Yucca Mountain News Clips
Tuesday, August 19, 2003
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
August 19, 2003
Waste route stirs debate
Test site material might travel across rural Nevada
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Federal and state officials are considering a proposal for the Energy Department to transport plutonium-tainted material across rural Nevada starting in 2005 after California opposed the use of one of its roadways.
The medium-level nuclear waste from the Nevada Test Site is destined for burial at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico.
An 1,800-mile route that includes 405 miles along two-lane highways through Tonopah, Ely and Wendover has emerged in a compromise for disposal of the waste.
Western governors have been seeking a solution since California refused in July to let DOE transport waste-bearing drums 90 miles on California Route 127 through Death Valley and onto interstates that would allow the shipments to avoid Las Vegas. That southern route from the test site to the New Mexico burial site would total about 1,130 miles.
A consultant to rural White Pine County criticized the proposal Monday and said the state was bending to the will of California, where most of the radioactive waste came from in the first place, and to the desires of Clark County leaders who oppose nuclear waste shipments through Southern Nevada.
"This is clout, no question," Mike Baughman said. "We find it absurd that the DOE would consider this."
Nevada has yet to take a position on the alternative route, but one state official said the route might be acceptable with safeguards.
U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the struggle to find acceptable shipping routes for the waste signals bigger troubles ahead in designing waste shipments to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository, where deadlier nuclear spent fuel would be stored.
"If they're having all this trouble with transportation of low-level waste, what in the world is going to happen to high-level nuclear waste?" Reid said.
Peggy Maze Johnson, executive director of Citizen Alert, said she planned to urge public hearings on whatever routes emerge. Citizen Alert is a Nevada-based citizen watchdog group.
"We need to be informed that these kinds of discussions are going around," Johnson said.
About 1,650 55-gallon drums of waste are stored at Area 5 of the test site, said Angela Colarusso, project manager for the facility's environmental management division. Much of the material originated at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory outside Oakland, Calif., before being sent to the test site in the 1970s and 1980s, she said in a speech last week in Pahrump.
The Western Governors' Association has been seeking compromise that would allow the shipments to take place. The waste includes laboratory clothing, tools, plastics and other solids contaminated with plutonium, neptunium and other radioactive material produced in nuclear weapons research and production.
California, which said that its state Route 127 had limited emergency response and was not designed for heavy trucks, has agreed to allow about half the tainted material to be shipped along the Death Valley route to Baker, association officials said.
From there it would travel on Interstate 15 to Barstow and then Interstate 40 east to New Mexico.
The California shipments would cease on Dec. 31, 2004, after about 55 shipments were made.
Starting in 2005, the remainder, about 55 shipments, would be transported through rural Nevada to Interstate 80, east through Salt Lake City and Utah, through most of Wyoming and then south on Interstate 25 through Colorado including Denver on its way to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.
Much of I-80 and I-25 track the route of nuclear waste that was shipped to New Mexico from the Energy Department's lab in Idaho Falls, Idaho.
"While this may be a longer route, the majority of the route already accepts TRU (transuranic) waste shipments," Western Governors' Association Executive Director James Souby said in an Aug. 12 letter to Energy Department Assistant Secretary Jessie Roberson.
"All participants now believe it is time for the Department of Energy to become involved if negotiations are to be completed and a compromise actually reached," Souby wrote.
William Mackie, program manager for the governors group, said several other routes remain in discussion, but the rural Nevada proposal seems to be emerging as the favorite.
A spokesman for U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who had objected to DOE plans to use the California state road, said, "There is no deal yet."
Nevada has been represented in the discussions by an official in its Agency for Nuclear Projects.
Agency Director Bob Loux said Monday the state has yet to take a position on the proposal, but he said it might be acceptable.
"I suspect it would not be objectionable primarily because we're doing low-level (nuclear waste) shipments on those routes generally," Loux said.
Loux said Nevada could require DOE to provide accident preparedness and emergency response training along the in-state route and allow for a state escort to travel with the canister-packed trucks.
White Pine County consultant Baughman called the plan absurd. "This is a very circuitous route."
Baughman said, Nevada customarily steers low-level nuclear waste shipments through rural counties to avoid heavily populated Southern Nevada.
"We find it a bit ironic that our state doesn't want to be dumped on, but when we do a routing decision like this, or encourage routing like this, we are dumping on rural counties in Nevada," he said.
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Las Vegas SUN
August 19, 2003
Editorial: Nuke report serves only as a pacifier
Las Vegas SUN
On the surface, a report released last week by the General Accounting Office prompts a feel-good response to the issue of transporting high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain. The conclusion -- "little risk of public harm" -- is wonderful, unless the reader delves a little deeper into the report. Then it is discovered the report is not based on new information or new tests. It is, in fact, simply a report based on a review of existing federal reports. Not surprisingly, then, the conclusion amounts to a pacifier for the American public. Nevada has been warning for years about all of the overly optimistic reports emanating from the federal government, which is under extreme pressure from the nuclear power industry to license Yucca Mountain as a burial site.
The true value of the report is the GAO's admission that worst-case scenarios have not been evaluated. Will casks containing the waste stand up to rocket attacks or planes crashed into them? Would they stand up to a tornado or remain sealed if the train or truck carrying them plunged off a bridge? These elemental questions still have no answers. The truth is, there can never be an honest feel-good report on this subject -- as no one will ever know until the day a shipment is caught up in such a scenario.
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Reno Gazette-Journal
August 14, 2003
Your Turn: Yucca Mountain: Wait until we know
I am a research professor of geology at the University of Nevada, Reno, and have lived in Nevada for 18 years. Prior to coming to Reno and joining UNR, I was with the University of California (UCLA and UC-Riverside) and Stanford University. I spent four years as a research scientist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and have been a consultant with Rockwell-Hanford in Washington.
I have been interested in ways that materials move in the Earth and lodge in particular places. I have studied how ore deposits form, including gold deposits of Nevada. A life-long interest is the origin of the rock “granite,’ which makes up most of the Earth´s continents. Geological features are not explained by existing concepts. Lately I have developed new mechanisms for moving energy and mass in the Earth that account for formation of granite. The concepts have implications on waste storage that cannot wait for the five to 20 years required for scientific acceptance of new ideas.
The public, politicians, scientists and engineers need to know of a scientifically based objection to Yucca Mountain.
The subject was presented orally and published as a paper in a Symposium on Engineering Geology and Geotechnical Engineering at UNR in March. I apologize for use of unfamiliar technical terms, but the seriousness of the situation requires it.
On arriving in Reno in the 1980s, my work as a consultant and researcher at National Laboratories convinced me that systematic studies on radioactive storage were lacking that merited choosing sites, including at Yucca Mountain. Needs for caution have been voiced recently by scientists in positions to judge. For example, researchers at University of Michigan with 20 years experience on radioactive storage state that systematic scientific studies at Yucca Mountain have not been done. Conclusions by geologists at UNLV, experts on volcanoes who studied the area, are that volcanic hazards are greater than had been thought. The site is above an unusually hot mantle with a thinner than average crust between. They recommend a different site. Research at Yucca Mountain should answer such scientific questions.
Fundamental changes in science in the last century were responsible for insights into my mechanisms. Ilya Prigogine, Nobel Prize winner, and his associates extended principles of classical physics on the basis of new mathematics and experimental studies. Included in the new physics are chaos, complexity, irreversible reactions and order from disorder. Processes in the Earth require energy in excess of equilibrium, or excess energy. My concepts are based on these principles.
I realized that placing our waste in one place underground would concentrate excess energy. Mobilized matter would move upward. Energy is transported more effectively in fluids rather than in solid rocks. Energy released in shallow sites above and below the water table creates convection cells. Hot springs and fumaroles result. Deeply buried waste would liquefy rocks. Liquid bodies with waste constituents would move upward in two ways. If light enough, they float as diapers. Or, they move chemically in my recently conceived reaction cells, which dissolve rocks above and precipitate minerals below. Radioactive volcanoes would be emplaced on the surface.
Advice in an emergency: Don´t just stand there, do something! However, at Yucca Mountain, just stand there, don´t do anything! Wait until we know what we are doing.
Dr. Frank W. Dickson is a research professor at the University of Nevada, Reno.
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Las Vegas SUN
August 15, 2003
Nevada's case vs. Yucca delayed
By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN
WASHINGTON -- A federal court has postponed the date of oral arguments for Nevada's consolidated court case against the Energy Department's Yucca Mountain project, and the delay could bode well for arguments against the site.
Oral arguments had been scheduled for Oct. 3, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit postponed the case Thursday and reclassified the case as "complex." The court designates only a few cases this way each year.
The "complex" classification means the judges decided it is more than just a regular case, said Linda Jones, the court's operations manager. The clerk's office will now need to randomly select a new panel of three judges to hear the case and set a new date for the oral arguments. She did not know the new date or have a timeline as to when it might be set.
Joe Egan, an attorney with Egan, Fitzpatrick and Malsch, the Washington-area law firm hired by the state to handle the legal challenges, called the change "very good."
According to a court guidebook, once deemed "complex," cases may be allowed several hours of argument time as opposed to the usual 10 or 15 minutes allotted for regular cases. The parties will usually receive an order allocating the time two to three weeks before the date, the court said. The court will also expand the usual page or word limits on briefs.
"Anything that allows the court to look more closely at documents and ask more questions is good for us,' Egan said. "The only bad thing is that it may delay it."
Bob Loux, director of Nevada's Nuclear Project Office, agreed that while the postponement is disappointing at least "it means the judges are taking a serious look at this. It suggests they understand this is a serious issue."
Energy Department officials could not be reached for comment.
The court consolidated several cases brought by the state challenging various aspects of the Yucca Mountain project. Located about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, the site is the potential federal repository for 77,000 tons of nuclear waste. Congress and President Bush approved the storage site last year and the department anticipates submitting a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in December 2004.
As part of its strong opposition to the site, Nevada has sued the department on the environmental impact statement, the recommendation and the guidelines used to determine the site's suitability to hold the waste. These cases have been lumped together with challenges against the Environmental Protection Agency's radiation standards for the site and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's rules for licensing the it. A constitutional challenge against the site filed in January is also part of this case.
The Nuclear Energy Institute has its own case against the EPA and is an intervenor on several of the other cases. These are also part of the "complex" case.
Mike Bauser, NEI associate general counsel, took no position on the court's decision but said it is a response to documents filed earlier by the all of the parties outlining the order they wanted the cases heard and how much time should be allotted for the arguments.
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Las Vegas SUN
August 15, 2003
Court postpones start of Nevada case against Yucca Mountain
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - A federal court has postponed the start of Nevada's case against a planned nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain - a move that could bode well for critics of the plan.
Oral arguments had been scheduled for Oct. 3, but the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia postponed the case Thursday and reclassified it as "complex."
With the designation, judges will be allowed to hear longer arguments, as opposed to the usual 10 or 15 minutes. But the change means a new panel of judges will be assigned to the case and a new hearing date will have to be determined.
"Anything that allows the court to look more closely at documents and ask more questions is good for us," said Joe Egan, a lawyer hired by the state to handle the case. "The only bad thing is that it may delay it."
Bob Loux, director of Nevada's Nuclear Waste Project Office, said he was encouraged by the change.
"It means the judges are taking a serious look at this. It suggests they understand this is a serious issue," he said.
A call seeking comment from the Energy Department was not immediately returned.
The court consolidated several cases brought by the state against the Yucca Mountain project. The lawsuits challenge the science, safety standards, site guidelines, the approval process and the constitutionality of forcing one state to accept the nation's waste.
Plans for the site, located about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, call for a federal repository holding some 77,000 tons of nuclear waste. Congress and President Bush approved the storage site last year and the Energy Department plans to submit a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission before the end of 2004.
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Pahrump Valley Times
August 15, 2003
School Board Preview
Road closure, PETT discussion on slate
PVT
The Nye County School Board will hold public hearing on a proposal to close part of West Street between Wilson Road and Long Street will be held at 6:30 p.m. Monday at the district office in Pahrump.
The hearing will be a continuation of the board's regular meeting, which begins at 10 a.m.
An item on the agenda for the morning session involves whether the school district should pursue PETT money - payments equal to taxes the county receives from the U.S. Department of Energy for the land value of Yucca Mountain - to help fund such items as the SAFE after-school program.
Board members will also consider changes to the student behavior handbook, have a discussion on paperless board meetings and set goals for the 2003-2004 school year.
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Pahrump Valley Times
August 15, 2003
Protest by California stalls waste shipments
By Doug McMurdo
PVT
When the Department of Energy canceled shipments of transuranic waste from the Nevada Test Site to a storage facility in New Mexico last month, half a dozen years of research, studies, and political wrangling came untracked, according to Angela Colarusso.
California officials protested the proposed transportation route, and that's all it took to stop the shipments, which were bound for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.
A compromise on transportation routes has yet to be announced by energy officials. But Colarusso, the project manager for the agency's environmental management division, said Wednesday that morale is low among workers at the test site, and the future of the shipment program is up in the air.
"We need to regain momentum," Colarusso said during a meeting at the Pahrump Nugget of the Community Advisory Board for Nevada Test Site Programs.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and other officials from that state protested the shipments. Colarusso said the objections were specific to Highway 127. The planned route would have taken the transuranic, or mid-level, nuclear waste from Mercury to Highway 373 that runs through Amargosa Valley. The road turns into Highway 127 on the California side of the border where it leads to Baker, Calif., and Interstate 15. From there the route would head to Barstow, Calif., where it would link up with Interstate 40 into Arizona.
Colarusso said the route was identified and approved six years ago, but was rejected during a Western Governors Association meeting held in early July. She believes the resistance is not due to the shipment of transuranic waste that was shipped to the Nevada Test Site from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory outside of Oakland, Calif., in the 1970s and 1980s. The facility generated its waste through weapons research, she said.
"Mid- and low-level waste is transported on California highways every day," Colarusso said, indicating the Yucca Mountain Project located in central Nye County and the planned site to store 77,000 metric tons of the nation's high-level nuclear waste, perhaps as early as 2010, was the underlying concern of Feinstein and other officials.
Colarusso said the beginning of the calendar year would be the "most optimistic" outlook on when the shipments might occur.
Of 1,650 55-gallon drums of waste stored at Area 5 of the test site, situated roughly 50 miles east of Pahrump, Colarusso said all but 20 came from the Livermore facility. A deal is in the works with California officials to use Highway 127. One route would have taken the shipments through the so-called Spaghetti Bowl in Las Vegas; this fact alone was enough to dismiss it outright, Colarusso said. The only other possible route would have sent the waste north on U.S. 95 past Tonopah, and then around. Officials decided early on the longer route was not feasible.
Colarusso said officials in California requested her agency provide funding to pay highway patrol troopers in that state to escort the waste, agree not to ship on certain days, and meet other conditions in order to use Highway 127.
Extensive effort is put into preparing a waste shipment, Colarusso said, voicing frustration with the halt in transports. Members of the Community Action Board agree. In strongly worded letters addressed to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, James Souby, the executive director of the Western Governors Association, and Kenny Guinn and Gray Davis, the governors of Nevada and California, respectively, the group said the stance taken by Feinstein and other California officials is tantamount to using "strong-arm" tactics against other government entities.
First and foremost, board members said 90 percent of the transuranic waste warehoused at the test site was generated in California. Millions of taxpayer dollars, they said, has been spent in preparation for the shipments, and discussions on the route in question have been occurring for nearly a decade and were approved by all parties six years ago.
On the California side of the argument, opponents of the shipments believe a precedent would be set for shipping high-level nuclear waste on Highway 127. CAB members scoff at the argument, saying the federal transportation department mandates all high-level waste routes be mapped out only on interstate highways.
Eight of a planned 50 shipments from the test site to Carlsbad were planned for the next fiscal year, said Colarusso.
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Pahrump Valley Times
August 15, 2003
Commission Preview
Clinic land sale on tap
A resolution directing the sale of 12.15 acres of land surrounding Pahrump Medical Center is on the agenda when the Nye County Commission meets at 8:30 a.m. Tuesday.
A letter to U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., requesting financial assistance to reopen PMC is also on the agenda.
Commissioners Patricia Cox and Candice Trummell will hold a pre-agenda workshop at 2:30 p.m. Saturday.
The Nye County School District is requesting $50,000 to provide financial assistance to indigent students who can't afford the new "Pay to Play" athletic program this coming year. That item is set for consideration at 2:30 p.m.
Also on Tuesday's agenda:
A public hearing on an ordinance banning horse tripping is scheduled for 10:30 a.m.
A request to increase the annual salary of the county justices of the peace to $81,846 is up for approval.
A Federal Aviation Administration grant for Beatty Airport and a $10,000 award for the Beatty Habitat Committee are to be considered.
Jim Petell has a request to speak about the protection of Nye County communities from possible nuclear waste under the Community Protection Plan.
In a related matter, commissioners will consider applying for federal assistance for a five-year cooperative agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy to study Yucca Mountain transportation issues.
The establishment of a minimum waiting period to resubmit applications for variances, conditional use permits and other planning maters is up for consideration.
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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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