***************************************************************** 07/26/02 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 10.190 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POLICY 1 Russia Expands Nuke Ties With Iran 2 U.S. Seeks More Russia Nuclear Info NUCLEAR REACTORS 3 US: NRC Cites Braidwood Nuclear Power Station for Violation of Low t 4 US: Security hazy in skies above Maine Yankee 5 US: Regulators query TVA on Browns Ferry plan NUCLEAR SAFETY 6 US: Reid drops federal nuclear plant guards plan 7 N.K. officials to return home after nuclear safety training 8 US: Las Vegas SUN: Reid renews battle to strengthen security at n 9 US: State to give pills to fight radiation NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 10 US: Survey: Nevadans Oppose Deal With Feds for Compensation For Yucc 11 US: Do You Live Near Nuclear Waste Routes 12 AU: Nuke dump proposal released - 13 US: YUCCA MOUNTAIN PROJECT: State-funded survey: Majority wants figh 14 US: DOE expected to seek more Yucca Mountain money 15 US: Former environmental director testifies at waste trial 16 US: Graham appointed to conference committee that could require plut 17 US: White House could soon join Yucca money fight 18 US: Editorial: Nevadans shouldn't back down 19 US: Senate OKs $73 million in projects for Nevada 20 US: Yucca: You've been dumped on. Now what? 21 AU: Nuclear waste dump proposed for Outback 22 US: Air Force can't explain possible toxic barrel 23 AU: Radioactive dump views sought 24 US: Survey: Nevadans Oppose Deal With Feds for Compensation For Yucc NUCLEAR WEAPONS 25 Torpedo fuel blast sank Kursk 26 Safeguarding Soviet Weapons 27 Former RF man takes lead role in helping Russia dispose of 28 Iraq seeking vital nuclear weapons equipment - report* US DEPT. OF ENERGY 29 Los Alamos Experiment Speeds Up Aging Of Nuclear Weapons With 30 Army sends big guns to IAAP meeting 31 Bunning: DOE wanted to kill screening fund - OTHER NUCLEAR 32 Shaheen promotes energy efficiency ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 Russia Expands Nuke Ties With Iran Las Vegas SUN July 26, 2002 MOSCOW- Russia wants to build six nuclear reactors in Iran and help its southern neighbor explore Caspian Sea oil fields, the government said Friday in a resolution certain to complicate Moscow's warming relations with Washington. The government released a 10-year proposal for cooperation with Iran that would dramatically expand ties beyond Russia's much-criticized $800 million contract for completion of a nuclear reactor at the Iranian port of Bushehr. While U.S.-Russian relations have blossomed since President Vladimir Putin offered his support for the U.S.-led war on terror, the Bushehr deal has remained a sticking point. The United States accuses Iran of sponsoring terrorism and has said Russian assistance is helping Iran develop nuclear weapons. Moscow has dismissed the accusations, saying the aid only serves civilian purposes and that the construction is under international control. Now, the new cooperation plan takes the nuclear deal even further, envisdaging a total of six Russian-built nuclear reactors in Iran - four at Bushehr and two at a yet-to-be-built plant in Akhvaz. Russian Nuclear Energy Ministry spokesman Nikolai Shingaryov said Russia would bid for contracts on the reactors after the first one at Bushehr is completed, likely in 2003 or 2004, according to the Interfax news agency. The government resolution was approved by Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov on Wednesday but still must be signed by top Russian and Iranian officials. The signing could take place at a meeting in Tehran in September, Interfax reported. The 12-page document was worked out by Iranian and Russian representatives "taking into account the traditionally friendly relations between the two governments," and is based on principles of international law and "mutual benefit," the resolution says. It says Russia's oil giant Slavneft and the National Iranian Drilling Company will work together to expand oil drilling in Iran, and proposes Russian help in building pipelines to bring Iranian oil to market, including one from Iran to India. It also proposes Russian help for Iranian exploration efforts in the Caspian Sea, whose oil and gas reserves - believed to be the world's third largest - have attracted attention from the U.S. government and the world's leading oil companies. Washington has championed pipeline routes to western markets that would skirt the Caspian's biggest players - Russia and Iran. Moscow and Tehran, meanwhile, have been in dispute with each other and the other three Caspian states over how to divide the sea's resources. Russia and Iran also plan to work together on a global navigation system that the resolution says would be used for geological research and monitoring a transport corridor between their countries. Russia proposes helping Iran launch communications satellites, and providing Iran with satellite photos for geological research. The two countries hope to set up a joint venture to produce Tu-204 and Tu-334 passenger aircraft in Iran. The U.S. Embassy had no comment on the resolution, but expressed concern about statements by a top Russian defense official Thursday that Moscow plans to sell more conventional weapons to Iran. "We do continue to have concern about weapons supplies to Iran because it could lead to imbalance in the region, and we continue to have concern about weapons falling into the hands of terrorists," a U.S. Embassy official said Friday on condition of anonymity. Earlier this week, U.S. Ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow said, "Russia has to avoid letting its desire for commercial gain end up hastening the day that (Iran, Iraq and North Korea) can pose a threat that could not only destabilize their own region, but undermine the security of the entire world." All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 2 U.S. Seeks More Russia Nuclear Info By MATT KELLEY Associated Press Writer July 25, 2002, 3:21 PM EDT WASHINGTON -- U.S. officials want to press Russia for greater access to information about Russia's nuclear weapons programs as the countries reduce their nuclear arsenals, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Thursday. Rumsfeld told the Senate Armed Services Committee he was confident Russia would make the two-thirds reduction in its deployed nuclear warheads called for under the treaty signed in May by President Bush and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. Bush wants the Senate to ratify quickly the treaty, which calls for reducing each side's strategic nuclear arsenal from about 6,000 warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200 by 2012. The treaty does not include any measures to verify that each side makes the required reductions. Rumsfeld said that was not a problem because Bush and Putin had announced plans to cut their arsenals to that level anyway. Critics say the treaty's lack of verification is a major flaw. "We need to be assured that 10 years from now, the United States and Russia know where and in what condition those weapons are, because of the chronic terrorist threat" of obtaining nuclear weapons, said Daryl Kimball of the Arms Control Association. Rumsfeld said U.S. officials still want more information about Russia's nuclear program -- especially its hoard of smaller, battlefield weapons. He said the Americans would work to get more access to that information through further negotiations with Russia. "There's no question that, even today, Russia is not transparent. They have a very secretive approach to a great deal of things," Rumsfeld said. "It is a concern. We're a good distance from feeling comfortable." Sen. Carl Levin, the committee chairman, said the Senate probably will ratify the treaty. Levin, D-Mich., said he was troubled by the fact that the treaty allowed an unlimited number of warheads to be kept in storage. "I hope we will find ways to destroy weapons, not just store them," Levin said. Rumsfeld said the United States needs to keep some warheads in storage in case its deployed warheads are found to be unsafe or unreliable. The United States does not have a factory ready to make new nuclear weapons, while Russia -- whose warheads do not have as long of a shelf life -- has an active warhead production line. The high costs of storing nuclear warheads means both sides will only keep the ones they really need, Rumsfeld said. "Russia has no interest in keeping weapons that are of no use to them," he said. Copyright © 2002, The Associated Press ***************************************************************** 3 NRC Cites Braidwood Nuclear Power Station for Violation of Low to Moderate Safety Significance NRC: Press Release Region III - 2002 - 46 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region III 801 Warrenville Road, Lisle IL 60532 www.nrc.gov No. III-02-046 July 25, 2002 CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663 Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov [opa3@nrc.gov] The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has determined that a violation of NRC safety regulations at the Braidwood Nuclear Power Station near Braidwood, Illinois, should be characterized as "white," meaning that it is an issue of low to moderate importance to safety. The plant, which has two reactors, is operated by Exelon Generation Company. An NRC inspection in February found that the utility had not taken adequate corrective action for valve problems affecting the functioning of a plant safety system which would control reactor pressure under certain accident conditions. The valves, which are designed to maintain sufficient air pressure to operate the safety system, had excessive leakage when tested in September of last year. Similar problems had been found during testing on seven occasions since 1991. Under its safety significance determination process, NRC officials classify certain conditions at nuclear power plants as being one of four colors which delineate increasing levels of safety significance, beginning with green and progressing to white, yellow or red. A preliminary "white" determination for the valve leakage problem was described in an letter to Exelon on June 25, which provided the company with an opportunity to request a regulatory conference to discuss this issue. Exelon subsequently informed the NRC that it did not contest the "white" characterization of the safety significance of this finding and did not request a meeting with the NRC staff. In addition to the white determination, the NRC issued a Notice of Violation to Exelon for failing to take effective action to correct the valve problems and prevent a recurrence. The "white" finding may result in future NRC inspections focusing on the plant's corrective action program and its response to the valve failures. In addition, because of another "white" issue involving the failure of an auxiliary feedwater pump to start in February, the NRC staff may schedule additional inspections or meetings with the utility to review plant performance more broadly. Additional details on the "white" finding are available in Inspection Report 2002-03, issued March 15, which is available from the Region III Office of Public Affairs or on the NRC's web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/BRAI1/brai1_chart.html [http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/BRAI1/brai1_chart.html] ***************************************************************** 4 Security hazy in skies above Maine Yankee An unofficial "incident" on July 10 involving a small plane leaves only confusion. --> [http://www.mainetoday.com] Friday, July 26, 2002 COLUMN: Bill Nemitz Copyright © 2002 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. WISCASSET - The skies were clear Thursday over the Wiscasset Airport. But if you happened to pick up the special notice from the Federal Aviation Administration, you couldn't help but get lost in the haze: "In the interest of national security, and to the extent practicable, pilots are advised to avoid the airspace above, or in proximity to, such sites as nuclear power plants . . . Pilots should not circle as to loiter in the vicinity of such facilities." In other words, the federal government isn't exactly ordering pilots to stay away from the former Maine Yankee nuclear power plant - located less than a mile east of the airport. Rather, the country being at war and all, it's simply asking aviators to "avoid" getting too close to the hundreds of tons of spent fuel still on the site. Thus it should come as no surprise that the more we try to figure out exactly what occurred over Maine Yankee on the evening of July 10, the hazier this unofficial "incident" seems to get. It began, unlike most national security breaches, with a call to the local police. According to acting Police Chief John Allen, security officers at Maine Yankee called that night to alert police that a small aircraft had just passed 20 feet over the plant's partially dismantled dome before disappearing over the horizon. Nobody knows for sure who it was. Police called Brunswick Naval Air Station, where an air traffic controller had spoken with the off-course pilot by radio and obtained the plane's registration number, but a check of the Wiscasset Airport revealed no sign of the aircraft. By this time, following its protocol, Maine Yankee security had also alerted the FAA, the FBI and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Officials from those agencies presumably listened to the few available details, nodded and went back to bed. The incident would have died there had not an enterprising reporter for the weekly Wiscasset Newspaper noticed the police log entry and started asking questions. One headline led to another until the flyover finally drifted this week onto U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe's radar screen. "What it did was set off a series of concerns," said Snowe spokesman David Lackey, adding that the senator simply wants assurances from the FAA and the new Transportation Security Agency that current general aviation policies provide sufficient security for places like Maine Yankee. Which puts us back in the haze. Maine Yankee spokesman Eric Howes said Thursday that when Snowe's office called him, he assured them that aircraft like the one that buzzed the dome (for the record, the 20-foot altitude reported to police has now been reset at about 800 feet) posed no threat to the spent fuel pool. Nor, Howes said, would such a plane be big enough and fast enough to disturb the fuel after it's moved into above-ground concrete storage casks this month. Howes conceded that the FAA special notice puts Maine Yankee in a "gray area . . . it's not a no-fly zone." But a wayward small plane, he stressed, "is not a problem." Longtime nuclear watchdog Ray Shadis, speaking for Friends of the Coast, scoffs at such talk. According to his research, a small aircraft loaded with 150 pounds of an explosive called PETN could blow a dry storage cask and everything in it to smithereens. "We're not talking about disturbing the golfers at the golf course here," said Shadis, who advocates a strictly enforced no-fly zone over Maine Yankee. "We're talking about a serious issue that involves a large portion of the state." We're also talking about mixed signals. Ann Walko, who owns Wicked Good Aviation over at the airport, still has no idea who may or may not have landed there after she closed up for the night on July 10. She hands out the FAA special notice to every pilot she sees, she said, but she can't guarantee that every pilot coming in from away knows to "avoid " an easterly approach over Maine Yankee. Walko has heard all the talk about whether there's enough security over Maine Yankee or whether we're all just kidding ourselves, whether all the inter-agency phone calls are worth it or whether, in the event of an actual attack, "by the time I pick up the phone it's too late." Her conclusion? In the wake of Sept. 11, the once peaceful world of general aviation has gone "nuts." "We keep track of airplanes that come and go - while we're here," promised Walko. Beyond that, until further notice, watch out for the haze. Columnist Bill Nemitz can be contacted at 791-6323 or at: bnemitz@pressherald.com [bnemitz@pressherald.com] . ***************************************************************** 5 Regulators query TVA on Browns Ferry plan By The Associated Press July 26, 2002 CHATTANOOGA - Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials questioned the Tennessee Valley Authority's plans to restart the 29-year-old Unit 1 reactor at the Browns Ferry nuclear plant. The mothballed reactor near Athens, Ala., is set to restart in May 2007 to boost power production. It is TVA's oldest reactor and has been idle since 1985, the year the utility closed its nuclear program because of safety concerns. TVA has said the restart, approved by TVA directors last month, would cost about $1.8 billion. "This isn't the typical review," Steven Hoffman, the NRC's senior project manager for license renewal, said of the Wednesday meeting in Washington. Tim Abney, TVA's Browns Ferry site licensing manager, said the TVA proposal involves reviews for 20-year renewals of existing licenses for three reactors at Browns Ferry. TVA also wants regulators to approve increased production capacity for each unit from 1,150 megawatts to 1,250 megawatts, he said. Abney said TVA intends to make changes at Unit 1 similar to those that enabled it to put Browns Ferry Units 2 and 3 back online in 1991 and 1994. "What's going to happen on Unit 1 is known," Abney said. "We don't see any real significant changes that will affect license renewal." P.T. Kuo, the NRC's director of licensing renewal and environmental programs, said, "It sounds like to me that even before we issue the Safety Evaluation Report, it could be outdated." Kuo said he believes TVA can answer his questions, however. Herb Berkow, an NRC regional project director, said the TVA plan might require regulators to think differently and might take longer. TVA is the country's largest public power producer, serving 8.3 million people through 158 distributors in Tennessee, North Carolina, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Virginia. The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 6 Reid drops federal nuclear plant guards plan Friday, July 26, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal Compromise bill contains federal assistance By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Facing strong opposition, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., dropped a controversial plan to replace nuclear plant security guards with federal officers before he formed a compromise that progressed in the U.S. Senate on Thursday. When Reid introduced his "Nuclear Security Act" in November, its main feature federalized nuclear power plants in the same way that government screeners are being installed at airports. But Reid and his allies, including Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., failed to overcome resistance from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission among others and ended up abandoning the idea, Senate and industry officials said. A less ambitious product was unveiled Thursday and quickly was passed by the Senate Environment and Public Work Committee. "Personally I'm not satisfied with everything in this bill, but it is a compromise," Reid said. "The security of power plants will vastly improve as a result of this legislation." Even though the federal guards were dropped, Reid said the plan will "ensure strong federal assistance" in securing nuclear plants. Aides said Reid has not decided whether to seek free-standing votes on the bill or whether to try to attach it to other energy or homeland security bills. The security measures would apply to all nuclear facilities licensed by the NRC, conceivably including a nuclear waste respository proposed for Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The new bill assigns a "federal security coordinator" to each nuclear plant whose job would be to coordinate federal, state and local emergency planning and law enforcement. It also would establish a "security response team" within NRC to conduct mock attacks that test guards at nuclear plants. Each plant would have to be tested once every three years. Tests now are conducted every eight to 10 years, Reid said. Additionally, it creates a Cabinet-level task force headed by the chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to examine nuclear plant security. The task force would be directed to recommend formation of a government anti-terrorism team that would support private security forces at the plants. Reid said the nuclear plant anti-terrorism teams could become a model for teams that could work at chemical plants and other potentially deadly facilities vulnerable to terrorist attack. A nuclear power executive said the new bill improves on the original but still is unnecessary. "U.S. nuclear power plants were safe and secure before September 11 and they are even more secure today," said Ralph Beedle, chief nuclear officer of the Nuclear Energy Institute. The bill contains firearms provisions that were requested by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Still, members of the NRC continue to oppose the bill, said commissioner Ed McGaffigan. "A truly awful bill has been translated into a series of merely bad provisions which will impede the commission's ability to improve on what we believe today is already the best security in the critical infrastructure of this country," McGaffigan said in a letter Thursday to Sen. Jim Jeffords, I-Vt., the Senate committee chairman. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2002 ***************************************************************** 7 N.K. officials to return home after nuclear safety training Korea Herald!!_National http://www.koreaherald.com A group of visiting North Korean officials returns home today, ending 26 days of safety training for nuclear power plants currently under construction in the North. The delegation of 25 North Korean government officials completed classes at the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety (KINS), near Daejeon, yesterday, said officials at the Korean Peninsular Energy Development Organization (KEDO). The U.S.-led KEDO is building two 1,000-megawatt light-water reactors in the energy-starved country under a 1994 agreement between Pyongyang and Washington that required the North to freeze its nuclear programs. During its stay in the South, the delegation inspected nuclear facilities in Uljin, North Gyeongsang Province. The group, led by Kim Yong-il, director of the North's State Nuclear Safety Regulatory Commission, will fly to Pyongyang via Beijing, officials said. (jihoho@koreaherald.co.kr 2002.07.27 (C) Copyright 2000 Digital Korea Herald. All rights reserved. [http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/contact/contact.shtml] ***************************************************************** 8 Las Vegas SUN: Reid renews battle to strengthen security at nuclear power plants ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Las Vegas SUN ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- July 26, 2002 Reid renews battle to strengthen security at nuclear power plants By Benjamin Grove LAS VEGAS SUN WASHINGTON -- Fresh from his failed fight against the nuclear energy industry over Yucca Mountain, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., is renewing his battle with nuclear utilities on another front: strengthening plant security. Reid, along with Sens. James Jeffords, I-Vt., and Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., on Thursday unveiled a new version of an old bill that calls for: + New nuclear plant security threat reviews, including threats "comparable to Sept. 11." + A new task force led by the chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that includes the secretaries of Defense, State, Justice, Health and the director of the CIA. The task force would assess emergency response and security plans. + A new "security response team" that would run mock attacks to test plant security guards; and a federal anti-terrorism team to protect power plant perimeters. + A new NRC security coordinator for each plant. The bill will "vastly improve" plant security, Reid said. Reid first introduced the plant security legislation in November, but has tinkered with it in an effort to garner more support and address a few NRC concerns. Notably absent from Reid's revised bill was his proposal to federalize nuclear plant security guard within the NRC. Reid dropped that provision in part to give it more political momentum in Congress, aides said. That proposal had irked the NRC and nuclear utility companies who said private plant security forces, including gun-toting security officers, are already formidable. NRC officials have said they are still undergoing a "top to bottom" review of security looking for weaknesses, but see no need to take on the responsibility of plant security. Despite changes, Reid's retooled legislation still drew a prompt rebuke from one member of the five-member Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which regulates nuclear power plants. The bill "is so rife with bad provisions that I literally could not sleep last night," NRC Commissioner Edward McGaffigan wrote in a Thursday letter to Jeffords. McGaffigan wrote that it is not clear what purpose the anti-terrorism team and security coordinator would serve, among other critiques. And nuclear industry officials also still object to the bill, said Mitch Singer, spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute. The bill duplicates many of the protections already in place. The industry doesn't need a law calling for more communication between plants and local authorities, for instance, Singer said. "It's already happening," Singer said. It's not clear how the bill will fare in the Senate, although Reid said its chances are "pretty good," adding that several Republicans have signed on in support. Reid and Jeffords are leaders of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, which approved the legislation Thursday. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Las Vegas SUN main page ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Questions or problems? Click here. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 9 State to give pills to fight radiation Boston Globe Online: Print it! By Quynh-Giang Tran, 7/26/2001 The Massachusetts Department of Public Health announced yesterday a program to immediately distribute free antiradiation sickness tablets to 250,000 Massachusetts residents, workers, and school children within 10 miles of the Pilgrim, Seabrook, and Vermont Yankee nuclear power plants, ending years of debate over the policy. Residents can receive one potassium iodide tablet per person in the household from selected stores, including Brooks, CVS, Wal-Mart, and K Mart, until Sept. 30. Children will have additional access to the pills at school and child-care centers within the 10-mile emergency evacuation zone. Employers whose businesses are within the area can also request the pills for their employees. Potassium iodide is a salt-like, over-the-counter drug that can be used to protect the thyroid gland from radiation poisoning in the event of a radioactive iodine release in a nuclear accident. However, it does not protect other parts of the body against radiation exposure, leading some to fear that the pills give people a false sense of security. ''The pills are a precaution,'' said Nancy Ridley, assistant commissioner of the Bureau of Health Quality Management for the Massachusetts Department of Health. ''It's better to be safe than sorry.'' In the event of a nuclear accident, Ridley said people should evacuate and seek a shelter rather than relying on the pills. ''You are going to have other radioisotopes coming out [from a plant] that will have more damage to other parts of the body,'' Ridley said. The department has about 600,000 pills. After the distribution to people nearest the nuclear plants, all remaining pills will be stockpiled outside the 10-mile radius to be used after evacuations. Pilgrim is located in Plymouth, while Seabrook and Vermont Yankee are located just over the border in New Hampshire and Vernon, Vt., respectively. Ridley assured residents that there would be enough for everyone. ''It's a positive step for the people in the area, but it's a baby step because it only provides for those within the 10-mile radius,'' said Mary Lampert, nuclear program director for the antinuclear advocacy group Massachusetts Citizens for Safe Energy. This story ran on page B2 of the Boston Globe on 7/26/2001. © Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company. ***************************************************************** 10 Survey: Nevadans Oppose Deal With Feds for Compensation For Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository Majority of Respondents Believe State Should Continue Fight Against Project LAS VEGAS, July 25 /PRNewswire/ -- A majority of Nevada residents responding to a recent survey believe the State of Nevada should continue its efforts to defeat the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain and should not negotiate a deal for financial compensation with the federal government. About 65 percent of the 404 residents responding to the survey, conducted on behalf of the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency, believe the state should continue its fight against Yucca Mountain, while 31 percent believe the state should stop fighting and make a deal with the government. Northwest Survey & Data Services of Eugene, Ore., conducted the statewide survey June 6 through June 19, before the U.S. Senate voted to approve the repository July 9 and President Bush's subsequent signing of the bill formally approving the project July 23. The survey has a margin of error of 4.9 percent. "Although we lost the political battle against Yucca Mountain, the results of this survey support our contention that a majority of Nevada residents remain steadfast in their desire for the state to defeat the project in the courts," said Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency. In response to a question citing the possibility that the Senate in July would override Gov. Kenny Guinn's veto of the U.S. Department of Energy's plans for Yucca Mountain, more than 69 percent of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed that the state should continue with lawsuits against the federal government. About 27 percent either disagreed or strongly disagreed. "It is in the legal arena where we believe we have the best chance to expose the bad science and administrative hypocrisy that led the government to approve Yucca Mountain," Loux said. In response to the question, "Do you believe the state should stop its opposition and make a deal, or do you think the state should continue to do all it can to oppose the repository, even if that means turning down benefits that may be offered by the federal government?" 65.1 percent said the state should continue its fight. Meanwhile, 30.9 percent said the state should make a deal with the government. The remaining respondents either were undecided or did not respond to the question. A majority of respondents -- more than 59 percent -- said they either disagree or strongly disagree with claims made by Yucca Mountain supporters that the Department of Energy can be trusted to live up to any benefits agreement that the federal government can make with the state. Slightly more than 34 percent either agreed or strongly agreed with that claim. When asked whether they would vote for or against Yucca Mountain if given the opportunity to cast a ballot on the issue, an even larger majority of respondents -- 76.2 percent -- said they would vote against the proposed repository, while 20.3 percent said they could cast "yes" votes. SOURCE Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency Issuers of news releases and not PR Newswire are solely responsible for the accuracy of the content. <#> Copyright © 1996-2002 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights Reserved. A United Business Media company. ***************************************************************** 11 Do You Live Near Nuclear Waste Routes MapScience.com - EricWard.com [http://www.ericward.com] URLwire for Thursday July 25, 2002 New Site Shows If You Live Near Nuclear Waste Routes At the site [http://www.mapscience.org/] , type in any street address and get a customized map that shoes how close that address is to a nuclear waste route within one, three, and five miles. Also shown are the nearest nuclear waste sources, schools and hospitals. URLwire At the site [http://www.mapscience.org/] , type in any street address and get a customized map that shoes how close that address is to a nuclear waste route within one, three, and five miles. Also shown are the nearest nuclear waste sources, schools and hospitals. The government provides little useful information about nuclear waste transportation implications of the Yucca Mountain repository. To fill that public information gap, D.C. based Environmental Working Group (EWG) developed a sophisticated Geographic Information System (GIS) analysis and the capacity to serve custom maps on the Web. The routes analyzed were taken directly from the U.S. Dept. of Energy”s final Environmental Impact Statement for the Yucca Mountain. nuclear waste dump. DOE analyzed two scenarios in order to “bracket” the range of the number of shipments required to deliver nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain from locations nationwide. The lower bound shipment estimate is derived from the “primarily train” scenario; the upper bound is associated with the “primarily truck” scenario. Some combination of the two, the DOE says, will be used for Yucca Mountain. EWG research and information technology staff painstakingly identified the routes selected by DOE by comparing the published maps in the EIS to the high-resolution rail and highway maps displayed on our GIS system. Altogether, they traced 20,000 separate route segments to replicate the DOE’s published maps. They then used the GIS system to draw bands along those segments identifying distances within 1 mile, 2 miles and 5 miles of the route. With the routes in our GIS system, they were able to pre-measure the distance between route segments and the physical location (latitude and longitude) of each of the nation’s 29 million, nine-digit zip codes (Zip+4s, in USPS parlance). When you type in an address on the MapScience site [http://www.mapscience.org/] , our server looks up the Zip+4 for that address and the associated latitude and longitude, and locates its proximity to the nearest nuclear waste route segment on a custom map displayed on your computer. At the same time, it identifies schools and hospitals in the vicinity from separate “data layers” and displays them, too. To learn more or to check out your address, visit http://www.mapscience.org/ [http://www.mapscience.org/] [http://www.ericward.com] Copyright © URLwire. Online news ***************************************************************** 12 AU: Nuke dump proposal released - theage.com.au July 26 2002 Australia's low-level radioactive waste could end up in trenches and boreholes 20 metres underground in the South Australian outback under proposals released today. The draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for a national low-level nuclear waste repository was today released for public comment. Science Minister Peter McGauran released the draft EIS for one preferred site and two alternative sites near Woomera in the SA outback. "The preferred option is to dispose of the radioactive waste in trenches and boreholes up to 20m deep in the central 100 x 100m area of the 1.5 x 1.5km national repository site," Mr McGauran said in a statement. "If approved, the facility will be operated safely and will be well monitored and maintained." Mr McGauran said people should have their say on the project. "It's in the interests of all Australians to have a national, purpose-built repository for the safe disposal of our low level radioactive waste," he said. "Radioactive waste is generated from the use of radioactive materials in medicine, industry and research. "This waste is currently stored in over 100 locations around Australia in research institutions, hospitals and government and industry stores, largely in facilities that were not purpose-built." Public comment on the draft EIS was invited from July 29 to September 20 this year, he said. A supplementary report will be prepared responding to public comment on the draft EIS. A decision on the final site for the facility is expected to be made by the government by late 2002 or early 2003. AAP Copyright © 2002 The Age Company Ltd ***************************************************************** 13 YUCCA MOUNTAIN PROJECT: State-funded survey: Majority wants fight Friday, July 26, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal Poll's credibility questioned since it was conducted before Senate vote By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL Declaring that "the battle has just begun," Nuclear Projects Commission Chairman Brian McKay said Thursday he is encouraged by Nevada's legal strategy for defeating the Yucca Mountain Project. At the same meeting where he made that statement, a state-funded poll showed that Nevadans are intent on fighting the project instead of making a deal for benefits. The $8,000 poll was conducted nearly a month before the U.S. Senate approved the nuclear waste project. President Bush signed the measure Tuesday. McKay admitted that Nevada's attempts to derail the project in Congress "came up a day late and a dollar short." He said the state will now have its day in federal court to challenge a litany of questionable actions by the agencies charged with designing and regulating the repository. The poll presented to the commission shows about 31 percent of respondents want the state to stop its opposition in exchange for benefits while 65 percent want the state to continue to battle the repository in the courts. But another pollster said the state's poll lacks credibility because it was conducted before the Senate voted 60-39 to approve the project on July 9. Brad Coker, managing director of Mason-Dixon Polling &Research Inc. based in Washington, D.C., said the poll his firm conducted in mid-July for the Review-Journal and reviewjournal.com compared with another one it conducted in February "is a more current reflection of public opinion." "If you look at our poll in February, I think the results of (the state's) poll are pretty similar to what we had back then on the question of fight versus settle." "The problem is," Coker said, "the Senate vote itself likely ended any hope of stopping Yucca, so a shift in voter sentiment to get something in return is not surprising." He said the state's poll, however, would have been relevant if it had been released before the Senate vote. "The fact that it took 13 days to conduct just 404 voter interviews is a red flag. By any professional standard, that is far too long to be `in the field' on a public policy survey," said Coker, a 19-year veteran of the polling business. Nevada's public affairs consultant, Mark Brown, said Northwest Survey &Data Services of Eugene, Ore., conducted the statewide survey June 6 through June 19 "during the midst of the heated political battle with highest publicity and media coverage in many years." "We just wanted to sense the pulse of Nevada and be able to communicate that to public officials," Brown said. The larger poll conducted for the Review-Journal several days after the Senate vote found the respondents were nearly split on the issue. The telephone survey was conducted July 12 through July 15 by Mason-Dixon. That poll of 625 registered Nevada voters, 221 more respondents than in the state's survey, found an increased number of respondents over previous polls want the state to make a deal for monetary benefits instead of continuing to wage a legal war against the project. The results show that 43 percent of the respondents favor making a deal while 49 percent would rather continue to fight the decision in court. Eight percent were not sure about what to do. The Mason-Dixon poll carries a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points. The state's poll by Northwest Survey &Data Services has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points. In February, six months before the Senate voted and shortly after Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham recommended the site, Mason-Dixon found that one-third of the people surveyed agreed that state leaders should make a deal. Nearly two-thirds of the respondents in that poll said Nevada leaders should not try to get as much federal money as possible in exchange for hosting a repository. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2002 ***************************************************************** 14 DOE expected to seek more Yucca Mountain money Friday, July 26, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal $94 million supplemental budget pending By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- Seeking to capitalize on its recent victory in Congress, the Department of Energy is preparing to ask lawmakers for additional money this year to speed work on the Yucca Mountain Project, sources confirmed Thursday. DOE has formed a $94 million supplemental budget request that is being reviewed by the White House Office of Management and Budget, officials said. It was not clear when the request would be finalized nor how it would be handled by Congress. "We're working with the Department of Energy to determine what funds are necessary," OMB spokeswoman Amy Call said without confirming the specifics of the talks. After winning lopsided House and Senate votes in recent months to finalize Yucca Mountain as the designated repository site, the DOE "wants to take advantage of the political opportunity they've been given," said an industry official who monitors the program. But the Energy Department is fighting a deep cut in the Yucca Mountain budget it sent to Capitol Hill already this year. A Senate bill written by chief Yucca critic Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., reduces 2003 spending by more than a third. The Bush administration asked for $527 million and the Senate has cut that to $336 million. Drew Willison, a Reid Senate Appropriations Committee aide, said a DOE supplemental budget request for Yucca has been rumored "for months" but the department has given no indications of its plans. "Not that it would make a difference to Senator Reid," who would fight any such proposal, Willison said. "The only way to get additional money is for Reid's subcommittee to appropriate it and we've seen what Senator Reid does to Yucca Mountain funding," spokeswoman Tessa Hafen said. Margaret Chu, who heads the Yucca Mountain Project as director of DOE's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, mentioned the plan in passing during a presentation at a nuclear industry meeting earlier this week, according to a person who attended. Reports in the energy trade press indicate a Yucca budget add-on of about $100 million is being considered. Sources said the new budget proposal was put together on July 10, the day after the Senate voted 60-39 to finalize the Yucca site 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Of the $94 million request, about $75 million would be spent on license preparations for the repository with the remainder on waste acceptance programs including nuclear waste transportation, a source said. Energy Department officials said earlier this year they would consider seeking more money if Congress voted by mid-year to approve Yucca Mountain. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2002 ***************************************************************** 15 Former environmental director testifies at waste trial Omaha.com Published Friday July 26, 2002 *BY ROBYNN TYSVER* WORLD-HERALD BUREAU LINCOLN - Despite assurances from consultants, a former state official testified Thursday that he had doubts about a company's financial ability to build a low-level nuclear waste facility in Nebraska. Randy Wood said he began to hear rumors in 1997 that the company, U S Ecology, was in financial trouble. Wood, then director of the Department of Environmental Quality, decided he needed another opinion. A year later, with a second unfavorable opinion in hand, he denied a license to build the facility. Wood, who now works in Texas, was the latest member of former Gov. Ben Nelson's administration to testify in a nuclear waste trial in federal court. A political appointee, Wood played a pivotal role in the state's decision to deny U S Ecology a license to build the controversial facility in Boyd County. That decision is at the heart of a lawsuit filed by a five-state compact against Nebraska. The compact alleges that the state denied the license on political grounds after utility companies had shelled out about $100 million to get the license. The state counters that although Nelson opposed the facility on the campaign trail, he made it clear there should be a "bright line" between his administration and regulators and that the license was rejected on scientific grounds. The trial is expected to end next week. As head of the Environmental Quality Department, Wood oversaw much of the technical review of the license application. He said no one in Nelson's office attempted to lobby him on technical decisions. A letter written by him and delivered to U S Ecology by a member of the governor's staff, he said, was not dictated by the Governor's Office. The 1991 letter outlined Wood's concern about wetlands on the proposed site - a key issue in the license review process. The letter was delivered to US Ecology by Kate Allen, then a member of Nelson's staff and a vocal opponent of the facility. The state hired consultants to help with the technical review of the license in 1991. One of the consultants was Dale Jacobson, a civil engineer in Omaha. As part of his duties, Jacobson reviewed US Ecology's financial status. Regulations required that the company have $50 million in the bank to build the facility. Regulators disagreed about whether the company had to have the money before or after acquiring the license. Jacobson believed that the company could get a bank guarantee or a loan after obtaining the license. He also believed that the company's financial status was "acceptable." Wood disagreed and decided to get another opinion from the Conley Smith financial firm, which determined that U S Ecology did not have the financial ability to build the facility. Wood asked Jacobson to change his report from "acceptable" to "unacceptable." Jacobson refused. "We asked him to change that, given the report from Conley Smith the day before," Wood said. "We can't say it's acceptable. That misleads the applicant. That misleads the public." Omaha World-Herald: Midlands ©2002 Omaha World-Herald. ***************************************************************** 16 Graham appointed to conference committee that could require plutonium shipment deadlines, fines AP Wire | 07/25/2002 | Graham appointed to conference committee that could require plutonium shipment deadlines, fines [http://www.ledger-enquirer.com] JACOB JORDAN Associated Press Writer COLUMBIA, S.C. - Rep. Lindsey Graham says he is one step closer to making sure that weapons-grade plutonium is not stored long-term at the Savannah River Site near Aiken. Graham, R-S.C., said Thursday that he has been appointed to a conference committee assigned to work out the differences between the House and Senate versions of the Defense Authorization bill. The Senate version of that bill includes wording that calls for fines of up to $100 million per year if the Energy Department fails to meet a strict plutonium processing schedules. Fines begin if the processing hasn't started by 2011. If processing hasn't started by 2017, all plutonium shipped to the state must be removed. "My goal is to get the House to agree to the language," Graham said. But that may be difficult. "There's no statute like this. There's no statute on the books that requires penalties to be paid to the state if they don't remove plutonium," Graham said. "There's no statute on the books that has this many deadlines and requirements so there will be some people who won't want this to be a precedent." Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., introduced an identical bill where fines and deadlines would serve as an insurance policy that the department would meet its 2006 goal to finish cleanup work and close the Rocky Flats facility in Colorado, which is sending plutonium to SRS. "I could see where other people want to mimic what Sen. Thurmond and I have done and if that happens the whole system is going to blow up," Graham said. "My goal is to get our language approved without letting it spread throughout the system in a way that would bankrupt the Department of Energy." Gov. Jim Hodges, a Democrat, sued the Energy Department last month in U.S. District Court to stop plutonium shipments from the Rocky Flats facility but a judge ruled against Hodges. The governor appealed to the 4th Circuit Court in Virginia which heard oral arguments July 10 but has not issued a ruling. Energy Department officials have not said if they have begun shipments citing national security reasons. ***************************************************************** 17 White House could soon join Yucca money fight Las Vegas SUN July 26, 2002 By Benjamin Grove WASHINGTON -- The White House soon may enter the fray over the Yucca Mountain budget as Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., maneuvers to slash money for the nuclear waste dump project. Fresh from its triumph in Congress, the Energy Department, which manages Yucca, is quietly working with the White House's Office of Management and Budget to prepare a "supplemental" budget request to Congress, sources said. The money -- it's not known exactly how much -- would be in addition to the $527 million President Bush requested in the proposed national budget he presented to Congress in February. "We are working with the Department of Energy to determine what additional resources are necessary (for Yucca)," OMB spokeswoman Amy Call said. Reid, who sits on the budget-setting Appropriations Committee, opposes additional money for Yucca. "You know what kind of reception it would get from me, but we have 99 other senators to worry about," Reid said. "From me it would get the cold shoulder." The money would keep the long-delayed project on target to meet an ambitious goal of opening the dump by 2010. The Energy Department needs the money for waste transportation planning and to prepare an application for a construction license, to be submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission by December 2004. OMB and Energy Department officials would not confirm how much more money the White House plans to request. It may be as much as $100 million, according to Environment and Energy Daily, a news service quoting industry sources. "We are working through the budget process in a responsible manner to ensure that the project can move forward in a responsible manner," department spokesman Joe Davis said. The extra money could prove crucial to the project next year because Reid, as chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that sets Yucca funding, this week arranged to cut the Bush budget request of $527 million to $336 million. Yucca advocates in Congress are vowing to restore the money, so House and Senate negotiators will hammer out a final budget agreement behind closed doors later this year. Reid negotiates to cut the budget every year as part of an annual attempt to slow the project. But this year budget wrangling takes on a new urgency because Congress this month approved the project, propelling it forward into a licensing phase. Officials at OMB point to page 411 of the appendix to the President's budget. The document plainly states that the White House would request additional money for Yucca if Congress officially approves the project, which it did. The Energy Department needs the additional money for transportation planning and to "provide a long-term management and financing plan for the entire licensing and construction effort," the Bush budget says. It's unclear whether lawmakers would approve the extra Yucca money this year. The Senate Appropriations Committee, among others, would have to approve it. Reid cannot single-handedly block budget requests, and the appropriations panel includes a number of Yucca advocates, including Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 18 Editorial: Nevadans shouldn't back down Las Vegas SUN July 26, 2002 Now that Congress and President Bush have approved the Yucca Mountain project, there have been renewed calls for Nevada officials to negotiate for benefits in return for conceding the fight. But Nevadans shouldn't even consider such an inane idea. As a practical matter, Congress and President Bush aren't about to hand us the keys to the treasury in light of what little money is left -- if any -- after the huge tax cuts and the war on terrorism. Besides, years ago New Mexico was assured it would receive financial benefits in return for allowing radioactive waste to be buried in its state, but the Energy Department reneged on its commitments. It also bears noting that there are hurdles that the Energy Department still must overcome before it can get a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build a dump. The licensing process will allow Nevada to point out the defects in the federal government's plans to ship and bury 77,000 tons of nuclear waste, a process that could lead to the license being denied. Nevada state government also will try to derail the dump through lawsuits filed in federal court. Both options, while facing considerable odds for success, still should be aggressively pursued. It also helps that Sen. Harry Reid is the chairman of a subcommittee with oversight of the Yucca Mountain project. The subcommittee recently recommended that just $336 million be set aside in the next year for Yucca Mountain, $191 million less than what Bush wanted. Reid likely won't get everything he wants, but decreasing the budget in any significant amount buys additional time before a dump can be built. Time, and more of it, is essential to Nevada's success. The state so far has been overwhelmed by the nuclear power industry's influence and money, but there is no price that we should place on the safety of Nevada's residents. This is a battle worth fighting, and Nevadans shouldn't weaken their resolve. Despite the disappointment of the past few weeks, we're confident that Nevadans will rise to the occasion and fend off this terrible project that threatens our safety. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 19 Senate OKs $73 million in projects for Nevada Las Vegas SUN July 26, 2002 The Senate Appropriations Committee approved more than $73 million in transportation projects for Nevada on Thursday, more than half of it earmarked for road, rail and airport projects affecting the Las Vegas Valley. The full Senate is expected to vote on the spending bill in September, said Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev. The transportation bill includes a total of $16.5 million for a bridge to bypass Hoover Dam. Reid said he inserted special language in the bill to speed up construction of the bypass. The bill also includes $10 million to widen U.S. 95 in Laughlin at the cutoff to Railroad Pass, which will help ease traffic in Laughlin until the bypass bridge is completed. Another $3.5 million goes to construction of the Las Vegas beltway from Pecos Road to Stephanie Avenue, and another $1 million to study ways to widen Interstate 15 between North Las Vegas and the Las Vegas Speedway. Reid said he put $1 million to build pedestrian overpasses in downtown Las Vegas to help spur development there. At least $10 million has been included for a monorail that will travel along the Strip. Another $9 million could build new bus and train depots around Las Vegas. There's $200,000 for a federal study on an Amtrak high-speed train between Las Vegas and Los Angeles and $2 million to continue work on creating a magnetic levitation train between Southern Nevada and Southern California. McCarran International Airport could receive $5.3 million to improve the air traffic control tower and other equipment and $1.5 million for an alternative-fuel bus project. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 20 Yucca: You've been dumped on. Now what? Answers to 8 questions about the Yucca Mountain screw job and how it affects your life By Damon Hodge (damon.hodge@vegas.com [damon.hodge@vegas.com] ), Joe Schoenmann (schoenmann@vegas.com [schoenmann@vegas.com] ) and Josh Bell (josh.bell@vegas.com [josh.bell@vegas.com] ) Illustrations by Benjamen Purvis The Senate's July 9 vote to send nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain officially ended The Period of Uncertainty. Officially, we are screwed. But, the more we thought about it, the more we realized that, before the first shipment runs over Mayor Oscar Goodman's body and heads for the mountain in 2010, we have more questions about our future than ever before. In fact, it feels like we've entered The Period of Even More Uncertainty. None of this, as you'll notice, has to do with our odds of winning any of the seven lawsuits filed by Nevada over the matter. Blame the Weekly staff's developing case of narcotizing dysfunction for that oversight, if you want. We're now braced for our destiny as the Entertainment and Nuclear-Waste Dump Capital of the World and curious about one thing in particular: Now what? We've broken that question down to eight parts for your convenience. We've even been thoughtful enough to provide answers. I'm tired of reading this story already. How come? You might be suffering from narcotizing dysfunction. Coined in the 1940s by Columbia University researchers, narcotizing dysfunction refers to information overload caused by overreporting an issue. Rather than producing empathy, says UNLV associate communications professor Tony Feri, apathy results. "A person can read stories (about an issue) and understand them, but they confuse the energy of reading the stories with thinking they have done something about the issue, or they begin to develop feelings of apathy," Feri says. "The stories becomes less news and more background noise." UNLV political science professor Ted Jelen says he's been tired of the Yucca issue "for quite a while." Done right, he says, media coverage can pique interest on a covered-to-death issue. Some stories about obtaining benefits for housing nuclear waste have been interesting reads, Jelen says, although he thinks it's too late for Nevada to begin negotiating for perks. Originally from Illinois, which has more nuclear reactors than any other state, and living in Las Vegas the last five years, Jelen sees both sides of the argument: the nuclear-waste-should-be-stored-in-remote-confines-away-from-people rhetoric espoused by the pro-Yucca lobby, and the argument from repository enemies that, at a minimum, waste should be kept where it's produced and, ultimately, it be transmuted into a less-deadly form or energy or that nuclear power be eliminated. "I'm not jaded on this issue, yet," Jelen says. "But I do think the media actually got more folks interested in Yucca Mountain." — D.H. What do tourists think about Sin City now? "Viva Las Vegas" sings to on-hold callers of Holiday Travel. No wonder why, in its 32 years, the Pennsylvania company has booked thousands of flights to Las Vegas. And executives don't see that tune changing. "I was in Vegas recently and the only people who seemed worried about Yucca Mountain were locals," Holiday Travel President Dorothy Petrulli says. "People who go to Las Vegas are gamblers. They couldn't care less about Yucca Mountain." Consensus among travel companies contacted by the Weekly is that, nuclear waste or not, gamblers will continue gamble and leisure travelers will continue to relax. Travel USA, based in Buffalo, N.Y., specializes in Vegas excursions, and owner Linda Scamurra expects to continue booking upwards of 2,000 Vegas-bound visitors annually. Since the Senate's July 9 approval of Yucca as a dump site, her 30-year-old company has seen no decrease in reservations. Most customers, she says, are avid gamblers, while others are repeat visitors oblivious to-or disinterested in-the issue. "The city is a popular destination and always will be," Scamurra says. Trudi Frank's been unable to gauge Yucca's impact on Las Vegas-based Total Travel. Business has yet to return to pre-9/11 levels, she says, making an analysis speculative. Besides, any widespread economic recriminations are years away, she says, as the issue is mired in litigation and the dump's not scheduled to open till 2010. "I don't think there will be fear until it's almost here, then it will scare people who travel," says Frank, whose six-year-old business books 200-plus trips per year. "Unless they see it and can physically be involved with it and touch it, I don't think nuclear waste is going to make much of a difference. People are going to do what they want regardless." — D.H. Will people still want to move here? If it comes, they will build. Entombing radioactive refuse under an earthquake-prone ridge of volcanic rock may scare some potential newcomers, home builders say, but shouldn't cool Las Vegas' red-hot housing market. Last year was a record one for new-home sales, with 22,940. "We've lived with nuclear explosions and they didn't affect property values. This won't, either," says Dennis Smith, president of Homebuilders Research Inc., a respected tracker of local housing activity. "We can't say that property values will be negatively affected. There's no proof. We haven't seen anything yet." That much Monaco Caruso concedes. Public affairs director for the 750-member Southern Nevada Home Builders Association, she sees inherent dangers in nuclear-waste storage. During the public comment period on Yucca, the 50-year-old association filed statements opposing the project from community health and transportation safety premises, a rare bit of veracity for the typically stoic group. "We're fairly conservative and don't take lots of positions on things, but we felt a need to speak out," Caruso said. "As with anything, there's obviously people on both sides of the fence. We're against it." Yucca Mountain wouldn't exactly be a boon to home builders, Caruso says, noting the handful of permanent jobs the repository would create-many in equipment operation and security-and its distance, 90 miles from here. At best, industry officials expect a negligible effect-50 or 60 new homes, an imperceptible total compared to the 50,000 homes sold and resold on average each year in Las Vegas. "There would be virtually no impact," Caruso said. Erika Geiser's fielded few calls about Yucca Mountain from clients at Christopher Homes, which caters to a high-end, educated clientele with a luxury line of abodes costing upwards of $500,000. Should nuclear waste come, the marketing executive hopes the combination of engineered safety barriers and purported geological protections will mitigate fears. "If we get it, we hope it will have no impact," Geiser said. "But by no means do we want it. We don't Yucca Mountain." — D.H. Naturally, health insurance rates will go up, right? Health insurance premiums seem to rise if the wind changes direction. Just think what a really good excuse-like, oh, having nuclear-waste trucked through our front yard and dumped into our back yard-could do to our rates. The spent fuel rods of enriched uranium and radioactive by-products are so toxic that anti-nuke opponents say three minutes of exposure to a 10-year-old fuel rod is lethal. Backers admit that accidents could happen along the way whether it's transported by truck, rail or barge. And you probably didn't know, thanks to a little-known law, that the tab for any major mishap would be picked up by we the people. Enacted in 1957, the Price-Anderson Act caps the nuclear industry's liability at $9.43 billion in any accident. Citizens foot any costs above that, a worrisome prospect considering that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the independent body charged with licensing the dump, estimates that a worst-case accident will cost upwards of $300 billion. (Chernobyl cost $358 billion, and that was back in the '80s). With the Yucca battle now tied up in litigation and waste storage still eight years away, local insurance officials declined speculation on the repository's impact on individual health premiums. Too early, they say. "We do not see a direct impact on health insurance rates at this point,"says Dale Fratianne, sales manager for John Alden Horizon Health. Sierra Health Services hasn't evaluated the situation yet, either. "If it becomes an absolute certainty that the waste will come and we can better understand the details of the project, its impact will certainly be taken into consideration," says Jenny DesVaux Oakes, Sierra's assistant vice president. "Health insurance premiums are based on experience, and this is a new issue." At present, Matthew Yee is unaware of any Michigan insurer that underwrites policies with nuclear incident caveats. "As far as I know, it's not even a factor that's considered," said Yee, vice president of specialty sales for Baker-Hopp and Associates, a Harper Woods, Mich., company specializing in solid-waste insurance. "I grew up two miles from Enrico Fermi II (Detroit Edison's nuclear plant), and I can tell you it's not an issue." — D.H. Can Harry still give 'em hell? Perhaps it was his role in the Jim Jeffords' switcheroo that gave us hope. By convincing the Vermont senator to flee the GOP and become an independent, Harry Reid earned the Senate's No. 2 post, put Democrats in control of the Senate and became the most powerful Nevada lawmaker since Pat McCarran. The Democrat also received anointing as our savior from Yucca Mountain. Perhaps it was unfair. Jesus had no problems raising Lazarus from the dead. Our man Harry wields power, too, as the majority whip, but it may have been unreasonable to think he could thwart a Canaanite government hell-bent on sending the nation's nuclear truffles our way. (The feds pumped $7 billion into the repository before any federal approvals). Yes, Nevada's Yucca-overthrow bid in the Senate fell 12 votes shy, 60-39, but the tally obscures Reid's indefatigable work on the issue. Without his involvement, the New York Times notes, 10 anti-Yucca votes would've been a miracle of walk-on-water proportions. Reid knew it was an uphill battle that would test friendships. After the vote, he says peers consoled him. Vermont Democrat Pat Leahy told him he couldn't sleep after the tally. "He said, ‘I'm sorry I let that I let you down,'" Reid said. "(Another opponent, Democrat) Zell Miller from Georgia said, ‘Harry, it was the hardest vote I ever had to cast." With the battle now in the courts-Nevada has filed seven lawsuits against the project-Reid is reflective, cherishing successes and failures. "I feel pretty good. I needed to pick up 12 more votes and I couldn't pick up 12 more Democrats," said Reid, who stunned Capitol Hill by scoring the of pledges of freshman Democrats Jean Carnahan of Missouri and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan. "I was disappointed in a few of my friends who didn't vote with me, but very, very few," Reid said. On the Republican side, he had Colorado Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell. "The only new one was John Ensign." If you need proof that Reid still has clout on Capitol Hill, check out what happened Tuesday: A Senate committee headed by Reid cut $200 million from Yucca funding. — J.S. and D.H. What do our silent gaming friends say now? Analysis of the casino industry's sideline shuffle on Yucca Mountain has been scathing. Fittingly. For all its bigness, Big Gaming was a Big Flop, a multibillion-dollar benchwarmer in the most important game in town. Save for Polo Towers executive Stephen Cloobeck and a few others, the Strip contingent's lips were zipped. Only after President Bush approved the dump did Big Gaming break the huddle. Its lobbying arm, the Nevada Resort Association, on record since 1991 opposing the dump, donated $600,000 to the anti-Yucca effort after Bush OK'd the site. That was followed by the American Gaming Association, mouthpiece for the U.S. casino industry, which set aside $500,000, a pittance compared with its $4.4 million in soft money, PAC and individual contributions to federal parties and candidates through April. AGA President Frank Fahrenkopf was unavailable for comment, but one gaming official told us that Nevada gaming companies were best positioned to thwart Yucca because the AGA formed in 1995, eight years after Congress selected the site. Nevada Resort Association President Bill Bible did not return calls seeking comment. Choosing silence as the better part of economic valor was the safest route for gaming companies, observers say. Better to leave the community high and dry than roil lawmakers or upset stockholders. "Everyone has a different tolerance for taking care of the community and doing what's altruistic to protect the citizens of this community and citizens of the United States," Cloobeck says. "It's very difficult for executives to balance their career and social efforts. A bad decision (inaction) was made based on corporate earnings. A lot of people would love to speak their minds, but are tied by corporate restraints. "This is not over," Cloobeck adds. "This is Round 3 or 4 of a 12-round fight." — D.H. Any chance of science still saving our ass? UNLV is conducting 32 studies of the Yucca Mountain project, including those on seismic activity, water flow under the mountain, the performance of waste canisters and the effects of bacteria. Money from the Yucca Mountain project has been a boon to UNLV researchers, says Gary Cerefice, research scientist at the university's Harry Reid Center. "Just being the local university is important," he says. "If there's something they need, they come here." The key word right now seems to be "cooperation"-UNLV researchers are doing tests the government wants. But that can change, Cerefice notes, pointing out UNLV's status as an independent research university. No matter what happens with Yucca Mountain, university scientists will be there to monitor it. So, could researchers use Yucca funds to challenge the site's feasibility? "Anyone who comes in with a preconceived notion will never be funded," Cerefice says. Though it's possible that future study could cast doubt on Yucca's viability, current studies aren't intensive enough to do so. "There are still a number of geological studies that need to be conducted," geology professor Jean Cline says. "All aspects of the project need to be monitored. But no show-stopper has been identified yet." Cline sees a few potential "show-stoppers," including the effect of colloids on the transport of radio-nuclides and the possible corrosion of the waste containers. There's no way to say, however, whether a study of any of these aspects will yield results that put the brakes on the Yucca project. Until such a study comes along, university researchers, like the rest of us, will just have to wait and watch. — J.B. Oscar talked tough, but will he be tough? If there's a silver lining in the Yucca debate, it's going to come at the expense of the men and women shipping that glowing waste through Las Vegas on the way to Yucca Mountain. Mayor Oscar Goodman-who could very well still be mayor in 2010 given his popularity ratings-has vowed to personally arrest drivers at the wheel of trucks carting radioactive refuse past Luxor, Circus-Circus and Fremont Street. "If they can't tell us we're safe, how dare they tell us they're bringing this crap here?" the mayor said at a Department of Energy hearing earlier this year. "Let's see the driver try to get out of jail in my city!" If he's serious, you could sell tickets; the streets would be lined with hecklers, tomato throwers and anyone else who wants to shout down the evils of Big Government. Oscar may be serious, but there are some questions as to how he would achieve this not-so-minor feat. As a small group of anti-wasters found out a few weeks ago-they were told that a planned stoppage of traffic on Interstate 15 near Charleston Boulevard had to be called off because it might endanger people-pulling something like that off won't be easy. And the highway is governed by the Nevada Highway Patrol. A call there this week, asking for contingency plans, turned up nada. "I think he would have to clarify what his intentions are," says NHP spokesman Alan Davidson, "from the standpoint that we are out on the road and the mayor is not a police officer. Sure, anyone can make a citizen's arrest. But I just think he's trying to pep up the community." You mean, it's just a lot of rhetoric? "Yes." That is not to say Oscar won't do it. But let's hope, against all odds, this thing dies in the courts long before he tries. — J.S. [http://www.lasvegasweekly.com] ***************************************************************** 21 AU: Nuclear waste dump proposed for Outback The West Australian + July 26, 2002 CANBERRA AUSTRALIA'S low-level radioactive waste could end up in trenches and boreholes 20 metres underground in the South Australian outback under proposals released today. The draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for a national low-level nuclear waste repository was today released for public comment. Science Minister Peter McGauran released the draft EIS for one preferred site and two alternative sites near Woomera in the SA outback. "The preferred option is to dispose of the radioactive waste in trenches and boreholes up to 20m deep in the central 100 x 100m area of the 1.5 x 1.5km national repository site," Mr McGauran said in a statement. "If approved, the facility will be operated safely and will be well monitored and maintained." Mr McGauran said people should have their say on the project. "It's in the interests of all Australians to have a national, purpose-built repository for the safe disposal of our low level radioactive waste," he said. "Radioactive waste is generated from the use of radioactive materials in medicine, industry and research. "This waste is currently stored in over 100 locations around Australia in research institutions, hospitals and government and industry stores, largely in facilities that were not purpose-built." Public comment on the draft EIS was invited from July 29 to September 20 this year, he said. A supplementary report will be prepared responding to public comment on the draft EIS. A decision on the final site for the facility is expected to be made by the government by late 2002 or early 2003. The Australian Democrats said the government was applying double standards to nuclear waste issues given the treatment of waste at Maralinga in the South Australian outback. Democrats energy spokeswoman Lyn Allison said: "If low-level waste must be stored 20 metres underground, how is it that plutonium-contaminated material with a half-life of 24,000 years can be buried at Maralinga in shallow earth trenches covered by just one or two metres of soil?" -AAP © 2002 West Australian Newspapers Limited All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 22 Air Force can't explain possible toxic barrel KnoxNews: Sci/tech Frank Munger By SAM STANTON July 25, 2002 They've found garbage, candy wrappers, newsletters and even plutonium in the two years officials have been digging at a once-secret dump site on the grounds of McClellan Air Force Base. But this week workers uncovered a 55-gallon drum that may contain one of the most disturbing finds yet: a material that may be uranium, the radioactive element used in atomic weapons. Air Force and Sacramento County officials say there is no confirmation yet that the material is uranium and insisted that it poses no danger to the public or the ongoing conversion of the base to civilian use. The radioactive reading from the barrel registered at 0.15 millirem, officials said, adding that a typical chest X-ray measures 10 millirem. Despite that, workers at the 1.25-acre dump site have secured the barrel and its contents inside a five-story high tentlike structure that covers the site. "It's looking like it is uranium, but we have to do further, more in-depth testing to be sure," said Dawn Young, spokeswoman for the Air Force Conversion Agency, which is cleaning up the site. The barrel was discovered as part of the ongoing excavation of an area known as Confirmed Site 10, a once-secret dumping area where the Air Force disposed of hundreds of barrels of trash and radioactive material. The site was located as officials began working to prepare the base for civilian business use and former base workers came forward and recalled watching the burial of the barrels. Excavation of the site began two years ago as workers uncovered 110 barrels in three weeks. The process was halted, however, when officials discovered some barrels containing plutonium, which is used in nuclear weapons and reactors. The radioactive reading does not necessarily mean the material is uranium, Young added, and no one is certain why such a material would have been in use at the base. Officials had a similar problem two years ago when the plutonium was discovered, with the Air Force saying it was surprised by the find and could not explain it. (Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com.) The Knoxville News-Sentinel Co. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 23 AU: Radioactive dump views sought NEWS.com.au | (July 26, 2002) LOW-level radioactive waste could end up in trenches and boreholes 20 metres underground in the South Australian outback under proposals just released. The draft Environmental Impact Statement for a national low-level nuclear waste repository was made available today for public comment. Science Minister Peter McGauran released the paper, which looks at one preferred site and two alternative sites near Woomera, South Australia. "The preferred option is to dispose of the radioactive waste in trenches and boreholes up to 20m deep in the central 100 x 100m area of the 1.5 x 1.5km national repository site," Mr McGauran said. "If approved, the facility will be operated safely and will be well monitored and maintained." Mr McGauran said people should have their say on the project. "It's in the interests of all Australians to have a national, purpose-built repository for the safe disposal of our low level radioactive waste," he said. "Radioactive waste is generated from the use of radioactive materials in medicine, industry and research. "This waste is currently stored in over 100 locations around Australia in research institutions, hospitals and government and industry stores, largely in facilities that were not purpose-built." Public comment on the draft EIS is invited from July 29 to September 20. A supplementary report will be prepared responding to that comment, and a decision on the final site for the facility is expected to be made by late 2002 or early 2003. AAP NEWS.COM.AU ***************************************************************** 24 Survey: Nevadans Oppose Deal With Feds for Compensation For Yucca Mountain Nuclear Repository Majority of Respondents Believe State Should Continue Fight Against Project LAS VEGAS, July 25 /PRNewswire/ -- A majority of Nevada residents responding to a recent survey believe the State of Nevada should continue its efforts to defeat the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain and should not negotiate a deal for financial compensation with the federal government. About 65 percent of the 404 residents responding to the survey, conducted on behalf of the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency, believe the state should continue its fight against Yucca Mountain, while 31 percent believe the state should stop fighting and make a deal with the government. Northwest Survey & Data Services of Eugene, Ore., conducted the statewide survey June 6 through June 19, before the U.S. Senate voted to approve the repository July 9 and President Bush's subsequent signing of the bill formally approving the project July 23. The survey has a margin of error of 4.9 percent. "Although we lost the political battle against Yucca Mountain, the results of this survey support our contention that a majority of Nevada residents remain steadfast in their desire for the state to defeat the project in the courts," said Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency. In response to a question citing the possibility that the Senate in July would override Gov. Kenny Guinn's veto of the U.S. Department of Energy's plans for Yucca Mountain, more than 69 percent of respondents either agreed or strongly agreed that the state should continue with lawsuits against the federal government. About 27 percent either disagreed or strongly disagreed. "It is in the legal arena where we believe we have the best chance to expose the bad science and administrative hypocrisy that led the government to approve Yucca Mountain," Loux said. In response to the question, "Do you believe the state should stop its opposition and make a deal, or do you think the state should continue to do all it can to oppose the repository, even if that means turning down benefits that may be offered by the federal government?" 65.1 percent said the state should continue its fight. Meanwhile, 30.9 percent said the state should make a deal with the government. The remaining respondents either were undecided or did not respond to the question. A majority of respondents -- more than 59 percent -- said they either disagree or strongly disagree with claims made by Yucca Mountain supporters that the Department of Energy can be trusted to live up to any benefits agreement that the federal government can make with the state. Slightly more than 34 percent either agreed or strongly agreed with that claim. When asked whether they would vote for or against Yucca Mountain if given the opportunity to cast a ballot on the issue, an even larger majority of respondents -- 76.2 percent -- said they would vote against the proposed repository, while 20.3 percent said they could cast "yes" votes. Copyright © 1996-2002 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights ***************************************************************** 25 Torpedo fuel blast sank Kursk BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Friday, 26 July, 2002, The Kursk was one of Russia's most sophisticated submarines Russia has confirmed that an explosion of leaky torpedo fuel led to the sinking of the nuclear submarine Kursk in 2000, killing all of its 118 crew. Russia's prosecutor-general, Vladimir Ustinov, said an investigation had established that an exploding fuel from a blank torpedo caused the other blasts that destroyed the submarine. [Russia's Prosecutor-General Vladimir Ustinov] Ustinov said the blast was triggered by a complex chemical reaction Speaking at a press conference in Moscow, Mr Ustinov said no one was to blame for the disaster, and no criminal charges would be filed. Correspondents say the Russian government had long been reluctant to admit that its state-of-the-art submarine was destroyed by an internal malfunction. Investigators had examined a number of other theories as to why the submarine sank in the Barents Sea in August 2000. 'Minute-by-minute account' There were suggestions that the Kursk was struck by a torpedo from a foreign submarine or had hit a World War II mine. But earlier this month, a Russian commission said an explosion of fuel in an old torpedo sunk the submarine. This was confirmed on Friday by Mr Ustinov, who had been ordered by President Vladimir Putin to inform the public of a 100-page final report of the investigation. Giving a minute-by-minute account of the investigation's report, Mr Ustinov said the Kursk was sunk by the blast in its own torpedo, which did not even have a warhead. [Russian rescue vessel at the scene two days after the disaster] Russia was criticised for failing to accept offers of foreign help promptly He said the volatile substance - hydrogen peroxide - used as its fuel in the torpedo exploded because of a complex chemical reaction. "The initial impulse which triggered an explosion of the torpedo was the result of an unusual process of events inside the oxidising agent reserve of the torpedo," Mr Ustinov said. This triggered a massive explosion of other, combat-ready torpedoes, and just over a minute after the initial blast the front section of the submarine was completely destroyed. The prosecutor-general said that 23 mariners survived the initial explosion and gathered in the stern of the submarine. He said they all died within six to eight hours, succumbing to carbon monoxide poisoning from the fires and high pressure. After the disaster, the Russian Navy ordered torpedoes of that type that exploded to be removed from service. No charges Mr Ustinov said that the investigation had revealed some violations by Navy officials during the training exercises in the Barents Sea. But he said he would not press criminal charges because the violations did not directly lead to the Kursk's demise or the death of the crew. Three top Russian Navy officers were demoted and another eight sacked after failed rescue operation, which some experts said was a punishment for the Kursk disaster. At the time, the Russian Government was criticised for not accepting offers of Western aid promptly. © MMII | News Sources | Privacy ***************************************************************** 26 Safeguarding Soviet Weapons (washingtonpost.com) Friday, July 26, 2002; Page A32 THERE HAS been considerable progress recently toward forging an international consensus on the need for urgent action to prevent weapons of mass destruction from the former Soviet Union from falling into the hands of terrorists. The problem is that the sense of urgency has not yet penetrated the bureaucracy of the Bush administration or some of the Republican leadership in Congress. At the highest political level, the administration recently recorded an impressive achievement, persuading the other members of the Group of Eight of rich industrial nations to match $10 billion in planned U.S. spending to control and dismantle nuclear, chemical and biological weapons over the next 10 years. But at the more mundane level of implementation, this year's funds for programs in Russia and other former Soviet states were frozen until this week because of lingering resistance within the administration and Congress. At a time when senior administration officials are warning that attempts by terrorists to attack the United States with a weapon of mass destruction are all but inevitable, such roadblocks must be removed. Though U.S.-funded programs to deactivate or destroy former Soviet weapons and dispose of nuclear materials have been underway for a decade, the scale of the remaining problem is awesome, and terrifying. Sixty percent of Russian nuclear materials still are not properly safeguarded. Of even more serious concern, little has been done about the vast arsenals of chemical and biological weapons still held by Russia. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) and former Sen. Sam Nunn (D-Ga.), who originally sponsored the disposal and safeguard programs, recently visited a Russian base where 1,971,000 artillery shells filled with deadly chemical agents are stored in dilapidated bunkers; a terrorist who managed to obtain only one shell would have the means to kill as many as 100,000 people. Destroying that stockpile of chemical weapons is at the top of Sen. Lugar's priorities for new programs to be funded under the recent G-8 agreement. Serious obstacles must be overcome, including winning Russian cooperation for expanding control programs and holding allied governments to their somewhat vague funding commitments. What's remarkable -- and unacceptable -- are the continuing bureaucratic and political snags in Washington. Despite President Bush's strong and repeated endorsement of the Nunn-Lugar programs since 9/11, the State Department blocked disbursement of funds for new programs through the first nine months of the fiscal year by refusing to meet a congressional requirement that it certify Russia's compliance with existing arms control treaties. Though the Clinton administration issued the required certification for eight straight years, Bush administration hard-liners have nixed it on the grounds that Moscow has not opened some biological facilities to inspection. The administration instead asked Congress to pass legislation waiving the certification process; now that proposal is meeting resistance in the Republican-controlled House, which so far has agreed to a waiver only for the last months of this fiscal year. Serious problems do exist with winning Russia's full compliance with its commitments on weapons of mass destruction. But the proper response can hardly be to hamstring the programs that are working to dismantle or safeguard those weapons so they cannot fall into the hands of rogue states or terrorists. The Bush administration has been arguing that the Russian government should now be regarded as a partner; if it believes that rhetoric, it should issue the certification needed to expedite Nunn-Lugar programs, or press House Republicans for a permanent waiver. The challenge of controlling the threat of the former Soviet arsenal is huge enough; there's no room for obstructionism in Washington. © 2002 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 27 Former RF man takes lead role in helping Russia dispose of weapons-grade plutonium By: Judy Wiff July 25, 2002 John Baker, left, poses with his nephew Scott Baker of Hudson. Submitted photo. *The events of Sept. 11 re-emphasized to John Baker the importance of his work. * *As director of the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of International Technology Projects for the Office of Fissile Material Disposition, the 60-year-old former River Falls man supervises work with Russia to dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium.* As tragic as the Sept. 11 attacks were, things could have been worse, said Baker. "If one of those planes had had some nuclear device on it, it would have been 100 times worse." "We were already doing all this stuff," said Baker of his work. "The issues maybe became a little sharper after Sept. 11." This past weekend Baker hosted nine Russian nuclear scientists on stops in Hudson and River Falls before accompanying them to the Prairie Island nuclear plant in Red Wing, Minn., Monday. At Prairie Island the group heard presentations on the facility's Dry Spent Fuel Storage Project. During their visit to the United States, the Russians will also have briefings and tour the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory and a DSFS facility in Richland, Wash. "It will be an exhausting week, especially for the Russians," said Baker, "but we hope the knowledge gained by our Russian colleagues will be very beneficial to them as well as to our joint program." Baker, who graduated from River Falls High School in 1960, served as a nuclear reactor operator and electronics technician in the U.S. Navy from 1960 to 1968. He earned his degree in engineering physics from the University of Kansas in 1972 and worked in commercial nuclear business until 1990 when he took a job with the Department of Energy. During a summit meeting in June 2000, the United States and Russia reached an agreement under which each country would dispose of 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium. The Russian Federation intends to use its 34 tons as fuel. Both countries will build new industrial-scale facilities to convert the plutonium to fuel. The agreement calls for each country to begin operation of such facilities by 2007 and to achieve a disposition rate of at least two metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium per year, said Baker. The United States has agreed to spend $10 billion over a decade to help fund the Russian work. "If we can somehow prevent this material getting in the wrong hands, the price tag is pretty cheap," said Baker. The Department of Energy provides the budget for the Russian work. Baker is responsible for supervising and coordinating the work, that involves contracts with the Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, Pacific Northwest and Oak Ridge national laboratories. The reprocessing procedure involves changing plutonium from a metal to an oxide and mixing it with uranium to make fuel for use in reactors. The reprocessed material is no longer suitable for use in weapons, said Baker. "The reason we're doing this is to get rid of the stuff so it doesn't fall into the wrong hands," he said. Baker's first trip to Russia was in 1995 when he attended a workshop at the Russian Academy of Science. The workshop focused on the disarmament of Russian nuclear submarines. His first trip to Russia under the current project was in April 1997. Since then, said Baker, he's traveled to Russia about 40 times for visits that lasted from one to three weeks. Baker sympathizes with the Russians. "The communist government lied to the Russian people for 75 years and told them what a great power they were," he said. But despite making scientific advances, the government did nothing for the common people, said Baker. Now, even though they have an abundance of natural resources, Russia is a Third World country, he said. "It grates on their nerves ... that they're not as great as they were told they were," said Baker. "But they're a fine bunch of people, really a fine bunch of people." Baker is also skeptical of his own country. Now the plutonium disposal project, which he thinks is so important, has support from both Congress and the administration. "But that could change in a heartbeat," said Baker. When the new administration took over, it ordered an 8-month review of the project, bringing the work to a standstill for that time, said Baker. "During that eight months, they basically brought us to our knees," he said. "You get a very jaundiced view of the world, being in Washington, because things happen (there) for no particular reason," said Baker. Baker and his wife, the former Kay Armstrong of River Falls, live in Maryland where she works as a realtor. Their daughter died two years ago, and their son, a jazz musician, spent the last year teaching at a music college in Nakhodka, Russia. /©River Falls Journal 2002/ ***************************************************************** 28 Iraq seeking vital nuclear weapons equipment - report* * Ananova: * Saddam Hussein is trying to buy special equipment used to produce fuel for nuclear weapons. His agents have been attempting to purchase a certain type of stainless steel tubing, uniquely used in gas centrifuges and a key component in making the material for nuclear bombs. A US administration official has told the Washington Times the tubing is an essential component of Baghdad's plans to enrich uranium. Iraq wants to get the element to the point where it could be used to manufacture a nuclear bomb. US President George Bush has called for Saddam to be overthrown, accusing him of seeking weapons of mass destruction. "This is only one sign that Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons programme," one US official told the newspaper. And military sources said there was other evidence that Iraq is rebuilding its nuclear programme, which was to have been dismantled under UN sanctions imposed after the 1991 Gulf war. According to the Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, Iraq has in the past sought to create enriched uranium through the use of high speed centrifuges, which spin uranium hexafluoride gas. The spinning separates out uranium isotope gas that is highly enriched and can fuel a crude nuclear bomb. Gary Milhollin, director of the Wisconsin Project, told the newspaper that stainless steel tubing would be essential to building such gas centrifuges because the radioactive gas is extremely corrosive. Story filed: 08:52 Friday 26th July 2002 /Copyright © 2002 Ananova Ltd/ ***************************************************************** 29 Los Alamos Experiment Speeds Up Aging Of Nuclear Weapons With "Spiked" Plutonium ScienceDaily Magazine -- Los Alamos National Laboratory (http://www.lanl.gov/) Date: Posted 7/25/2002 Los Alamos Experiment Speeds Up Aging Of Nuclear Weapons With "Spiked" Plutonium LOS ALAMOS, N.M., July 24, 2002 - Sometime after midnight on Feb. 25, 1941, in a cramped, third-floor laboratory at the University of California in Berkeley, Glenn Seaborg, Joseph Kennedy and Art Wahl for the first time isolated a new, man-made element, number 94, one that would change the world. Today that element, plutonium, is the main ingredient of weapons in the U.S. nuclear stockpile. Those weapons now are older - and the plutonium inside them has been aging longer - than any earlier stockpile weapons. So researchers at the National Nuclear Security Administration's Los Alamos National Laboratory are trying to hurry along the plutonium aging process to learn how long the metal will last and how that might affect the stockpile. The nation stopped making new weapons in 1989 and stopped underground nuclear testing in 1992. Researchers at Los Alamos, which designed five of the seven weapon systems in the U.S. stockpile, play a major role in certifying each year that those weapons are safe, secure and reliable. Certification depends on understanding how the plutonium cores of the weapons, known as pits, will change with age. "We have to learn how to predict the properties of plutonium as it ages in the weapons, and to do that we need plutonium that's been around as long as plutonium has been on the planet," said Joe Martz, manager of Los Alamos' Enhanced Surveillance Program. The crucial experiment involves "spiking" samples of nuclear weapons plutonium, the isotope known as Pu-239, with 7.5 percent of the plutonium-238 isotope, which decays about 300 times faster. Plutonium-238, because of its high decay rate, is normally used to provide electrical power for deep-space probes such as the Galileo mission to Jupiter and the Cassini mission to Saturn. The hamburger-sized spiked samples, cast at Los Alamos on May 13, 2002, should age roughly 16 times faster than the plutonium-239 in U.S. nuclear weapons. "Every day that passes, the spiked plutonium will be aging more than two weeks, compared to normal weapons plutonium," said Dave Olivas, the metallurgical engineer who is running the experiment with physicist Franz Freibert; both work in Los Alamos' Nuclear Materials Science Group. "When the samples have aged for the equivalent of 60 years, we'll measure all their properties." This means Olivas and Freibert won't know for certain whether their efforts have paid off for four years, although they plan periodic checks to compare the spiked plutonium to metal inside stockpile weapons. The researchers began preparing for the experiment in 1998 by building a compact replica of the pit manufacturing line at Rocky Flats, where U.S. nuclear weapon cores were made from the mid-1950s until 1989. They prepared the plutonium-238 metal and combined it with plutonium-239, alloyed the metal with other materials, heat treated it, and shaped it, with every step closely mimicking the way weapons pits were fabricated at Rocky Flats. To ensure its authenticity, the team started with plutonium that was actually made at Rocky Flats just before it closed. They prepared nine identical samples spiked with the Pu-238 and nine of plain Pu-239, and compared their characteristics: fundamental structural, physical, chemical and mechanical properties, such as electrical resistivity and elastic constants, and metallic properties such as density, chemistry and strength. "At birth our samples are fraternal twins, and we are doing the DNA analysis to make sure," Martz explained. Now they must wait and see how the metal ages, like watching a time-lapse movie of a plant growing that's played on fast forward. Aging impacts in stockpile weapons has been subtle so far, but to understand the aging effects after 60 years, scientists can't simply multiply the effects they've seen in 20-year-old plutonium by three, the current age of the oldest weapons in the stockpile. This is because plutonium is the most unpredictable of all the metallic elements, and some aging effects may appear suddenly after years of stable behavior. The team expects to see some changes in the density of the spiked plutonium and in the growth of helium within its molecular structure, similar to aging effects they've observed in stockpile plutonium. By analyzing the samples at birth and as they age, the researchers hope to prove they have made plutonium that is nearly identical in nature to metal manufactured into weapons at Rocky Flats. By comparing the samples to the oldest material in the stockpile, they hope to determine whether the accelerated aging process accurately mimics the way weapon pits change as they age. "Most things age from the outside in, but plutonium is much more unique because it also ages from the inside out," says former Laboratory Director Sig Hecker, a plutonium metallurgist and technical adviser to the experiment. As plutonium atoms decay, they break down into uranium atoms and helium nuclei, both of which are highly energetic. The helium nuclei eventually combine with other helium nuclei to form helium gas bubbles inside the plutonium metal. The newborn uranium atoms continuously knock plutonium atoms out of place; in fact, about one of every 10 plutonium atoms in a pit is knocked out of position by uranium atoms each year. Most return to their original locale, but some are permanently displaced. "It's not enough simply to accelerate the initial displacement of the plutonium atoms and the damage due to this radioactive decay, we also have to raise the temperature of our samples to accelerate the subsequent healing of the damage, just as it happens in a real weapon," Olivas explained. A lot is riding on the experiment. The measurements of density, symmetry and other changes in the spiked plutonium will become sentinels for the plutonium in the stockpile. They will tell the scientists and engineers who continuously track the health of nuclear weapons whether the pits will survive for 60 years and longer. That predictive capability will be crucial for policy makers who must decide when to replace stockpile pits. Los Alamos has been working to recapture the capability to make a small number of pits, and is scheduled to produce its first certified stockpile pit in 2007, a year after the experiment should yield results. But the United States has not yet decided when and where to build a facility to make new pits, nor how many that new plant should make each year. "Intelligent experiments such as this will inform the policy community so that decisions about future, larger-scale manufacturing can accurately assess the environmental and fiscal costs," Martz explained. "This will provide the only data on 60-year-old plutonium, and that's why this experiment is so crucial to the success of stockpile stewardship," he added. ### Los Alamos National Laboratory is operated by the University of California for the National Nuclear Security Administration of the Department of Energy and works in partnership with NNSA's Sandia and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories to support NNSA in its mission. Los Alamos enhances global security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, developing technical solutions to reduce the threat of weapons of mass destruction and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health and national security concerns. For more Los Alamos news releases, visit World Wide Web site http://www.lanl.gov. Editor's Note: The original news release can be found at http://www.lanl.gov/worldview/news/releases/archive/02-084.shtml Note: This story has been adapted from a news release issued by Los Alamos National Laboratory for journalists and other members of the public. If you wish to quote from any part of this story, please credit Los Alamos National Laboratory as the original source. You may also wish to include the following link in any citation: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/07/020725080951.htm ***************************************************************** 30 Army sends big guns to IAAP meeting The Hawk Eye Special: IAAP [The Hawk Eye Special Edition] Friday, July 26, 2002 [Unknown dangers at IAAP] Vilsack calls meeting to determine fate of flyover proposal. By Dennis J. Carroll The Hawk Eye Gov. Tom Vilsack and state health regulators are expected to press Army officials today as to why they refuse to conduct a flyover of the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant in Middletown to look for possible radiation contamination from 25 years of nuclear weapons production. "We want to make sure there's nothing there to cause some sort of health problem in the future," said Kevin Teale, a spokesman for the Iowa Department of Public Health. "Our position is that some sort of site survey needs to be done and we think a flyover is the best way to do it," Teale said. The Army and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have contended that a tree–top flyover with aircraft equipped with high–tech radiation gear is not warranted and would not accomplish what its proponents think it would. Vilsack spokesman Ron Parker said the governor requested the meeting with Pentagon–level officials "to get a better handle on how seriously federal officials are taking this and what steps they intend to take." "Clearly, the top priority is the health and safety of the workers and former workers at the plant," Parker said. Vilsack, the Health Department's radiological division chief Don Flater, representatives of the Iowa attorney general and Sen. Tom Harkin, D–Iowa, are to meet this afternoon with eight high–level Army and Corps of Engineers officials in the governor's statehouse office. According to Army spokes–man Major Rudolph Burwell in Washington, those expected to attend included Raymond Fatz, deputy assistant secretary of the Army for environmental, safety and occupational health; David Bell of the office of the general consul to the secretary of the Army; Richard Newsome of the an Army environment, safety and occupational health office. Also, Bruce Smith of the Army's civil works department; Col. Christopher Young and Jewel Simmons of the of the Army's materiel command headquarters; and Sharon Cotner and Dennis Chambers of the Corps of Engineers St. Louis office. Cotner is the corps' project manager for radiation assessment and cleanup at the plant. Larry Johnson, a spokesman for the Middletown plant, said IAAP officials including its commander, Lt. Col. Yolanda Dennis–Lowman, were not expected to attend the meeting. State officials contend the Army has brushed aside their demands for a sitewide assessment of just how much radioactive contamination the Atomic Energy Commission may have left behind when it ceased assembling nuclear weapons at the plant in the mid–1970s. A recent June report from the Corps' St. Louis office rejected the flyover idea on the grounds that it would not detect radioactive contaminants unless they were large and on the top of the ground. The report also rejected the notion of a walking or driving survey or gathering of subsurface samples. In a letter last year to the secretary of the Army, Vilsack cited declassified documents that refer to "plutonium," "ground zero" and "an incident that may have led to contamination" in the early 1970s. The Atomic Energy Commission assembled, test fired and disassembled nuclear weapons or their components at IAAP from the late 1940s to the mid–1970s. Army and plant officials had issued numerous assurances that the AEC had cleaned up after its operations ended. However, over the past couple of years, chunks of depleted uranium and radiation–contaminated soil were found at two AEC firing sites. In addition, large deposits of the heavy metal barium, also used by the AEC, were uncovered near burning pads and slowed the Environmental Protection Agency Superfund cleanup of the plant State officials are concerned that there may be other undetected contaminated areas on the plant's sprawling 19,000 acres. On Wednesday, the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee approved $500,000 for a flyover of the plant. The measure had been offered by Harkin. The Hawk Eye 800 S. Main St., Burlington Iowa 52601 319-754-8461 Front Desk · 319-754-6824 FAX · 1-800-397-1708 Toll Free ***************************************************************** 31 Bunning: DOE wanted to kill screening fund - The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Friday, July 26, 2002 A DOE spokesman says the senator misunderstood about funding for the cancer program. But a watchdog group says another official told Bunning the opposite. By Bill Bartleman bbartleman@paducahsun.com--270.575.8650 What must not be lost in the debate over continuing the early lung cancer testing program for workers and former workers at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant is that it is saving lives, said Leon Owens, president of the production workers union at the plant. U.S. Sen. Jim Bunning and others say the U.S. Department of Energy was on the verge of abolishing the program by not requesting enough funds to keep it going next year. However, U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell used his influence as a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee to put the money back into the budget bill that is moving through Congress. About 1,800 current and former workers in Paducah have participated in the health screening program, said Owens, president of Paper Allied-Industrial Chemical Energy Workers Local 5-550. He's aware of at least three who have been diagnosed with early signs of lung cancer. "They owe their lives to the testing program," he said. "I talked with one woman, a former worker, who had been screened, and a nodule was found. She went to the Anderson Cancer Clinic in Houston and had surgery. They got it early enough that she didn't even require chemotherapy or radiation." Without the early testing, it is likely the cancer would not have been detected until symptoms began to appear. At that stage, the survival rate is less than 30 percent. Detected early, the survival rate exceeds 70 percent. Bunning wants to know why DOE requested only $1 million when $5.2 million is needed. "I am dismayed that the federal government, which misled workers for nearly 40 years about their exposures to compounds associated with lung cancer risk, is now trying to end a program designed to help DOE workers survive lung cancer," Bunning said. He sent a letter to Beverly Cook, assistant DOE secretary for environment, safety and health, asking for an explanation to "recent statements by certain DOE officials suggesting that DOE intends to abolish" the program. Last year Cook replaced Dr. David Michaels, who was instrumental in drafting the legislation that implemented the program. The Senate Appropriations Committee approved $5.2 million for the program Wednesday, which was $4 million more than recommended by DOE. The program provides a mobile testing unit that rotates between DOE facilities in Paducah; Oak Ridge, Tenn.; and Portsmouth, Ohio. Joe Davis, DOE's Washington spokesman, said there's a misunderstanding, because DOE never intended to abolish or cut the program. "We fully support it," he said. "We put the amount of money in the budget that those who run it initially asked for." The budget request was submitted to Congress several months ago. That amount was about $1 million, which he said would have been added to $3.25 million that was appropriated but not spent this year. After members of Congress recently said $5.2 million was needed, "We didn't oppose that," Davis said. He also added that Bunning's comment that some in DOE want to abolish the program "is not true." However, Richard Miller, a policy analyst for the Government Accountability Project, a Washington watchdog group, said Cook told Bunning she wanted to abolish the program because of concerns the early cancer testing exposes workers to a high level of radiation. "Mr. Davis may not have all of the facts he needs to understand how the budget was put together," Miller said. "DOE may not have wanted to abolish the program, but Bev Cook wanted to abolish it. If they ask for only $1 million and $5 million is needed to operate it, you can only assume that someone was trying to kill it." Bunning discounted concern about radiation exposure during testing, saying it is extremely low and does not place the worker in jeopardy. Owens said most workers agree the benefit of early testing is worth the low exposure. "The program is totally voluntary and the risk is explained to the worker," Owens said. "To my knowledge, we have had no complaints at all from anyone who had the testing." In his letter to Cook, Bunning urged DOE to support full funding. "I urge the DOE to revisit its decision to eliminate this vital program," he said. "We must do all we can to protect the health of these workers who have served our country. The federal government initially deceived these Americans and placed them in harm's way. Now we should do our utmost to reduce the harm by continuing to provide them with DOE's early lung cancer detection program." The bill will be considered by the full Senate after the August recess, a spokesman for McConnell said. The bill would then go to the House for a vote. ***************************************************************** 32 Shaheen promotes energy efficiency [The Concord Monitor online edition] Thursday, July 25, 2002 MERRIMACK, N.H. - Gov. Jeanne Shaheen says the $3 billion in annual subsidies to oil and gas companies should be cut and some of that money allocated to alternative fuel development and promotion of energy efficiency. "I don't think we have an energy plan at the national level that makes sense," Shaheen said Wednesday at a news conference at PC Connection. "Congress needs to direct more of its efforts on supporting the technologies of the future, not the policies of the past," the U.S. Senate candidate said. "We need to have a more balanced approach," the three-term Democratic governor said. The Bush energy plan that last year called for expansion of nuclear power should be put on hold, she said. "I continue to think nuclear power will be part of the fuel mix. Any more has to await the problem of dealing with the waste, and I don't think we have been able to answer that question," she said. Officials from PC Connection, Millipore in Jaffrey and Northland Forest Products in Kingston spoke about how they saved money through high- and low-tech energy conservation programs. Millipore plant manager Tim Hines said his staff shaved 10 percent, or $100,000, from its annual energy bill by placing timers on ovens and using variable-speed motors. Jameson French of Northland Forest Products said his company saved $300,000 over the past decade with low-tech improvements that increased energy efficiency from 61 percent to 90 percent. Shaheen pointed to her energy conservation program in state buildings that should save between $2 million and $4 million a year on energy. "If we took that New Hampshire approach to Washington," she said, "we would save $1 billion a year," she said. © Concord Monitor [http://www.concordmonitor.com] and New Hampshire Patriot P.O. 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