Yucca Mountain News Clips
Thursday, November 20, 2003
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Las Vegas SUN
November 20, 2003
Crash near Yucca raises concerns
By Mary Manning
<manning@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN
This week's crash of a fighter jet about 40 miles from Yucca Mountain raised concerns about the proposed nuclear waste repository Wednesday.
Joseph Ziegler of the Energy Department told a panel of scientists advising the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that Air Force officials had volunteered to establish a no-fly zone over the mountain.
In a Sept. 11 letter to key lawmakers, including House Armed Services Chairman Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., Air Force officials warned that a Yucca repository could affect training and endanger sensitive operations.
Air Force officials argued that plans to haul waste through the Nevada Test and Training Range adjacent to the Nevada Test Site and Yucca Mountain, are "untenable." The A-10 crashed at the range.
The potential for an aircraft crashing into the repository site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has been a controversial issue between the DOE and the NRC, Ziegler said.
The NRC has said that there is a "high risk" of such a crash either by commercial jetliners or military jets.
Ziegler said there were "no high risks" at Yucca Mountain in the Energy Department's view. The NRC, he said, defines risks differently.
Originally, the Energy Department estimated that there was a one in a million chance of an aircraft crash .
Ziegler said the probability of such a crash could be as low as one in 10,000.
"We are working with the Air Force on flight activities," Ziegler said, noting that the military is worried about transportation routes to the repository, not spent fuel and nuclear wastes stored on top of the mountain.
Both commercial and military jets fly within eight miles of the repository site, said Paul Harrington, an Energy Department engineer working on repository development.
The Air Force has plans to increase its training flights for fighter pilots who fly over parts of the Test Site, Harrington said. Since September 1992 the Test Site has ceased full-scale underground nuclear weapons experiments.
"The Air Force has been more active over the Nevada Test Site since testing ceased," Harrington said. "We have to go back and re-analyze the risks from those flights."
Steve Frishman, technical adviser to the Agency for Nuclear Projects, the state agency for Yucca Mountain oversight, said the Federal Aviation Administration has predicted an increase in both military and commercial flights near Yucca Mountain.
By 2020 there may be as many as one flight per minute near the repository, he said.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 20, 2003
Talk of nuke dump site 'no-fly' zone follows Air Force jet crash
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - A no-fly zone might be established over the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump if the military increases flights over the nearby Nellis Air Force training range and the Nevada Test Site, project officials said.
"We are working with the Air Force on flight activities," Energy Department representative Joseph Ziegler told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste on Wednesday.
The discussion about air space came less than a day after an Air Force A-10 Thunderbolt II attack jet crashed in the desert on the Nellis range, about 40 miles from Yucca Mountain. The pilot, Capt. John Dyer, ejected safely. The Air Force is investigating the crash.
In a Sept. 11 letter to congressional leaders, Air Force leaders warned Congress that training might be crimped at Nellis if radioactive waste was shipped across the bombing range to Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
The NRC advisory committee meeting at a neighborhood casino in Las Vegas was scheduled before Tuesday's crash.
It reopened discussion about Energy Department plans to storing more than 20,000 tons of spent fuel casks shipped to the site on pads outside the repository before entombing them below ground. The repository is being designed to contain 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel in tunnels mined 1,000 feet below the surface.
Critics have said storing casks above ground could make them vulnerable to an aircraft crash, explosion or fire.
Paul Harrington, system engineering leader for the Department of Energy's Office of Repository Development, said the Air Force has advised Yucca Mountain planners that the number of military training flights will increase in coming years over the 4,562-square-mile Nellis range and the adjacent 1,375-square-mile Nevada Test Site.
Yucca Mountain is at the western edge of the nuclear weapons test site, which is operated by the National Nuclear Security Administration, an Energy Department agency.
Harrington said previous aircraft hazard risk calculations did not account for the possibility of increased military flights.
Those calculations put the probability of an aircraft crash Yucca Mountain at less than 1 in 10,000, or too low to require analysis.
Harrington said Air Force officials have not objected a Yucca Mountain "no fly zone" similar to a restricted flight area over a test site facility where nuclear devices are assembled and taken apart.
Another project official, Russ Dyer, said analyzing the potential for aircraft accidents ranks among the most urgent tasks for scientists preparing to apply to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission next year for a repository operating permit.
The Energy Department plans to open the repository in 2010.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 20, 2003
Editorial: Secrecy sows distrust
Las Vegas SUN
Earlier this month the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that staff members will meet privately with U.S. Energy Department officials to review information the department has collected for the Yucca Mountain project. Others, including officials from Nevada where the Energy Department wants to store 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste, inexplicably haven't been invited to the closed-door meeting. Nevadans are worried about the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which has the final word on the project, getting cozy with the Energy Department. "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission appears to be in bed with the Energy Department, but they aren't married yet, so this is not right," Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is supposed to be an independent body, but such meetings further the distrust of an Energy Department project that has dismissed the dangers posed by the transportation and storage of man's deadliest waste. In 2002 Nevada officials criticized similar secret meetings held between employees of the same federal agencies. It looked bad then and it still looks bad today. If there's nothing to hide, why not invite the public to listen in?
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 20, 2003
Yucca Mountain: Crash concerns discussed
Nuclear waste advisory panel urged to take another look at Nellis, test site risks
By Keith Rogers
Review-Journal
Energy Department officials said Wednesday calculations of aircraft hazards need to be revised at the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository based on increased military flights over Nellis Air Force Range and the Nevada Test Site.
The discussion during a session of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste in Las Vegas came less than a day after an A-10 Thunderbolt II attack jet crashed on the Nellis range, 20 miles north of Indian Springs. Capt. John Dyer ejected safely, and a board of Air Force officers is probing the cause of the crash.
Travelers reported seeing smoke from the downed plane as far away as Yucca Mountain, the site 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas where the government wants to entomb 77,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste stored at 131 other locations.
The meeting at Texas Station had been set long before the accident. Tuesday's crash was the third in as many years in or near a 30-mile radius from the mountain. In one crash, the aircraft, a Navy F/A-18C Hornet, was carrying two 500-pound bombs.
Energy Department plans call for storing more than 20,000 tons of spent fuel casks on pads outside the repository where the decaying waste will age before it is put below ground. Given current circumstances, the casks could be vulnerable to an aircraft crash, explosion and fire.
"One of the design parameters ... might have to include aircraft crash resistance," said Paul Harrington, system engineering leader for the Department of Energy's Office of Repository Development.
He said Air Force officials have advised planners on the Yucca Mountain project that they anticipate increasing the number of training flights over the 4,562-square-mile Nellis range and in the airspace of the adjacent 1,375-square-mile Nevada Test Site.
The test site, the nation's nuclear weapons proving ground, is operated by the National Nuclear Security Administration, a DOE agency. Yucca Mountain sits along the test site's southwestern edge.
"That will certainly have an effect on probabilities," Harrington told the panel.
Harrington said previous aircraft hazard risk calculations were based on historic data that didn't account for the possibility of increased military activity in the area. Those calculations showed the probability of an aircraft crash at the mountain to be less than 1 in 10,000, or too low to require analyzing the consequences of plane exploding and catching on fire there.
"We had no reason to believe beforehand that it would become a problem," he said.
Harrington said Air Force officials have not objected to having a 'no fly zone' over Yucca Mountain, similar to the restricted flight area over a facility on the test site where nuclear devices are assembled and taken apart.
He acknowledged Tuesday's Thunderbolt crash.
"Yes, they lost an A-10, but there is an awful lot of real estate out there that hasn't had an A-10 crash," he said.
Another project official, Russ Dyer, said analyzing the potential for aircraft accidents ranks among the most urgent tasks to complete as scientists attempt to have a license application for the repository ready for Nuclear Regulatory Commission review by December 2004.
"Aircraft crash (analysis) is relatively higher than the others" in priorities for licensing to be completed, Dyer said.
Nevada Nuclear Project Agency officials have been skeptical that the repository's surface facilities can be designed to prevent an aircraft crash turning the site into a disaster area ripe with radioactive contamination. They stress that military operations are not compatible with nuclear waste transportation and storage.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
November 20, 2003
Lieberman: Safety key to Yucca site
Presidential hopeful says nuclear waste repository wouldn't go forward based on politics
By Erin Neff
Review-Journal
Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Joe Lieberman said Wednesday that he would not go forward with plans to site the nation's nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain "if I feel it's not safe."
Lieberman, D-Conn., told reporters he is a "clear alternative" to President Bush, whom he said was guilty of breaking promises and "knuckling under to special interests."
During a 2000 campaign visit to Lake Tahoe, Bush promised to base any decision on Yucca Mountain on "sound science." He approved legislation last year to store 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, despite numerous unresolved scientific questions.
Lieberman also took a slight jab at Democratic front-runner and former Yucca Mountain proponent Howard Dean, who during a campaign stop in Las Vegas last month said he had "seen the light" on Yucca Mountain now that he's running for president and no longer is governor of Vermont.
"I didn't support (the Yucca Mountain bill) because it was just not the right thing to do," Lieberman said. "This is a statement about the kind of president I intend to be.
"I'm going to stick with a decision whether it's popular politically or not," Lieberman said. "Howard Dean has gone a slightly different way."
After a brief news conference, Lieberman spoke to about 35 people at a $1,000-a-plate luncheon at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, according to host Hal Ober, a developer.
Ober said he was not certain how much money was raised. Attendees included former Las Vegas Mayor Jan Jones; state Sen. Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas; Democratic National Committeeman Steven Horsford; and Adriana Martinez, Nevada Democratic Party chairwoman.
In a brief opening statement to reporters after arriving at McCarran International Airport from Chicago, Lieberman said in the past he had felt "very real pressure" to move waste from the four power plants in Connecticut.
Lieberman said that now that Yucca Mountain has been approved, he would want to examine whether there are alternatives.
"Isn't there some way we can figure out how to recycle that much nuclear waste and find something useful to do with it?" he asked.
Lieberman voted against the Yucca Mountain bill in 2002 and has also opposed efforts to designate Yucca Mountain as an interim storage facility.
But in a March 23, 1999, letter to the chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Lieberman and other Democratic senators urged an "accelerated waste acceptance" time frame to ship waste from shuttered power plants once a central repository was approved.
Lieberman said Bush's 2000 campaign statement was strictly political, and that, if elected president, "I'm not going to let something go forward if I feel it's not safe, if I feel it's not right."
"It's a big decision with big consequences, and I'm not going to let this decision, to the best of my ability, be rushed for political reasons," he said.
Lieberman said he was the only candidate who didn't "go to a reflex reaction" during a Democratic campaign event Tuesday in New Hampshire sponsored by the American Association for Retired People, which had just pledged support for a compromise on Medicare legislation.
"All of us in politics in the federal government have been promising seniors for years that we'd provide a prescription drug benefit in Medicare," Lieberman said. "This bill gives at least 10 million seniors in America prescription drug benefits that are pretty good under Medicare."
Lieberman said that while the bill now contains provisions he does not support, he wanted to talk with fellow senators about possible support for the compromise. He said he planned to make a decision on the bill within a few days.
"The question is `Do we say no to 10 million Americans ... or do we say let's put our foot in the door now for seniors and let's fix the parts we don't like in the years ahead?' " Lieberman said.
Lieberman also said he did not support efforts to approve a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. During the late 1990s, Lieberman said he supported efforts to define marriage "in the traditional way between a man and woman," but to let individual states determine whether to recognize civil unions.
"I don't favor a constitutional amendment," Lieberman said. "I think the Constitution is kind of like the Ten Commandments; you don't amend it lightly."
Lieberman is the fifth Democratic candidate to visit Las Vegas this year, following Rep. Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., retired Gen. Wesley Clark and Dean. Gephardt will make another trip to Las Vegas on Friday for two private fund-raising meetings.
Lieberman, who spent about three hours in Las Vegas on Wednesday, said he plans to return several times before the state's Feb. 14 Democratic caucus.
Republicans in Nevada, who are gearing up for Bush's planned fund-raising visit next Tuesday, sent out a news release condemning Lieberman for his criticism of Bush.
"Senator Lieberman would better serve the people of Nevada by returning to his duties in Washington," Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said in the news release issued by the Nevada GOP.
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Provo Daily Herald
November 20, 2003
In Our View: Nevada right place for Fernald waste
The Daily Herald
It appears that, for the time being, at least, the radioactive waste stored in Fernald, Ohio, won't be coming to Utah.
Envirocare of Utah announced that it was withdrawing a request to modify its license to accept the material now held in silos at the former atomic weapons plant.Company representatives said the timetable laid out for cleaning the Fernald site made it impossible get the amended license in time.
The Fernald waste is 25 times more radioactive, even after its planned dilution with concrete, than is allowed under Envirocare's current license.
The company had presented itself as a less expensive disposal alternative to the Nevada Test Site north of Las Vegas because radioactive material could be shipped to Tooele County in 27 trainloads rather than 3,800 truckloads, saving $30 million.
But while $30 million sounds like a lot of money to ordinary people, it's virtual loose change on a government scale, not enough savings to justify stopping short of the best disposal site in the country.
With Envirocare now seemingly out of the picture, it's time to apply common sense. The Fernald waste should be shipped off without further ado to the Nevada Test Site -- which has absolutely nothing to lose. It is forever uninhabitable because of decades of atomic tests in the mid-20th century.
Unlike Utah, where the addition of the Fernald waste would represent a significant ratcheting-up of radiation levels for shallow-earth disposal, Nevada would see no meaningful impact at all. The radium-laced tailings under consideration are so far below Nevada's ambient level of nuclear heat that the stuff wouldn't even be noticed.
Some in Nevada are raising objections to taking the Fernald waste. They sound like a man whose house has just burned down but who is worried about the risk of lighting a match amid the charred remains.
Nevadans, of course, don't want the waste to be transported through their cities any more than Utahns do. And many fear that allowing Fernald waste to come in will pave the way for the government to send superhot spent fuel rods to Yucca Mountain. In this Utahns share a common interest because nine out of 10 shipments would pass through Utah.
But let's be reasonable. In the case of Fernald waste, the stuff will never be safer than when it is shipped -- whether by rail or truck, it hardly matters.
The waste would be diluted at a 4-1 ratio with concrete, then cast into heavy steel containers to prevent any radon gas emissions generated from the waste's radium from getting to the atmosphere. It's this radon that is the potential problem, and even there it's a question of sustained exposure. The transportation risks are trivial.
Utah's main trouble with the Fernald waste isn't the shipping; the more important question is long-term ground storage and potential contamination of water and air over hundreds or thousands of years. Steel and concrete break down.
This is not a fear that Nevada can reasonably argue for itself. The old test site has been thoroughly poisoned already.
Nevertheless, Nevadans can be expected to mount a stiff resistance to the Fernald waste. They're no pushovers, having become adept at nuclear-political combat.
It is clear the waste cannot stay at Fernald, where nearby residents are experiencing increased cancer rates. While Envirocare of Utah may arguably be a better place than Ohio, it will never be the best. The best place -- clearly -- is the long-dead Nevada Test Site.
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St. George Daily Spectrum
November 20, 2003
Senator must show where he really stands
In Our View
Just one day after it was reported that Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, had pushed for regulatory changes as early as 1999 that would allow more radioactive waste into his home state, the senator made what appears to be abrupt about-face.
Bennett now claims that he opposes the disposal of "hotter" nuclear waste in Utah. It's a position that has been strongly taken by Gov. Olene Walker, former Gov. Michael Leavitt and Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah.
The senator said he still isn't clear about how language that would allow the more dangerous radioactive material into Utah got into the Energy and Water Appropriations bill that would reclassify highly contaminated waste from nuclear cleanup sites in Fernald, Ohio, and Niagara Falls, N.Y., and allow its disposal in Utah. The bill, which now awaits a vote in the House and Senate, however, came from a committee on which Bennett sits.
The question is, where was Bennett when the bill was drafted?
He chalks it up to "an innocent series of coincidences," that a congressional aide had checked with the state and heard no objections about reclassifying the waste and did not flag the provision when he passed it on to his replacement.
This just does not wash.
If, indeed, one of Bennett's aides checked with state officials, it certainly would have thrown up a red flag. Leavitt was adamantly opposed to storage of any nuclear waste in Utah. His successor, Walker, is equally opposed.
Bennett's critics charge that the senator looked the other way because passage of the bill would allow Envirocare, a northern Utah company, to bid on a contract to handle the waste.
In the middle of all this is Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, who is a former Envirocare lobbyist. Bishop is said to have inserted the language into the bill. Luckily, Envirocare has since withdrawn its bid to alter its license, likely making the issue a moot point.
Still, this state, particularly the southern portion of it, is acutely sensitive to issues involving the government's past and present actions regarding nuclear materials. There are immense concerns over the transportation of waste material to the Yucca Mountain storage facility and the prospects of a smaller site in Skull Valley or other Utah locations.
It's a sensitivity that should be shared by our representatives. At the moment, we can't be sure exactly where Bennett stands because of his backpedaling and his curious puzzlement over a bill that would have significant impact on his constituents.
He now says he is against the storage of these materials in Utah. Let's see if he backs up his most recent position with action in the Senate to defeat this bill.
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Las Vegas SUN
November 19, 2003
Presidential hopeful Lieberman makes fund-raising stop in Vegas
By Christina Almeida
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Joe Lieberman said his visit to Nevada on Wednesday was the first of many he plans during his race for the White House.
"I've always felt that when I have come to Nevada that it's my kind of state," he said. "It's moderate and independent-minded and that's the kind of Democrat I am."
Lieberman, D-Conn., spoke with reporters shortly after arriving at McCarran International Airport from Chicago, where he attended a fund-raiser in Skokie, Ill., Tuesday night. He was to spend about three hours in the state, attending a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser before leaving for California.
In brief remarks, Lieberman criticized the Bush administration for failing to live up to its 2000 campaign promises.
He said the president hasn't boosted the nation's economy and went back on his promise to follow sound science in deciding where to locate the nation's nuclear waste dump. Bush signed legislation last year to store 77,000 tons of radioactive material at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
"We are weaker at home and weaker around the world," Lieberman said before departing for the private fund-raiser. "I am running for president to restore prosperity and security to our country, and faith and integrity to the White House."
About 50 people attended Wednesday's fund-raiser at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, said Tovah Ravitz, the senator's deputy communications director. The luncheon was hosted by Richard Bryan, a former U.S. senator and two-term governor, and by former Las Vegas Mayor Jan Jones and developer Hal Ober and his wife, Dee.
Lieberman is the fifth Democratic presidential candidate to visit southern Nevada this year. The state, which went to Bush three years ago, is expected to be key in the 2004 presidential election as candidates seek its five electoral votes.
Republicans have begun mobilizing, outlining plans to build a network of grass-roots support. The GOP is focusing on fund-raising and targeting Hispanics who could prove critical to the president's re-election efforts.
Although Lieberman trails former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry in New Hampshire polls, he has said he was optimistic that he can attract support from moderate Democrats, independent voters and some moderate Republicans. Recent polls show that about one-fourth of likely primary voters are undecided.
Lieberman has said his New Hampshire campaign is gaining momentum, thanks, in part, to the endorsement of more than 40 former supporters of U.S. Sen. John McCain, who defeated Bush four years ago in the state's GOP primary.
Lieberman, who was elected to the Senate in 1989, has received endorsements from congressional colleagues. Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., fellow Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, Sen. Thomas Carper of Delaware and 10 other House members have endorsed him.
Lieberman is focusing his time and money in New Hampshire and other early voting states rather than Iowa, which he abandoned last month. Retired four-star general Wesley Clark also has bypassed Iowa, where Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri holds a slight lead over Dean in the most recent poll.
Lieberman had another Wednesday fund-raiser scheduled for 6:30 p.m. in Menlo Park, Calif. He was expected to overnight in California, give a morning speech in San Francisco and attend an evening fund-raiser in Los Angeles before returning to Connecticut.
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On the Net: http://www.joe2004.com/
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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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