Yucca Mountain News Clips
Tuesday, May 13, 2003
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Las Vegas SUN
May 13, 2003
Where I Stand -- Brian Greenspun: President at it again
Brian Greenspun is editor of the Las Vegas Sun.
DO IT to me one more time ...
The incomparable Lionel Richie made that song famous but those words, well, Nevadans have learned to live by them ever since we provided the electoral margin of victory for President George W. Bush.
The tradition in American politics has been that a victorious president usually rewards those whose support helped him win. Not that he would go out of his way to help one state over another -- gosh, I don't think that's ever been done -- but, at least, the president has not sought out ways to harm those who have been so helpful.
Until President Bush took office that is.
We all know the stake he has driven through our heart by naming Yucca Mountain as the place where the nation's high-level nuclear waste will be buried -- well ahead of any science determining that the site just a few miles from downtown Las Vegas was safe and contrary to his promise when he asked for our votes -- but it seems he may not be through with us yet.
This time his administration may be after sponge titanium. What's that, you ask? Good question. The answer is that sponge titanium is produced in only one place in the United States, only one place in the Western Hemisphere, not a bit in Europe and, except for Kazakhstan and Russia, maybe nowhere else at all.
So where is this place from whence the entire United States production of this critical metal comes? Where is this place that supports 350 jobs and countless hundreds of family members? Where is this place which has been an integral part of its community for close to 60 years?
Why, Henderson, of course.
Before I go any further, let me be clear. I have been and still am a proponent of the entire industrial complex in Henderson picking itself up and moving to a part of this valley or the next that will allow the million and a half people who live here a chance to breathe cleaner air and drink cleaner water without fear of what those plants will continue to contribute to our ecological ruin.
But even I am compassionate enough to accept a plan to move those workers, those plants and those families away from the population centers in a way that doesn't disrupt their economic lives or the vital nature of the work they are doing.
That same compassion is lost on the folks in Washington. Instead, there is a move afoot designed to grant certain trade concessions to Russia that will allow them to be the only provider to the world of this defense-critical metal while driving Timet out of business and its people out of work.
Right now there is a general tariff on all goods that trade on the world market. Titanium imported into the United States is imposed a 15 percent tariff, which keeps Timet in business and provides this country with a source for titanium should we need it in a hurry.
The Bush administration talked the free trade game during the election but immediately imposed taxes on some imports in order to protect certain industries -- like steel and lumber. So one would expect them to do the same thing for Timet, right? So far, wrong!
When Russia made a similar move during the Clinton administration, Harry Reid and Richard Bryan went to bat for Timet and convinced President Clinton to reject Russia's request for special concessions. He sided with Nevada.
This time, though, it appears that the United States is trying to repay Kazakhstan for its help in Afghanistan, even if it means hurting Henderson workers. And if Kazakhstan gets the tariff removed so does Russia. You remember Russia, that's the country that didn't support President Bush on Iraq. (Now's about the time when I would really like to say "I told you so," but I am too much of a gentleman for that kind of behavior).
So here's the whole picture. To repay Kazakhstan, the Bush administration appears ready to turn its back on Nevada. By doing so, President Bush will give aid and comfort to the Russian titanium industry, causing the loss of the last remaining vestige of titanium indpendence in the United States and helping a country that refused to help us in Iraq.
And, by doing all this, the company that profits most is Specialty Metals, which is -- drum roll please -- a Belgian country. You remember Belgium. It also turned its back on the United States when we needed the help on the Iraq vote. And Belgium went much further. It threatened to indict Gen. Tommy Franks -- he's our guy -- for war crimes.
None of this is a surprise. That's how politics works in the big, bad world out there. What is a surprise, though, is that President Bush would even contemplate giving aid, comfort and money to Russia and Belgium at the expense of American jobs and Nevada business.
Hey, Mr. President, do it to us one more time. How's that for a theme song?
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Reno Gazette-Journal
May 12, 2003
Editorial: Yucca problems hurt nuke firms
The nuclear power industry has always been its own worst enemy, and the federal government — particularly the Department of Energy — isn´t far behind.
For some 30 years, the industry has blamed environmentalists for its woes, but the environmentalists´ protests would have had little effect were it not for the poor performance of the utilities that hocked their future for nuclear power: for planning, poor siting decisions, poor construction, poor operations.
The biggest failure of the industry, however, has been its refusal to deal seriously with the stacks of nuclear waste building up at plants around the nation. Instead of taking responsibility for the problem that they´ve created, the utilities have relied on the federal government to solve it.
Yet, despite the help of Congress, which decided that only one site for a nuclear waste repository would be studied — Nevada — the federal government has let the industry down … and continues to do so.
That´s why President George W. Bush´s proposal to boost nuclear power as a primary goal of his energy independence plan is doomed to fail. Unless they can find some place to unload existing and future waste, there can be no expansion of the industry. Yet the utilities and the federal government have put all of their eggs in the Yucca Mountain basket, a plan that increasingly appears unable to pass muster.
The problems with the Department of Energy´s Yucca Mountain program have been well publicized in Nevada; opponents of the plan, including most statewide office holders, have made sure of that. But the government has given them plenty of ammunition.
On Friday, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, in a copyrighted story, reported that DOE contractors had paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in settlements with former employees who claimed they were fired for complaining of problems in the quality assurance program at Yucca Mountain. According to the newspaper, documents show that the money to pay the claims actually came from the federal government.
In one case, an employee of a subcontractor alleged harassment, theft and other wrongdoing by the quality assurance contractor. Eventually the subcontractor reached an out-of-court settlement with the employee, who claimed wrongful termination.
The reaction wasn´t surprising. Both Democratic Sen. Harry Reid and Republican Sen. John Ensign rightly expressed concern that project funds were being misspent and wasted.
The nuclear power industry surely will charge Nevadans with obstructionism, just as they criticized environmentalists for slowing the growth of the industry a generation ago. The truth, however, is that the utilities and the feds have no one to blame but themselves.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 10, 2003
Major Yucca contract awarded
$29.7 million to design robotics to handle packages of nuclear waste
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Yucca Mountain Project managers announced the award of a major contract Friday to design robotics to handle heavy packages of nuclear waste as they are prepared for burial in the planned Nevada repository.
Cogema Inc. won a $29.7 million bid for work it will be expected to perform over the next 4 1/2 years, according to Bechtel SAIC, the main operating contractor for the Energy Department program.
The contract is the first big prize tied to the design and construction of the repository complex, project officials said.
Cogema's bid raised eyebrows in some circles when it became known last month because it is a subsidiary of a French-owned consortium, the AREVA Group.
New York Times columnist William Safire among others questioned whether Cogema should be rewarded since France did not support the U.S. war in Iraq.
Concerning those views, "we haven't responded to that. We are a U.S. company," said Dorothy Davidson, a spokeswoman for Cogema, which is headquartered in Bethesda, Md.
Cogema and Bechtel officials could not yet say what types of jobs and how many may be tied to the design project.
Cogema prevailed in a technical evaluation against two other bidders, Bechtel President John Mitchell said in a statement. "Its proposal was superior in key performance areas critical to the Yucca Mountain Project and offered the best value," he said.
Bechtel declined to identify the other bidders pending meetings with them next week, according to spokeswoman Beatrice Reilly.
"We are going to be making thousands of procurements for goods and services over the next four or five years, and many will be for millions of dollars," Reilly said.
The total cost of the repository program is estimated above $58 billion, if it is able to overcome numerous technical, political, financial and legal challenges and get a burial complex built by DOE's stated goal of 2010.
Cogema is a major supplier to the nuclear industry, with particular experience operating "dry handling" facilities for nuclear waste.
Reilly said the company will plan and design machinery that will allow highly radioactive spent fuel assemblies to be prepared for burial at the site 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas "so that there will be no human contact."
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Las Vegas SUN
May 10, 2003
Major Yucca Mountain nuke waste dump contract awarded
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - A company has been awarded a $29.7 million contract to design robots to handle heavy packages of nuclear waste targeted for burial at the planned Yucca Mountain respository.
Cogema Inc. is expected to perform the work over the next four years, according to Bechtel SAIC, the main operating contractor for the Energy Department program.
The contract is the first major prize tied to design and construction of the nuclear waste dump about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, project officials said.
Cogema is a subsidiary of a French-owned consortium, the AREVA Group.
New York Times columnist William Safire and others questioned whether Cogema should be rewarded since France did not support the U.S. war in Iraq.
"We haven't responded to that. We are a U.S. company," said Dorothy Davidson, a spokeswoman for Bethesda, Md.-based Cogema.
Cogema and Bechtel officials could not say what types of jobs and how many will result from the contract.
Cogema prevailed over two other bidders, but Bechtel declined to immediately identify them.
"Its proposal was superior in key performance areas critical to the Yucca Mountain Project and offered the best value," said John Mitchell, Bechtel president.
Bechtel spokeswoman Beatrice Reilly said Cogema will design machinery that will allow radioactive spent fuel to be prepared for burial at Yucca Mountain without human contact.
Cogema is a major supplier to the nuclear industry, with experience operating "dry handling" facilities for nuclear waste.
"We are going to be making thousands of procurements for goods and services over the next four or five years, and many will be for millions of dollars," Reilly said.
The total cost of the repository program is estimated at more than $58 billion.
The federal government is facing numerous legal, technical and financial challenges to build the repository by its goal of 2010.
Top Nevada elected officials strongly oppose the dump and the state is fighting it in court.
Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal
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KVBC
May 10, 2003
More Oversight Issues Surround Yucca Mountain Controversy
Questions about oversight at Yucca Mountain are bringing up questions about safely storing nuclear waste less than a hundred miles from Las Vegas. There have been recent reports about about whistleblowers being fired or reassigned after raising concerns about the Yucca Mountain project. News 3's Dana Wagner reports there are new questions about the work being done at the site.
One way to make sure things are being done right is through the quality assurance program. It's an independent check of the work that scientists are conducting at Yucca Mountain. A state geologist told News 3 that all of us should be concerned that there are some serious questions being asked about that independent oversight.
"Quality assurance issues have been a problem with the Yucca Mountain project really since the beginning of the project." Steve Frishman is a geologist who's been working for Nevada's Nuclear Waste Project Office. He says if there's questions about quality assurance at Yucca Mountain, then there's questions about safely storing nuclear waste.
"We have no basis to believe any of their claims of safety. We do independent work and we come up with different answers than theirs in a number of areas." Frishman says the number one concern of the Department of Energy is to license Yucca Mountain in a timely fashion. He says whistleblowers slow down the process, so the DOE gets rid of, or moves people that bring questions of quality assurance.
"The Department of Energy seems hell bent on building it, whether it's built to standards or not." Some say the Department of Energy has lied to us in the past, and they'll lie to us again. "Given what we know about quality assurance program in the Yucca Mountain project, what we're now seeing with quality assurance professionals who are being thwarted in their work, we can't trust them."
We talked to a Department of Energy spokesman this afternoon by phone. Joe Davis says all quality assurance concerns have been solved, or are being solved. He says no matter what anybody says, the scientific integrity of Yucca Mountain will not be compromised. Nevada's senators are trying to stall the Yucca Mountain project by cutting the budget. Just yesterday, Senator John Ensign was able to slash 70 million dollars from the Defense Nuclear Waste Disposal Program. In fact, the DOE has such big budget problems, they may have to lay off fifty to a hundred workers at Yucca Mountain this summer.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
May 10, 2003
Radioactive Residue: Inspectors find taint on trucks
Discoveries made at test site after deliveries of low-level nuclear waste
Waste inspectors this week found radioactive residue on two tractor-trailers that hauled tainted equipment to the Nevada Test Site from a decommissioned nuclear weapons material factory in Kentucky, authorities said Friday.
As a result, officials with the Department of Energy and a government contractor said the company in charge of environmental cleanup at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant in western Kentucky has voluntarily suspended all waste shipments until an investigation is completed and corrective actions have been taken.
Greg Cook, public affairs manager for the contractor, Bechtel Jacobs Co. LLC, said the toxicity of the material, destined for disposal at the test site's low-level nuclear waste dump 75 miles northwest of Las Vegas, "was not appreciable at all and certainly not at a level that would be hazardous to people."
He said there was no indication that harmful material escaped into the environment.
"It's my understanding there was no contamination beyond the truck bed, and that this involved some isolated spots on the bed," Cook said. "This was not a situation where you had a trail of materials to the edge of the bed and then disappearing."
The level at which radioactivity was found would have been acceptable for safe transportation guidelines if the trucks had displayed appropriate placards and the tainted equipment had been marked accordingly.
"It appears we did not properly label all of the waste," Cook said.
Frank DiSanza, waste management director of the Energy Department's environmental program at the test site, said the flatbed rigs arrived Monday and Tuesday, and in both cases contamination was detected on the trucks' beds during a routine survey after their cargo had been off-loaded.
"It was above the limits that the DOT (Department of Transportation) has for us to put the truck back in commercial transit," DiSanza said in a telephone interview.
DiSanza said both trucks were decontaminated and allowed to return to Paducah.
DiSanza said a team from the Energy Department's Nevada Operations Office will travel to Paducah the week of May 19 to discuss corrective actions.
Cook said instruments measuring contact exposure showed the contaminated areas were emitting slightly higher levels than what the Department of Transportation considers acceptable for unlabeled waste material.
Cook said the location of the contaminated areas led officials to believe the contamination is linked to the 5-foot-tall, funnel-shaped bins, known as "T-hoppers," that were being transported along with other containers for disposal.
The hoppers, said Cook, were being hauled by a Kentucky-based carrier, Landstar Ranger. The hoppers had held uranium tetrafluoride, also called green salt, a crystal byproduct of the process that enriches uranium for use in nuclear bombs.
He said the hoppers probably had been used during the plant's life cycle, from 1955 to 1977. Before its decommissioning, the plant enriched uranium that then was shipped to other facilities to turn the material into nuclear fuel pellets for commercial power reactors.
Before leaving Paducah, the hoppers went through a decontamination process and then were sprayed with an adhesive that was supposed to seal remaining particles against the metal, Cook said. He said an investigation will seek to determine how and why particles came to be fixed to the trucks.
Trailers ferrying low-level radioactive waste are not required to travel fixed routes, and Cook said it was not known what roads the trucks traveled from Kentucky to Nevada.
He said he doubted the drivers will be required to map the route they took, "the reason being there's no reason at all to think there was any kind of possibility they threw off anything that could present a hazard out there."
"It's very unlikely there's anything on the roadway that could ever be identified," he said.
Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev., and Harry Reid, D -Nev., were not notified of the leak, aides said Friday.
This week's incidents were reminiscent of problems that surfaced in late 1997 when low-level nuclear waste shipments from the dismantled Fernald, Ohio, uranium foundry to the Nevada Test Site were discovered leaking.
During an 18-month suspension of waste shipments from the Fernald facility, an investigation determined that the leaking containers were made from an untested design.
Low-level radioactive waste is not to be mistaken for high-level nuclear waste and used nuclear fuel from commercial power reactors that the government plans to entomb in Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Compared with other forms, low-level radioactive wastes take a relatively short time to decay to safe levels and includes such items as research and medical materials and tainted laboratory gear, towels, rags, filters, tools and clothing.
Nevertheless, Peggy Maze Johnson, executive director of Citizen Alert, a statewide environmental group, said the waste shipping problems at the test site this week underscore the need for better accountability of Department of Energy nuclear waste operations, including its plans for a high-level waste repository at Yucca Mountain.
"Our concern has been not only that it is coming here and coming across country, but that all nuclear waste is 'iffy,' " she said.
"Maybe this was insignificant, but what kinds of safeguards are they going to have when they begin shipping high-level waste?" Maze Johnson said.
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Las Vegas SUN
May 09, 2003
Budget cuts, layoffs could slow Yucca Mountain study
By Steve Kanigher
<steve@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas Sun
Two separate events Thursday -- a possible budget cut and announcement of potential layoffs -- could slow down efforts to build a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.
Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., convinced the Senate Armed Services Committee to unanimously approve his amendment to divert $70 million from the Defense Nuclear Waste Disposal Program, which includes waste storage at Yucca Mountain 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Separately, Christopher Kouts, acting director of the Department of Energy's Yucca Mountain systems analysis office, informed the National Academy of Sciences that there could be layoffs this summer affecting 50 to 100 Yucca employees because the department has been struggling with budget cuts.
"If they are laying off scientists who need to complete studies, that could materially affect the Yucca Mountain Project," Bob Loux, director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Project, said today.
Yucca Mountain spokesman Allen Benson could not be reached for comment this morning.
Because Kouts did not specify the type of employees who could be laid off, Loux said it would be premature to speculate on the impact that would have on the Yucca project. But Loux said it is looking less likely that the Energy Department will be able to meet a December 2004 deadline to submit a licensing application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to give a green light.
"They have 293 studies that need to be completed before they submit their licensing application," Loux said. "The DOE would like to blame the budget for all their problems. But the department has had many major scheduling problems and they have had an inability to complete certain studies to the satisfaction of the NRC."
Ensign's amendment would divert the $70 million instead to refurbish the National Nuclear Security Administration's laboratories, nuclear weapons plants and other facilities. The bill now moves to the Senate floor.
"It was apparent to me that the Department of Defense was requesting increases in their nuclear waste disposal program with the ultimate intention of storing the waste in Nevada and cutting their funding request was the best way to counter their strategy," Ensign said today.
"My amendment not only slows the effort to bring nuclear waste to Nevada, it provides the necessary funds to improve facilities that are important to our nation's defense. I'm grateful to the other senators on the Armed Services Committee for agreeing to it."
Sens. Ensign and Harry Reid, D-Nev., issued a joint announcement earlier this week that they were planning to hold a field hearing in Las Vegas on May 28 to address quality assurance concerns related to Yucca Mountain. Yucca whistle blowers are expected to testify.
Ensign spokesman Jack Finn and Reid spokeswoman Tessa Hafen both said today that the hearing agenda will include a probe into reported payoffs of fired employees by Yucca contractors who had expressed concerns about the project.
"Our goal is to get all the whistle-blowers to testify," Hafen said.
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Las Vegas SUN
May 09, 2003
Nuke waste argument focuses on Baltimore tunnel fire
By Benjamin Grove <grove@lasvegassun.com>
and Mary Manning <manning@lasvegassun.com>
LAS VEGAS SUN
WASHINGTON -- The Baltimore train tunnel fire burned at peak temperatures up to 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit during its first three hours, a fire expert who studied the blaze said Thursday. That's higher than the 1,475-degree rating for nuclear waste shipping containers required by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
But despite the skepticism of Nevada experts, independent fire experts and NRC officials at a meeting Thursday said radiation would not have leaked from the hulking metal waste containers if waste had been aboard the train.
Both the state of Nevada and the NRC have been analyzing the July 2001 Howard Street Tunnel fire in Baltimore as part of the high-stakes preparations in the development of the Yucca Mountain project. NRC consultants explained some of their findings at a meeting with Nevada consultants at NRC headquarters in Rockville, Md.
The Yucca project aims to construct a national repository for high-level nuclear waste at the Nevada site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, and state officials have challenged whether waste can be shipped there safely. The NRC would be responsible for licensing and regulating the site. The agency also regulates the waste containers.
As part of the NRC's analysis of the Baltimore fire, which has not yet been documented in a full report, experts examined materials from the blaze, including aluminum-coated, cast-iron train car air brakes and train car roof plating, as well as paint and rail-bed sand samples.
Fire experts from the National Institute of Standards and Technology also conducted extensive modeling based in part on baseline statistics gathered at a monitored fire test in a decommissioned West Virginia highway tunnel in the 1990s.
The revelation by NIST's Kevin McGraffan that the fire may have reached 1,800 degrees sparked a line of questions from five Nevada consultants. Nevada officials have challenged the theory that radiation would not have leaked from the casks in the Baltimore fire.
The consultants also raised a few concerns about NIST's modeling.
"All of your modeling is based on a limited amount of tunnel fire testing," Nevada waste transportation consultant Bob Halstead said during McGraffan's presentation. Halstead also decried some "unjustifiably sweeping" generalizations in the NRC's analysis.
Both the NRC and the NIST put the spent fuel in an extra container, adding a layer of protection that the state's analysis did not take into account, Fred Dilger, Clark County Nuclear Waste Division transportation expert, said. A truck shipment of spent reactor fuel would not be packed in an extra container, because the load would weigh too much, he said.
Other experts have noted that the NRC failed to examine the "re-radiation" of heat from the walls of the tunnel, which would intensify the fire, Dilger said.
"The point is really bad accidents happen and really bad accidents can cause containers to fail," Dilger said.
Further, there is a question about how comprehensive the model is, Dilger said.
"The lesson is, we should consider the extra protection for truck shipments of nuclear waste," Dilger said.
Yucca project managers have joined NRC officials in saying that waste containers are robust and would survive conceivable fires.
Still, the NRC is planning a new series of impact and fire tests on full-scale models of the steel waste-shipping containers.
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Las Vegas SUN
May 09, 2003
Cutbacks, funding issues raised about Yucca Mountain nuclear dump
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - The Energy Department said Friday that layoffs might be needed to save money at the Nevada site picked for a national nuclear waste dump, even as a newspaper reported that hundreds of thousands of dollars have been paid to settle complaints about quality assurance.
Joe Davis, spokesman for the Energy Department in Washington, D.C., blamed congressional budget-cutting, not the settlements, for layoffs that he said could come this summer at Yucca Mountain.
Kristi Hodges, lead auditor for a program contractor, said millions of dollars had been spent settling quality assurance cases. Hodges based her estimate on the amount of settlements, attorney fees, time spent by government lawyers and funds paid to private, legal advisers.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal cited documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request showing one settlement for nearly $300,000. Another, in February, was for an undisclosed sum.
The newspaper said documents show most payments came from the Energy Department, which wants to entomb 77,000 tons of high level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Davis said the Energy Department was not a party to the settlements, but said money the department paid to contractors could have underwritten settlements with contractors' employees.
Nevada's congressional delegation responded strongly, with Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., calling the payments "hush money."
"We've wasted billions of dollars constructing an unnecessary facility and now we find that they're paying million of dollars," Reid said, "all to the detriment of the taxpayers."
Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said Congress would take "very, very seriously" any appearance of cover-up or problems with the project.
In a letter Thursday to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, Nevada's three U.S. representatives cited other claims about retaliation against officials who've raised quality assurance questions about Yucca Mountain.
Shelley Berkley, a Democrat, and Republicans Jim Gibbons and Jon Porter ask Abraham to explain "whether and how the department protects DOE and contractor employees who raise legitimate concerns."
Davis said the Energy Department responds appropriately, and said the Nuclear Regulatory Commission praised the DOE quality assurance program last week.
"All the quality assurance issues that have ever been raised have been documented for action and have either been addressed or are currently being addressed," he said.
Davis said the Energy Department will make a "safe, sound and effective scientific recommendation" when it applies to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a license to run the project.
Hodges, an auditor for Yucca Mountain contractor Navarro Research and Engineering, said she alerted the DOE inspector general's office two years ago to allegations of corruption and personnel problems in the quality assurance program, but the charges weren't investigated.
Reid and Ensign are preparing for a May 28 hearing in Las Vegas to address questions about Yucca Mountain quality assurance programs. They said the new information reinforced their concerns that funds have been misspent.
Funding problems could force layoffs at the site this summer, said Christopher Kouts, chief Yucca Mountain systems analyst.
Kouts told a National Academy of Sciences radioactive waste study board in Washington that as many as 100 workers, or 10 percent of the staff, might be laid off in July or August.
Energy Department spokesman Allen Benson at the Yucca Mountain project office in Las Vegas called the report premature, but said staffing cuts were being considered as part of an economizing effort.
Benson said tours might be restricted, along with access to some parts of the exploratory tunnel and other parts of the site.
Program managers have said portions of the mountain can be restricted without affecting ongoing scientific studies and the priority of filing a repository license.
Energy Department officials have said they need $591 million this year to meet a December 2004 goal for submitting an operating license.
But, "if you don't get the money you request, you have to run the operation around the budget you have," Davis said.
The Senate Armed Services Committee approved an amendment Thursday by Ensign to take a bite out of the site's budget.
Ensign said the committee cut from $430 million to $355 million the Pentagon's annual contribution to the nuclear waste program. The Yucca Mountain Project is part of the defense budget because the Pentagon plans to store military nuclear waste there.
Part of the Yucca program also is paid by ratepayers of utilities who use nuclear power through a special fund routed administered by the Energy Department.
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Pahrump Valley Times
May 09, 2003
County budget a 'tough nut to crack'
By Mark Waite, Reporter
Budget Workshop
TONOPAH - Nye County Commissioners were faced with a $1.8 million deficit in the 2003-04 fiscal year budget, even without any additional positions, as they sat down for their first budget workshop Wednes-day.
"It's a tough nut we have to crack," Nye County Budget Director Charlie Rodewald told commissioners after presenting the initial figures.
Following his introductory remarks, commissioners sat in silence as they eyed the budget figures; only Commission Chairman Henry Neth's sigh broke up the quiet.
"So let's crack it. Where do we start?" ViceChairman Joni Eastley asked.
The county commission scheduled three days of workshops on the budget this week but only needed one. Commissioners whittled the deficit down to $336,000, and then insti-tuted a 2 percent budget cut across the board, leav-ing a $147,000 surplus. The draft budget will be pre-sented at a public hearing at the Nye County Commis-sion meeting in Amargosa Valley May 19.
Commissioners eyed cuts in a number of areas in-cluding the sheriff's de-partment's DARE program.
Rodewald's figures showed a deficit, even though projected expenditures for the fiscal year beginning July 1 of $26.3 million reflected a drop from $27.1 million last year.
"We assumed an ending fund balance of $2.7 million and built the budget around that," Rodewald said of the present fiscal year budget. However the general fund balance for the current year, 2002-03, is projected to dwindle to just $76,000 by the end of this fiscal year June 30, he said.
Revenues are projected to increase from $24.3 million to $24.4 million for the coming fiscal year. But Commissioner Eastley cautioned some revenues were for grants that hadn't yet been received.
Rodewald said the budget included a 3 percent cost of living increase for employees based on the Consumer Price Index and a man-dated increase in county contributions to the Personal Employment Retire-ment System (PERS). It doesn't include $1.6 million in requests for new personnel, a contingency fund or any capital expenditures, he said.
Eastley noted the budget reflected a $608,706 de-crease in the sheriff's de-partment budget, to $9.5 million, though the sheriff requested a $1 million increase. She was especially concerned about funding five additional dispatch positions.
Neth suggested a 5 per-cent cut across the board, but Commissioner Candice Trummell said that would hit some of the smaller departments hard that couldn't absorb the cuts. Rodewald said there are already 32 county positions vacant, worth $679,000.
The commission meeting room gradually filled up with county department heads and elected officials. But Neth remarked, "Elected departments and managers don't even need to be here before us. They're not going to get any new positions, period."
Commissioner Patricia Cox thought there would be more of an increase in revenues from gaming, sales tax, cigarette tax and liquor tax. Intergovernmen-tal taxes - which include mostly sales taxes, cigarette taxes, fuel taxes and gaming taxes - went up $340,950 from $10.21 million to $10.55 million.
"We have more busi-nesses that have come into Nye County in the last couple years that would cause a substantial increase in our budget," Cox said.
Neth noted that while the southern end of the county is growing fast the economy in the northern part is shrinking. Rodewald said the assessed taxable values of the county rose from $788 million to $816 million; subsequently property tax collections are projected to rise $388,711 from $8.2 mil-lion to 8.6 million.
Neth tried to dissuade fel-low commissioners from the temptation to raid PETT funds; the $10 million reimbursed to Nye County each year by the U.S. Department of Energy for the property value of Yucca Mountain.
"We're not going to take money out of the PETT funds and augment this budget. That's been the pol-icy of this board since the PETT funds were insti-tuted," Neth said. "If we use those monies they're not a recurring revenue source."
Commissioner Cox added it wouldn't show good favor with the DOE using the money to balance the an-nual budget. She suggested going out for proposals for financial managers, after hearing a presentation the day before by Wells Capital Investments, in which rep-resentatives of the Wells Fargo subsidiary pledged to get the county higher returns on investments.
County Manager Dave Chavez said a plan to lease-purchase new vehicles could save $250,000 on maintenance and repair for the old ones.
After a suggestion by Commissioner Eastley, Emergency Services Director Bill Hall said rural fire departments could probably do without the $10,000 the county furnishes each one, saving $120,000.
Chavez talked about sav-ing some of the $100,000 budgeted in prisoner medical care by contracting out for a medical provider to serve the jail.
Eastley suggested using PETT money for the $75,000 necessary in matching funds for sheriff's depart-ment grants.
Attention then turned to the $167,150 budgeted for the Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) program, for which Tonopah area super-visor Johanna Cody said the county only recovers $43,410 in grants.
"My sons went through the DARE program, I think it's a great program. But when it comes to putting officers on the street, I'd suggest cutting it," Eastley said.
While Sheriff Tony DeMeo said some school districts like Salt Lake City provide more effective programs than DARE, he said, "There's so many little kids that count on it. We would feel like we're the grinches that stole Christmas."
DeMeo told Commissioner Trummell there was no way of documenting whether the program was successful.
"The one deputy that goes in the school is giving some kind of representation. We touched so many kids with DARE," DeMeo said. Commissioners elected not to cut the program.
Commissioner Cox noted each department had $3,000 to $4,500 budgeted for phones. She also inquired about using PETT educational endowment funds to pay for employee training, tallying up a combined $130,030 in training costs for all the departments.
"The spirit of that en-dowment fund was to sup-port the schools and the school district," Neth re-plied. "That fund was not created in the spirit to fund county government."
"We're doing exactly what the federal government is doing, taking a shot at our kids and that's not OK with me," Neth said. He later agreed to allow the use of PETT special projects funds to pay for employee training.
But a suggestion by Trummell to look at the $371,888 budgeted for animal control in Pahrump caught Neth's eye.
"That budget is exactly like I predicted," Neth said. "It's going out of control. We need to privatize that function."
Assistant County Manager Mike Maher said the cost of impounding animals in pending court cases has increased costs. But he said, "It's going to cost you around $300,000 to run an adequate program there."
"When it was privatized it was still $254,000 per year," Neth replied. But he noted the services the county received for that amount weren't adequate.
Rodewald recommended against increasing the sub-sidy to the Pahrump Senior Center from $131,338 to $175,000. Trummell ques-tioned providing money to the nonprofit corporation when they're talking about eliminating DARE.
"The county basically provided them an augmentation every year," Neth said. Eastley said she'd like to see the minutes of that meeting. Neth replied, "If the county decides not to fund the senior center it'll be a county function again in six months."
During the afternoon, commissioners discovered they didn't budget for $467,000 in possessory use taxes levied on Nevada Test Site contractors like Bechtel Corporation, which were paid under protest. The commission penciled in half of that amount as revenue, whittling the deficit down to $336,000. Neth then suggested cutting the budget 2 percent across-the-board. That would still allow Sheriff DeMeo to hire three positions and leave $147,000 for contingencies.
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Pahrump Valley Times
May 09, 2003
Letter: Give DOE some room
By Rebecca Smith
It looks like the opposi-tion to the repository pro-gram is lining up and taking shots and that's fine; this program has always been under a microscope, and it has a great deal of oversight built in.
But before we go casting stones, let's give the new management team at Yucca Mountain, John Arthur and John Mitchell, a chance to give their man-agement improvement initiatives a chance to show some results. They are proven leaders with a lot of experience managing federal projects, and they un-derstand the requirements and are assigning responsi-bility and demanding ac-countability; quality is job No. 1 to them.
It's now the Office of Repository Development; it's no longer the Site Characterization Project. That is a significant shift in the De-partment of Energy's (DOE) focus related to Yucca Mountain. The focus, with a significantly reduced budget, is to prepare a complete and high-quality license application by late next year to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).
The project is transforming itself, and they must adopt new ways to do busi-ness. Let's let the process play itself out and allow the NRC to rigorously go over the license application and give a thumbs up or thumbs down to a repository at Yucca Mountain.
It's clear after this recent management review meeting between DOE and NRC that these two federal agencies aren't buddy-buddy when it comes to the project, so I don't want to hear any arguments from the state or the "anti's" about these two federal agencies being too close.
The state's petition to have independent judges instead of the NRC to review the project is just an-other delay tactic. The state recently lost a petition for rulemaking, so now they came up with this new peti-tion to delay and obstruct.
I say enough is enough; let's let this national program play itself out and let's allow science to guide the decision.
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Working for Change
May 09, 2003
Bill Berkowitz
Bremer of Iraq
Counter-terrorism and corporate crisis management specialist heads Iraq's reconstruction
When L. Paul Bremer III sets down in Iraq as the U.S.'s new overseer of reconstruction, he'll be bringing a lot of baggage along with him. Chosen by President Bush for his expertise in counter-terrorism, crisis management and diplomacy, Bremer has a resume that includes extended service in the Reagan Administration, an eleven-year stint at Kissinger & Associates, and the co-chairmanship of the Heritage Foundation's Homeland Security Task Force.
That President Bush has turned to a civilian and a skilled negotiator -- the president called Bremer a "can-do-type person'' -- is indicative of the administration's fear that events in post-war Iraq are in danger of spinning out of control. Bremer, the current Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Marsh Crisis Consulting, a subsidiary of the Marsh & McLennan Companies (MMC), will take the reins of the multi-billion dollar reconstruction project from retired Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, the administration's first civil administrator, and assume command over the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Affairs.
Early commentary on this leadership change focused on whether Bremer's appointment was a victory for a beleaguered State Department. While Secretary of State Colin Powell may be in need of victories, the Washington Post pointed out that Bremer is "a hard-nosed hawk who is... supported by Rumsfeld and Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz.’ Furthermore, “White House aides said the appointment affirms Bush's satisfaction with Pentagon control over Iraq until a new government is in place." Bremer's appointment indicates that there continues to be substantial support for the Iraqi National Congress, headed by Dr Ahmad Chalabi.
Robert Gelbard, a retired career diplomat who led post-conflict efforts in Haiti, Bosnia and East Timor, told Newsday that "In terms of finding someone to manage this process, which has not started out well, I do not believe that [the White House] could have done better" than to select Bremer. According to Gelbard, administration sources believed that Garner "was not sophisticated enough to supervise the transition."
Who is L. Paul Bremer and why is the White House counting on him?
Bremer is a consummate insider with roots in several presidential administrations: During his twenty-three year diplomatic service career, he was stationed in Afghanistan, Malawi, Norway, and also served as Ambassador to the Netherlands. In 1989 he joined the powerful New York-based Kissinger Associates, and in late 2001, along with former Attorney General Edwin Meese he co-chaired the Heritage Foundation's Homeland Security Task Force, which created a blueprint for the White House's Dept. of Homeland Security. For two decades Bremer has been a regular at Congressional hearings and is recognized as an expert on terrorism and homeland security.
According to the Web site of Financial Executive International, Bremer currently sits on the board of directors of Air Products and Chemicals, Inc., Akzo Nobel NV, the Harvard Business School Club of New York and The Netherland-America Foundation. He is also a Trustee of the Economic Club of New York, and is a member of The International Institute for Strategic Studies and The Council on Foreign Relations.
Bremer's bread and butter issue is terrorism. According to the World Socialist Web Site, in 1981, President Ronald Reagan's Secretary of State Alexander Haig appointed him as his special assistant in charge of the department's "crisis management" center. From there he became Reagan's ambassador-at-large for counter-terrorism -- a tenure that coincided with Reagan Administration-sponsored "low intensity" wars in Central America and Africa. Although Bremer co-chaired the Operations Sub-Group at the National Security Council along with Oliver North, according to Malcolm Byrne of the National Security Archive, Bremer was on the "periphery" of the Iran/Contra Scandal.
Bremer has consistently espoused a get-tough stance towards terrorists. In an August 5, 1996, Wall Street Journal opinion piece titled "Terrorists' Friends Must Pay a Price" Bremer called on the Clinton administration to "get serious about the fight against terrorism." Bremer advised Clinton to deliver ultimatums to Libya, Syria, Iran and Sudan telling them to close down terrorist bases or they will "receive the full weight of American might." Ironically, Iraq was not mentioned in the piece.
In September 1999, Speaker of the House of Representatives Dennis Hastert named Bremer Chairman of the National Commission on Terrorism. This commission reviewed America's counter-terrorism policies and, in June 2000, it reported its recommendations to the President of the United States and to the Speaker.
Two days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Bremer wrote: "Our retribution must move beyond the limp-wristed attacks of the past decade, actions that seemed designed to "signal" our seriousness to the terrorists without inflicting real damage. Naturally, their feebleness demonstrated the opposite. This time the terrorists and their supporters must be crushed. But," he added, "we must avoid a mindless search for an international 'consensus' for our actions. Tomorrow, we will know who our true friends are."
In October 2001, the Washington, D.C.-based Heritage Foundation named Bremer and former Attorney General Edwin Meese III as co-chairs of its Homeland Security Task Force. The Task Force's January 2002 report titled "Defending the American Homeland" claimed the U.S. was "dangerously vulnerable" to terrorist attacks. It made a number of recommendations including: increasing security at U.S. borders, encouraging greater sharing of information among various federal law enforcement agencies and with local law enforcers, changing federal law to allow greater monitoring of foreigners in the United States, securing federal computer networks and information systems better, moving ahead with the plan to bury nuclear waste beneath Yucca Mountain in Nevada, improving communications with the public in the event of attack or increasing threats and "unleash[ing] market forces to mobilize the private sector to promote infrastructure security." A number of these recommendations have already been put in place.
The Homeland Security Task Force fused the war against terrorism to the mission of the Heritage Foundation -- privatization, de-regulation and smaller government -- maintaining that "many government initiatives, such as the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), antitrust legislation, liability concerns, and current tax policies, inhibit the development of a true partnership for security between the private sector and the government."
In June 2002, President Bush appointed Bremer to the President's Homeland Security Advisory Council. Composed of American businessmen, academics and political leaders, the Council ostensibly provides the President with independent advice on the defense of the American homeland.
Bremer is also listed as a senior advisor to William J. Bennett's Americans for Victory Over Terrorism (AVOT). A few months back he was a featured speaker at the AVOT-sponsored "teach-in" at UCLA. At that event, former CIA chief R. James Woolsey described the war against terrorism as a "fourth world war."
A month after 9/11, Jeffrey W. Greenberg, Marsh & McLennan Companies' chairman and chief executive, recognized that the terrorist attacks, which killed 295 of its employees, was also a new business opportunity. "Within days of the twin towers' destruction," the Wall Street Journal reported, Greenberg and top company officials "began planning to form a new subsidiary to sell insurance to corporate customers at sharply higher rates than were common before Sept. 11." The company also "accelerated plans to launch a new consulting unit to capitalize on heightened corporate fears of terrorism." On October 11, Marsh Crisis Consulting was launched with Bremer at its head. Bremer told the Journal that the unit would concentrate on catastrophic risks, those that in some cases could put a company out of business.
In addition to retaining retired Lt. Gen. Jay Garner, Bremer's team in Iraq is being peopled with former Iraqi exiles and assorted Reagan and Bush I retreads. Doug Henwood, editor of the Left Business Observer, told Inter Press Service's Emad Mekay in late April that the selection process is "very much like the Bush administration itself -- a bunch of private sector alumni called upon to perform the task in government they were performing in the private sector."
Mekay noted that recent appointees included "agricultural industrialist" Dan Amstutz, who will "lead the US government's agriculture reconstruction efforts in Iraq" and Peter McPherson, a long-time Washington insider and deputy US treasurer in the Ronald Reagan administration, who will be "financial coordinator" for the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance (ORHA). His deputy in Iraq will be George Wolfe, a senior US Treasury Department lawyer.
Bremer's greatest challenge will be to create the trappings of a democracy while ensuring that a fundamentalist Islamic government does not win control over the country. If the Shiite majority prevails in democratic elections, post-war Iraq could take on a decidedly anti-American cast. Anatol Lieven of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace told WBAI Radio's Doug Henwood in late April that such a government would not want the U.S. to control its oil or establish military bases on its soil -- and would not be likely to recognize Israel.
What special expertise about Iraq or the Middle East is Bremer bringing to Iraq? None, says a former senior State Department official who has worked with Bremer. He is a "voracious opportunist with voracious ambitions," the official told Newsday. "What he knows about Iraq could not quite fill a thimble. What he knows about any part of the world would not fill a thimble. But what he knows about Washington infighting could fill three or four bushel baskets." For more please see the Bill Berkowitz archive.
Bill Berkowitz is a longtime observer of the conservative movement. His WorkingForChange column Conservative Watch documents the strategies, players, institutions, victories and defeats of the American Right.
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State of Nevada
Agency for Nuclear Projects
www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/
nwpo@nuc.state.nv.us
775-687-3744
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