Drive, Suite 400, Arlington TX 76011 www.nrc.gov No. IV-02-022 April 16, 2002 CONTACT: Breck Henderson Phone: 817-860-8128 Cellular: 817-917-1227 E-mail: opa4@nrc.gov [opa4@nrc.gov] The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with representatives of AmerenUE/Union Electric Co. on Monday, April 22, to discuss the results of the agency's annual assessment of safety performance at Callaway nuclear power plant. The facility is located near Fulton, Missouri, and is operated by AmerenUE. The meeting, which will be open to the public for observation, is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. at Capitol Plaza Hotel, 415 McCarty St., Jefferson City. NRC staff will be available before the meeting is adjourned to answer any questions from the public. A letter sent from NRC Region IV to AmerenUE addresses plant performance during the period April 1 to December 31, 2001, and will serve as the basis for the meeting discussion. It is available on the NRC web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/call_2001q4.pdf. Current performance information for Callaway is available on the NRC web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/CALL/call_chart.html. ***************************************************************** 10 Atomic Safety & Licensing Board to Hold Hearing April 23 in Chattanooga on TVA Appeal of NRC Discrimination Ruling NRC: Press Release Region II - 2002 - 25 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 www.nrc.gov No. II-02-025 April 16, 2002 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416 Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417 E-mail: [opa2@nrc.gov] An independent Atomic Safety & Licensing Board appointed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission will conduct an evidentiary hearing in Chattanooga beginning April 23 on a Tennessee Valley Authority appeal of a $110,000 civil penalty sought to be imposed by the NRC for alleged violation of NRC employee protection requirements. The hearing will commence at 9:30 a.m.(EDT), at the United States Bankruptcy Court, Courtroom A, Historic U.S. Courthouse, 31 East 11th Street, and will continue April 24-26, beginning at 9:00 a.m, and, to the extent necessary, on April 30 - May 9, also commencing at 9:00 a.m. The members of the Atomic Safety & Licensing Board established to preside over the hearing are Charles Bechhoefer, Chairman; Ann Marshall Young and Dr. Richard F. Cole. Parties to this proceeding are TVA and the NRC staff. Issues to be considered are whether TVA violated NRC requirements by discriminating against a former employee for engaging in protected activities; and, if so, whether an NRC Order imposing a civil monetary penalty for the violations should be sustained. Documents related to this proceeding issued prior to December 1, 1999, are available for public inspection in the NRC Public Document Room (PDR) at One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852-2738, telephone 301- 415-4737 or 1-800-397-4209. Documents issued subsequent to November 1, 1999, are available through the PDR and electronically through the NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System (ADAMS), accessible to the public through NRC's Internet web site at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. Help in using ADAMS is available by calling the PDR at the above telephone numbers. The hearing is open to observation by interested members of the public. EDITORS: No video and/or audio recording devices will be allowed during the proceeding because they are prohibited inside the federal courthouse. ***************************************************************** 11 NRC to Hold Meeting April 30 at NFS Nuclear Fuel Plant to Discuss NRC Performance Review of Licensee Activities NRC: Press Release Region II - 2002 - 26 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 www.nrc.gov No. II-02-026 April 19, 2002 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416 Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417 E-mail: opa2@nrc.gov [opa2@nrc.gov] Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials will meet with officials of Nuclear Fuel Services, Incorporated, in Erwin, Tennessee, on April 30 to discuss the agency's latest review of the facility's safety performance. The meeting is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. (EDT) at the NFS Training Center in Erwin, located on Jackson Love Highway near Exit 15 on Interstate 181. The meeting is open to observation by the public, and NRC officials will be available prior to its conclusion to answer questions from interested observers. The NRC review, which covers a period from January 14, 2001 through February 16, 2002, indicates that NFS has continued to conduct its activities safely and securely. The NRC said five major areas evaluated - Safety Operations, Nuclear Materials Safeguards, Radiological Controls, Facility Support, and Special topics - showed that performance at NFS "significantly improved" in several areas. However, the agency said its review indicated that improvement is needed in the areas of radiological controls and in the maintenance and testing of important electrical equipment. The NRC also said that, although performance in the area of implementation of procedures has improved, additional progress is needed. NRC officials said that, based upon the results of the review, the agency will continue its core inspection program at NFS with additional NRC inspection emphasis upon review of the plant's corrective actions to improve the reliability and testing of important electrical systems. Copies of an April 8 letter to NFS with enclosures outlining details of the performance review, may be obtained from the Region II Office of Public Affairs in Atlanta and will be available electronically for public inspection in the NRC Public Document Room (PDR) in Washington, D.C., or on the NRC's Agencywide Document Access and Management System (ADAMS) Internet web site at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. Help in using ADAMS is available through the NRC PDR at 301-415-4737 or 1-800-397-4209. ***************************************************************** 12 Washington Nuke Plant Probed Las Vegas SUN April 18, 2002 RICHLAND, Wash. (AP) - Nuclear regulators are investigating a safety violation that could have caused bursts of potentially fatal radiation at a plant that makes fuel assemblies for commercial reactors. The violation occurred last week at the Framatome Advanced Nuclear Power plant, but did not result in an accident. Site manager Bob Link said an employee poured radioactive uranium oxide powder into a 45-gallon barrel that was missing a safety device to prevent an uncontrolled nuclear reaction and releases of potentially deadly radiation. The employee realized the mistake, and reported it. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission began an investigation this week. Two or three barriers, either chemical or physical, are generally put in place to prevent such accidents. In the Framatome incident, a second barrier was missing. The plant is operated by Framatome ANP Inc., one of the world's largest builders of nuclear plants. On the Net: http://www.framatome-anp.com [http://www.framatome-anp.com] All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 13 Chinese-made nuclear plant put into commercial use BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 19, 2002 (New China News Agency) Haiyan (Zhejiang), 19 April: The number one turbogenerator unit of the Second Qinshan Nuclear Power Plant has been put into operation for commercial use. The nuclear plant, located in Haiyan County, Zhejiang Province in east China, was independently designed and built by China with a capacity of 600,000 kW, and it passed a 168-hour test Wednesday [17 April] night. "Initial operation of the turbo unit proves that the power plant has an excellent security performance," said Yu Zhongde, chief engineer for the plant, adding that the plant had reached the world technological standards for the operation of nuclear reactors. Some of the performance even approached to the level designed for future nuclear industry construction in developed nations, Yu revealed. The nuclear power plant, costing around 14.8bn yuan (over 1.78bn US dollars) in total investment, operates under modern management methods and 47 out of 57 large-scale key units of machinery were all developed by China. With design, construction and management technologies and experience, China is now expected to construct larger nuclear power plants with capacity of over 1m kW, said Li Yongjiang, manager of the Qinshan Nuclear Plant Associated Co. Source: Xinhua news agency, Beijing, in English 0339 gmt 19 Apr 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 14 NRC Dispatches Inspector to Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station Following Discovery of Radioactive Particles Off-Site NRC: Press Release Region III - 2002 - 21 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region III 801 Warrenville Road, Lisle IL 60532 www.nrc.gov No. III-02-021 April 17, 2002 CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663 Pam Alloway-Mueller (630) 829-9662 E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov [opa3@nrc.gov] The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is reviewing an incident in which microscopic radioactive particles were recovered from four individuals, their clothing, residences and hotel rooms after leaving the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio. Radiation protection personnel at the Davis-Besse plant were notified on March 22 by the Oconee nuclear facility in South Carolina that discrete radioactive particles were found on a worker's sleeve. The worker was undergoing in-processing for work at the Oconee facility, and had last worked at Davis-Besse. FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company operates the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant near Oak Harbor, Ohio. The licensee's investigation to date has determined that a total of 13 discrete particles were recovered from four individuals, their clothing, residences and hotel rooms in Ohio, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. The individuals had worked on steam generators at Davis-Besse, which shut down in mid-February for a refueling outage. A senior health physicist from the NRC's Region III Office in Lisle, Il., has been dispatched to the Davis-Besse plant to assess the possible dose consequences to the four contract employees who visited Davis-Besse before traveling to other sites and to evaluate the licensee's investigation into the matter. FirstEnergy is attempting to determine how the particles were transported off-site. Preliminary dose calculations by the licensee indicate no adverse health effects are expected to either the workers or members of the public from the tiny particles. The particles are believed to be byproducts of the fission process with relatively low levels of activity. ***************************************************************** 15 Lithuanian premier reiterates closure of nuclear plant depends on EU finds BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 19, 2002 Vilnius, 18 April: Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Brazauskas reiterated on Thursday [18 April] that Lithuania would not be able to close its Ignalina nuclear power plant without financial aid from the EU. The Lithuanian government decided this week that costs for shutting down the nuke [as received] would reach 2.4bn euros by 2020 and will top 3bn euros later. Asked on Thursday how much of those costs Lithuania could cover, Brazauskas answered: "Not one cent". "I don't see any way we can provide for those funds in our investment programme, neither from the budget nor from privatization sources," the Lithuanian prime minister told reporters on Thursday after a meeting with President Valdas Adamkus. "Lithuania with its economy cannot bear such costs. Only with European Union aid, only with help from donors or from other sources [we will be able to do this], which means this isn't just Lithuania's problem, it's a common European Union problem," Brazauskas said. In 1992 the Lithuanian government created a domestic fund for closing the nuclear facility, which has collected about 46m euros so far. Donor states and the European Commission have pledged around 203m euros for closing the Lithuanian nuke so far. The budget proposed by the European Commission for financing EU expansion includes separate provisions for annual aid to close the Ignalina plant of 70m euros for the three years after Lithuania enters the EU. Lithuanian negotiators are optimistic about negotiating discrete long-term financial aid from the European Commission for closing Ignalina, including a portion of EU funds set aside for specific tasks to take Lithuania's only nuclear power plant off-line... Source: BNS news agency, Tallinn, in English 1654 gmt 18 Apr 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 16 Lithuanian official unaware of Belarusian plans to buy nuclear plant BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 19, 2002 The director of the Ignalina nuclear power plant [Viktoras Sevaldinas] has said he has not heard about the intentions of Belarus to buy the plant. Speaking to the Lithuanian radio, Viktoras Sevaldinas described such claims as a joke. According to the director, all issues related to the Ignalina plant are addressed at the highest level. Meanwhile, the Baltic News Agency, quoting the Belarusian deputy foreign minister, Alyaksandr Mikhnevich, reported that Belarus had been considering a possibility to buy the Ignalina nuclear power plant from Lithuania. According to the official, the acquisition of the Ignalina plant is one of the options to increase the country's power generating potential considered by the Belarusian government. However, the Belarusian deputy energy minister, Yawhen Mishuk, said it was not expedient to purchase the Ignalina plant as an additional power producer. He regards the plans to buy the Ignalina plant utopian because presently Belarus does not have funds even for the most necessary investments in the country's power sector. Source: Lithuanian Radio, Vilnius, in Lithuanian 1100 gmt 19 Apr 02 /© BBC Monitoring /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. ***************************************************************** 17 Romania: Bulgarian president says two nuclear plant reactors to be shut down BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 19, 2002 Bucharest, 19 April: There is a new climate in Bulgarian-Romanian relations and the two countries should handle the problems together, Bulgarian President Georgi Purvanov said in Bucharest late on Thursday [18 April] evening. Immediately after his arrival in the Romanian capital he met with Romanian President Ion Iliescu in the presidential palace Cotroceni... Later on Thursday the Bulgarian president and the Greek prime minister were guests at an official dinner given by the Romanian president. Purvanov's programme on Friday started with a meeting with Konstandinos Simitis. The two assessed in positive terms the political and economic relations between the two countries. Greece is the second biggest investor in Bulgaria and its fourth biggest trading partner, presidential foreign policy adviser Zlatin Trupkov told the press. The two leaders paid special attention to the country's accession to the EU in the light of the Greek presidency of the EU in early 2003. The Greek prime minister underscored his country's first support and commitment to Bulgaria's entry in the EU and NATO. Purvanov insisted for a fair participation of Bulgaria in the Burgas-Alexandroupolis oil pipeline project. At the end of April an expert group will meet in Athens to decide on the share of participation of all sides. Trupkov explained that a decision on the matter will be taken at two levels: expert and political. Another issue discussed by Purvanov and Simitis was the construction of three new border crossings on the common border. Special attention was paid to the Gotse Delchev-Nevrokop crossing which is practically ready on the Bulgarian side. The project was mired in a dispute some time ago over concerns about its effect on the local population of brown bears. The Greek government leader said that there are no problems with the projects now and it is time to think of even more new border crossings. Also, Purvanov confirmed the Bulgarian position on the Kozloduy nuclear power plant: that Unit 1 and 2 will be closed down before the end of this year, and that an international expert examination - with EU participation - will be made in connection with the closure of Unit 3 and 4. The Bulgarian head of state also raised the question of Bulgaria's participation in the preparation for the Olympic Games in Athens. More specifically, they talked about the participation of Bulgarian companies in tenders for construction of Olympic facilities in Greece, and also for possibilities to intensify tourism. It was the second meeting of the Bulgarian president with the Greek prime minister. The two first met in Sofia during Simitis' visit at the time of Purvanov's inauguration as president of Bulgaria. Source: BTA web site, Sofia, in English 19 Apr 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 18 Nuclear reactor temporarily shut down after short-circuit in Ukraine Fri Apr 19, 4:06 AM ET KIEV, Ukraine - A nuclear reactor at Ukraine's Rivne nuclear power plant was shut down temporarily after a short-circuit in electricity lines, officials said Friday. The safety system prompted plant workers to turn off reactor No. 3 on Thursday evening, the Energoatom state nuclear company said. The reactor was restarted about four hours later. It was the second incident in five days at the Rivne plant. On Sunday, workers shut down the No. 3 reactor after detecting a hydrogen leak in the generator's cooling system. Ukraine was the site of world's worst nuclear disaster in April 1986, when a reactor at the Chernobyl atomic plant exploded. The plant was closed for good in 2000. Minor malfunctions occur frequently at the country's four other atomic power plants. Currently, 10 nuclear reactors are working and producing about 40 percent of the country's electricity output, while three reactors are undergoing repairs. (ms/ji) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 19 N-plants' owner pledges action Syracuse.com: News [The Post-Standard] Constellation Nuclear says it has plan to address issues at Nine Mile Point. Friday, April 19, 2002 By Chris Iven Officials with Constellation Nuclear, owner of the Nine Mile Point 1 and 2 nuclear power plants, admitted to federal regulators Thursday that they must maintain their equipment better. "We are certainly very committed to raising the level of performance at this station to much higher levels," Constellation executive Raymond Wenderlich told Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials. "We think we have a good plan to do that." During the public meeting at the Joint News Center in Volney, NRC officials said the plants are operating safely but said the plants' performance must improve. Because of equipment and human failures last year, the NRC placed the two plants into its "regulatory response" category. That means that the NRC has scheduled additional inspections of the plants in May to ensure that the causes of the problems are fixed. Nine Mile Point 1 and 2 are among 29 nuclear plants nationwide under more intense NRC scrutiny. There are 103 plants operating in the country. One of the main safety systems at Nine Mile Point 1 was off-line for most of the first quarter of 2001, but plant operators failed to report that for months. At Nine Mile Point 2, equipment and human failures forced the plant to abruptly shut down four times last year, including three times from October to December. Thursday's review covered the plant performance for all of 2001. Constellation bought the plant Nov. 7. Since then, the company has worked to cut through its large "corrective maintenance" backlog, said John Conway, Constellation's site vice president. That has allowed the maintenance staff to concentrate on preventive maintenance, he said. That work, he said, will identify and fix problems before equipment has a chance to fail. At the same time, the company is working to improve worker morale, Wenderlich said. "To really get to be a top-notch organization, you've got to unleash the passions and the power of the people," Wenderlich said. That means developing a better understanding of employees' personal needs and empowering them to make their work environment better, he said. Better maintenance, meanwhile, makes it less likely that employees will NRC, FROM PAGE B-1 be called in to do emergency work on failed equipment, Wenderlich said. "People get sick of getting called in on nights and weekends," Wenderlich said. Randy Blough, supervisor for all NRC resident inspectors in the Northeast, said Constellation described a plan that can succeed, but he reserved judgment. "It sounds like they're working on the right things," Blough said. "Our conclusion will be reached after we do the follow-up inspections." © 2002 The Post-Standard. Used with permission. © 2002 Syracuse.com. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 20 Kansas nuclear plant gets a glowing review The Wichita Eagle | 04/18/2002 | [http://www.aberdeennews.com] [Aberdeennews Photos] Posted on Thu, Apr. 18, 2002 [story:PUB_DESC] By Jean Hays The Wichita Eagle Wolf Creek Nuclear Operating Corp. received high marks from the federal government on its operation of the nuclear power plant near Burlington. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will discuss the findings of its annual safety review at a public meeting tonight in Burlington. Overall, no problems that would affect the safe operation of the plant were found, according to the NRC. The annual review focuses on three main areas: reactor safety, radiation safety and security. The NRC gave the plant a green light, its best rating, in every category. "All in all, I would have to say that their performance was pretty good," said David Graves, the branch chief in the NRC's office in NRC's Arlington, Texas, which monitors Wolf Creek. Graves said that Wolf Creek, like all plants, has been required to increase security since Sept 11. Wolf Creek is currently shut down for a routine replacement of fuel rods. The plant is scheduled to begin generating electricity again by the end of the month. Westar Energy and Kansas City Power &Light Co. each own 47 percent of the power plant. The Kansas Electric Power Cooperative owns 6 percent. WANT TO HEAR MORE? The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will give Wolf Creek its annual report card tonight. The public meeting begins at 7 p.m. at the Coffey County Courthouse, 110 S. Sixth St. in Burlington. NRC representatives will answer questions from the public before the meeting. ***************************************************************** 21 Davis-Besse alone has woes Beacon Journal | 04/19/2002 | [http://www.miami.com] [Ohio Photos] 68 other, similar U.S. nuclear plants tell NRC they are OK By Jim Mackinnon Beacon Journal business writer No other nuclear power plants in the country say they have the same kind of boric acid problems that damaged a crucial safety device at FirstEnergy's Davis-Besse plant, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said yesterday. In a related matter, FirstEnergy said it probably will deliver overnight to the NRC its final report on how boric acid damaged the Davis-Besse reactor vessel head. FirstEnergy officials were still working on the report yesterday afternoon, a company spokesman said. The NRC said yesterday that it had finished a preliminary look at responses from the nation's 68 other pressurized-water reactors, which are similar in design to Davis-Besse. Shortly after the Davis-Besse damage was found in early March, the NRC asked the other plants to demonstrate why they would not have, or develop, similar acid damage. ``They didn't see anything that would require any immediate regulatory response,'' NRC spokesman Victor Dricks said. NRC staff members are analyzing the responses and may have additional questions for the operators of some plants, Dricks said. The staff will put together a final report but has no deadline, Dricks said. Preliminary reports fromFirstEnergy and the NRC concluded that Davis-Besse's staff failed to recognize signs going back at least four years that boric acid was leaking and had begun eating cavities on top of the reactor vessel head, a 150-ton steel dome that covers the radioactive fuel core. A thin layer of stainless steel prevented the acid, which is in the reactor coolant, from eating all the way through the vessel head. A hole would have allowed hot, radioactive coolant to jet into the containment-chamber building. The NRC's two inspectors who work full time at the plant apparently also failed to note the signs, which included an increasing amount of rust clogging filters. FirstEnergy has said it wants to repair the damaged vessel head at an estimated cost of $16 million and restart Davis-Besse this summer. The plant has been shut down since Feb. 16. Jim Mackinnon can be reached at 330-996-3544 or jmackinnon@thebeaconjournal.com [jmackinnon@thebeaconjournal.com] ***************************************************************** 22 Expert closer to cause of Vermont Yankee leak By Associated Press, 4/19/2002 06:50 MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) A new hydrogen gas water treatment system installed at Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant last year may be to blame for the leaking nuclear fuel at the Vernon reactor. William Sherman, the state nuclear engineer with the Vermont Department of Public Service, said Thursday the hydrogen gas system was probably the cause of the leaking fuel, although a definite diagnosis wouldn't be known until the plant shuts down for repairs in May. Yankee officials had all but eliminated defective uranium fuel from a list of potential causes, as well as mistakes in maintenance or operation, Sherman said. Sherman testified Thursday before the Public Service Board on the proposed sale of Vermont Yankee to Entergy, the fourth largest utility in the United States. The leakage problem was first discovered in December. But it has worsened in the past few weeks, and the decision was made to shut the plant for two weeks in May in order to take care of problems before the hot summer months, when power is at a premium in New England. Vermont Yankee officials have said there is no risk to the public because the radioactivity that is leaking is still well below safety limits. Yankee had hoped to keep operating until October, when it has a regularly scheduled refueling and maintenance shutdown. Often, the cause of leaking fuel at nuclear reactors can be traced to manufacturing defects or foreign matter getting into the reactor core. Equipment failure is a third possible cause, Sherman said. However, Sherman said ''an unexpected chemical effect associated with chemical treatment in the plant'' apparently was to blame in this case. Vermont Yankee installed the hydrogen gas treatment facility last year to improve water chemistry. The treatment system was designed to extend the life of the plant. ***************************************************************** 23 Lawsuit claims Connecticut Yankee plan would ruin historical site By Associated Press, 4/18/2002 16:25 EAST HADDAM, Conn. (AP) A new lawsuit claims that Connecticut Yankee's waste storage plan will ruin the historical homestead of Venture Smith, a slave who became an entrepreneur in the 18th century. The lawsuit was filed in Middlesex Superior Court by a Smith descendant, David Warmsley of Middletown, and an amateur historian, Douglas R. Jones of Essex. Connecticut Yankee's decommissioning plan includes a storage facility for spent nuclear waste in an area that is near or at the site of Smith's family farm. Historical researchers have not pinpointed the exact boundaries of Smith's farm. He died in 1805, and it passed from family ownership in 1843. The Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power Co. now owns it. The lawsuit seeks a court order to halt construction pending an archaeological survey of the property. If items of historical significance are found, it could stop the storage facility from being built, said the men's attorney, anti-nuclear activist Nancy Burton. Smith was born free in Africa to a tribal leader, but he was captured and enslaved as a child. He was bought and sold several times before he was able to purchase his freedom in 1765, at the age of 36. Smith went on to own a 100-acre farm, three houses and a fleet of 20 ships, according to a narrative he published in 1798 that was dictated to a schoolteacher. Warmsley said that if his ancestor were alive today, he would help fight the Connecticut Yankee plan. ''All his life people were trying to take things away from him and I think he'd feel, 'Here we go again. They're trying to take my heritage away from me,''' Warmsley said. Kelly Smith, a spokeswoman for Connecticut Yankee, said the company is dedicated to preserving Venture Smith's legacy also. Archaeologists who reviewed the storage site before it was chosen found nothing. Remnants of the foundation of the Smith home lie about a quarter of a mile from the waste storage site. The Smith home site would not be harmed and could be safely examined by archaeologists even after construction is completed, Smith said. As part of Connecticut Yankee's decommissioning, nuclear waste that is now being stored in a pool at the plant will be moved into steel and concrete casks. ***************************************************************** 24 Nuclear reactor temporarily shut down after short-circuit in Ukraine AP Fri Apr 19, 4:06 AM ET KIEV, Ukraine - A nuclear reactor at Ukraine's Rivne nuclear power plant was shut down temporarily after a short-circuit in electricity lines, officials said Friday. The safety system prompted plant workers to turn off reactor No. 3 on Thursday evening, the Energoatom state nuclear company said. The reactor was restarted about four hours later. It was the second incident in five days at the Rivne plant. On Sunday, workers shut down the No. 3 reactor after detecting a hydrogen leak in the generator's cooling system. Ukraine was the site of world's worst nuclear disaster in April 1986, when a reactor at the Chernobyl atomic plant exploded. The plant was closed for good in 2000. Minor malfunctions occur frequently at the country's four other atomic power plants. Currently, 10 nuclear reactors are working and producing about 40 percent of the country's electricity output, while three reactors are undergoing repairs. (ms/ji) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. ***************************************************************** 25 Radiation found on 4 workers toledoblade.com Regional News | Article published Thursday, April 18, 2002 PARTICLE IN PORT CLINTON HOTEL Escape of particles from facility probed By TOM HENRY BLADE STAFF WRITER The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is investigating how four contract workers left FirstEnergy Corp.’s Davis-Besse nuclear plant with radioactive particles on their clothing. The probe into last month’s discovery occurs less than a week after top company leaders went to Washington in hopes of winning back confidence of high-level government officials concerned about problems at the Ottawa County plant. Thirteen particles that stuck to the men have been found at various locations in Ohio, South Carolina, Virginia, and Texas, including one hotel or motel in Port Clinton and a condominium there, said Victor Dricks, spokesman for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s headquarters in Rockville, Md. While none of the radiation involved appears to be any more threatening than a typical dental X-ray, the NRC is concerned "because the circumstances suggest a loss of control of licensed material," Mr. Dricks said. The agency on Tuesday classified the event as an "unusual occurrence" and sent a health physicist from its Midwest regional office in a Chicago suburb to Davis-Besse to investigate screening procedures. "You don’t typically see something get out of a site and be picked up like that," Kenneth Riemer of the NRC’s reactor safety division said. Officials from the Ohio Emergency Management Agency and the Ohio Department of Health have gone to the nuclear plant to observe the inspection. Workers are screened for radioactive particles whenever they finish shifts in the containment area of nuclear plants and are not allowed to leave until all traces of such material are removed. That procedure is done as a safeguard. The particles in question had a mix of niobium, zirconium, ruthenium, and cerium. Each are capable of emitting up to 6 millirems of radiation into human tissue over 24 hours, assuming the particle is not brushed, knocked, or washed from skin during that time, Mr. Dricks said. That’s 6 percent of the 100-millirem dosage the government has set as the annual maximum exposure limit from background radiation sources, Mr. Dricks said. Each dental X-ray emits about 10 millirems. Some medical X-rays emit as much as 40 millirems, Jay Carey, Ohio Department of Health spokesman, said. All 13 particles that were identified were recovered and will be disposed of with other low-level radioactive material, Richard Wilkins, FirstEnergy spokesman, said. Neither the NRC nor the utility would identify the Port Clinton locations where the particles were found. They would not disclose identities of the men, other than to say they were contract workers who travel around the country and who did some maintenance on Davis-Besse’s steam generator. The issue came to FirstEnergy’s attention on March 22, when particles were found on three of those four men as they were screened upon arrival for work at Duke Energy Corp.’s Oconee nuclear power complex in South Carolina. The fourth man with contaminated clothing was en route to a job at the Comanche Peak nuclear complex in Texas, operated by TXU Electric Co. FirstEnergy subsequently dispatched its own inspectors on a multistate search for the particles, while not revealing the information - something that has upset some Ohio government officials. At least one particle was found in a motel or hotel in South Carolina where three of the men had been staying. Three particles were found at a private residence in Lynchburg, Va. Locations for other particles included a noncontainment area of Davis-Besse plus the Oconee and Comanche sites, Mr. Dricks said. FirstEnergy verified all four workers had been at Davis-Besse before leaving for jobs in South Carolina and Texas but does not admit Davis-Besse is the source for the particles. That’s because the clothing those workers wore was not believed to have been taken inside Davis-Besse’s containment area, from which the particles most likely would have been picked up. Those workers used lockers in another part of the plant and had no traces of contamination on protective gear when they suited up prior to entering the containment area, according to Mr. Wilkins. "The clothing that was found [in South Carolina] did not come into the plant [Davis-Besse]," Mr. Wilkins said. "We’re not saying it [the particles] didn’t come from Davis-Besse," he emphasized. "We’re saying we don’t know where it came from." The Ohio EMA and state health department said they were notified about the stray particles Monday, more than three weeks after FirstEnergy learned about them from the South Carolina utility. "We’re concerned with the delay in notification," said Dick Kimmins, an Ohio EMA spokesman who described the oversight as "a big deal" to his agency. Mr. Kimmins said the public has a "justifiable concern with this." "We’re clearly concerned with how it could have occurred in the first place. We’re aware of peoples’ concerns, especially given the recent problems at Davis-Besse," he said. Corrosion on top of Davis-Besse’s nuclear reactor head discovered last month was described by government regulators as the worst of its kind ever found in the United States. Five of 69 reactor nozzles developed cracks over the years, one of which allowed boric acid to leak out and burn through the top six inches of the steel lid. The only thing that prevented a hole that would have allowed radioactive steam to be released into the containment structure was a swath of stainless steel that is only three-eighths of an inch thick. Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D., Toledo) called for the plant’s shutdown. Gov. Bob Taft is reserving comment until the NRC completes its investigation. But the governor’s press secretary, Joe Andrews, said Mr. Taft is not completely satisfied with how things transpired. "We should have been notified," Mr. Andrews said. FirstEnergy officials spoke with the governor’s office this week, and notified the state EMA and health department as a "courtesy," Mr. Wilkins said. He said the utility did not notify state officials sooner because it did not feel obligated. "There was no risk to public health or safety here," Mr. Wilkins said. "If this had been a risk, they’d have known about it immediately." The latest federal investigation occurs less than a week after an April 10 meeting at the NRC headquarters, in which FirstEnergy had its top executives and engineers make the firm’s first formal pitch to fix Davis-Besse’s corroded reactor head. The NRC is still weeks away from deciding whether it will allow the utility to make an estimated $16 million of repairs, a project that would be the largest of its kind ever attempted on an in-service nuclear plant. Anti-nuclear activists said the revelation about the workers unknowingly carrying radiation particles off site is stunning, given the intense scrutiny Davis-Besse has been under since the corrosion issue triggered an investigation. In addition to sending an inspection team to Davis-Besse, the NRC ordered all 68 other nuclear plants with pressurized water reactors to turn over their inspection records immediately. "Even in this time of high-crisis investigation, Davis-Besse is not paying attention to some of the most basic regulations. It’s appalling," said Christine Patronik-Holder of the Safe Energy Communication Council. "It’s a breakdown of the radiation protection system, which is a very serious breach in both worker and community safety. It’s another reason why the plant should not be reopened," said Shari Weir, spokeswoman for Ohio Citizen Action. ©2002 The Blade. Privacy Statement. By using this service, you accept the The Toledo Blade Company, 541 N. Superior St., Toledo, OH 43660, (419) 724-6000 ***************************************************************** 26 NRC Revises Regulations on Medical Uses of Radioactive Material NRC: Press Release - 2002 - 48 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001 E-mail: opa@nrc.gov [opa@nrc.gov] www.nrc.gov No. 02-048 April 17, 2002 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has revised its regulations on the medical uses of radioactive material. The regulations also respond to a petition for rulemaking filed by the University of Cincinnati. The agency currently regulates the use of certain radioactive materials in medical diagnosis and treatment, as well as research, for about eleven million patients a year. The revisions, designed to be both risk-informed and more performance-based, focus the regulations on the medical procedures that pose higher risks to workers, patients and the public from a radiation safety aspect. The regulations also eliminate some of the previous detailed requirements of those who perform lower risk diagnostic medical procedures such as bone or thyroid scans. Licensees have six months to implement the new requirements. Highlights of the revised rule are: (1) Patient notification/reportable events -- Under the revised regulations, the term "medical event," referring to the administration of radioactive materials in a manner that differs substantially from the physician's direction, replaces the previous term "misadministration." The regulations continue to require that, when a medical event occurs, the licensee must notify the NRC, the referring physician and the affected patient, unless the referring physician personally informs the licensee either that he will inform the individual or that, based on medical judgment, telling the individual would be harmful. Previously, the licensee was required to provide a written description of the medical event regardless of whether it was requested. Under the revision, the patient must be informed that such a description can be obtained from the licensee. Also, under the revision, if the physician is not the licensee, the licensee must provide a copy of the medical event record to the referring physician. (2) Radiation Safety Committee -- Under the revised regulations, the Radiation Safety Committee is responsible for broad oversight of the uses of certain radioactive materials. However, the current specific responsibilities of the Radiation Safety Committee have been transferred from the Committee to licensee management. A Committee is still required for certain medical licensees performing two or more higher risk activities such as those used in the treatment of cancer. The regulations specify radiation safety goals or objectives for the Committee, but allow licensee management flexibility in implementing those goals. (3) Physician's written directions -- Detailed requirements for a medical licensee to have a quality management program have been deleted. Instead, the revised regulations require that licensees have written procedures for those activities involving higher risk. Licensees must develop and maintain procedures to provide high confidence that the right patient receives the correct dose at the correct treatment site, consistent with the physician's written instructions. (4) Training and experience -- Some of the training requirements for individuals performing diagnostic procedures using radioactive materials in unsealed form have been reduced, consistent with the lower risk associated with these procedures. However, the revised regulations retain the current training requirements for individuals using sealed sources of radioactive material for therapeutic administrations because of the higher risk associated with using these types of material. The training and experience requirements contained in Subpart J of the current regulation are also being retained for a two-year period from the effective date of the revised rule. Training and experience were the primary concerns expressed by commenters during development of the final rule. In addition, the revised rule adds a requirement for reporting unintended medical radiation exposure of an embryo, fetus, or nursing child. The revised rule also addresses a petition for rulemaking filed by the University of Cincinnati. The petition requested a 500-millirem radiation dose limit for certain individuals visiting patients who are required to be confined to the hospital while receiving radiation treatment, where the visitors are determined by the physician to be necessary for the patient's physical or emotional support. The response to the petition, incorporated into the rule, allows physicians the discretion to permit visitors to receive up to 500 millirem from exposure to a hospitalized patient. A millirem is a unit of measurement used to determine the effect of radiation on the body (for instance, a round-trip, cross-country flight is equal to about 5 millirem). The current limit of 100 millirem per year for visitors is the same as for members of the public under other circumstances. The agency believes the emotional benefit to the patient and the visitor outweighs any small increase in radiation risk to the visitor, and, accordingly, physicians should be provided the flexibility to make decisions regarding patients' visitors. A proposed rule on the medical uses of radioactive material was published in the Federal Register for comment on August 13, 1998. The NRC staff held meetings and workshops since then in San Francisco, Kansas City and Washington, D.C., that included participation by the general public, state regulators, medical professional societies, and medical boards. Also, the Commission was briefed by the Advisory Committee on the Medical Uses of Isotopes (ACMUI) and various stakeholders during public meetings. Issues regarding the rule were also discussed with the ACMUI at public meetings. Over 600 comments were received during development of the rule, which were considered in development of the final version. The agency has also revised its medical policy statement on the medical uses of radioactive material. Highlights of the policy statement were announced separately. This regulation becomes effective six months after publication of a Federal Register Notice on this subject, expected shortly. Documents related to this rulemaking may be examined at the NRC Public Document Room, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Room O-1 F23, Rockville, MD 20852. Documents will also be available through the NRC's Agencywide Document Access and Management System (ADAMS). Help in using ADAMS is available by contacting NRC's Public Document Room staff at 1-800-397-4209, 301-415-4737 or by sending an email message to pdr@nrc.gov [pdr@nrc.gov] . For more information on the final rule, contact Roger W. Broseus at 301-415-7608, or by email at RWB@nrc.gov [RWB@nrc.gov] . ***************************************************************** 27 NRC Announces Workshops on Medical Uses of Radioactive Material NRC: Press Release - 2002 - 49 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-001 E-mail: opa@nrc.gov [opa@nrc.gov] www.nrc.gov No. 02-049 April 18, 2002 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will conduct two public workshops on April 25 and 30 to discuss draft guidance for obtaining an NRC license to use radioactive materials in medical procedures. A third workshop relating to inspection guidance is planned for early June and will be announced separately. The April workshops will be held from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. at NRC headquarters in the Auditorium, located at Two White Flint North, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland. The April 25 workshop will focus on guidance pertaining to therapeutic applications of radioactive materials. The April 30 workshop will focus on guidance pertaining to diagnostic applications of radioactive materials. Each workshop will be preceded by an open house at 8 a.m. Additional information about the workshops can be found at NRC's web site at www.nrc.gov, under "Public Meeting Schedule" and "Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards." The availability of draft NUREG-1556, Volume 9, "Consolidated Guidance About Materials Licenses; Program Specific Guidance About Medical Use Licenses," which will be discussed at the workshops, was announced in the Federal Register on April 5. It can be found at NRC's website at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr1556/v9/index.html and is also available through the NRC Public Document Room, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Room O-1 F23, Rockville, MD 20852 (telephone 1-800-397-4209 or 301-415-4737). Written comments on the draft guidance can be submitted by June 4, to the Chief, Rules and Directives Branch, Division of Administrative Services, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC, 20555. Comments can also be made at NRC's website at http://www.nrc.gov/public-involve/doc-comment/form.html For more information about the draft guidance and upcoming meetings, contact Roger W. Broseus at 301-415-7608, or by email at RWB@nrc.gov [RWB@nrc.gov] . Persons planning to attend either of the workshops should contact Roberta Gordon at 301-415-7555, or by email at REG@nrc.gov [REG@nrc.gov] , so that adequate copies of handouts can be made available. Questions about the public meeting process should be directed to Francis Cameron at 301-415-1642. ***************************************************************** 28 Radioactive Particles Found on Nuclear Workers Environment News Service: AmeriScan: April 18, 2002 OAK HARBOR, Ohio, April 18, 2002 (ENS) - Microscopic radioactive particles were recovered from four individuals, their clothing, residences and hotel rooms after they left the damaged Davis-Besse nuclear power plant in Ohio, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) said Wednesday. The incident happened in March, but the NRC did not make it public until this week. Radiation protection personnel at the Davis-Besse plant were notified on March 22 by the Oconee nuclear facility in South Carolina that radioactive particles were found on a worker's sleeve. The worker was undergoing a new employee interview and processing for work at the Oconee facility, and had last worked at Davis-Besse. FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company operates the Davis-Besse nuclear power plant near Oak Harbor, Ohio. The company's investigation has determined that a total of 13 discrete particles were recovered from four individuals, their clothing, residences and hotel rooms in Ohio, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia. The individuals had worked on steam generators at Davis-Besse, which shut down in mid-February for a refueling outage. During that shutdown, workers removing boric acid corrosion deposits from the reactor vessel lid found that the acid had drilled a six inch deep hole in the lid, leaving just 3/8 inch of stainless steel between the reactor and the containment building. A senior health physicist from the NRC's Region III Office has been dispatched to the Davis-Besse plant to assess the possible dose consequences to the four contract employees who visited Davis-Besse before traveling to other sites and to evaluate the company's investigation into the matter. FirstEnergy is attempting to determine how the particles were transported off site. Preliminary dose calculations by FirstEnergy suggest that the tiny particles will not cause any ill health effects to the workers or to members of the public. The particles are believed to be byproducts of the fission process with low levels of radioactive activity. Underground Cleanup Accelerated at INEEL WASHINGTON, DC, April 18, 2002 (ENS) - A settlement between the Energy Department (DOE) and the state of Idaho will speed cleanup of buried wastes at the Pit 9 area of the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL). The DOE said it has also reached an agreement to move forward with a comprehensive technical study of cleanup options for the entire 88 acre Subsurface Disposal Area at INEEL. The settlement, which includes the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, establishes a $5 million reserve fund that could be tapped by the regulators if the DOE fails to meet future commitments on the Pit 9 buried waste retrieval demonstration project. The DOE also agreed to pay Idaho $800,000 for potential delays under the previous Pit 9 cleanup schedule. Under the agreement reached Wednesday, the DOE will excavate 80 to 100 cubic yards of buried transuranic waste in the one acre Pit 9 by October 31, 2004. DOE has already met one milestone in the new agreement by completing preliminary design on the project. Construction is scheduled to begin in June. Transuranic waste consists of clothing, tools, rags, debris, residues, and other disposable items contaminated with radioactive elements, primarily plutonium. A new glovebox excavator approach in Pit 9 will allow the DOE to complete the excavation demonstration 67 months faster and at 37 percent less cost than was envisioned using the old design submitted by the DOE to its regulators. Work that INEEL scientists and engineers have performed in Pit 9 over the past couple of years to locate and verify areas of contamination supported the use of the simpler, faster excavator design. "This agreement is an important step forward in our efforts to clean up the site," said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. "DOE will begin pulling waste out of Pit 9, and will evaluate all options for cleaning up the larger 88-acre disposal area containing other buried waste. We are firmly committed to getting the job done, and working with Governor [Dick] Kempthorne and the state to address long term scientific missions at the site." The agreement also sets out a new schedule for a feasibility study of alternatives for cleaning up the entire Subsurface Disposal Area. The study will include data and operational experience gained from the Pit 9 demonstration project. The ultimate cleanup decision is expected to be made in 2007. [news@ens-news.com] © Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. All ***************************************************************** 29 More NTS survivors to receive compensation Las Vegas SUN April 18, 2002 By Mary Manning < [manning@lasvegassun.com] > A National Nuclear Security Administration official handling claims for former Nevada Test Site workers and their families said he has no idea how many new claims will result from changes to work-related illness compensation. Congress approved legislation in October 2000 that compensated nuclear workers for their illnesses. When the act went into effect on July 31, it had been amended to allow benefits for children of workers who died after contracting work-related illnesses from exposure to radiation, beryllium or silica. Eligible survivors receive a lump sum payment of $150,000 per family. The benefit is $50,000 for survivors of uranium workers. More than 1,000 former Test Site workers or their families have applied for benefits since July, said Bob Agonia, the director of the Las Vegas Resource Center, set up to help smooth the application process. "I have no idea how many more the amendment will affect," Agonia said. "Thousands of employees worked out there. I wouldn't be able to guess." At the height of nuclear weapons testing, the Test Site employed 10,000 workers. The Test Site conducted 928 nuclear weapons experiments above and below ground from 1951 until 1992. In addition to changing those eligible for payments, the amendment also added a leukemia and easier standards for those with silicosis. The National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health is also studying residual radiation and beryllium to see if they cause or contribute to cancer in covered employees. For more information or to schedule an appointment to file a claim, call the center at (702) 697-0841 or toll-free at (866) 697-0841. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 30 Nuclear Terror: US Ships High-Radiation Device to China by Mistake (Beijing Time) Friday, April 19, 2002 Recently the US reported two losses of high-radiation devices which strained the nerve of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. One is a measuring instrument containing Cs-137 high-radiation material lost by a paper plant in Wisconsin, which was later found shipped to China, but fortunately kept untouched in a safe place. Nuclear terror has been a focus of public concern since the "September 11" incident. Recently the US reported two losses of high-radiation devices which strained the nerve of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. One is a measuring instrument containing Cs-137 high-radiation material lost by a paper plant in Wisconsin, which was later found shipped to China, but fortunately kept untouched in a safe place. The other is a box containing Ir-192 found in a shop of second-hand articles, and disastrous results would had been caused if the shop owner haven't called police quickly. Cs-137 shipped to China by mistakeThe North America StoraEnso, with its headquarter in Wisconsin, is a subsidiary company of Sweden-Finland StoraEnso, a world famous paper producer. Last year the company sold equipment of a factory to a Chinese paper plant. The equipment, according to agreements, should be dismembered entirely and then shipped to China. However, workers in charge of this didn't notice the eye-attracting yellow alarm mark and didn't adopt any measure for the Cs-137 measuring instrument fastened on a metal tube. As a result, it was loaded and shipped to China together with other devices. Last January inspectors of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission found the high-radiation device was missing. On January 31 representatives of StoraEnso rushed to the Chinese plant, finding the device still fastened on steel beam, untouched. StoraEnso has 10 to 20 such instruments containing Cs-137, mainly used to measure pulp density and paper thickness, according to the company spokesman. The one shipped to China, camara-sized, may cause harm to human body in many aspects if carelessly opened, even death. Cs-137 is a kind of high-radiation material which brings great harm if improperly used, experts say. If seeped into soil, it could remain centuries in natural environment, even join in food chain. The reporter tried to contact South America StoraEnso by telephone to learn how the company dealt with the case, but couldn't get through. The device didn't cause harm since it was fastened in a sheltered place, according to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The company, after finding the device, sealed it immediately and put it in safe place. Now concerned parties are talking how to ship it back safely to Wisconsin. By PD Online Staff Li Heng Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 31 Probe of radioactive particles on worker clothes Augusta Georgia: Technology: Web posted Friday, April 19, 2002 By Tom Henry Scripps Howard News Service The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is investigating how four contract workers left an Ohio nuclear plant with radioactive particles on their clothing. Thirteen particles that stuck to the men have been found at various locations in Ohio, South Carolina, Virginia, and Texas, said Victor Dricks, spokesman for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. While none of the radiation involved appears to be any more threatening than a typical dental X-ray, the commission is concerned "because the circumstances suggest a loss of control of licensed material," Dricks said. The agency on Tuesday classified the event as an "unusual occurrence" and sent a health physicist from its Midwest regional office in a Chicago suburb to FirstEnergy Corp.'s Davis-Besse nuclear plant to investigate screening procedures. "You don't typically see something get out of a site and be picked up like that," said Kenneth Remer of the NRC's reactor safety division said. Officials from the Ohio Emergency Management Agency and the Ohio Department of Health have gone to the nuclear plant to observe the inspection. Workers are screened for radioactive particles whenever they finish shifts in the containment area of nuclear plants and are not allowed to leave until all traces of such material are removed. That procedure is done as a safeguard. The particles in question had a mix of niobium, zirconium, ruthenium, and cerium. Each is capable of emitting up to 6 millirems of radiation into human tissue over 24 hours, assuming the particle is not brushed, knocked, or washed from skin during that time, Dricks said. That's 6 percent of the 100-millirem dosage the government has set as the annual maximum exposure limit from background radiation sources, Dricks said. All 13 particles that were identified were recovered and will be disposed of with other low-level radioactive material, said Richard Wilkins, FirstEnergy spokesman. The issue came to FirstEnergy's attention on March 22, when particles were found on three of those four men as they were screened upon arrival for work at Duke Energy Corp.'s Oconee nuclear power complex in South Carolina. The fourth man with contaminated clothing was en route to a job at the Comanche Peak nuclear complex in Texas, operated by TXU Electric Co. [http://augusta.com] ***************************************************************** 32 Plutonium production delays cited 04/19/02 Amarillo Globe-News: Local News: From staff and wire reports Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico might be lagging in its effort to build plutonium pits, which fuel nuclear weapons, a federal report says. The lab is behind schedule in about half the things it needs to do to make the grapefruit-sized metal balls, says the report prepared by the Department of Energy's Office of Inspector General. The report, released this week, cites bad management and planning that relied on a problematic computer program. Progress has been made since the report was prepared, said Everet Beckner, the DOE's deputy administrator for defense programs. The lab is now only behind in 14 of the 40 manufacturing processes need to make the pits, he said. The United States has not built new, weapons-grade pits in more than 10 years. The DOE made the Los Alamos lab responsible for making new pits seven years ago. The possibility of delays has not caused any problems with the work schedule at Pantex, said Brenda Finley, DOE and National Nuclear Security Administration spokeswoman. Through Finley's office, Del Kellogg, leader of the production operations team said, "At this point, we don't foresee any impact at the plant." The lab has made pits, but they have not been certified, or guaranteed to work as good as the old ones. Only certified pits can be placed in nuclear weapons. A pit is squeezed by high explosives. The pit then explodes in a fusion blast. The report says it will cost $1.7 billion to prepare the first pit. Chris Paine of the Natural Resources Defense Council questioned how the lab had failed to make a certified pit, especially given how much money the lab has spent. "I think it's ridiculous," he said. "You spend a billion dollars over a decade and you say you can't certify a pit. You're either incompetent or you're lying." The Associated Press and Amarillo Globe-News Business Editor Greg Rohloff contributed to this report. ***************************************************************** 33 Plutonium: On the road to nowhere? Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists April 18, 2002 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said last week that there is no guarantee that the program to convert excess weapons plutonium into reactor fuel at South Carolina's Savannah River Site will ever begin (Associated Press, April 18). The NRC's statement appears to give weight to the position of South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges, who has vowed to block entry of plutonium into his state, believing that once it arrives, it will never leave. Thirty-four metric tons of the radioactive substance, removed from U.S. warheads, are slated to undergo reprocessing into mixed oxide (MOX) fuel at the Savannah River Site as part of a disarmament agreement with Russia, but no timetable has been set. In a letter to Hodges, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham offered a written agreement and said he would submit legislation to Congress to guarantee that the plutonium would not be permanently stored in South Carolina after reprocessing. But Hodges, who wants a legally binding agreement that could withstand a new administration and a new Congress, rejected those terms. Abraham has said the plutonium shipments will begin May 15. In the May/June 2001 Bulletin, Allison Macfarlane et al. proposed a different way to dispose of weapons plutonium—"storage MOX." "Instead of being used to fuel reactors, storage—MOX rods would be mixed in with spent fuel rods headed for geological burial," they wrote. Of course, the success of that proposal in the United States would depend on another state, Nevada, being convinced—or more likely, forced—to accept nuclear waste at its Yucca Mountain site. ***************************************************************** 34 Feds Doubt Plutonium Conversion Plan News Home - Fri Apr 19,11:10 AM ET COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - The agency that oversees the nation's commercial nuclear reactors says there is no guarantee that a controversial federal program to turn plutonium from nuclear weapons into fuel for reactors will ever start. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressed its concerns in a memorandum filed in a relicensing case last week. Gov. Jim Hodges' office says it validates his fight to keep federal shipments of plutonium out of the state, a fight that could lead to a showdown with federal officials next month. The regulatory agency agreed with Duke Energy Corp., which also worries whether a program to convert the plutonium at the federal nuclear facility called the Savannah River Site will fail before it begins. The Savannah River Site is south of Aiken, near the Georgia state line. Duke Energy's concerns were filed as part of the utility's plans to relicense several nuclear power plants that would use the new form of fuel made from weapons-grade plutonium, company spokesman Tom Shiel said. The new nuclear fuel is called mixed oxide or MOX. In its memo, the NRC wrote that agency officials "see no reason to doubt Duke's statement that its submittal of a MOX license amendment application is uncertain." Cortney Owings, Hodges' spokeswoman, said the NRC and Duke misgivings about the feasibility of converting to use of MOX "validate Governor Hodges' position" against allowing plutonium into the state. "There are a lot of questions that need to be answered involving this process," she told The New York Times. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham (news - web sites) has said his intention is to begin shipments of 76 trailer loads of plutonium from the former nuclear weapons facility in Rocky Flats, Colo., to South Carolina shortly after May 15. The shipments would continue through June 2003. Hodges, a Democrat, wants Abraham to sign documents that could be enforced by the courts assuring the plutonium won't be stranded in South Carolina if the Energy Department changes its plans. He has said he is ready to send state troopers to intercept the truckloads or even lie in the road himself to stop them. Abraham says he would commit to taking the plutonium out of the state if the plan falls through, but does not want courts to be involved in national security decisions. Department of Energy (news - web sites) spokesman Joe Davis said the government is so committed to the MOX program that it has pledged to spend $4 billion over the next 20 years. "This is the policy of the United States," he said. Besides, he said, the NRC's doubts about the program are Hodges' fault. "It's because the governor won't agree to allow us to move forward," he said. The MOX program is part of an international arms agreement between the U.S. and Russia in which each country pledged to convert some of their plutonium used to arm nuclear missiles into fuel. Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 35 NRC to Meet with Company to Discuss Cleanup of Lakehurst, NJ., Site NRC: Press Release Region I - 2002 - 36 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 www.nrc.gov No. I-02-036 April 16, 2002 CONTACT: Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331 E-mail: [opa1@nrc.gov] Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with representatives of Heritage Minerals, Inc., on Tuesday, April 23, to discuss the status of cleanup efforts at the Heritage Minerals site in Lakehurst, N.J. Specifically, there will be a review of the company's responses to a March 2002 confirmatory survey of remaining radioactivity at the site, as well as a discussion of any additional required remediation work. The meeting, which is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m., will be held in the Public Meeting Room at the NRC Region I office, 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. It will be open to the public for observation. The site, located off Route 70, had been used for mining and processing local monazite ores to extract heavy minerals. ASARCO, Inc., began operation at the site in 1973, followed by Heritage Minerals, which ceased processing operations in August 1990. The processing of the ores resulted in a waste pile containing natural thorium and uranium in sufficient quantities to require an NRC license. Heritage Minerals has now removed the waste pile and is in the process of checking the site for any remaining radioactivity. ***************************************************************** 36 Fatal crash on likely nuclear waste route Elaine Goodman [egoodman@rgj.com] RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL 4/18/2002 09:11 pm A fatal traffic collision involving a shipment of flammable material on U.S. 95 near McDermitt renewed concerns Thursday about the possible transport of nuclear waste along the same route. James Pike, 62, of Kooskia, Idaho, was killed after he was ejected from the passenger seat of a Cadillac that hit a tractor-trailer truck about 3 p.m. Wednesday near the Oregon border, authorities said. The truck overturned during the collision, spilling flammable material on the road. Officials could not immediately identify the material. Nevada officials said the crash is exactly what worries them most about shipping nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain if the dump there is approved. Fire during a high-impact accident involving a nuclear waste spill could turn the radioactive material into an aerosol, spreading it over a large area and into ground water and the food chain, said Joe Strolin, planning division administrator for the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects. The agency, part of the governor’s office, opposes the Yucca Mountain proposal. “That would be a truly nasty scenario,” Strolin said. Strolin and officials including U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., are concerned that the nuclear power industry relies primarily on computer simulations to determine how nuclear waste transportation casks resist fire rather than testing casks in real fires. But former Nevada Gov. Bob List, a consultant with the Nuclear Energy Institute, said the waste casks have never leaked during shipment over more than 3 million miles in the United States. “This material is transported very safely on a regular basis,” List said. “The spill would be from the chemicals, not from the nuclear.” Strolin said U.S. 95 is a possible shipping route to Yucca Mountain from the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratories outside of Idaho Falls. Nuclear waste usually is transported on interstates, which are considered safer than other highways, Strolin said. But Strolin said other highways, such as U.S. 95, might be approved for nuclear waste if they’re quicker than interstate routes. The southbound Cadillac lost control on the icy road and veered into the oncoming truck, deputies said. Car driver, James A. Pike, 41, was flown by Care Flight helicopter to Washoe Medical Center. The driver is the passenger’s son. It was not immediately clear whether the driver of the truck, 35-year-old Steven P. Shear of Meridian, Idaho, was injured. © Copyright Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett ***************************************************************** 37 Tauzin Delivers Statement On Yucca Mountain Committee on Energy and Commerce News Release: 04.18.2002 [Chairman Tauzin] Committee News Release The Committee on Energy and Commerce W.J. "Billy" Tauzin, Chairman Contact Peter Sheffield 202.225.5735 [http://energycommerce.house.gov] [http://energycommerce.house.gov/107/publications.htm] [http://energycommerce.house.gov/schedule.htm] 106th Congress Archive Website Minority Website Site Map [http://energycommerce.house.gov/107/search.htm] WASHINGTON (April 18) -- House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Billy Tauzin (R-LA) is scheduled to deliver the following remarks today at an Energy subcommittee hearing on approving the Yucca Mountain site as a permanent repository for nuclear waste: “Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this important hearing. In my opinion, we will consider this morning one of the most important public health and safety issues the Subcommittee will consider this year -- the development of a centralized and permanent geologic disposal site for the country’s nuclear wastes. “Today, high-level nuclear wastes are spread out at 77 sites in more than 30 states in every region of the country. Most of these waste sites are located near nuclear power plants, where spent nuclear fuel is carefully stored. Several other nuclear waste sites were created due to weapons production activities at DOE facilities like the Hanford site, where liquid radioactive wastes are stored in tanks. “Every one of these waste sites shares one common aspect: They were all designed for temporary storage of these dangerous wastes -- not long-term disposal. “There are many negative risks posed by the failure to develop a single centralized disposal site for nuclear wastes. Currently, more than 161 million Americans live within 75 miles of a nuclear waste storage site. These waste sites are located near 20 major waterways, which supply household water for more than 30 million Americans. Moreover, although these sites are well protected and secure, they could pose an attractive target for terrorist attack. “So for the sake of long-term public health and safety, and our national security interests, it is absolutely critical that we move to develop Yucca Mountain. “The Yucca Mountain site is located 90 miles away from Las Vegas. It is isolated on remote federal land at the Nevada Test Site, 14 miles away from the closest residence -- and is safe and secure. “The wastes will be stored 1,000 feet underground, and 500 feet above the water table. The wastes will be held in steel containers, and the containers will be placed under a titanium shield. Furthermore, not only is the airspace around Yucca already restricted, but an existing security force at the Nevada Test Site will protect the area. This is a comprehensive defense-in-depth approach. “In its January letter to Congress, the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board underscored this fact, stating: ‘eliminating all uncertainty associated with estimates of repository performance would never be possible at any repository site. Policy-makers will decide how much scientific uncertainty is acceptable at the times various decisions are made…’. “On February 15, 2002, the President recommended -- on the advice of DOE Secretary Spencer Abraham -- that Congress approve the Yucca Mountain site, even if the State of Nevada disapproves. “Based on my review and understanding of DOE’s extensive scientific work at the Yucca Mountain site, I am prepared to support this important policy decision. Thank you Mr. Chairman.” - 30 - Related Documents [http://energycommerce.house.gov/107/keywords/Energy.htm] [ ] [http://www.house.gov] [ ] The Committee on Energy and Commerce 2125 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 (202) 225-2927 [http://com-notes.house.gov/cchear/submit.nsf/1900807eb66566a085256726006cc80c?O penForm] ***************************************************************** 38 Most lawmakers at hearing back Yucca nuke dump By Doug Abrahms [online@rgj.com] ASSOCIATED PRESS 4/19/2002 12:09 am [Energy boss Spencer Abraham testifies Thursday at the Yucca Mountain hearing. - Associated Press/ASSOCIATED PRESS] WASHINGTON — A vast majority of House members at the first congressional hearing on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump voiced support Thursday for the project, saying they favor moving the radioactive garbage out of their states and into Nevada. Democrats as well as Republicans said they wanted to move quickly ahead to build the nuclear-waste dump because the issue has been studied for 20 years. The dump would be built some 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, and nuclear waste-laden trucks and trains could be routed through northern Nevada. The House is expected to pass a resolution within weeks that supports President Bush’s decision to build Yucca Mountain. The Senate will take up the issue later this year. Nevada’s congressional delegation has decried the Yucca Mountain project, saying that transporting the waste would endanger much of the nation. But during the hearing, Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La. and chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee, said high-level nuclear waste is being stored in more than 30 states, and more than 160 million people live within 75 miles of a nuclear power plant or military weapons facilities. “So for the sake of long-term public health and safety and our national security interests, it is absolutely critical that we move to develop Yucca Mountain,” he said. “It is isolated on federal land at the Nevada Test Site — 14 miles away from the closest residence — and is safe and secure.” Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, said he plans to vote at a Senate energy and commerce subcommittee hearing on Tuesday to override of Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn’s veto of Yucca Mountain. He has said he expects the full House to approve the bill in early May. Yucca Mountain proponents tried to appease opponents by saying several times that passing this resolution would only allow the process to move forward, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission still must approve the application. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said that if Congress fails to support Yucca Mountain, the Energy Department has no alternative site but remains responsible for taking possession of the spent nuclear fuel from atomic power plants. “There is no alternative at this point,” he said. “Failure to do this leaves us with a responsibility to deal with the waste and no plan.” Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said at the hearing that commercial power plants could continue to store their nuclear waste on-site in dry casks until the Energy Department finds a better solution than moving it across America’s highways and railroads and burying it in the Nevada desert. The costs have continued to mount for the project, which Ensign dubbed “boondoggle in the desert.” “If we know these dry casks are good for 100 years, what’s the rush?” he said. Nevada Reps. Jim Gibbons, a Republican, and Shelly Berkley, a Democrat, also spoke against Yucca Mountain at the hearing. “Yucca Mountain has not or never will be geologically sound” enough to house nuclear waste, Gibbons said. Still, the big fight remains in the Senate, which is expected to start taking up Yucca Mountain in late spring or early summer. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., did not speak at the House hearing. Reid spokesman Nathan Naylor said the senator could be more effective battling Yucca Mountain elsewhere. “We’ve got some political tricks we will pull up our sleeve,” Ensign said referring to the Senate vote on Yucca Mountain. © Copyright Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett ***************************************************************** 39 20% rise in Sellafield Irish Sea dumping online.ie : News The Irish Examiner 19 Apr 2002 By Ann Cahill, Europe Correspondent SELLAFIELD plans to increase the amount of radioactive waste it dumps into the Irish Sea by as much as a fifth for some substances, a public hearing heard in Brussels yesterday. The head of safety at the nuclear reprocessing plant was accused of lying to the hearing by MEP Nuala Ahern over the issue of the increased emissions. Ms Ahern accused John Clarke of lying when he told the hearing Sellafield was not planning to raise the limits for quantities of radioactive waste they planned to release into the sea over the next six years. The Green party member said he was trying to confuse the public because, while they might not be planning to increase the legal limits of how much waste they can get rid of in this way, they do plan to increase emissions. Mr Clarke agreed that the Sellafield authorities have applied for permission to pump more radioactive waste into the sea up to 2008, but said it would still be under the current legal limits. Ms Ahern produced a document showing the quantities they wish to get rid of and that some radioactive elements would be increased by as much as 21%. The danger of a terrorist attack on Sellafield was highlighted by MEP Avril Doyle who said, following the September attack in New York, this had to be seriously considered. The main concern is about the huge quantities of highly toxic waste stored in containers over ground at Sellafield and the danger of a plane or missile striking them. According to the Wise-Paris report commissioned by the European Parliament into Sellafield and Europe's only other nuclear reprocessing plant at Cap Le Hague in France, this is a real worry. The report said, if even a fraction of waste was released, about one million deaths from cancer could be expected world-wide as a result. The French government has sited anti-missile weapons around their plant and banned all over-flights. British MEP Roy Perry who is vice-chairperson of the Petitions Committee of the Parliament who held the public hearing said they had written to the British government about this. They had not replied and he understood that this was because such information should be kept secret. Replying to an appeal from Ms Doyle for dialogue between the British and Irish governments about the Sellafield problem, Mr Perry agreed. He said "I can only feel ashamed by the efforts of the British authorities not to address these issues". EU Environment Commissioner Margot Walstrom told the hearing she did not see nuclear energy as a sustainable source of energy because of the problems presented by waste. ***************************************************************** 40 Sellafield debate sparks racist slur on Green MEP Irish Newspapers Welcome to The Irish Independent Issue DateFri, Apr 19 A BRITISH MEP made a racist attack against Green MEP Nuala Ahern at the end of a heated exchange on the nuclear industry yesterday. "She's Irish, she can't understand English," said British Labour MEP Gordon Adam in the Petition Committee of the European Parliament yesterday. After initially demanding that Ms Ahern also withdraw her claim that British Nuclear Fuels was "lying" about figures, he conceded he had been "creative" with his language. Ms Ahern said: "It was unacceptable and racist and extraordinary for the European Parliament where we do not insult people because of their national identity." Last night a spokeswoman for the British Labour Party in the European Parliament said the comments from Mr Adam were "inappropriate" but said that since he had withdrawn them, disciplinary action was not foreseen. The attack was provoked by a row between Ms Ahern and the head of safety at Sellafield, John Clarke. Ms Ahern accused the senior BNFL official of lying over increasing discharges from the plant. Mr Clarke insisted that although radioactive discharges were temporarily rising, they were still below the maximum British legal limits. Rejecting her claims, he said BNFL had not applied for an increase in the legal limit of discharges it can release into the environment. The European Commission also made the startling admission that it had neither the resources nor the information to monitor the nuclear industry in countries like Britain and France. "I can't say to people that they shouldn't worry," admitted the Environment Commissioner, Margot Wallstrom. She said people's fears should be taken seriously, with the public entitled to information. One million people could die as a result of a terrorist attack on Sellafield, insisted the chief author of a report into the nuclear reprocessing industry for the European Parliament. Rejecting criticism of his findings, Mycle Schneider of the Wise Paris group of energy consultants said the estimate was not sensational. An accidental release from Sellafield would be at least twice as serious as the Chernobyl accident, resulting in a million deaths globally from cancer, he said. Apart from an accident, he warned that the six storage tanks containing highly radioactive waste could not withstand a direct terrorist assault, like the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York. "There is no 100pc safe system," he said at the end of the two-day hearing, following his team's report into the reprocessing plants at both Sellafield and Cap de la Hague on the North coast of France. The estimate was first published in a highly critical report last autumn. Conor Sweeney in Brussels © Copyright Unison ***************************************************************** 41 British minister claims Sellafield can't close online.ie 19 Apr 2002 Brian Wilson, the British minister with responsibility for nuclear power, defiantly claimed today Sellafield nuclear plant cannot and should not be shut down. Mr Wilson was responding to a postcard campaign organised by anti-Sellafield campaigners to pressure the British authorities to close the controversial plant. Mr Wilson described the campaign as one of misinformation. ***************************************************************** 42 MEPs warn of terror risk to Sellafield Independent © 2002 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd By Stephen Castle, in Brussels 19 April 2002 European MPs warned yesterday of the danger of a terrorist attack on the nuclear reprocessing plant at Sellafield. The warning came during a European Parliament committee session in which the plant in Cumbria was described as one of the world's worst polluters. During a sometimes stormy meeting, a Labour MEP was accused of making a racist remark to an Irish colleague as exchanges became heated over Sellafield's safety record. Discharges from Sellafield have long been of concern in Ireland and campaigners have deluged Downing Street with postcards calling on Tony Blair to shut Sellafield. Yesterday the argument was extended to encompass the added dangers posed by terrorism. Several Irish and British MEPs united in voicing fears that, after the 11 September attacks, Sellafield and a similar plant at Cap de la Hague in France might be terrorist targets. Avril Doyle, a Fine Gael MEP argued: "Before 11 September I would have laughed at the suggestion, but the game has changed completely since then – completely and tragically for all of us. We need experts to try to quantify the increased risk of a major credible terrorist attack on Sellafield and Cap La Hague since September 11." Nuala Ahern, an Irish Green MEP, also warned of a "serious risk of a terrorist attack". Roy Perry, a Conservative MEP, said he had written to Mr Blair asking what measures had been put in place since 11 September, but had received no reply. "There seem to be two ways of dealing with this. The French government has gone for openness, keeping people informed about security measures, but the British Government prefers total secrecy on such matters. They cannot both be right. We need to know what is being done," he said. The hearing was plunged into controversy when a British Labour MEP, Gordon Adam, was accused of making a racist comment to Ms Ahern. She claimed that during the exchanges over the safety record of Sellafield Mr Adam said that, because she is Irish, she did not understand English. Ms Ahern described Mr Adam's comments as "unacceptable and racist and extraordinary for the European Parliament where we do not insult people because of their national identity". Mr Adam was not available for comment, but a spokeswoman for the Labour Party in the European Parliament said the comment was inappropriate. Her understanding was that the matter was closed. The committee discussed a report by the Paris-based World Information Service on Energy on the possible toxic effects from the Sellafield and Cap de la Hague plants, both of which discharge radioactive material into the environment. The report says discharges from the plants are some of the largest man-made radioactive releases in the world. It argues that "discharges result in high radioactive concentrations in foodstuffs" and says that "it cannot be ruled out that these very large releases" could contribute to leukaemia clusters around Sellafield. ***************************************************************** 43 British Deny Radwaste Deal with Russia Spent fuel imports The Russian Ministry of Nuclear Energy (Minatom) is actively promoting plans for large scale imports of spent nuclear fuel to Russia for storage or reprocessing. (Moscow:) British nuclear authorities today expressed surprise at remarks made last week by Russia's Nuclear Minister Alexander Rumyantsev where he said Minatom would be signing a contract for imports and reprocessing of Spent Nuclear Fuel (SNF) from experimental reactors in the United Kingdom. Charles Digges, 2002-04-19 14:00 Rumyantsev's comments, made last Wednesday in a meeting with seven environmental groups, centred on a supposed contract, due to be signed next year, that would involve the import of an unspecified amount of SNF from British experimental reactors. The most likely source for the waste, according to environmentalists present at that meeting, would be Scotland's Dounreay facility, which has two shutdown fast neutron, or "breeder," reactors, which when loaded with plutonium have the capacity to produce even more plutonium than they burn. Rumyantsev would not confirm or deny during last week's meeting that the supposed import would be coming from Dounreay. But according to a statement from the United Kingdom's nuclear regulatory body, know as the UKAEA, which was sent to Moscow's Ecodefense! office and confirmed by Bellona, the British haven't been involved in any negotiations with Minatom about any imports of SNF to Russia. "The UKAEA has no information about any kind of negotiations with Minatom about the import [to Russia] and subsequent reprocessing of British spent nuclear fuel," said UKAEA representative June Love in an emailed statement. Furthermore, a representative for Scotlands's Dounreay facility, reached by telephone Thursday, said: "By a decision of the British Government, fuel from experimental reactors will never be reprocessed. In large part, that fuel contains plutonium. We don't have any information about sending it to Russia." Indeed, even the Magnox reprocessing plant, operated by British nuclear concern BNFL, has no interest in the waste from Dounreay. "We don't want that spent fuel reprocessed either here or abroad," said BNFL chairman Colin Punler in a telephone interview Thursday. He added that the French reprocessing concern Cogema had offered to take SNF from British experimental reactors but were refused. Minatom spokesman Yury Bespalko, however, indicated in a telephone interview Thursday that Minatom was sticking to its story. "We met with British authorities and are drawing up plans for a contract, just as Rumyantsev told the group," of ecologists who met with him last week. "I have not heard anything to contradict that," he added. Though Minatom may be unfazed by the flat contradiction issued by British authorities, it has left environmentalists who attended last week's meeting with Rumyantsev scratching their heads. "Either Minatom is engaged in wishful thinking, or the British are trying to hide the deal," said Vladimir Slivyak, co-chairman of Ecodefense! Thursday. "Most likely, Minatom is spreading disinformation and trying to hide its real motives from the Russian public. If the British really were planning on sending that SNF, it would be met with protest along the entire route by which it came." It is also conceivable that Rumyantsev's statements were meant as a trial balloon about Minatom's little-publicized but long held plans towards enhancing its own breeder reactor program, as the SNF — if it were in fact obtained from the Dounreay facility — would likely contain plutonium. At the moment, however, Russia lacks the capability of re-fabricating plutonium into the MOX fuel — a combination of plutonium oxide and uranium oxide — that is burned in breeders. This may happen in the not so distant future, with funding from the United States Department of Energy, who has long negotiated with the Russians over MOX fabrication plan for the purposes of destroying — rather than increasing — stocks of high and weapons grade plutonium. This MOX would be burned in retrofitted VVER-1000 reactors, of which Russia has eight. According to a spokesman for the DoE reached Tuesday, this program will likely be discussed in more detail at the upcoming summit between Presidents George Bush and Vladimir Putin set for late May. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway Menu ***************************************************************** 44 Yucca engineering hurdles remain high Friday, April 19, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal Essay: Repository design testing key By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL Congress should override Gov. Kenny Guinn's veto of the Yucca Mountain Project. Then it should change the nation's nuclear waste laws to establish a new national laboratory in Nevada to test a repository design that's safe and trustworthy. That's what journalist Luther Carter sees as the course to follow on the bumpy political road to resolving problems with entombing the nation's highly radioactive waste in the mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Carter, who has written extensively on Yucca Mountain and nuclear waste issues, makes his points in an essay titled "A Sweeter Deal at Yucca Mountain." The essay appears in the spring "Issues in Science and Technology," a publication of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Engineering. It will be included in a forthcoming book by MIT Press, "Uncertainty Underground." Carter states that putting a new national laboratory in Nevada is needed "to take over direction" of the Yucca Mountain Project from the Energy Department, which faces hurdles in demonstrating that a repository reliant on engineered barriers will work. "Managers of the Yucca Mountain Project may have unwittingly set a trap for themselves by choosing to make the case for licensing by relying far less on the mountain's natural hydrogeologic characteristics to contain radioactivity than on the engineered barriers that they propose," Carter writes. Yucca Mountain Project spokesman Allen Benson said Energy Department officials are reviewing Carter's essay. "We're looking at it, but right now we have no comment," he said Thursday. Carter's essay states three things are needed to move forward with a Yucca Mountain repository. "First, an override by Congress of Nevada's veto of the Yucca Mountain site. Next, amendments to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act to encourage a profound political reconciliation between Nevada and Washington and to make the repository project stronger financially and technically." He noted that the government underestimated the cost of studying sites in 1982, when the price tag was supposed to be $100 million per site. "No one could foresee that by 2002, characterization of Yucca Mountain alone would exceed $4 billion." The essay doesn't discuss safety problems and terrorist risks that Nevada leaders have said are inherent with transporting nuclear waste to the mountain. Instead, Carter looks at the technical consequences of storing spent fuel in a maze of tunnels in the mountain. He said among the problems with engineered barriers -- metal canisters to contain the waste and drip shields to deflect corrosive water trickling down through the volcanic-rock ridge -- is that test modules first should be installed to demonstrate the design for licensing. Carter said the third thing needed for a successful waste disposal program is "an aggressively exploratory design effort to ensure a repository worthy of our confidence in the safe containment of radioactivity." The effort would be guided by the powerful director of a new national laboratory in Nevada connected to the university system, much like the national labs in California and New Mexico. webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 45 WASTE SHIPMENT DATE REQUESTED WASHINGTON -- Seeking further ammunition against the Yucca Mountain Project, Nevada's senators on Thursday asked a federal agency for details about more than 3,000 nuclear waste shipments. Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and John Ensign, R-Nev., asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to provide "complete information on every shipment of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste shipped in the United States by truck, rail or barge." Industry consultants estimate there have been about 3,025 shipments between sites, and to and from storage facilities in the United States between 1964 and 1997, the most recent year for which detailed records are available. Before commercial power plants began shipping nuclear waste in 1964, there were fewer shipments, and they were handled by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission. Reid and Ensign asked the NRC to provide, for each shipment, route descriptions and miles traveled and any accidents "or other unusual event." The agency also was asked to describe the security accompanying each shipment, including its cost and information on how local and state governments were notified of the shipment coming through their jurisdiction. Reid and Ensign issued their request in a letter to NRC Chairman Richard Meserve. They said they wanted "to better understand the safety and safeguard implications" that would be associated with anticipated tens of thousands of nuclear waste shipments to a proposed repository at Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Meserve was asked to provide the data by May 3. -- STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU Friday, April 19, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal House committee takes testimony on nuclear waste dump Energy secretary, Nevadans make arguments; majority of panel favors repository By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham got a friendly reception Thursday when he urged a House subcommittee to support burying nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. Abraham told the House energy and air quality subcommittee that the Bush administration has concluded that 77,000 tons of nuclear waste could be best protected at Yucca Mountain, located 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Abraham described the site as "one underground secure location next to an Air Force base in the middle of nowhere." Most of the 15 subcommittee members who attended the session cheered the secretary. "Let's get this job done for the sake of this nation," said Rep. Charles Norwood, R-Ga. Nevada officials also appeared before the panel, urging members to kill the proposal. They also found some support, with one congressman echoing concerns about whether the waste can be safely transported to Nevada from 131 sites scattered across the country. Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass., said the waste will be "much more vulnerable in trucks, on trains, than secure inside a nuclear power plant facility." "It's a short distance from box cutters to box cars," Markey said, referring to the weapons wielded by the Sept. 11 terrorists. President Bush on Feb. 15 recommended that the nation's nuclear waste be buried at Yucca Mountain. Gov. Kenny Guinn vetoed the president's decision on April 8 under a special process devised by Congress in 1982. Now, the House and Senate are preparing to vote in the coming weeks whether to override the Nevada governor. If Nevada prevails in either body, the Yucca program would be killed. If Guinn is overridden, the Energy Department then will commence the next step in its plan to open a repository at Yucca Mountain. That step would be preparing a repository license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Abraham said the DOE believes it can have a repository open by 2010. Texas Republican Joe Barton, chairman of the House energy and air quality subcommittee, scheduled a vote on the Guinn override for next Tuesday. The panel is expected to override by a wide margin, and the entire House would vote on the matter within weeks. U.S. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said Nevada has written off its chances in the upcoming House vote and will concentrate on the Senate. There, he said, "We've got some parliamentary tricks up our sleeve." Abraham appeared for about an hour before the subcommittee in his first public defense of Bush's recommendation. The alternative to a single repository, he said, is to leave waste piling up in pools at 131 sites around the country, including 19 power plants that already have been shut down. "I am convinced of the scientific basis of this recommendation," he said. Testifying before Abraham appeared, Nevada lawmakers urged the subcommittee to take a closer look at the issue and vote to sustain Guinn's veto. "We are imploring you to take the time and do the right policy," Ensign said. Ensign and Reps. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., and Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., outlined the state's case that Yucca Mountain geology is too weak for safe nuclear waste storage. They also argued the government hasn't done enough study on transportation routes to Nevada and their possible vulnerability to terrorist attack. Because commercial power plants will continue to generate nuclear waste after Yucca Mountain opens, Berkley said the repository "will not reduce the threat of terrorism at operating reactors. It adds one more site to protect." Gibbons said, "Regardless of what the DOE crystal ball may show, the future stability of Yucca Mountain is in question. Congress must not allow ourselves to be motivated by carelessness, convenience or political expediency." Panel members said they were familiar already with Nevada's arguments after being lobbied incessantly by Berkley and Gibbons. Abraham said concerns about transporting nuclear waste won't be alleviated by killing the Yucca Mountain Project. He said the waste will be transported somewhere. "The question is, do we want to do it in a coordinated national plan or do we want it to take place on a more ad hoc basis?" he said. webmaster@lvrj.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - ***************************************************************** 46 Nevada is competing with calamities all over Nevada Appeal April 19, 2002 By Barry Smith One of the problems Nevada will have in getting anybody in other states to pay attention to its campaign against nuclear-waste storage at Yucca Mountain is the fact everybody is preoccupied with their own environmental calamities. In Nevada, we're dismayed the federal government would even consider shipping nuclear waste here. Yucca Mountain is in the news nearly every day, politicians debate and declaim, columnists like me expound on the topic. We also think the rest of the country should be just as outraged. The message in Nevada's lobbying campaign is that radioactive gunk will be traveling right past your house. Or pretty close, anyway. Write your senators, we say. Let them know how you feel, we urge. Help Nevada, we plead. And some will hear our cry for help. For most, however, Yucca Mountain in Nevada will be just another tree in a forest of controversial issues. Our plea will be lost in the windstorm of criticism that blows constantly, saying "Our own government is doing something horrible to us and we just can't get it to stop." The first state targeted for Nevada's lobbying campaign is Vermont, liberal and environmentally conscience. We're hoping to get some help. But one doesn't have to look hard to find where Vermont's environmental concerns lie: the Hudson River. Yes, it's actually in New York where General Electric dumped cancer-causing PCB in the river for 35 years. But it's a helluva lot closer to Vermont than Yucca Mountain. In fact, it's a lot closer than Yucca Mountain is to most Nevadans. The Environmental Protection Agency has undertaken a $500 million Superfund cleanup project to dredge the PCB-laden silt out of the Hudson. It's been a controversy for two decades now -- about the same time as Yucca Mountain -- and there are deeply divided opinions on the best way to proceed. The plan calls for environmental dredging, described as a process that can remove the bad silt. But opponents of that plan say it will merely stir up the PCBs that have settled to the bottom of the river and will actually worsen the contamination. Have you heard of this issue? Perhaps so. Have you been moved to call or write your senator to express an opinion? Probably not. On the question of transporting nuclear waste, is Nevada the only state with a problem on its hands? Far from it. In South Carolina, they're just as angry with Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham as we are in Nevada. Gov. Jim Hodges has vowed to use state troopers to block the Energy Department from sending several tons of plutonium into South Carolina from the shuttered Rocky Flats weapons plant in Colorado. "The department intends to begin shipping plutonium from Rocky Flats to Savannah River no sooner than 30 days from today," Abraham wrote Monday. "It is essential that we begin shipments of materials from Rocky Flats to South Carolina by approximately May 15, 2002 in order to meet the nation's goal of closing the facility." The controversy centers on whether South Carolina is to be the temporary storage site, as the feds promise, or whether the plutonium will stay there forever. Most people are probably thinking, "Gee, sounds like South Carolina's problem. I'm glad I'm in Nevada, because that stuff has to be shipped all the way from Colorado to South Carolina. I wouldn't want it going past my house." Ultimately, it's an issue you've probably managed to avoid, unless you're a regular on the nuclear-storage beat. And if you are, then you probably already know Russia doesn't want to store nuclear waste from the United States, either. Actually, Russia -- like some folks in short-lived Bullfrog County, Nev. -- thought importing nuclear waste might be a profitable business venture. But it seems like the market for reprocessed nuclear fuel is on the down side right now, and Russian environmentalists are worried their country is going to become a dumping ground for the whole nuclear world. Like I said, things are tough all over. I could go on with examples of controversies. Do you think the farmers in the Klamath Basin of Oregon, where irrigation water was cut off to save an endangered fish, give a damn about some empty mountain in the desert of Nevada? Pick up a newspaper in any part of the country, you'll find a big environmental issue and a lot of ideas on how it should be solved. Do I think the Yucca Mountain foes are wrong? No. Am I suggesting Nevada should give up its fight? No. Am I recommending the state should do any less to build support and try to win votes in the Senate? No. I'm just saying we shouldn't expect a lot of help. Barry Smith is managing editor of the Nevada Appeal. Copyright Nevada Appeal. Materials contained within this site may ***************************************************************** 47 How fast must waste go? Charlotte Observer | 04/18/2002 | [http://www.macon.com] [Macon Photos] HENRY EICHEL Charlotte Observer COLUMBIA - S.C. Gov. Jim Hodges Wednesday received fresh ammunition in his fight with the federal government over planned shipments of plutonium to the state within the next month. The New York Times Wednesday quoted a private contractor that will help move the radioactive material from Colorado to Aiken as saying the company believed it would meet the 2006 deadline for closing the former Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant and that there was no rush to start shipping the material. That appeared to directly contradict U.S. Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham, who said in letter to Hodges last week, "It is essential that we begin shipments of materials from Rocky Flats to South Carolina by approximately May 15, 2002 in order to meet the nation's goal of closing the facility." Since then, contractor Kaiser-Hill has issued a statement saying that The New York Times twisted its comment about the urgency of shipments this year, leaving the issue and Hodge's potential use of the information cloudy. The Rocky Flats closing is part of a nuclear nonproliferation treaty between the United States and Russia. The Energy Department has said it intends to send 76 semi-trailer loads of plutonium from Colorado to the Savannah River Site near Aiken. The shipments would continue through June 2003. Most of the approximately 54 tons of plutonium is supposed to be processed into nuclear power plant fuel. The rest will be stored at Savannah River until a permanent federal nuclear waste is built, possibly in Nevada. Kaiser-Hill President Alan Parker told The Bulletin of the Atomic Sciences last November, "I'm not particularly interested about when the first shipment goes, just the last one." The New York Times wrote that Parker meant there was no need to begin moving the plutonium now and that spokesman John Corsi confirmed that for the article. Kaiser-Hill is based in Golden, Colo. Wednesday, Corsi was referring all calls from the news media to the Department of Energy, which released a letter from Corsi to the Times. In the letter, Corsi said that what Parker really meant was, "it is the last shipment that determines whether the goal of 2006 is met; of course, that would be our focus." He wrote, "To twist a quote from last year into a conclusion today that we don't need to ship immediately is false." Gov. Hodges' press secretary, Jay Reiff, said, "At best, it's a mixed message. At worst, it's another indication that the Department of Energy hasn't been shooting straight with South Carolina." Hodges is threatening to use state troopers to block the shipments if the energy department doesn't give the state a legally binding promise to take back the plutonium if the plans to convert it into fuel runs into trouble. The project isn't scheduled to be completed until 2009. Abraham said he will ask Congress to pass a law guaranteeing that South Carolina won't be stuck with the plutonium -- but he insists on shipping while the bill is being debated. -- THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CONTRIBUTED TO THIS ARTICLE. -- HENRY EICHEL: (803) 779-5037; HEICHEL@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM [HEICHEL@CHARLOTTEOBSERVER.COM] ***************************************************************** 48 Yucca director plans visit Las Vegas SUN April 19, 2002 By Mary Manning The new Energy Department director in charge of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository is scheduled to visit with local officials in Las Vegas, a spokesman said. Margaret Chu, sworn in as director of the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management on March 20, is planning to meet with officials from 10 affected county governments on May 2, said Allen Benson, a Yucca Mountain spokesman in Las Vegas. Her schedule is not final and Benson said he did not know if she would visit Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, the proposed national repository for 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste. There are 10 counties considered directly affected by the department's plans to build and operate a repository at Yucca Mountain. The affected counties include Nye County, where the mountain is located, Clark County, with the largest population in the state, and Inyo County, Calif., whose boundary is 17 miles west of Yucca Mountain. Chu is responsible for advising Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and President Bush on issues surrounding the ongoing scientific research and possible licensing of the nation's first permanent high-level nuclear waste repository. For more than 20 years Chu conducted research on nuclear waste management, nuclear reactors, energy policies, nuclear materials management, nuclear weapons non-proliferation issues and environmental remediation at Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico. From May 1995 until April 1998 Chu succeeded in certifying the Waste Isolation Pilot Project, a repository for plutonium from U.S. nuclear weapons operating since 1998 near Carlsbad, N.M. Since 1998 she has led and managed 170 professional staff members on global nuclear waste management problems at the Nuclear Waste Management Programs Center at Sandia. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 49 Yucca hearing flows against Nevada Las Vegas SUN April 19, 2002 By Benjamin Grove WASHINGTON -- A familiar pattern of point and counterpoint arguments emerged Thursday during the first congressional hearing on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. + Nevada lawmakers said Yucca Mountain was a geologically unsuitable site to bury waste. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham disagreed. + Nevada lawmakers argued that shipping nuclear waste cross-country to the repository is dangerous. Nuclear industry officials disagreed. + Nevada lawmakers said waste should remain safely stored on-site at nuclear power plants nationwide until better permanent storage solutions are developed. The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners disagreed. And so it went, another session of give-and-take on the controversial Yucca issue, played out in front of the House Energy and Air Quality subcommittee. The hearing was the first of several this year to on the proposed nuclear waste dump before full House and Senate votes, likely by the end of July. But in the end, the hearing offered few surprises. It was clear that four hours of testimony had done nothing to change any minds. Most of the 31 lawmakers on the panel plan to support Yucca in a vote scheduled for Tuesday. As Nevada lawmakers strained to make their points, subcommittee members generally dismissed their pleas. "We need to make a decision, and I strongly urge my colleagues and the full committee to adopt the Yucca Mountain site," Rep. Albert Wynn, D-Md., said early in the hearing. Rep. John Shadegg, R-Ariz., echoed the call. "This is the most heavily studied piece of ground in the world," he said. "It is time we concluded this process." The hearing was also a showcase for some of the arguments pro-Yucca forces are using to rally lawmakers to support the project. Abraham argued that lawmakers should quickly approve Yucca because experts at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission -- not rank-and-file lawmakers -- should make the final call on whether the site is suitable. If Congress approves Yucca, the NRC could be responsible for licensing the site as a waste burial ground. Abraham hinted that Yucca critics are afraid the NRC would deem the site safe and license it. "We're confident enough to go to the next stage," Abraham said. "Those who oppose (Yucca) wouldn't even test it." Abraham said his department's studies so far clearly indicate Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is a safe place to bury the nation's nuclear waste, despite Nevadans' claims. Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., argued, "Regardless of what the DOE crystal ball may show, the future stability of Yucca Mountain is in question -- even by its own scientists." But Abraham insisted the site passes department muster, throwing statistics at the panel. Abraham said Energy scientists had been studying geologic waste disposal for 24 years and spent $4 billion (other department estimates indicate even more has been spent). Abraham added that he visited the site, talked with department scientists and pored over reams of documents, including summaries of 116 hearings and 37,000 public comments. Those arguments seemed to hit home with panel members. Several nodded in agreement as Abraham spoke about Yucca studies. Rep. Dick Boucher, D-Va., said he had been "persuaded" that there was enough scientific evidence for Congress to support the site. Rep. Charles Norwood, R-Ga., said, "It is my opinion that this has been not only very expensive, but very complete." Nuclear Energy Institute President and Chief Executive Joe Colvin laid out several other pro-Yucca points for the nuclear-friendly crowd. He picked away at lawmaker anxiety over wasted money, explaining that ratepayers who use nuclear-generated electricity nationwide had contributed $18 billion to a fund designated to construct Yucca Mountain. "They expect a solution," Colvin said. Another witness urged lawmakers to consider the jobs nuclear plants create. Industry officials have said that without Yucca Mountain, some plants face closure. The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, with 780,000 members and 15,000 at nuclear plants, supports Yucca, said James Dushaw, an IBEW director. Even the union's Las Vegas chapter supports the project, Dushaw said, holding a letter dated Thursday to Congress from the local's business manager David Jones. The letter said, "Speaking as electricians, Nevadans, and Americans, we believe an aggressively managed repository at Yucca Mountain can make a meaningful and safe contribution to our country." "There's much more than jobs at stake here," Dushaw said. "The IBEW submits that this issue is a challenge to the nation's will and determination to preserve and further develop all safe energy options." The hearing was not all one-sided. Barton allowed Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., and Gibbons to open the proceeding, and let them speak beyond their seven-minute allotment. Several Republican members praised Gibbons for his tenacious opposition to the project and "noble" service to his district. Barton also invited Congress' own investigative arm, the General Accounting Office, which has been critical of the Energy Department's timelines. One GAO official summarized findings that included that the Energy Department was not prepared to submit a license application to the NRC because scientific studies are not complete. Barton also invited Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board Chairman Jared Cohon. The board was created by Congress in 1987 to act as an independent watchdog of scientific studies at Yucca Mountain. Cohon said the board's view is that data supporting the department's Yucca performance estimates are "weak to moderate" because of unresolved technical studies and important "uncertainties" about the project. Among those: uncertainty about the long-term strength of alloy waste containers. But lingering doubts about Yucca outlined by the officials -- and the arguments of the Nevada delegation -- likely had little effect on the subcommittee members. In fact, Barton and Vice Chairman John Shimkus, R-Ill., were the only lawmakers left in the hearing room by the time Cohon testified. Barton t pressed Cohon and the GAO official on a point. He asked the two to clarify whether their agencies, despite doubts, had ever declared the Yucca site unsuitable. Both answered, "No, sir." In other news: + The anti-Yucca television advertisements Nevada officials began running in Burlington, Vt., Tuesday prodded viewers to call their senators, independent James Jeffords and Democrat Patrick Leahy. The 30-second spot informs viewers that nuclear waste will be hauled "right through the towns we live in." Jeffords and Leahy support Yucca Mountain, and the ad is designed to pressure them to vote against it. Jeffords spokesman Erik Smulson would only say that the ad generated a "moderate" response, declining to offer a specific number. Jeffords issued a press release strongly stating his support for the Yucca dump on Tuesday, but then issued a toned-down, one-paragraph statement late Wednesday: "I have supported the Yucca Mountain repository in the past and it is unlikely my position will change. However, I do recognize that legitimate questions remain about the proposal, including the safety of transporting nuclear waste to the site. I look forward to full and open discussions over the next few weeks." Today Jeffords stressed that he was concerned about waste transportation, but asked if he was reconsidering his stance he said, "Not really. I have taken my position, although I'm always willing to listen." After an Earth Day event today, Jeffords said the anti-Yucca ad was "something you have to be ready for in politics." He also would not say the number of people who have called his office. "We are hoping they go away quietly," he said, smiling. + Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Ensign on Thursday said they had asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to hand over information about all high-level nuclear waste shipments. Industry officials have said there have been more than 3,000 shipments since 1964 of high-level waste, mostly radioactive material from nuclear power plants and military sites. None of the shipments resulted in radiation release, industry officials say, although environmental groups dispute that. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 50 Worries grow over waste trucked in DOE wants to increase volume, change designation of material Thursday, April 18, 2002 By LISA STIFFLER SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER RICHLAND -- As workers slog through the nation's biggest environmental cleanup, new waste keeps streaming in and plans are being drafted to import more dangerous discards. Truckloads of radiation-contaminated waste -- averaging 175,000 cubic feet a year -- are being dumped into unlined dirt trenches at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Roughly half comes from out of state.The U.S. Department of Energy wants to increase the volume and allow incoming waste to include radioactive material mixed with hazardous chemicals. The agency plans to release a draft environmental impact statement later this month and invite public comment on the plan. Documents obtained by the watchdog group Heart of America Northwest indicate that DOE is looking to send nuclear-research waste from Battelle Columbus Laboratories in Ohio to Hanford. That waste is tainted with long-lived radionuclides, such as plutonium. Government regulations currently prohibit bringing such "transuranic" material to Hanford for long-term storage. "Hanford is absolutely the wrong place to be burying this kind of waste," said Tom Carpenter, West Coast director of the Government Accountability Project. Waste that is radioactive for thousands of years has plenty of time to leach into the nearby Columbia River, he said. No decision has been made on the destination of the Battelle waste, but if it came to Hanford it would only be until a long-term disposal site was secured, said a government official who asked not to be identified. Washington's Department of Ecology is concerned about the potential for setting a precedent in this state with the import and storage of transuranic waste, specifically the debris that's so dangerous it has to be handled remotely with robotic equipment. "It has a path in, but it has no path out from here," said Mike Wilson, Ecology's nuclear-waste program manager. "Our notion is transuranic waste is going out of Hanford." The only waste now being shipped to Hanford is deemed "low-level," which tends to have smaller amounts of radiation and includes contaminated construction materials, lab clothing and debris. The material is dumped in one of five dirt troughs that are 20 feet wide, 600 to 800 feet long and 30 feet deep. There are more than 70 solid-waste burial grounds, filled mostly with Hanford's own waste. State and federal environmental agencies and watchdog groups are worried about the unlined trenches. Without a barrier, waste can leach into the soil and migrate into the groundwater. "We don't allow our kitchen garbage to go in unlined ditches," said Gerald Pollet, executive director of Heart of America Northwest. "We sure shouldn't be allowing DOE to dump radioactive waste in unlined ditches." In February 2000, DOE selected Hanford as one of the nation's two nuclear-waste dump sites. The other is near Las Vegas. The environmental impact statement will address how much low-level waste and radioactive waste combined with dangerous chemicals, or "mixed low-level waste," will ultimately be stored in DOE trenches at Hanford. Limits being considered are 12 million cubic feet of low-level waste and 7.4 million cubic feet of mixed waste, which combined would nearly fill Seattle's 76-story Bank of America Tower. Ecology will require lining in the trenches for mixed waste, but the agency lacks the authority to dictate the burial conditions of low-level waste alone, spokeswoman Sheryl Hutchison said. Pollet is convinced that the state has the right to refuse off-site waste, and to demand that all trenches at Hanford be lined. Documents show that in four shipments between 1989 and 1995, mixed waste was illegally dumped as low-level. DOE insists imported waste is screened for hazardous chemicals and is safely handled. It comes packaged in boxes, metal drums and tear-resistant plastic bags. "We don't believe we have a lot of contaminants leaching out of the low-level waste cells," said George Sanders, Hanford's waste-management director. "We depend upon our groundwater-monitoring program for that." But some of the wells used to test groundwater have gone dry and the project relies on wells adjacent to the waste trenches, not below them. Sanders admitted there is some "uncertainty" with monitoring. Ironically, if higher volumes of radioactive garbage and mixed waste come to Hanford, some people believe it may give the state more clout over the cleanup. "We need to use that leverage to get what we're owed," said Todd Martin, chair of the Hanford Advisory Board, a cleanup-oversight group. "There will be no quid pro quo," countered state Attorney General Christine Gregoire. "You can't say we'll clean up in trade for taking the nation's waste." DEFINING WASTE CURIE: A unit describing how radioactive something is. Named for radiation pioneers Pierre and Marie Curie. RADIONUCLIDE: A radioactive element. HALF-LIFE: Time needed for radioactivity to reduce in half. After 10 half-lives, material is deemed fully decayed. TRANSURANIC: Radioactive, man-made elements, includes plutonium. HIGH-LEVEL WASTE: Created from chemical separation of uranium and plutonium from other radioactive material. Defined by origin, not curie amount or radionuclide. LOW-LEVEL WASTE: Radioactive waste that isn't spent reactor fuel, high-level waste or containing large amounts of transuranic waste. MIXED LOW-LEVEL WASTE: Low-level waste combined with hazardous chemicals. Sources: Roy Gephart and Regina Lundgren, "Hanford Tank Cleanup: A Guide to Understanding the Technical Issues," 1998 P-I reporter Lisa Stiffler can be reached at 206-448-8042 or lisastiffler@seattlepi.com [Seattle Post-Intelligencer] 101 Elliott Ave. W. Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 448-8000 Home Delivery: (206) 464-2121 or (800) 542-0820 Send comments to newmedia@seattlepi.com [newmedia@seattlepi.com] ©1999-2002 Seattle Post-Intelligencer ***************************************************************** 51 Radioactive Shipments on Roads, Railways and Waterways Would Threaten Public Health and Safety Public Citizen April 18, 2002 Congress Should Put the Brakes on Nevada Nuclear Dump Plan, Public Citizen President Tells Lawmakers WASHINGTON, D.C. — Shipping tens of thousands of tons of deadly nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain would compromise the health and safety of millions, Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook told lawmakers today. Not only is the chance of a crash high, but the transport casks have not been adequately tested and the shipments would make prime terrorist targets, Claybrook said. Claybrook testified before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce’s Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality. It was the first congressional hearing to examine the Yucca Mountain project since President Bush approved it in February. "Transporting nuclear waste is inherently dangerous because it increases the likelihood of radioactive release and introduces this risk to densely populated areas where the emergency response and public health infrastructure may lack the capacity to respond effectively to a nuclear emergency," Claybrook said. Following Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham’s recommendation to go forward with the project, President Bush approved the plan to build a permanent repository for 70,000 metric tons of high-level nuclear waste from commercial reactors and Department of Energy (DOE) weapons facilities at Yucca Mountain, 80 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn vetoed the project April 8, and both houses of Congress will vote this spring whether to support or override his veto. Transporting waste from current storage sites across the country would entail tens of thousands of shipments on roads, rails and waterways in 44 states and the District of Columbia. As former administrator of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Claybrook told lawmakers that the dangers raised by those shipments cannot be justified. The administration has touted the safety record of nuclear waste transport, but it downplays the fact that there have been incidents in which radiation was released and that waste has never been shipped on such a massive scale. Since 1949, there have been 72 incidents involving nuclear waste shipments, four of which involved radioactive contamination beyond the transport vehicle, according to data compiled by the state of Nevada. General traffic crash rates also indicate the high likelihood of a disaster. In 1999, there were 453,000 crashes involving large trucks — 8,857 of them involving hazardous materials — and 2,768 train crashes. In spite of the statistical certainty of crashes, the casks that would be used to transport the high-level waste have not been adequately tested. Physical tests were performed in the 1970s on now-obsolete casks, and current computer-model tests dangerously underestimate the conditions casks would need to withstand in a worst-case accident, Claybrook said. The tests simulated crashes at speeds no higher than 30 miles per hour, submersion under water for only one hour and fires lasting only 30 minutes at 1475 degrees Fahrenheit. But no rules limit the casks to traveling at less than 30 mph, and a crash involving a river would likely mean a cask is submerged for far longer than one hour because of the logistics of pulling it out. Also, Claybrook noted that last summer’s fire in Baltimore’s Howard Street train tunnel burned more than three days and likely reached temperatures over 1500 degrees. Claybrook also noted that the Sept. 11 attacks have raised the prospect of terrorist sabotage of nuclear waste shipments. Although Abraham has twice halted nuclear transports due to security concerns, officials have not addressed the security implications of the Yucca Mountain project. An analysis by the state of Nevada indicated that a successful terrorist attack on a transport cask using a common military device could cause 300 to 1,800 latent cancer fatalities, while a state-of-the-art anti-tank weapon could cause 3,000 to 18,000 latent cancer deaths and cost more than $17 billion to clean up. Further, the Yucca Mountain site itself is unsuitable, Claybrook said. It sits atop an aquifer and in an earthquake zone, and the site selection process has been rife with conflicts of interest and industry influence, including millions spent on lobbying and campaign contributions to decisionmakers. The DOE’s long history of investing in wasteful ventures, combined with the numerous technical, environmental and policy issues that remain unresolved with the project, suggest that Yucca Mountain is poised to become another contaminated site and taxpayer boondoggle, Claybrook said. She recommended to the subcommittee that it uphold Guinn’s veto, hold hearings in major cities along waste transportation routes and maintain vigorous oversight of any repository proposal or nuclear waste management program. Click here to read Claybrook's testimony. ### ***************************************************************** 52 Counterinitiative Seeks to Block Plan to Hike Nuclear-Waste Tax The Salt Lake Tribune -- Friday, April 19, 2002 BY JUDY FAHYS THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE A counterinitiative has been launched against a proposed statewide ballot measure that would outlaw "hotter" radioactive waste from being disposed in Utah and boost taxes on the waste already allowed. A group calling itself "Utahns Against Unfair Taxes" asked the state Elections Office on Thursday for permission to circulate petitions to put its own initiative on the ballot next fall. If approved by voters, the law would ban initiatives that "establish or levy taxes that apply to a specific industry, entity or individual." The new group's chairman, attorney Hugh Matheson, said the waste-control initiative unfairly aims at one company, Envirocare of Utah, and has other businesses worried. Envirocare and other businesses are backing his group, Matheson said. "We'll also be warning Utahns to avoid being duped into signing the 'Radioactive Waste Restrictions Act' initiative, which is a targeted tax aimed at putting one specific company out of business under the guise of helping teachers and the homeless," he said. "We hope the 'Stop Targeted Taxes Act' will keep this abusive initiative process from becoming an accepted practice in Utah politics." Election officials said it would probably be next week before they can screen the new initiative. To get approval for circulation, the initiative must be deemed logical and not obviously unconstitutional, said Utah Elections Director Amy Naccarato. At least 76,180 voter signatures are needed by June 3 to get a proposed initiative onto ballots this fall. Petitions must have a certain number of signatures -- representing at least 10 percent of the registered voters who cast ballots in the 2000 election for governor -- in 20 of Utah's 29 counties before the proposed law can be certified to appear on the ballot. The counterinitiative has an effective date two weeks earlier than the waste-control initiative. But, if Utahns were to pass both, whichever one has the most votes would be enacted. Mickey Gallivan, spokesman for the waste-control initiative, denied his group is targeting one company. He said the state has become the nation's dumping ground for radioactive waste in part because the state's tax on the stuff is so low in comparison with those in states with comparable facilities, Washington and South Carolina. And, under the waste-control measure, some of the tax revenue would go to homeless programs and public schools, he noted. "This is an attempt to bring equity to that burden" of accepting out-of-state waste, Gallivan said. © Copyright 2002, The Salt Lake Tribune ***************************************************************** 53 Nevada Fights N-Waste Site -- Utah of Little Help The Salt Lake Tribune -- Friday, April 19, 2002 BY DAWN HOUSE Empathy shared between Utahns and Nevadans over deaths and illnesses suffered in both states from nuclear fallout during Cold War atomic bomb testing stops when it comes to Nevada's fight against the U.S. government's plan to store radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain. Nevada's congressional delegation can expect little help from Utah in its fight in Congress to keep thousands of tons of nuclear waste from being shipped into its state and stored at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Only Rep. Jim Matheson, the lone Democrat in Utah's congressional delegation, opposes the Yucca facility. As for the Republicans, Congressman Jim Hansen supports the plan. Rep. Chris Cannon's concerns are whether the 120,000 shipments of waste over the next 24 years will be shipped through Utah. Sens. Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett have supported the Yucca storage site in the past, though both are expressing caution now. By contrast, Utah's entire delegation opposes the proposal to temporarily store spent nuclear fuel on the Goshute Reservation, 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City. But only Matheson sees similarities between the two sites -- and Western deaths from radioactive fallout during open air bomb testing in the 1950s and early 1960s. "For the past 50 years, people in Utah and Nevada have been living with the lies told by the federal government about the so-called safety of radioactive material," said Matheson. "We are still paying the price for trusting the government. We've already done more than our fair share." Last week, Nevada Republican Gov. Kenny Guinn formally rejected construction of the Yucca facility in papers filed with Congress. Under a law crafted by Hansen, Nevada has a right to veto Bush's February decision to build the site. But Congress, in turn, can override Nevada's objection. The House and Senate have 90 legislative days to act or the Yucca site will be abandoned -- a prospect few Nevadans expect. "The deck is stacked against us," Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., has said. This week, Nevada launched a series of television ads, designed to pressure the Senate into rejecting the storage site by focusing on the dangers of shipping spent nuclear fuel rods across the nation. A vote is expected in July. "With over 50,000 nuclear trucks and trainloads moving through our streets, even the government admits nuclear accidents are inevitable," the ad says. "And terrorist attacks will become harder than ever to prevent. Only the Senate can stop this now. Call your senators today." The 30-second spots will next run in Utah, Missouri and Oregon. But the campaign may be a tough sell for the Utah delegation. Bennett supported a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain, but said, "I want to review new science which has emerged on the issue before I reaffirm that this is in fact the best way to handle nuclear waste." Hatch said that spent nuclear fuel rods can be shipped safely, and he has historically supported a repository at Yucca Mountain. However, he is now examining the Yucca Mountain proposal to determine "what effect it would have on the plan to store spent fuel in Skull Valley." Judy Treichel, executive director of the Nevada Nuclear Waste Task Force, said it is disappointing that Nevada opposes storing nuclear waste on the Goshute Reservation at the same time the Utah delegation is leaving its sister state hanging. "The Utah delegation is wrong if they think a Yucca facility will somehow get Utah out of having a waste facility in Skull Valley," she said. "Waste will be transported through Utah to Nevada if Yucca opens, and nobody will want to move the waste that will be stored in your so-called 'temporary' facility." Hansen spokesman Bill Johnson said: "Utah's and Nevada's fights are not the same. Yucca Mountain was chosen after years of careful study. The waste would be stored under a mountain and in the middle of an Air Force training range while the Utah site would be at an unsecured Goshute Indian reservation. The two issues are totally different from a homeland security perspective." Matheson said that technology is evolving to the point that waste can be safely stored right where it is generated -- mostly in the East. "With so many unanswered questions remaining about terrorist threats or the risk of accidents, the prudent decision is to leave it where it is until we have the answers," he said. Cannon's concerns center on transporting radioactive waste, not on storing it in Nevada. "Nevada's Yucca Moun- tain storage facility has been a long-term, on-going project with $4 billion of taxpayer funds invested in the studying, planning and early construction of the site," Cannon said. © Copyright 2002, The Salt Lake Tribune ***************************************************************** 54 Big agreement means excavation of nuclear waste to start. KTVB.COM | News | Idaho News on Demand 04/17/2002 Patrick Sawyer Idaho's Newschannel 7 Its a major development tonight in the effort to remove nuclear waste buried in eastern Idaho. The state and the federal government have come to an agreement on how clean up should be handled---beginning with pit-9 at the INEEL. The agreement today announced by Governor Kempthorne marks the end of a decade long dispute over cleanup at pit-9. And it marks the first time the d-o-e will begin excavation to remove buried waste located there. The Department of Energy has finally agreed to begin pulling radioactive material out of Pit 9 at the INEEL by fall. Pit 9 has been at the center of debate over radioactive cleanup in Idaho. Kempthorne, "For the first time, since the 1991 Superfund cleanup agreement, the doe must meet deadlines for on the ground performance not just completing paperwork." The settlement between Idaho and the feds includes money for the state if deadlines aren't met. Idaho's congressional delegation is excited about the agreement. Sen. Mike Crapo, "With resolution of the Pit 9 agreement we're now able to work effectively to move forward on developing broad-based budget support for environmental management at the site without the conflicts that keep dragging it down, related to Pit 9." Rep. Mike Simpson, "With the Pit 9 agreement that they've had, and they'll do the demonstration project, that's important to Idaho to demonstrate how we can clean this buried waste up." Excavating techniques used in Pit 9 will be helpful in cleaning up the rest of the 88-acre site. Those same excavating techniques could help speed up the removal of waste from the entire disposal area. Kempthorne says this is a major breakthrough in removing buried waste from Idaho. After years of negotiations, Kempthorne says the state now has a commitment from the Department of Energy. Kempthorne, "We believe that instead of looking at a cleanup record that is based on 2018, through this accelerated process, we're looking at a date of 2012." The DOE has met one deadline, they've come up with an actual plan for the excavation site. Work should begin this June Under the agreement reached today, the DOE will excavate a portion of buried waste in the 1-acre Pit-9 by November of 2004. ***************************************************************** 55 State asks for nuclear waste ruling KTVB.COM | News | Idaho News on Demand 04/18/2002 Associated Press The state today asked a federal judge to rule on whether buried material was included when the U-S Department of Energy promised in 1995 to remove all plutonium-contaminated waste from eastern Idaho by 2019. Attorney General Al Lance and Governor Dirk Kempthorne want US District Judge Edward Lodge to conclude that buried waste falls within the agency's court-enforceable agreement to remove ``all transuranic waste'' at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. The Energy Department contends its landmark agreement with then-Governor Phil Batt did not include the I-N-E-E-L's 88-acre radioactive landfill. It contains refuse buried in the 1950s and 1960s from nuclear weapons production at the government's Rocky Flats complex in Colorado. Specifically, the agency contends the 1995 agreement doesn't apply to waste buried at the site before 1970. ***************************************************************** 56 Nev. Governor Faces Long Odds to Block Yucca Nuclear Dump April 19, 2002 THE NATION Nev. Governor Faces Long Odds to Block Yucca Nuclear Dump Profile: Guinn, fighting his biggest battle, says the key issue is safety. No alternative exists, Energy chief tells a House panel. By TOM GORMAN, TIMES STAFF WRITER LAS VEGAS -- For all the arcane debate surrounding the use of Yucca Mountain as the nation's nuclear waste repository, Gov. Kenny Guinn says the argument should be all about the children. "We owe it to our children and their children to demand that the government follow the law and guarantee that a dump site in Nevada won't become a health hazard," said Guinn, who is fighting the biggest battle of his political career. Last week, the Republican governor vetoed President Bush's selection of Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as a $60-billion burial ground for spent nuclear fuel rods. On Thursday, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham told a committee of the House, which is widely expected to support the administration, that there is no alternative to Yucca Mountain. To block the project, Guinn needs about 15 more votes in the Senate. He knows the odds are against him, but Guinn grew up as an underdog and forged a successful career that belied his childhood. The man who would become a teacher, a school superintendent, a university president and governor, with child welfare issues consistently topping his agenda, is the son of illiterate fruit pickers who migrated from Arkansas to the small Central California town of Exeter. Like his parents, he picked grapes, plums and peaches in the fields on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada. "Kids like me--Arkies and Okies--were told we wouldn't be going to college, so we should take auto mechanics and agriculture classes," Guinn said. "And I said, wait a minute, I am going to go to college." His career moved swiftly, from a teacher in Visalia, Calif., to a long-range planner for Las Vegas' school district. Within five years, he was the district superintendent. "I wanted to end up in a position where I could help children," said Guinn, who is married and has two grown sons. "Education is how children overcome adversity." Guinn left the district and plied his financial and management skills as the head of a bank and a gas utility company. While chairman of Southwest Gas Co., he agreed to serve a year as interim president of the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, which was polarized by a debate over athletic versus academic priorities. Guinn, by now a wealthy businessman, kept $1 of his salary and donated the rest to scholarships. As governor, Guinn expanded the state's Medicaid system to provide health benefits to 25,500 children, compared with the 1,700 children served previously, and he earmarked proceeds from the state's tobacco settlement to fund college scholarships. Best known for its casinos and sex trade, Nevada is the fastest growing state in the country. From 1990 to 2001, its population has grown by 72.5%, to 2.1 million, including many young families with school-age children seeking jobs and affordable places to live. A political novice, Guinn was promoted by the local political machinery as an ideal gubernatorial candidate because of his civic involvement. He amassed the biggest campaign war chest in the state's history, and in 1998 easily defeated then-Las Vegas Mayor Jan Jones to become Nevada's first Republican governor in 16 years. "Everywhere I've been . . . I've set priorities and implemented long-range planning," said Guinn, 65. "I felt I still had a lot to give and the right background. What I'm doing now isn't that different from what I've done all my life." Said Dina Titus, who heads the state Senate's Democratic caucus, "It's hard to be critical of Kenny because everything he does is so middle-of-the-road. He hasn't made any big mistakes. In his heart, he wants to always do the right thing. He should have been a Democrat." A former topless dancer and an attorney who lost election as a justice of the peace are the only ones challenging Guinn's plans to occupy the governor's mansion for another four years. Jones says she will vote for Guinn but chides him for not aggressively pursuing state tax reform. Nevada does not tax personal or business income, and the state is facing a significant budget deficit. "He has spent an inordinate amount of time researching and educating himself on potential budget deficits, yet has been somewhat restricted by his political handlers in taking a strong leadership role, which I think he would enjoy," Jones said. Instead, Guinn convened a committee of civic and business leaders to explore new state revenue sources. Where others say Guinn was playing it politically safe by dodging new-tax issues during his first term, Guinn said he would rather launch tax legislation formed by consensus than propose his own. "I don't think a governor has the right to say I think I know what's best for you," he said. But these days, he's telling his president to walk away from Yucca Mountain. Guinn said Nevada has already made patriotic sacrifices for the country, when 100 atomic bombs were detonated above ground in the state from 1951 to 1963. Hundreds of people were killed nationwide and thousands were sickened by radiation poisoning despite government assurances that the tests were safe. Because of so many unanswered questions about the safety of Yucca Mountain, Guinn said, the government still isn't trustworthy. He took his case to Washington last week to generate more publicity. Leaving hardball lobbying to Nevada's two senators, Guinn met with only one undecided senator, Christopher S. Bond (R-Mo.). "I certainly didn't make any commitment," Bond said later. "But he did a very good job in tailoring his presentation for me. As a salesman, he was one of the much better ones." Among those applauding Guinn's anti-Yucca efforts is former Nevada Gov. Robert List, who grew up with Guinn in Exeter. List, a Guinn political ally, recently has been chided by Nevadans because he signed up with the Nuclear Energy Institute to promote the potential economic benefits of storing nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. "I'm proud of the fight he's putting up," List said. "When it comes to anything that could threaten a state in any way, it's a governor's first job to protect the people and environment from even the smallest threat, and that's exactly what he's doing." Copyright 2002 Los Angeles Times ***************************************************************** 57 County officials support transport, storage of nuclear waste in Nevada 04/18/02 The Holland Sentinel - 041802 local 6 The Holland Sentinel Spent fuel from plants could pass through area on way to Yucca Mountain--> Web posted Thursday, April 18, 2002 County officials support transport, storage of nuclear waste in Nevada Spent fuel from plants could pass through area on way to Yucca Mountain [dyonkman@sentinelnet.com] Staff writer Ottawa County officials are supporting a federal measure to store radioactive nuclear waste in a permanent site near Yucca Mountain in Nevada. At a meeting on Wednesday, the Ottawa County Board of Commissioners directed staff to draft a resolution in support of the measure. The Michigan Association of Counties passed a resolution in support earlier this year. The Yucca Mountain repository is the single spot in the United States that has been identified as a federal repository. Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn has rejected the president's plan to create the repository there. Congress has until September whether to overturn Nevada's rejection and build the repository or find a new site. The House Subcommittee on Energy and Water meets this morning to discuss legislation to override Guinn's veto. "We've made tremendous advances towards getting this stuff removed from our shores," said U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, R-St. Joseph, who is a past author and original sponsor of legislation to create the site at Yucca Mountain. "Since Sept. 11, the need to have nuclear waste secured in a centralized location has gone up a notch." If approved, transportation of the nuclear waste wouldn't start for 10 years, according to Mark Savage, public affairs director for the Palisades nuclear plant near South Haven. The United States has already spent $7 billion on the project and $100 million has come from Michigan alone. In the meantime, nuclear waste continues to sit in containers on Michigan's western coastline directly above critical portions of the state's water supply. At Palisades, concrete cylinders sit less than 500 feet away from the shore and contain waste that will stay radioactive for a quarter of a million years. It is one of 103 operating nuclear reactors in the United States. Spent fuel is stored at five in Michigan, including Palisades, Cook I and II near Bridgman, Fermi II near Monroe and Big Rock nuclear plant near Charlevoix. However, the threat of danger isn't that great, according to company officials. It is physically impossible to blow up the uranium stored at Palisades like a bomb, Savage said. Plutonium useable in weapons can be extracted from spent uranium, but it is an incredibly complex scientific process. The United States also stopped re-processing spent fuel and extracting plutonium in 1979. At Palisades, it is stored in concrete-reinforced steel casks adjacent to the plant. "We've kept it safe for 30 years," Savage said. "We continually monitor it every day." But questions of its safety have arisen. At Palisades, bubble-like flaws were discovered within the inch-thick steel of its fourth cask soon after it was loaded in 1994. Consumers Energy officials immediately pledged to unload it even though they insisted the cracks weren't a safety hazard. Local environmentalist Carol McGeehan has several concerns about the proposal. She worried that transporting nuclear waste would create miniature Chernobyl's waiting to happen if an accident were to occur while waste was being transported from all over the country. There's also the terrorist threat involved, she said. In total, the entire amount of spent uranium in the country could fit into a football field 14 feet deep, according to Savage. Although commissioners said that it's not the perfect solution to the issue, it does send the spent fuel far away from Lake Michigan. "If I lived in Nevada, I wouldn't want it, but it's got to go somewhere," Georgetown Township Commissioner Dale Mohr said. Said Cornelius Vander Kam of Georgetown Township of the repository: "This is a tunnel deep, deep in a mountain and miles away from anywhere." County Administrator Bob Oosterbaan said that the waste would likely be transported on land by truck or train rather than shipped on Lake Michigan. "This is there for years," Allendale Township Commissioner Roger Rycenga said. "I don't think the transportation is a dangerous situation, but I think it's dangerous where it's at." HollandSentinel.com ***************************************************************** 58 NRC voices doubt over plutonium conversion plan being fought by South Carolina's governor [http://www.sfgate.com] (04-19) 08:06 PDT COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- The agency that oversees the nation's commercial nuclear reactors says there is no guarantee that a controversial federal program to turn plutonium from nuclear weapons into fuel for reactors will ever start. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressed its concerns in a memorandum filed in a relicensing case last week. Gov. Jim Hodges' office says it validates his fight to keep federal shipments of plutonium out of the state, a fight that could lead to a showdown with federal officials next month. The regulatory agency agreed with Duke Energy Corp., which also worries whether a program to convert the plutonium at the federal nuclear facility called the Savannah River Site will fail before it begins. The Savannah River Site is south of Aiken, near the Georgia state line. Duke Energy's concerns were filed as part of the utility's plans to relicense several nuclear power plants that would use the new form of fuel made from weapons-grade plutonium, company spokesman Tom Shiel said. The new nuclear fuel is called mixed oxide or MOX. In its memo, the NRC wrote that agency officials "see no reason to doubt Duke's statement that its submittal of a MOX license amendment application is uncertain." Cortney Owings, Hodges' spokeswoman, said the NRC and Duke misgivings about the feasibility of converting to use of MOX "validate Governor Hodges' position" against allowing plutonium into the state. "There are a lot of questions that need to be answered involving this process," she told The New York Times. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham has said his intention is to begin shipments of 76 trailer loads of plutonium from the former nuclear weapons facility in Rocky Flats, Colo., to South Carolina shortly after May 15. The shipments would continue through June 2003. Hodges, a Democrat, wants Abraham to sign documents that could be enforced by the courts assuring the plutonium won't be stranded in South Carolina if the Energy Department changes its plans. He has said he is ready to send state troopers to intercept the truckloads or even lie in the road himself to stop them. Abraham says he would commit to taking the plutonium out of the state if the plan falls through, but does not want courts to be involved in national security decisions. Department of Energy spokesman Joe Davis said the government is so committed to the MOX program that it has pledged to spend $4 billion over the next 20 years. "This is the policy of the United States," he said. Besides, he said, the NRC's doubts about the program are Hodges' fault. "It's because the governor won't agree to allow us to move forward," he said. The MOX program is part of an international arms agreement between the U.S. and Russia in which each country pledged to convert some of their plutonium used to arm nuclear missiles into fuel. ©2002 Associated Press   ***************************************************************** 59 Plutonium production delays cited Amarillo Globe-News: Local News: 04/19/02 041902 news 5 Amarillo Globe-News Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico might be lagging in its effort to build plutonium pits, which fuel nuclear weapons, a federal report says.-->Web posted Friday, April 19, 2002 From staff and wire reports Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico might be lagging in its effort to build plutonium pits, which fuel nuclear weapons, a federal report says. The lab is behind schedule in about half the things it needs to do to make the grapefruit-sized metal balls, says the report prepared by the Department of Energy's Office of Inspector General. The report, released this week, cites bad management and planning that relied on a problematic computer program. Progress has been made since the report was prepared, said Everet Beckner, the DOE's deputy administrator for defense programs. The lab is now only behind in 14 of the 40 manufacturing processes need to make the pits, he said. The United States has not built new, weapons-grade pits in more than 10 years. The DOE made the Los Alamos lab responsible for making new pits seven years ago. The possibility of delays has not caused any problems with the work schedule at Pantex, said Brenda Finley, DOE and National Nuclear Security Administration spokeswoman. Through Finley's office, Del Kellogg, leader of the production operations team said, "At this point, we don't foresee any impact at the plant." The lab has made pits, but they have not been certified, or guaranteed to work as good as the old ones. Only certified pits can be placed in nuclear weapons. A pit is squeezed by high explosives. The pit then explodes in a fusion blast. The report says it will cost $1.7 billion to prepare the first pit. Chris Paine of the Natural Resources Defense Council questioned how the lab had failed to make a certified pit, especially given how much money the lab has spent. "I think it's ridiculous," he said. "You spend a billion dollars over a decade and you say you can't certify a pit. You're either incompetent or you're lying." The Associated Press and Amarillo Globe-News Business Editor Greg Rohloff contributed to this report. 1996-2002 Amarillo Globe-News ***************************************************************** 60 Yucca debate rarely truthful United Press International: Opinion: By Scott R. Burnell UPI Science News From the Science & Technology Desk Published 4/18/2002 6:16 PM WASHINGTON, April 18 (UPI) -- Both sides in the ongoing battle over placing a nuclear waste storage facility at Nevada's Yucca Mountain have demonstrated enough disregard for the facts that it sometimes appears they have licensed Steve Jobs's famous "reality distortion field." The sad fact of the matter is there is plenty of opportunity for rational discussion on the subject without resorting to examples of creative omissions and flat-out inaccuracies, such as those found in Thursday's House hearing on the state's objection to the project. "There's a lot of fear-mongering going on," observed Rep. Bobby Rush, D-Ill., a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee subcommittee that held the hearing. But he was only half-right -- there was quite a bit of hope mongering, too. Perhaps the most glaring departure from reality arose several times as both opponents and supporters dealt with the idea that antitank missiles pose a grave threat to shipments of spent nuclear fuel that would travel from all parts of the country to the Yucca repository. Subcommittee chairman, Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, supports Yucca. He said tests showed a missile would put an "indentation" in a shipping cask. In fact, tests have shown the warhead puts a small hole entirely through the cask. United Press International looked at the missile scenario and found that, while serious, it is not the catastrophe envisioned by Yucca foes such as Nevada's Republican senator, John Ensign, its Democratic representative, Shelly Berkley and others. "We know the canisters can be breached with a TOW missile," Ensign said. "They can't be adequately protected, at least with current technology." Ensign seems to have forgotten that a defense called reactive armor exists against the shaped-charge warheads found in TOWs and less-sophisticated antitank weapons. Since shaped charges rely on a precise explosion to penetrate targets, reactive armor disrupts the warhead with an opposing detonation. Several armies, including Russia and Israel, have made wide use of reactive armor on their tanks. Adapting the technology to protect shipping casks is a viable option. Also, if missiles are determined to be a problem for mobile shipments, the technology for certain would be helpful in protecting the stationary "dry cask" storage facilities found at several nuclear plants around the country. Yucca opponents tend to say two things: Transporting the waste is unsafe, and there are alternatives to Yucca. But the two are contradictory, because the alternatives also would require moving the waste from its current locations. The spent fuel itself is another area of debate where facts are scarce. Yucca supporters say the site will consolidate the nation's nuclear waste, making it easier to protect. Opponents rightly point out that nuclear plants will have to hold onto spent fuel until it cools enough for transport. They stretch credibility, however, when they say this negates the protection of one permanent site. Once the backlog of spent fuel is transported, any new waste would reside in indoor cooling pools, not exposed in the dry cask system. When the Nevada congressional delegation complains the Yucca choice was "purely political," they omit a few details. The current Nuclear Waste Policy Act does indeed present the matter as an all-or-nothing choice, but not because nothing else was looked at. About a dozen sites across the country were originally considered, but all others fell to the wayside for scientific as well as parochial considerations. For example, one proposal would have stored the waste in subterranean salt domes near the Gulf Coast. The idea was dropped when studies showed the waste canisters would heat the salt to the point that it would flow over the waste, making future retrieval difficult if not impossible. The Department of Energy is not off the hook either when it comes to distortions about Yucca. At the House hearing, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham warned legislators if the plan is rejected, waste holders would turn to an "ad-hoc" approach to finding alternative storage sites, as opposed to a coordinated DOE effort. This is not as bad as it sounds. Civilian sites would have to go through the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which could take care of coordination. Abraham also strained hyperbole to the limit when he compared DOE's 20 years of Yucca research to the more quickly achieved Hoover Dam, Manhattan Project and Apollo space program. Each of those past achievements required a huge engineering effort, but for issues of much narrower scope than Yucca. Despite Abraham's invoking those feats, society's success in those projects has very little to do with whether or not Yucca will work. With all due respect to the physicists, rocket scientists and workers that made those plans work, determining all the factors affecting a nuclear waste repository over an expected 10,000-year lifespan is a few orders of magnitude more complex. Copyright © 2002 United Press International Copyright © 2002 United Press International. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 61 Pressure mounts for inquiry into Ranger uranium mine. 19/4/2002. ABC News Online [Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online] There is increasing political pressure to hold a Senate inquiry into uranium mining operations at Ranger in the Northern Territory. Traditional owners, minor parties and now Labor have backed calls for an inquiry after revelations by a former mine employee. The latest claims of environmental mismanagement at Ranger, which is surrounded by Kakadu National Park, have come from a former scientist who monitored water at the site. Investigations are now underway into whether water quality tests have previously been misreported, while spills of uranium tailings were under-reported. The Gundjehmi Aboriginal Corporation's Andy Ralph is in no doubt about what should happen. "We need a full and independent Senate inquiry to be held now," he said. Labor's environment spokesman Kelvin Thompson agrees. "A Senate inquiry is needed to enable all the facts to be put on the table," he said. With Labor's support, an inquiry could be considered by the Senate late next month. © 2002 Australian Broadcasting Corporation ***************************************************************** 62 Rio rebuffs coal, uranium critics The West Australian + April 19, 2002 Sombre message: Rio Tinto chief Leigh Clifford, left, and chairman Sir Robert Wilson, who repeated gloomy economic predictions at yesterday's annual meeting. PICTURE: THE AGE By Barry FitzGerald SACKED coal workers and the anti-uranium mining lobby were yesterday given short shrift at the Melbourne annual meeting of the global mining giant Rio Tinto. After a colourful protest outside the meeting, their complaints were given a good airing during the formal business of the meeting, attended by about 200 shareholders and a follow-up to the main event of the London meeting last week. The Rio board had to deal with a barrage of questions on its refusal to reinstate coal workers sacked at three of its operations over the past four years despite being directed to do so by the Industrial Relations Commission. The group also backed away from guaranteeing there would be no development of the Jabiluka uranium deposit in the Northern Territory - a project that the traditional Aboriginal landowners continue to oppose. The meeting was told Rio was within its rights to continue to appeal against the IRC decision on reinstating the sacked coal workers and, while a Jabiluka development was not on the cards, it was not possible for Rio to rule one out forever because that was a "sovereign issue". After the meeting the group's managing director, Leigh Clifford, said he expected the results of Rio's appeals to the IRC's unfair dismissal reinstatement orders "will be handed down in the not too distant future". He said that given the potential for the company or the workers to make additional appeals, the IRC had kick-started a conciliation process. "We have been open to conciliation and negotiations on this matter for some time," Mr Clifford said. But he added there had been an "unrealistic expectation about jobs that are available back at the mines". "I think if there is good faith on both sides there is a prospect of resolving some of those issues. But I don't think people should expect to be lottery winners out of such an exercise," Mr Clifford warned. In his formal address to the meeting, the group's chairman, Sir Robert Wilson, delivered the same message as that delivered in London last week. The London address prompted a 2.4 per cent sell-off in Rio's share price as the market read it to be a gloomy assessment on the pace of economic recovery and its effect on commodity prices. Sir Robert was making no apologies yesterday but was nevertheless trying to be more upbeat at the media conference that followed the meeting. "Our best guess is that there will be some pick-up in global demand as the year progresses but it is not going to be dramatic," he said. "The question of the pricing of commodities is a separate one to some extent and one that we wouldn't necessarily have a particular insight into." But Sir Robert added that it did not take much activity by the big hedge funds to a have a "dramatic effect" on commodities traded on terminal markets. On a positive note, Sir Robert said there was "some evidence that the hedge funds are modestly long at the moment". He also said Rio's one-time icy relationship with key customers had now thawed, with a delay in completing iron ore and coal price talks with Japanese steel mills not unusual. Sir Robert said this was not the first time the resource giant had failed to secure new price agreements by April 1, the start of the Japanese financial year. But he noted that one-year talks with Japan, which set the benchmark for bulk commodity prices across Asia, were not completed until at least six months into the Japanese fiscal year. "So there's nothing exceptional about this and don't think we have a concern about relations with our customers," Sir Robert said after the meeting. Relations with Japan's steel mills hit a low in 2000 after Rio Tinto's $3.5 billion hostile takeover of Robe River iron ore producer North Ltd. Rio's share price ended yesterday's trade 18¢ higher at $37.30. -THE AGE with AUSTRALIAN ASSOCIATED PRESS © 2002 West Australian Newspapers Limited ***************************************************************** 63 Hearing reveals support for Yucca United Press International: By Scott R. Burnell UPI Science News From the Science & Technology Desk Published 4/18/2002 4:09 PM WASHINGTON, April 18 (UPI) -- A House bill meant to override Nevada's veto of the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage site faces little real opposition, comments at a hearing Thursday indicated. Members of the Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality heard testimony from both supporters and opponents of the matter in advance of the committee's vote on House Joint Resolution 87, currently scheduled for next Tuesday. Before the first witness spoke, however, several legislators telegraphed their intention to approve the override. Rep. Billy Tauzin, R-La., chairman of the full committee, said his support is based in part on preferring one consolidated storage site to dozens scattered across the country. "Every one of these (current) sites shares one common aspect," Tauzin said. "They were all designed for temporary storage of these dangerous wastes, not long-term disposal. For the sake of long-term public health and safety, ... it is absolutely critical that we move to develop Yucca Mountain." Congress selected the site for final consideration when it amended the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1987. The Department of Energy recommended the site to President George W. Bush last January and Gov. Kenny Guinn, R-Nev., formally opposed the plan this month. Both houses of Congress must now override Guinn's veto by a simple majority within 90 legislative business days in order for the project to move forward. Much of the hearing's discussion indicated Nevada's only real chance for upholding its veto lies in the Senate. Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., noted that although legislators are not qualified to judge the accuracy of DOE's recommendation, their vote to nullify the veto will allow the experts at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to examine the project during the licensing process. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, said an NRC examination means much more time will pass before any waste could travel to Yucca. "The DOE can (then) work on a transportation plan to continue our nation's excellent record of transporting nuclear waste," Barton said. "The federal government can work with Nevada to make sure the state is ready and well-compensated for hosting this necessary site." But the state's congressional delegation, appearing before the committee, has no intention of reaching that point without a fight. Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said DOE was supposed to recommend a site whose geology would isolate the waste regardless of human factors. "I hold a masters of science degree in geology," Gibbons testified. "I must tell you Yucca Mountain is not, nor will ever be, geologically sound. The DOE realizes they can spend enough to make the man-made engineering barriers sound (but) that is not what the law requires." Transporting the waste, though a separate issue from determining Yucca's suitability, is a keystone of the state's opposition. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., told the committee both accidents and terrorist activity could breach waste storage casks, exposing people to radiation. "Transportation, especially post-9/11, hasn't been studied adequately," Ensign said. "We've heard the terrorists are looking for dirty bombs; these are potential dirty bombs." The DOE stands fully behind its positive appraisal of Yucca's potential, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham told the legislators. The repository can be operated safely for a "pre-closure" period of 50 to 300 years, he said. Advancing science during that time would no doubt improve the site's ability to withstand the remainder of its expected 10,000-year lifetime, he said. "We not only tested normal circumstances, we also looked at factors that are difficult to approximate," Abraham. "We considered if, 10,000 years from now, human intrusion in the form of someone drilling for oil might somehow penetrate the storage casks. We took into consideration a glacier enveloping the area and retreating, exposing the mountain to much more water." Committee members signaled further support for the override by using their questions to give Abraham every chance to refute Yucca's critics. For example, in response to queries from Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va., Abraham noted independent organizations have found DOE's research acceptable. Failure to proceed with the plan would set the country back decades in its search for a solution for the waste problem, Abraham told Boucher, exposing the federal government to continued lawsuits for failing to take control of spent fuel piling up at commercial nuclear plants. Copyright © 2002 United Press International ***************************************************************** 64 Doubts Are Cast Over Plan for Converting Warheads April 19, 2002 By DAVID FIRESTONE ATLANTA, April 18 — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has expressed doubt about the Bush administration's $3.8 billion plan to convert nuclear warheads to power-plant fuel, raising questions about whether it will become the nation's principal method of disposing of plutonium once aimed at the Soviet Union. The doubts expressed by the commission, which is independent, appear to bolster the contention of the State of South Carolina that plutonium scheduled to be shipped from Colorado next month may never be converted to fuel at a government plant on the Savannah River. South Carolina's governor, Jim Hodges, has threatened to block the shipments with state troopers unless the federal government guarantees that the plutonium will be removed from the state if the conversion program collapses. The conversion plan is part of the 1996 agreement between the United States and Russia to decommission most of their cold war missiles and render the plutonium inside unusable for weapons. In January, the Bush administration announced that it had settled on a plan to process the warheads into mixed-oxide fuel for power plants, but the plan is contingent upon the Russians doing the same. Most of the converted fuel, known as MOX, would have gone to two nuclear power plants in North Carolina and South Carolina run by the Duke Energy Corporation. In February, Duke officials told the regulatory commission that the conversion plan might never happen. "Substantial uncertainties and contingencies continue to surround the program," the company wrote in a legal memorandum. It said the program's future depended on Russia's cooperation, future decisions by the federal Department of Energy, and the ability of the department to get a license for the conversion plant. At the time, Duke was fighting off a challenge by two environmental groups, which argued that the company's reactor licenses should not be renewed if Duke planned to use the untested MOX fuel. On April 12, the regulatory commission dismissed the environmental groups' challenge, saying the future of the MOX program was so uncertain that it should not be the basis of a license challenge. The commission said "we see no reason to doubt Duke's statement" that the MOX program was riddled with uncertainties, and it said any number of events could occur in the next six years that would make it impossible to use the converted fuel in a power plant. The statement was welcomed in the South Carolina governor's office, which said it had every right to worry that the plutonium would not be processed and would remain in the state permanently. "The Duke and N.R.C. statements validate Governor Hodges's position against allowing plutonium into South Carolina without an ironclad agreement that it will be removed," said Cortney Owings, a spokeswoman for the governor. "There are a lot of questions that need to be answered involving this process." The Department of Energy has said it must begin shipping plutonium from the Rocky Flats nuclear site outside Denver by May 15, or it will not make its deadline to close down the site by 2006. Ambassador Linton Brooks, chief of the Energy Department's nuclear nonproliferation programs, said today that the regulatory commission's position simply stated the obvious fact that the program was not finished yet. But Mr. Brooks said resolving the dispute with South Carolina would eliminate much of that uncertainty. "There are a lot of things that we need to make sure come out right, and that's why we're so anxious that we resolve the issue with the state," he said. "The biggest impediment to getting the Russian program going is uncertainty about our program." The department's insistence that the shipments begin quickly was supported on Wednesday by the Kaiser-Hill Company, a private contractor that is cleaning up the Rocky Flats site for the department. In November, the president of the company said it did not matter when the first shipments began, but in Wednesday's statement, the company agreed with the department that the shipments must begin by late spring or the deadline would not be met. Company officials said they had a strict timetable that required the plutonium to be removed by 2003, so full decontamination of the site could begin. The shipments from Colorado to South Carolina are estimated to take at least a year, assuming Governor Hodges allows the trucks in. Senator Wayne Allard of Colorado, who has led the effort to close Rocky Flats, said the administration's support of immediate shipments from his state had nothing to do with his re-election campaign, as South Carolina officials have charged, but with the need to ensure that the agreement with Russia was proceeding. "This issue has never been about Colorado vs. South Carolina," Mr. Allard said. "It has always been about national security." If the shipments do not begin in 30 days, he said, "our national security and environmental safety will be compromised." Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company | Privacy Information ***************************************************************** 65 The problem of non-proliferation of nuclear weapons The Daily Star: FeaturesFeatures Volume 3 Number 928 Fri. April 19, 2002 Lessons from India and Pakistan Talukder Maniruzzaman The developing countries are still in the process of completing the period of capitalist revolution where an inner law of developmental process brought the capitalist countries into long drawn international wars. That is why the weapons of mass destruction which were the strength of present-day technological states have now become crucial as deterrence for the "underdogs". That is why "Outsiders [NWS] underestimated India's and Pakistan's ability to break out of attempted strangulation of the nuclear option and overestimated their own capacity to coerce them into submission." Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. They were sent to Eden. But for mankind the earth is as good as Eden. As poet Rabindranath Tagore wrote "I don't want to depart from this beautiful earth...." Mankind ate the forbidden fruit for the second time when in 1945 American scientists exploded the first atomic device. The stockpile of nuclear weapons at present is reported to be so massive that our beloved "Eden" can be destroyed several hundred times over. It is indeed a good news that the leaders of the Nuclear Weapons States (NWS) have realised that possession of nuclear power itself threatens the very existence of our wonderful Eden. So we have the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (1963), Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (1968), INF Treaty (1987), The START I and II agreements of 1990 and 1993 respectively, extension of the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1995 and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in September 1996 after nearly forty years of sporadic negotiations. There were also growing talks about banning of the fission materials. It seemed that the good sense has dawned on the leaders of the NWS and the prospect of aversion of second "Fall" of mankind could be achieved slowly, gradually and incrementally. Unfortunately the process of building the superhighway to nuclear-free world got a severe jolt by the nuclear tests of May 1998 by India and Pakistan. These tests have proved the enormity of building a nuclear-free world through the gradual process of reduction of existing nuclear arsenals and future non-proliferation. The important question that looms large on the minds of saner people of the world is why did India and Pakistan reverse the process of denuclearisation of the world? What lessons can you draw from these Indian and Pakistani examples about the problems of nuclear non-proliferation? An attempt to answer these questions is the cardinal element here. NWS's initial help and later connivance First, the NWS themselves flouted the norms developed in the Cold War period. Although the Indian leaders often claim indigenous origins of their nuclear weapons the fact remains that the first nuclear reactor was made available to India by Canada, "most ally of United States of America. Even during the Clinton Administration, it was reported that nuclear sensitive materials were exported to India in exchange for promised liberalisation of Indian trade. Thus the West was partly responsible for India's "eating of forbidden fruit". Allegation of clandestine supply of nuclear know-how to Pakistan is too publicised. Moreover in the 1980s the USA herself gave massive military assistance to Pakistan to fight her "proxy war" in Afghanistan against Soviet Union. Many experts would argue that this large-scale aid of hardware enabled Pakistan to accumulate enough resources to build a nuclear bomb. France is also have reported to have sold some sensitive nuclear materials to Pakistan as well as India. Presence of "intractable and protracted" international conflicts Secondly, the wind of non-proliferation led South Africa, Brazil and Argentina to denuclearise themselves. These "nuclear-threshold" countries had no territorial claims with their neighbours. But in regions like Middle East (with Israel, Iraq and Iran), Korean Peninsula (North Korea and South Korea), China-Taiwan and India-Pakistan where territorial, ideological and civilisational disputes have been continuously mounting tensions, any help relevant for nuclearisation in exchange for trade or strategic advantages cannot but accelerate the process of nuclearisation. On the above grounds NWS cannot escape partial responsibility of nuclear proliferation in India and Pakistan. So the first lesson we can draw is that any transfer of nuclear know-how and nuclear fission materials should be strictly avoided by the NWS. Moreover, as India and Pakistan are by now nuclear states, the original Five NWS should bring all the pressures they can command on India and Pakistan not to sell or transfer their nuclear know-how and fission materials to any non-nuclear country. National interest vs global interest The third lesson is that the so called "protracted" or "invisible" wars as in Kashmir, Palestine, Korea, Taiwan, Sri Lanka, and the like which are probable "flash points" for nuclear war (by states or non-state organisations) should draw immediate attention by the international community. The international community must take all possible steps to solve these problems through political means. The present international theory and practice puts "national interest" as the "guiding star" of their foreign and security policies and often allow these "flash points" areas to linger on. If further nuclear proliferation is to be avoided the original NWS must replace their present doctrine and practice by devising and observing scrupulously the doctrine of "global interest." This is a tall programme. But it must be tenaciously pursued by the major powers, including the present" 'lonely superpower." Sense of "status-deprivation" The fourth lesson is even harder to address. It is the problem of sense of "status deprivation" felt by the large states like India, Brazil vis-a-vis the NWS. Indeed as a teacher and a researcher of South Asian States for the last 34 years, I feel strongly that India's decision to denote could be fruitfully interpreted in the context of political history of a sub-continent. From the very moment of her birth India has been suffering from, what is called, a sense of "Status Discrepancy" in the international system. India has long been deeply unhappy at her exclusion from the "Nuclear Club", as defined by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1968, which divides the world into haves -- the United States, Soviet Union, China, Great Britain and France -- and have-nots. India is permanently excluded under the terms of the treaty because she exploded her first nuclear device (1974) after the treaty had been signed. Dubey, a former Secretary of Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Government of India, has justified the nuclear stance saying, "India demonstrated its political will and courage expected of any nation which has a modicum of self-respect and aspires to be a regional and global player of some significance. It seems to me that the intellectuals and rulers of India specially those in New Delhi suffer from a sense of inferiority complex vis-a-vis the West. Intellectuals and ruling elite in India think that they can overcome their inferiority by making India into a great military power. This feeling of India eloquently described by I.K. Gujral when he said: "No American President has visited in 20 years, but Mr. Clinton does not mind going to China. [What it does in] Tianamen is all right, in Tibet is all right, in Taiwan is all right. Everything [China does] is all right, but you ignore our security concerns because we are poor and a non-nuclear power. In your eyes either having a bomb and making money is what matters. Well, money is difficult to make, bomb is not." "They want status, and they want it desperately," said Michael Krepon of the Henry L. Stimson in Washington. While India suffered from the sense of status-incongruence vis-a-vis the world, Pakistan on the other hand suffers from the same feeling vis-a-vis India. With the gradual depletion of modern weapons that Pakistan acquired in 1950s and 60s and US sanction on Pakistan's acquisition of state-of-art weapons from the United States of America even on hard cash, Pakistan became much weaker than India in terms of weapons of conventional war. Pakistan's acute sense of insecurity was magnified by nuclear weaponization of India. The boastful declaration of Vajpayee to use nuclear weapon if necessary, together with Advani's open threat to follow "a pro-active policy in Kashmir" further aggravated the already hostile Pakistan-India relationship. Regime security vs national security Another lesson to be learned from the Indian nuclear explosion is that the national leaders of non-nuclear states must be enlightened enough not to use the ruse of regime security in the name of national security. Many observers believe that Bajpayee government exploded the nuclear device in May 1998 just to rouse raw Hindu-nationalistic jingoism to win the soon-to-be held election. The leaders with courage and vision are equally needed in the NWS. For example, the platform for anti-missile defense system by both the Republican and Democratic parties will ignite further the process of nuclear proliferation both among the "threshold" nuclear powers and the NWS. The present-day American leaders should be well advised not to incite nuclear proliferation by raising security-scare among the people of the richest nation by trying to sell that anti-missile defence programme just to win the presidential election. The American leadership could benefit from reading from John F. Kennedy's Profiles of Courage. Both the developed and developing nations should be encouraged more and more organizations like Pugwash to enlighten the masses of the world further about the dreadful consequences of the nuclear proliferation. Messianic leaders must be "hedged" with "compassion" A further lesson can be learned from the Indian experience. The spread of "Hindutva" has given the Indian elite an apocalyptic vision and a missionary zeal. Such universal ideological-cum-religious movements by Khomeinies in Iran and Gaddafi in Libya or idiosyncratic megalomaniac leaders like Saddam Hossain are difficult to be hedged in. So relentless but "compassionate" attempt should be made by all concerned to stop the spread of nuclear weapons, know-how and fission materials by the international community as a whole. "Poor with the Bomb" It has been reported by an authority like Philip Talbot that "maintaining the American nuclear capability cost the United States just under $5.5 trillion." It is the strong impression of the present researcher that given the abysmal poverty of the great majority of the people of India and Pakistan, Indian and Pakistani ruling elite can be persuaded by the leading security experts and diplomats of the world to solve Kashmir problem and to freeze their nuclear programme and the money saved could be used for economic development for the respective countries which, as the examples of Germany and Japan show, are the real currency of power and status. After all the collapse of the Soviet Union was hastened by the nuclear arms race with the United States of America. Empathic leadership Finally it seems that there is a perception gap among the political leaders of the developed world and the late developing countries towards the problem of nuclear proliferation because of the level of difference in the stage of development process in the "two blocks" of the world. The developed world has passed the phase of industrial revolution and entered into the technological and digital revolution. War has become irrelevant for them. The developing countries are still in the process of completing the period of capitalist revolution (roughly the 19th century to the beginning of the World War II) where an inner law of developmental process brought the Capitalist countries into long drawn international wars. That is why the weapons of mass destruction which were the strength of present-day technological states have now become crucial as deterrence for the "underdogs". That is why "Outsiders [NWS] underestimated India's and Pakistan's ability to break out of attempted strangulation of the nuclear option and overestimated their own capacity to coerce them into submission." To conclude, the "Fall" of our dearest "Eden" may be difficult to prevent but, I would argue, is not inevitable. Talukder Maniruzzaman is Professor of Political Science, University of Dhaka The Daily Star Internet Edition ***************************************************************** 66 Comment: The Soviet threat was a myth Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Stalin had no intention of attacking the west. We were to blame for the cold war Andrew Alexander Friday April 19, 2002 The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk] On a long and reluctant journey to Damascus, as I researched the diaries and memoirs of the key figures involved, it dawned on me that my orthodox view of the cold war as a struggle to the death between Good (Britain and America) and Evil (the Soviet Union) was seriously mistaken. In fact, as history will almost certainly judge, it was one of the most unnecessary conflicts of all time, and certainly the most perilous. The cold war began within months of the end of the second world war, when the Soviet Union was diagnosed as inherently aggressive. It was installing communist governments throughout central and eastern Europe. The triumphant Red Army was ready and able to conquer western Europe whenever it was unleashed by Stalin, who was dedicated to the global triumph of communism. But "we" - principally the US and Britain - had learnt from painful experience that it was futile to seek accommodation with "expansionist" dictators. We had to stand up to Stalin, in President Truman's phrase, "with an iron fist". It was a Manichean doctrine, seductive in its simplicity. But the supposed military threat was wholly implausible. Had the Russians, devastated by the war, invaded the west, they would have had a desperate battle to reach the Channel coast. Britain would have been supplied with an endless stream of men and material from the US, making invasion virtually hopeless. And even if the Soviets, ignoring the A-bomb, had conquered Europe against all odds, they would have been left facing an implacable US: the ultimate unwinnable war. In short, there was no Soviet military danger. Stalin was not insane. Nor was he a devout ideologue dedicated to world communism. He was committed, above all else, to retaining power, and ruling Russia by mass terror. Stalin had long been opposed to the idea that Russia should pursue world revolution. He had broken with Trotsky, and proclaimed the ideal of "socialism in one country". Foreign communist parties were encouraged to influence their own nations' actions. But it was never Stalin's idea that they should establish potentially rival communist governments. Yugoslavia and China were to demonstrate the peril of rival communist powers. The cold war began because of Russia's reluctance to allow independence to Poland. Stalin was held to have reneged on promises at Yalta. Roosevelt and Churchill had demanded that Poland be allowed a government that would be "free" and also "friendly to Russia". It was a dishonest formula. As recently as 1920, the two countries had been at war. No freely elected Polish government would be friendly to the USSR. Furthermore, as Stalin pointed out at Yalta, Russia had been twice invaded through Poland by Germany in 26 years, with devastating consequences. The invasion of 1941 had led to the deaths of 20 million Russians. Any postwar Russian government - communist, tsarist or social democratic - would have insisted on effective control at least of Poland, if not of larger areas of eastern Europe, as a buffer zone against future attacks. The cold war warrior Harry Truman came to office in April 1945. The existing White House, including the belligerent Admiral Leahy, convinced him that he must make an aggressive start. In May, Churchill told Anthony Eden, the foreign secretary, that the Americans ought not to withdraw to the lines previously agreed. There had, he said, to be a "showdown" while the Allies were still strong militarily. Otherwise there was "very little prospect" of preventing a third world war. Churchill's iron curtain speech at Fulton, Missouri, in March 1946 - the phrase originated with Dr Goebbels, warning of the same red peril - reflects the great warrior's view of the Soviet menace. Not surprisingly, however, it was seen by the Russians as a threat. Referring to the new "tyrannies", Churchill said: "It is not our duty at this time when difficulties are so numerous to interfere forcibly in the internal affairs of countries." The inevitable implication was that there would be a time when difficulties were not so numerous. Truman had adopted an aggressive attitude to Russia the previous October. He produced 12 points which he said would govern American policy, including the importance of opening up free markets. The programme would be based on "righteousness". There could be "no compromise with evil". Since half his points were aimed at Soviet rule in eastern Europe, the evil he had in mind was plain. He added that no one would be allowed to interfere with US policy in Latin America. So Russian interference in countries essential to its safety was evil. But exclusive US domination of its own sphere of influence was righteous. In any case, a programme based on "no compromise with evil" is a preposterously naive basis for a foreign policy, destining a country to permanent warfare. (Perhaps, as the war against terrorism suggests, this is the capitalist world's version of Trotskyism.) The Atlantic Charter of 1941 was another example of humbug, with its declaration that countries should be free to elect their own governments. Churchill had later to explain that this did not apply to the British Empire. Molotov inquired what Britain intended to do about Spain. Spain was different, Churchill insisted. Churchill's hostility to the Soviet Union was longstanding, despite the wartime alliance. He had proposed in 1918 that the defeated Germans should be rearmed for a grand alliance to march on Moscow. He supported the allied intervention in the Russian civil war. More important was his wartime theme that the Germans should not be disarmed too extensively because they might be needed against Russia. Moscow also suspected, with reason, that some British politicians had hoped appeasing Hitler would leave him free to attack Russia. Against this background, it is unsurprising that the Soviet attitude was nervous and suspicious. The west made virtually no moves to allay these fears, but adopted a belligerent attitude to an imaginary military and political threat from an economically devastated and war-weary Russia. The fact that the cold war continued after Stalin's death does not, as some claim, prove the Soviets' unchanging global ambitions. The invasions of Hungary in 1956 and of Czechoslovakia in 1968 were brutal acts, but were aimed at protecting Moscow's buffer zone. The same may be said of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1980 (as a result of which, with the help of the CIA, the Taliban came into existence). In none of these cases was there a territorial threat to the west. At times even Eisenhower seemed ambivalent about the cold war, warning about the vested interests of the American "military-industrial complex". Under his presidency US foreign policy had fallen into the hands of crazed crusaders such as John Foster Dulles. Followers of Dulles's crusading approach remained prominent, especially under Reagan, until the collapse of the Soviet Union. Revisionist views of the cold war regularly surface in the US, though the case is sometimes spoiled by the authors' socialist sympathies (something of which I have never been accused). In Britain, the revisionist view has not had much of a hearing. One can, of course, understand why few in the west want the orthodox view overturned. If that were to happen, the whole edifice of postwar politics would crumble. Could it be that the heavy burden of postwar rearmament was unnecessary, that the transatlantic alliance actually imperilled rather than saved us? Could it be that the world teetered on the verge of annihilation because post-war western leaders, particularly in Washington, lacked imagination, intelligence and understanding? The gloomy answer is yes. · Andrew Alexander is a Daily Mail columnist, and is writing a book about the cold war. A longer version of this article appears in the current issue of the Spectator [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002 ***************************************************************** 67 Tactical nukes would hinder China The Taipei Times Online: 2002-04-19 By Chiou Chwei-liang ªô«««G Last month, the Los Angeles Times published an article about a classified document, the Nuclear Posture Review, leaked from the US Department of Defense. The article states that the US is considering a change to its nuclear policies. The change would involve turning large strategic nuclear weapons, which have been obsolete since the end of the Cold War, into smaller tactical nuclear weapons that could be used in the post-Cold War world. These weapons would be used to attack military command centers, or caves and underground complexes where biological or chemical weapons are stored. The document also clearly states that these nuclear weapons could be used against seven possible nations. Apart from the countries in the "axis of evil" -- North Korea, Iran and Iraq -- they might also be used against China, Russia, Syria and Libya. The document further identifies three hot spots where war is thought most likely to break out: the Korean Peninsula, following a North Korean invasion of the South; the Middle East, following an Iraqi attack on Israel or other neighbors; and the Taiwan Strait. The document created a stir from the moment it became public. Liberal US media such as The New York Times clearly stated their strong disagreement with the position the review adopts, which was not surprising. Taiwan has officially chosen to refrain from commenting on the matter. Surprisingly, however, Minis-ter of National Defense Tang Yao-ming (´öÂ`©ú), during a recent interpellation in the legislature, said that Taiwan continues to maintain its "five nos" policy: no to developing, producing, obtaining, storing or using nuclear weapons. He emphasized that a Taiwan Strait free of nuclear arms is Taipei's objective. The Taiwan Strait issue must be solved by peaceful means and the ministry does not wish it to turn into a conflict involving nuclear arms. Tang also said that he did not want to comment on the report that the US may use nuclear weapons to intervene in a cross-strait conflict since the report came from US media and not through official channels. Unfortunately, his statements mean that Taiwan opposes the Washington's use of limited tactical nuclear weapons to protect Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion. It is said that this is not the thinking of President Chen Shui-bian (³¯¤ô«ó) and his government and that the National Security Council was surprised by Tang's statements. The council reportedly has criticized him indirectly. There are also rumors that the defense ministry will announce a change in its position. Some American friends of mine have great problems understanding this issue. If China attacks, Taiwan will surely find itself in grave danger. Under the Taiwan Relations Act, the US is obliged to come to our aid militarily. The US has regional tactical nuclear weapons that cannot be used to resist the force of the conventional Chinese army, but instead has to engage in a time-consuming and exhausting conventional war in the Taiwan Strait. If Washington were to play by these rules, it would be demonstrating that the US government had gone mad. Even if Taiwan's forces had been annihilated by China's, we still wouldn't want the Americans to use these tactical nuclear weapons, but would instead want them to come up with some brilliant military maneuver to defeat the invading People's Liberation Aarmy. Do we want the Americans to suffer the same kind of heavy losses that they suffered in the Vietnam War? If so, then why should the Americans send soldiers to protect us? We want them to save us, but then we also want them to fight a war that is none of their business with their hands tied. Aren't we asking too much? These questions from my American friends are all good ones, and I don't know how to answer them. This, of course, is absolutely not what Tang meant. What he was describing was Taiwan's past nuclear-arms policy. During the Cold War, the US didn't talk about using tactical nuclear weapons in the Taiwan Strait; what they talked about then was nuclear war that would bring total destruction. Under such circumstances, the defense ministry's "five no's" policy was correct. Times have changed, however, and both the cross-strait and the global strategic situation are completely different. It is inappropriate for the defense minister to make a statement based on an old policy in response to a new strategic situation. What's more, as my American friends point out, the leadership in Beijing has always bullied the weak and feared the strong. The unequivocal statements in the Nuclear Posture Review that the US may use tactical nuclear weapons in the Taiwan Strait are meant to warn China unequivocally that the US is deadly serious and that it will not shrink from using maximum power in a cross-strait war. China should harbor no illusions about US' willingness to stand up to it, as it did in the Korean War. Xu Shiquan (³\¥@¸à), director of the Institute for Taiwan Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (¤¤°êªÀ·|¬ì¾Ç°|¥xÆW¬ã¨s©Ò), recently made a preposterous statement to the effect that a recent series of actions considered anti-Chinese by Bei-jing amounted to serious interference in China's domestic affairs. He added that the US should not forget that China once went to war with the US on the Korean peninsula for similar reasons. Xu should stop living old dreams. If there were a war in the Taiwan Strait, the US would use the most advanced regional tactical nuclear weapons. Would China still dare go to war then? My American friends believe they wouldn't and I agree with that view. A few days ago, the leader of Japan's Liberal Party, Ichiro Ozawa, said that the military threat posed by China is constantly increasing, but that Japan is capable of producing 1,000 nuclear warheads on short notice and has the ability to become a major military power. Strategic experts in Taiwan also believe that, given the threat from China, it is necessary for Taiwan to develop nuclear arms. From an idealistic perspec-tive, of course, I oppose war in general and nuclear war in particular. From a realistic perspective, however, if the US developed more advanced nuclear weapons that could be restricted to a theater of war, and if China were to invade Taiwan, I would find it difficult to say no to nuclear arms. I believe that if the US unequivocally adopts the strategy outlined in the Nuclear Posture Review, the possibility of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan will diminish. Chiou Chwei-liang is a visiting professor at Tamkang University. Translated by Perry Svensson This story has been viewed 493 times. URL=[http://www.taipeitimes.com/news/2002/04/19/story/0000132493] Copyright © 1999-2002 The Taipei Times. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 68 N-sub project is Navy’s worst kept secret - [19/4/2002] - HindustanTimes.com Vishal Thapar (New Delhi, April 18) It's India's worst kept secret but one that has been close to the heart of Indian officialdom. Successive Defence Ministers have denied the existence of the Advanced Technology Vehicle (ATV) Project. For those not in the loop about defence matters, the ATV is India's nuclear submarine in the making. The defence establishment is so keen on keeping the project under wraps that one of the reasons cited for the removal of former naval chief Vishnu Bhagwat was that he talked to the press about India's future nuclear sub. But a casual stroll around Kashmir House — the seat of the Integrated Defence Staff set-up in the Capital — is a revelation of Indian officialdom's nonchalant approach towards keeping secrets. An inelegant, twisted signboard marks the office of the Director-General, ATV Project. Friendly personnel hanging around the office volunteer to tell you that the Director-General is Vice-Admiral R.N. Ganesh. While, the signboard seems to have existed for years, a Ministry of Defence spokesman still insists that "the ATV Project does not exist". When told that a signboard at Kashmir House suggests otherwise, he says: "It could be something on a conceptual plane but there's nothing on the ground." The project has facilities in Vizag, Hyderabad and Kalpakkam. A Mumbai-based private-sector engineering giant is also reportedly associated with the project. The secrecy is inexplicable. Defence analyst Rear Admiral (retd) Raja Menon had said in an earlier interview: "I don't know why India has to be so embarrassed and secretive about its legitimate aspirations. In building a nuclear submarine, India is not violating any convention or law." Reports suggest that India may build five nuclear-powered submarines that are capable of firing ballistic missiles. Government officials also deny the programme to develop sea-launched ballistic missile, codenamed Sagarika. Vice-Admiral Ganesh was one of the commanding officers of the INS Chakra nuclear-propelled submarine (SSN) leased from Russia from 1988 to 1991. Naval sources say the INS Chakra was both a training facility and a "design laboratory for indigenous nuclear submarine technology". Vice-Admiral Ganesh has been in charge of the Advanced Technology Vehicle Project since October 2000. Send your feedback at feedback@hindustantimes.com Hindustan Times House, 18-20, Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi 110001, India Phone[Board]91-11-3361234 ©Hindustan Times Ltd. 1997. ***************************************************************** 69 Pakistan: Official says nuclear installations "well-protected" BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Apr 19, 2002 April Islamabad: Chairman Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) Parvez Butt has said Pakistan's nuclear installations are well-protected and there is no cause of concern. The PAEC chief was responding to newsmen after attending the concluding ceremony of an international training course on "Agronomical Practices in Saline Agriculture" here on Thursday [18 April]. To a question, he said there should be a judicious mix of hydel, thermal and nuclear power plants to provide electricity to the people at affordable price. Earlier, addressing the concluding ceremony, Parvez Butt said that Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission had launched a project to rehabilitate 25,000 acres of saline wastelands of the country. He said that the Farmers Participatory Saline Agriculture Development project would cost 176.82m rupees. He called upon the Muslim countries to develop technology and skill to make the saline wastelands productive. The 12-day training course was attended by International Atomic Energy Agency, IAEA experts, farmers and extension workers from Morocco, Iran, Egypt, Syria, Jordan and Tunisia. Source: The News web site, Islamabad, in English 19 Apr 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 70 INEEL cleanup agreement The Times-News Online -- Twin Falls, Idaho Sunday, April 21, 2002 Q:Do you support restricting development on the north rim of the Snake River Canyon? Yes, I support development. No, I oppose development. Doesn't matter to me. The agreement Idaho's new agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy over cleaning up buried waste at INEEL includes: * Cleanup of Pit 9, a one-acre test project intended to guide cleanup of the entire 88-acre buried nuclear waste laINEEL cleanup agreement The Times-News Online -- Twin Falls, Idaho Sunday, April 21, 2002 Q:Do you support restricting development on the north rim of the Snake River Canyon? Yes, I support development. No, I oppose development. Doesn't matter to me. The agreement Idaho's new agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy over cleaning up buried waste at INEEL includes: * Cleanup of Pit 9, a one-acre test project intended to guide cleanup of the entire 88-acre buried nuclear waste landfill at INEEL. * Court action to affirm Idaho's interpretation of a 1995 settlement agreement. Idaho says the agreement requires the Department of Energy to remove buried nuclear waste from Idaho. DOE disagrees. * Commitments for a long-term mission at INEEL long after cleanup is finished. * Accelerated environmental cleanup of the entire INEEL site, details said by officials to still be under discussion. # Buried waste at INEEL * Where it came from: During the 1950s and 1960s, plutonium-contaminated waste (transuranic waste) from the Rocky Flats nuclear bomb factory near Denver was dumped in an 88-acre burial ground at the Radioactive Waste Management Complex at INEEL. * What was done with it: The waste was buried in 20 pits and trenches -- many unlined -- dug in the shallow desert soil. * Affected area: It's estimated that 10-12 acres of the 88-acre burial site contain radioactive waste, Idaho's INEEL Oversight Program says. There are other types of radioactive waste and chemical waste buried at the site. # About Pit 9 * Size of the site: Pit 9 covers about one acre of the 88 acres and is about 17.5-feet deep. * How much is there: From 1967 to 1969, the government dumped about 110,000 cubic feet of plutonium-contaminated waste in Pit 9, then covered it with about 6 feet of soil. * What is there: Waste in Pit 9 includes plutonium and other radioactive materials and organic solvents along with parts of machinery and reactors -- even an old pickup truck bed. * Flood effects: Historical records give an idea of how waste once may have been distributed in the pit, but a 1969 flood floated and mixed up most of the 4,000 drums and 2,500 boxes of waste. # Pit 9 dispute timeline 1991: Gov. Cecil Andrus negotiates initial INEEL cleanup agreements. 1993: The Pit 9 project is devised as model for digging up and treating plutonium-contaminated waste called transuranic waste, one of the several kinds of radioactive and hazardous wastes at INEEL. 1996: DOE submits project design plans to meet deadlines, but acknowledges that its contractor, Lockheed Martin Idaho Technologies Co., still has more work to do on planning and requests extensions. 1997: Pit 9 project renegotiated to set new deadlines and penalties assessed for missed deadlines. Penalties included a $100,000 payment to the state and $840,000 in supplemental DOE environmental projects in Idaho. 1998: DOE terminates Lockheed's contract. 1999: DOE hires new contractor Bechtel BWXT Idaho. 2001: Progress made on moving forward with Pit 9, such as installing probes to characterize buried waste, but DOE asks for more extensions of up to 10 years. Idaho says no. Feds agree to begin digging nuclear waste ... New INEEL agreement with state calls for payment of penalties, court interpretation By Jennifer Sandmann Times-News writer TWIN FALLS -- The U.S. Department of Energy has agreed to begin digging up within two years one acre of buried nuclear waste it was supposed to have removed years ago. Gov. Dirk Kempthorne announced Wednesday that the federal agency and the state have reached a new deal that calls for retrieval and treatment of plutonium-contaminated waste to be under way by 2004 at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory near Idaho Falls. Under the agreement, the Department of Energy will pay the state $800,000 in penalties for missed deadlines and establish a $5 million reserve fund for possible future settlement payments if the department doesn't meet terms of the new agreement. "This is a major breakthrough toward removing buried waste from Idaho, because for the first time we have a commitment tied to on-the-ground performance instead of studies and more paperwork," Kempthorne said. The news pleased environmental activists critical over delays in the project and skeptical of the federal agency's intentions. Kempthorne made the announcement Wednesday in Idaho Falls with Department of Energy officials. Idaho's congressional delegation joined in over speaker phone. It capped the end of a year-long dispute started by the Department of Energy in February 2001 when it wanted to extend the deadline for project designs -- just designs, not actual excavation of the waste -- by up to 10 years. The request came after years of previously missed DOE deadlines on the project. Kempthorne and U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham still could not agree on whether former Gov. Phil Batt's 1995 settlement agreement to get nuclear waste out of Idaho covers the total 88 acres of buried waste at INEEL. "The secretary of energy and I have agreed to disagree," Kempthorne said. Idaho will take the issue to court and ask a federal judge to affirm the state's interpretation of the settlement agreement that "all waste" means "all waste." "I'm convinced that the 1995 agreement does include the buried waste," Kempthorne said. Beatrice Brailsford of the Snake River Alliance, a nuclear watchdog group, said she is glad Idaho is standing firm on the buried waste issue. Brailsford, who was lobbying nuclear waste cleanup issues Wednesday in Washington, D.C., said she is cautiously optimistic about the new agreement. INEEL is the storehouse of several types of nuclear waste, such as spent nuclear fuel. The dispute over Batt's settlement agreement is whether the Department of Energy must retrieve and remove from Idaho plutonium-contaminated waste buried in an 88-acre landfill atop the eastern Snake River Plain aquifer. The aquifer supplies drinking water to some 200,000 people in southern Idaho. Concerns are over the potential threat of groundwater contamination should waste particles leach into the aquifer deep below. The agreement announced Wednesday addresses buried waste on several fronts. First, the Department of Energy agreed to begin waste retrieval and treatment in a one-acre test site known as Pit 9 by 2004. The Pit 9 project was devised in the early 1990s and has been plagued by repeated delays and missed deadlines. Secondly, the department said it would postpone a decision on what to do with the full 88 acres of buried waste until it evaluates Pit 9 results. While Pit 9's original goal was to test retrieval and treatment techniques, the Department of Energy had been giving indications of late that it planned to leave the waste in the ground, capping it with cement. It was the cheapest, fastest cleanup option noted in the department's top-to-bottom INEEL review done earlier this year. Over the years, the federal agency has said the complexity of the retrieval and treatment of buried waste has been cause for the delays. Now it has decided to use a "glovebox excavator," which it says is a faster, cheaper cleanup plan than the earlier one envisioned. A backhoe tractor will be enclosed inside a building. It's a 20-square-foot area at Pit 9 that must be dug up by 2004, just the beginning of Pit 9 excavation. The Department of Energy expects that small area to yield 80 to 100 cubic yards of buried waste. Kempthorne and the Idaho congressmen stressed that negotiations included Department of Energy commitments to secure a long-term mission for INEEL, which employs 7,500 people, once nuclear waste cleanup is done. In its top-to-bottom INEEL review, the department stated it would close the lab once cleanup was finished. Under pressure from Idaho's congressional delegation, the agency retracted the statement, saying the wording was unfortunate and that the it didn't plan to close the lab. Times-News writer Jennifer Sandmann can be reached at 733-0931, Ext. 237, or jsandmann@magicvalley.com. Copyright © 2002, Magic Valley Newspapers ***************************************************************** 71 INEEL issues CD with lessons on energy The Idaho Statesman - Always Idaho 04-15-2002 IDAHO FALLS A compact disc devoted to energy education is being distributed to the state´s teachers by the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. More than 700 of the discs, titled Get Smart About Energy, were sent to public and private schools in Idaho. The disc contains lessons about the world´s growing energy needs and energy conservation. All the lessons meet National Science Education standards for three grade levels. The discs, produced by the U.S. Department of Energy, are distributed by the INEEL´s Education Research and Initiatives unit. Edition Date: 04-15-2002 ***************************************************************** 72 Reaction skeptical on faster cleanup The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Friday, April 19, 2002 The DOE now wants to start with a 'clean slate' at the Paducah plant and do the cleanup work in less time at a much lower cost. By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650 Regulators and citizen watchdogs are skeptical of another Department of Energy plan to clean up the Paducah uranium enrichment plant more quickly and cheaply. In 1999, DOE implemented a new strategy to prioritize waste and clean it up more rapidly. In 2000, DOE estimated a $1.3 billion cost to complete the task by 2010. Regulators and others doubted the plant could be cleaned up that fast, and the General Accounting Office, Congress' auditing arm, put the total cost at $3.5 billion. DOE now wants to start with a "clean slate" and hasten cleanup by three to four years at a cost of $482 million for seven major components, including groundwater, scrap metal and burial grounds. The Sun obtained a 12-page summary of a draft plan, which would apply potentially less costly "commercial" cleanup standards, "focus on real risk reduction" and limit policy decisions to senior DOE managers in Washington. DOE officials told members of 1st District U.S. Rep. Ed Whitfield's staff Thursday that the $482 million "is not representative" of the overall cleanup budget proposed for Paducah, said Jeff Miles, Whitfield's press secretary. Miles said the officials did not give a total but wanted to expedite the work in cooperation with regulators of the state and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. "Obviously, if the cleanup can be done faster and achieve the same results, then Congressman Whitfield is all for it," Miles said. "If it cannot be done that way, then he's not in favor of it." DOE officials have not publicly addressed concerns about the plan. "We continue to work closely with our partners in Kentucky and the EPA on an accelerated cleanup strategy,’’ DOE spokesman Joe Davis said. ‘‘Our goal is to accelerate risk reduction and cleanup. We believe we can do it, but there are still details to be worked out." DOE managers made the presentation March 21 to state and federal regulators in Lexington. The plan calls for all major cleanup by 2006 and appears to have fewer opportunities to hold the Energy Department accountable for failing to meet deadlines. "One of the concerns I have is starting with a 'clean slate,'" said James Bickford, state natural resources secretary. "That bothers me a lot. ... The clean slate and acceleration don’t match." He said the state has not formally responded to the plan. "We are ... going through all this and trying to figure out what some of this stuff means," Bickford said. "I don’t want to slam-dunk them right now until I fully understand this." Mark Donham, an environmentalist and chairman of the plant's citizens' advisory board, said the plan "raises a lot of questions, and I haven't had those questions answered, although I've asked for conversations with DOE officials." DOE previously put a $535 million price tag on removing and disposing of radioactive and hazardous waste buried at the plant. The new plan would stabilize the waste, leave it in place and monitor it at a cost of $9 million through 2006. Donham said the waste includes uranium that can catch fire if exposed to the air. The plan also assumes that considerable waste would be put into a landfill north of the plant and near some homes. "That's pretty controversial," Donham said. "I think there are a lot of questions about that, and it certainly hasn't been agreed to by regulators." The plan cites $72 million for "bio-remediation" of groundwater through 2006. A DOE feasibility study two years ago said the preferred alternative was to completely clean up the groundwater at a cost of nearly $1 billion, Donham said. He doesn't like the idea of letting DOE senior managers in Washington make final decisions about the cleanup in Paducah. Although the idea of faster, cheaper cleanup is good, Donham said, he is skeptical because, he said, the Bush administration does not have a good environmental record. "I don't think Don Seaborg (Paducah DOE site manager) did this," he said. "This is something that's coming down on these folks from Washington." A copy of the 12-page summary was presented at the citizens' advisory board meeting Thursday evening, but little discussion took place. Seaborg mentioned the negotiations with state and federal regulators and told the board he was not currently prepared to offer any answers in the way the board might like. In February, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham announced new strategies for cleaning up the nation’s contaminated nuclear sites, including Paducah. Highlights included $800 million more annually to speed the cleanup of sites posing the greatest threat to the environment and the public. DOE also proposed in its 2003 fiscal budget to cut $20 million in support for Kentucky’s monitoring of soil, air, water and wildlife around the Paducah plant. Bickford wrote Abraham, saying, "There are serious questions about the ability of DOE to meet its legal obligations to the citizens of Kentucky." Robert Logan, commissioner of the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection, said he understands that the Energy Department has projects all over the country that need money. "But we have only one, and we’re concerned about what’s going to happen in Kentucky." The Associated Press contributed to this report. ***************************************************************** 73 Portsmouth: National Sacrifice Zones - Appalachia First: Mike Bryan Appalachia First Those of us who live downwind and downstream from the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, Ohio have long suspected that a strong connection exists between the seemingly high incidence of cancer and other diseases in the area and the release of toxic wastes from the uranium enrichment plant into our local environment. Yet, so far, we have no concrete, incontrovertible evidence. On February 26, 2002 a media conference was held in Portsmouth, Ohio in order to share the findings of a report completed by Radioactive Waste Management Associates on groundwater contamination at the Piketon facility. Unfortunately, this report also failed to make any indisputable connection between the plant’s groundwater contaminants and diseases in the area. The problem, it seems, is the information used as the basis for this report came from the Department of Energy. The inadequacy of such government-provided information stems from the facts that the production of weapon’s grade uranium at the facility classifies a great deal of information for security reasons, that the DOE only began testing for certain contaminants after learning about their significance during the course of the plant’s operation over the last half century, and that no concerted community, political, or media effort has ever demanded more complete data. One would assume that, in lieu of off-site environmental impact studies by the DOE, the Environmental Protection Agency would gather such information. But it has not, at least not in any comprehensive manner. Apparently, the only way to get an accurate analysis of the plant’s groundwater, soil, and airborne contaminants, their impact on the local environment, and their correlation to the health of the area’s inhabitants will be through an independent study. That, of course, would take money and the political and community will to get it done. The federal government acknowledged its responsibility to nuclear industry workers who became ill from their exposure to contaminants in the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000. Unfortunately, only workers exposed to specific contaminants, not all nuclear-related contaminants, qualify for the EEOICPA’s $150,000 compensation and lifetime health benefits. The low $150,000 compensation amount itself could be seen as a slap in the face to many of these disabled workers, especially when considering what that amount averages per year of lost work for the long-time disabled and when comparing the $150,000 to the $500,000 to $1.5 million or so earmarked for each of the families of the September 11th victims. My Question Is: Could the Piketon site eventually be deemed another national sacrifice zone, an area so contaminated or so depleted of its resources that it has little or no future use? Often, Appalachian communities are caught in the conflict between the short-term benefits of jobs in industries that in some way negatively impact the environment and the long-term consequences those industries have on their employees and on the region’s residents and natural surroundings. While the jobs at the uranium enrichment plant added greatly to the economic health of the community, the facility’s detriment to the area’s physical health has yet to be determined. Without a comprehensive, independent study that connects a high incidence of certain diseases in the area to nuclear-industry contaminants, these disease rates could be attributed to a myriad of other factors, such as the socioeconomic status of the area’s residents, their heredity, other industrial pollutants, or other natural factors. Only after determining the impact of each and every one of these factors can the local community take the appropriate corrective actions. Only with adequate information can a clear determination be made as to whether or not the short-term economic benefits of any future industrial development at the now inoperative Piketon site, such as the proposed spent uranium-processing facility or the proposed nuclear power plant, would outweigh any potential long-term negative impact on the health of the employees, the community, or the environment. Right now, we are just operating in the dark. Mike Bryan is the founder of the coalition/advocacy organization Appalachia First. Send comments to appalachiafirst@hotmail.com. Originally published in the Portsmouth Daily Times on Friday March 8, 2002. ***************************************************************** 74 Feds Doubt Plutonium Conversion Plan Fri Apr 19,11:10 AM ET COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - The agency that oversees the nation's commercial nuclear reactors says there is no guarantee that a controversial federal program to turn plutonium from nuclear weapons into fuel for reactors will ever start. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressed its concerns in a memorandum filed in a relicensing case last week. Gov. Jim Hodges' office says it validates his fight to keep federal shipments of plutonium out of the state, a fight that could lead to a showdown with federal officials next month. The regulatory agency agreed with Duke Energy Corp., which also worries whether a program to convert the plutonium at the federal nuclear facility called the Savannah River Site will fail before it begins. The Savannah River Site is south of Aiken, near the Georgia state line. Duke Energy's concerns were filed as part of the utility's plans to relicense several nuclear power plants that would use the new form of fuel made from weapons-grade plutonium, company spokesman Tom Shiel said. The new nuclear fuel is called mixed oxide or MOX. In its memo, the NRC wrote that agency officials "see no reason to doubt Duke's statement that its submittal of a MOX license amendment application is uncertain." Cortney Owings, Hodges' spokeswoman, said the NRC and Duke misgivings about the feasibility of converting to use of MOX "validate Governor Hodges' position" against allowing plutonium into the state. "There are a lot of questions that need to be answered involving this process," she told The New York Times. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham has said his intention is to begin shipments of 76 trailer loads of plutonium from the former nuclear weapons facility in Rocky Flats, Colo., to South Carolina shortly after May 15. The shipments would continue through June 2003. Hodges, a Democrat, wants Abraham to sign documents that could be enforced by the courts assuring the plutonium won't be stranded in South Carolina if the Energy Department changes its plans. He has said he is ready to send state troopers to intercept the truckloads or even lie in the road himself to stop them. Abraham says he would commit to taking the plutonium out of the state if the plan falls through, but does not want courts to be involved in national security decisions. Department of Energy spokesman Joe Davis said the government is so committed to the MOX program that it has pledged to spend $4 billion over the next 20 years. "This is the policy of the United States," he said. Besides, he said, the NRC's doubts about the program are Hodges' fault. "It's because the governor won't agree to allow us to move forward," he said. The MOX program is part of an international arms agreement between the U.S. and Russia in which each country pledged to convert some of their plutonium used to arm nuclear missiles into fuel. Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. ***************************************************************** 75 DOE pit 9 INEEL agreement statement energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release RELEASE DATE: April 17, 2002 Department of Energy and Idaho Reach Agreement on Pit 9 Cleanup Agreement Will Also Guide Cleanup Investigation of Entire 88-acre Subsurface Disposal Area at Idaho National Engineering &Environmental Lab WASHINGTON, D.C. – The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced today that it has reached a settlement and agreement with the state of Idaho that will significantly speed up and reduce the costs of retrieving buried waste from the Department’s Pit 9 area at the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL). In addition, the Department announced that it has reached an agreement to move forward with a comprehensive technical study of cleanup options for the entire 88-acre Subsurface Disposal Area at INEEL. The settlement with the state of Idaho and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency establishes a $5 million reserve fund that could be tapped by the regulators if DOE fails to meet future commitments on the Pit 9 buried waste retrieval demonstration project. DOE also agreed to pay Idaho $800,000 for likely delays under the previous Pit 9 cleanup schedule. Under the agreement reached today, DOE will excavate 80 to 100 cubic yards of buried transuranic waste in the 1-acre Pit 9 by Oct. 31, 2004. DOE has already met one milestone in the new agreement by completing preliminary design on the project. Construction is scheduled to begin in June of this year. The new “glovebox excavator” approach in Pit 9 will allow DOE to complete the excavation demonstration 67 months faster and at 37 percent less cost than was envisioned under the schedule for the old design submitted by DOE to its regulators. Probing work that INEEL scientists and engineers have performed in Pit 9 over the past couple of years to locate and verify areas of contamination supported the decision of DOE and its regulators to use the simpler excavator design, which will be faster from the start of construction to completion of retrieval. “This agreement is an important step forward in our efforts to clean up the site,” said Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham. “DOE will begin pulling waste out of Pit 9, and will evaluate all options for cleaning up the larger 88-acre disposal area containing other buried waste. We are firmly committed to getting the job done, and working with Governor Kempthorne and the state to address long-term scientific missions at the site.” The agreement also sets out a new process and schedule for conducting the remedial investigation and feasibility study of alternatives for cleaning up the entire Subsurface Disposal Area. The new schedule allows for full consideration of the data and operational experience gained from the Pit 9 demonstration project -- and will thoroughly evaluate a full range of cleanup options, including removal of buried waste. The ultimate cleanup decision is expected to be made in 2007, and will be supported by rigorous study, a firm technical basis, and the advice of independent technical experts. Cleanup of the INEEL is guided by a 1991 agreement established under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation and Liability Act - the Superfund law - and other Federal and state environmental laws. The new settlement agreement does not address the applicability of the 1995 Settlement Agreement signed with the State governing the shipment of certain nuclear materials, including transuranic waste. However, any steps the State may take to seek a legal clarification of the 1995 agreement are not expected to impede progress on Pit 9 or the investigation of remediation alternatives for the larger Subsurface Disposal Area. Media Contact: Joe Davis, 202/586-4940 Ron King/Tim Jackson, 208/526-7300 Release No. PR-02-066 Back to Previous Page> ***************************************************************** 76 Energy Secretary Applauds Governor Engler’s “NextEnergy” Initiative for Michigan energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release RELEASE DATE: April 18, 2002 Washington, DC—Today, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham made the following statement in response to Governor John Engler’s announcement to make Michigan a leader in next generation automotive technologies. “Governor Engler should be commended for his vision and leadership in recognizing that the future of the American automobile industry lies in fuel cell powered vehicles and the deployment of the hydrogen infrastructure needed to support next generation cars, trucks and SUVs. “The NextEnergy plan recognizes that bringing together the public and private sectors along with higher education is key to the success of developing new fuel technologies and applications. “The Department of Energy is currently working on a report to Congress that will highlight the need for more public and private fuel cell research. After this report is completed later this year, we will begin to award fuel cell grant money to research projects across the country.” Media Contact: Jill Schroeder, 202/586-4940 Release No. PR-02-067 ***************************************************************** 77 Regulator questions SRS plan Augusta Georgia: Technology: Web posted Friday, April 19, 2002 Associated Press [http://wire.ap.org/] COLUMBIA - The agency that oversees the nation's commercial nuclear reactors says there is no guarantee Savannah River Site's program to make fuel out of weapons-grade plutonium will ever start. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressed its concerns in a memo filed last week. The agency agreed with Duke Energy Corp., which said it worries whether a Russian program to convert the plutonium into mixed-oxide fuel, or MOX, will fail before it begins. The U.S. Department of Energy says the first trucks might roll into Savannah River Site by May 15. Duke Energy's concerns were filed as part of the utility's plans to relicense several nuclear power plants that will use the new fuel, company spokesman Tom Shiel said. South Carolina Gov. Jim Hodges has threatened to do anything within his power to stop plutonium shipments into the state. The U.S. Department of Energy says the first trucks might roll into SRS by May 15. The plants to convert plutonium into nuclear plant fuel at SRS won't be complete for six years, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said. Mr. Hodges worries that the program will never be fully funded and that the untreated weapons-grade plutonium will sit in the state indefinitely. The MOX program is part of an international arms agreement between the United States and Russia in which each country has pledged to convert some of their plutonium, once used to arm nuclear missiles, into fuel. If one side backs out of the agreement, the other side might not continue with it, Mr. Shiel said. Questions have surrounded the Russian program for months. "If this doesn't occur in Russia, then it very well could not occur here," Mr. Shiel said. "In that case the problem goes away, or the Department of Energy goes in another direction." But Department of Energy spokesman Joe Davis said the government is so committed to the MOX program that it has pledged to spend $4 billion during the next 20 years. "This is the policy of the United States," he said. Attorney General and Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Condon has called for Mr. Hodges to sign an agreement with federal officials. Fellow GOP candidate Secretary of State Jim Miles, on the other hand, wants Democrats and Republicans to unite behind Mr. Hodges. "We will not be the dumping ground for the rest of the country," Mr. Miles said. [http://augusta.com] . ***************************************************************** 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: *****************************************************************