Yucca Mountain News Clips
Monday, October 4, 2004
---------------------------
Chicago Daily Herald
October 04, 2004
How free trips get the ear of Congress
By Stephen Baxter and Justin D. Fox
Medill News Service
WASHINGTON - Criss-crossing the globe for speeches, conferences and fact-finding missions, members of Congress and their families have taken nearly $14.4 million worth of trips in the last 4¨ years - with private interests picking up the tab.
An analysis of congressional trips by Medill News Service in partnership with American Public Media's Marketplace program and American RadioWorks found that private interests spent $14,388,672 since Jan. 1, 2000, to send House and Senate members on 4,851 trips.
The academic groups, think tanks and corporate sponsors say the trips allow lawmakers to learn valuable information without spending taxpayer money. But critics say sponsors are buying special access to lawmakers, often in congenial surroundings.
While some members took privately funded trips to make speeches in places like Pittsburgh and Peoria, others went on fact-finding jaunts to Aspen, Colo., or spent $3,000 on meals at a five-day conference in Barcelona, Spain.
The most popular destination was Florida, with 558 trips, followed by California with 386 and New York with 354. West Virginia, home to the luxurious Greenbrier resort in White Sulphur Springs, was the fourth-most popular destination with 223 trips.
Many of the 159 sponsored trips to Nevada - the fifth-most common destination - mixed tours of the proposed nuclear waste disposal site at Yucca Mountain with the lure of Las Vegas.
While domestic destinations dominated the list of travel hot spots, Israel, Mexico, Italy, the United Kingdom and Cuba also made the top 20 most-visited list.
In all, senators took 1,071 trips, House members 3,781.
The House and Senate allow the trips if they are part of official duties and if lawmakers disclose where they went, the amount spent and the sponsor. Senate rules limit domestic trips to three days and international trips to seven days, excluding travel time.
Disclosure forms often are filed late or are incomplete, and the only place to find them is in House and Senate office buildings.
Sen. John Breaux, a Democrat from Louisiana, traveled the most at others' expense, taking 56 trips costing more than $158,000. On average, Breaux accepted a free trip a month, every month, over the period analyzed.
A spokeswoman said Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a Democrat from Connecticut, makes travel decisions based on whether trips pertain to issues of interest to him and his Senate committees. Lieberman, the Democratic candidate for vice president in 2000, is one of the most frugal lawmakers, listing three dozen trips totaling less than $500.
Bill Nell of the Aspen Institute, an international relations think tank that sponsored 488 trips, said sending lawmakers on trips helps them better understand issues.
"If we discuss China, Latin America, or Russia, for example," he said, "it is much more meaningful to do it in the country we're studying with people from that country."
The Aspen Institute topped the list of money spent by sponsors at more than $2.5 million. Second place went to the Ripon Educational Fund, a program of the Ripon Society. It doled out more than $600,000 to pay for 59 trips. Spending about $575,000 on 70 trips, the American Israel Education Foundation came in third.
Opinions on privately sponsored trips range from enthusiasm and skepticism to outright disapproval. While some lawmakers and sponsors say the trips promote understanding, some government watchdog groups say they give sponsors disproportionate influence on Capitol Hill.
"Typically these trips help educate members of Congress only about one side of an issue. As such, sometimes they're worse than not traveling at all," said Gary Ruskin of the Congressional Accountability Project said.
Danielle Brian, director of the non-partisan Project on Government Oversight, is also skeptical.
"It's for the most part only wealthy institutions that can do this. So in itself there is definitely a skewed leaning toward powerful special interests versus the average citizen," she said.
"At some level, Congress doesn't have all the resources to go on all the trips it could. So I don't say they're blanket wrong. But if the company sponsoring the trip has a financial interest, that's where I draw the line."
Others do not draw that same line.
In June 2003, Angelina S. Howard, executive vice president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, wrote an opinion column in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that included praise for Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia for supporting new nuclear power plants - a key proposal in the pending energy bill.
Two months later, the Nuclear Energy Institute, an association of nuclear energy companies, sent Chambliss on an $18,911 fact-finding mission to Italy - the fourth-most expensive Senate trip since Jan. 1, 2000.
Steve Kerekes, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, said Chambliss' trip to Italy included visits with Italian energy ministry officials and a tour of the Ansaldo-Camozzi Nuclear and Special Components facility, where steam generators for nuclear reactors are made.
Kerekes said the purpose of that trip was "to help advance their understanding of what's involved (in Italy) and understand that ... there's no domestic industry to protect here in the United States with tariffs on these components (steam generators)."
Chambliss' office did not return repeated phone calls.
Over the years, efforts have been made to tighten congressional rules related to privately sponsored trips and make the information more easily available to the public. But all have become stuck in the gears of the political machine.
In 1998, former Rep. Lee Hamilton, a Democrat from Indiana, introduced a resolution that would have required any House member taking a trip to submit a report on how the travel was related to official House business, including findings and recommendations as well as a detailed itinerary of all meetings, interviews, inspection tours and other official functions.
Hamilton also wanted to require the disclosure forms and reports be posted on the Internet, but his resolution never got to the floor of the Republican-controlled House.
Currently, members need only name the sponsor, destination and purpose of the trip and a list of transportation, lodging, meal and other costs. Far from being searchable on the Internet, these reports can be seen only in the House Cannon office building.
Similarly, Senate travel forms are found only in the Senate Hart building.
Steven Weiss of the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan watchdog group that examined congressional travel in 1998, said people are no more aware of privately sponsored trips today than they were six years ago.
"I think the public is still largely unaware of the fact that special interests can pay for members (of Congress) to travel for supposed educational purposes," Weiss said, adding that making records available online could bring this issue to the public's attention.
While Weiss noted that not all trips are paid for by groups with legislative agendas, Ruskin said it is important for citizens to examine lawmakers' privately sponsored trips "to find out what there is to be learned about members' ethics and their propensity for accepting graft and reasonable facsimiles of graft."
---------------------------
Minneapolis Star Tribune
October 03, 2004
Environment: Kerry's record outshines even Gore's
Robert Braile
When John Kerry is asked about his environmental record, he often refers to lessons his mother taught him about "responsibility to this world," to a speech he gave in Massachusetts on the first Earth Day in 1970, to an acid rain commission he led as that state's lieutenant governor, and to victories he claims as a U.S. senator on marquee issues from coral reefs to climate change.
It is a telling response. While Kerry has a glittering environmental record by most accounts, it reflects a distinct taste for Brussels over Boston -- for the more glamorous international and national issues of the day, over the more provincial issues that might normally preoccupy a senator. Or, at least, a senator not eyeing the Oval Office.
Not that Kerry has neglected the Bay State in what he calls his "commitment of a lifetime." Supporters say he has helped over the years in cleaning up Boston Harbor, the Massachusetts Military Reservation and the Housatonic River, showing political courage in the latter two cases, especially, by standing up to powerful players in the Pentagon and General Electric Corp., respectively.
Also, the national causes he has championed were as relevant in Massachusetts and New England as anywhere else. His efforts to reduce air and water pollution, toughen drinking-water standards, strengthen the federal Superfund program, reduce national forest logging and road construction, increase motor vehicle fuel economy, protect fisheries, conserve land, develop green transportation options and enhance renewable energy programs have served environmental interests from coast to coast.
From the start of his political career, Kerry has garnered his grandest headlines and most enthusiastic support from the national environmental community on high-profile issues that have about as much to do with Massachusetts as manatees. He has opposed opening a nuclear waste repository at Nevada's Yucca Mountain and drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He has participated in international climate change talks everywhere from Rio to Kyoto to The Hague.
Even on international and national issues that have affected Massachusetts, Kerry has sought the larger stage. In 1987, three years into his first Senate term, he criticized the Reagan administration for its lack of leadership on acid raid and called for Senate hearings on global impacts of the problem. At the time, acid rain was as acute a concern domestically and abroad as climate change is now, although perhaps more a concern for Germany's Black Forest than for the Berkshires.
Kerry has critics among environmental activists in Massachusetts, who see his support as driven by careerism and bravado more than purpose and passion. He could be counted on to vote the right way, they say, but has not delivered as much as some of his colleagues in the New England congressional delegations, among America's greenest -- nor as much as Kerry himself claims.
Nevertheless, his record has earned him very high marks from environmental groups. His lifetime League of Conservation Voters rating, based on Senate votes, is 92 out of 100 -- so high that the group endorsed him on Jan. 24, three days before the New Hampshire primary, the earliest in a campaign season it has endorsed any candidate in its 34-year history. (In 2000, it did not endorse former Vice President Al Gore until May 30 -- and Gore, one of the greenest politicians in recent memory, had a League rating of only 64.)
It remains to be seen whether such support will tip the scales for Kerry in what polls have long indicated is a very close race with President Bush. So far he has chosen -- as Gore did four years ago -- not to make his environmental commitment a highlight of his campaign.
Instead, he has cast his environmental platform in terms of how he would resolve local bread-and-butter issues, shying away from showcasing the positions that represent the greatest difference between himself and the president.
Strategically smart or not, that may be Kerry's most telling position of all.
Robert Braile reported on the environment for the Boston Globe from 1987 to 2001. He is writing a book about race, culture and the environment in America.
---------------------------
Naples Daily News
October 03, 2004
Ben Bova: Where Bush, Kerry stand on science
By Ben Bova
Special to the Daily News
As we rapidly approach election day, very little has been said by either candidate about the crucially important subject of science. Or at least, very little has been reported by the news media.
While we witness the teeth-gnashing furor over the candidates' Vietnam-era military service, issues such as stem-cell research, energy policy, space exploration, and environmental protection get little more than lip service from the media.
Is this because of poor reporting or are both candidates largely ignoring issues of science policy? The prestigious British science journal Nature rose to the occasion and sent a science-related query both to Sen. John Kerry and President Bush: 15 questions that ranged from global warming to nuclear proliferation. And both candidates replied — or, at least, someone on their staffs replied.
As you might expect, much of their responses is posturing and rhetoric. For example, Bush speaks about how swiftly and effectively his administration moved to contain mad cow disease after a single infected cow was found, while Kerry talks about "the Bush USDA mishandling of mad cow disease" and how "John Edwards and I will improve our food safety and inspection process."
To me, the four most important science-related issues are energy policy, which heavily affects the environment, including global warming, stem cell research, space exploration, and missile defense.
Energy policy means developing alternatives to fossil fuels that will allow us to lessen our dependence on OPEC petroleum and decrease the amount of greenhouse gases we pour into the atmosphere. Bush has proposed a program for developing hydrogen fuels. The president has also decided that radioactive wastes from our nuclear power plants will be stored at the federal facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, although several states and environmental groups have threatened court suits to prevent this.
Personally, I regard opposition to the Yucca Mountain storage facility to be based mainly on politics and hysterical ignorance. Nuclear wastes can be stored safely there and, within a few decades at most, physicists will have developed the technology for deactivating those radioactive materials and turning them into harmless inert elements.
The Nature article did not mention the Yucca Mountain decision. Instead it asked the candidates about ITER, the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. This is a fusion reactor, in which nuclei of hydrogen atoms are fused together to form helium and release energy. Fusion is what powers the sun and stars, and when fusion power plants become practical here on Earth, we will have abundant clean energy whose fuel comes from water.
Both candidates support the ITER program. Bush sees it as "a critically important experiment to test the feasibility of nuclear fusion" Kerry says he supports "a strategically balanced U.S. fusion program that includes participation in ITER to supplement a strong domestic fusion science and technology portfolio."
On stem-cell research, Bush points out that he is the first president to permit federal funding for embryonic stem-cell studies. The media generally point out that the research allowed under Bush is quite limited, but the fact is that under Clinton and all previous presidents no federal funding was permitted for any work on embryonic stem cells.
Religious conservatives condemn such research because it uses embryonic tissue, which they see as morally wrong. Although himself a conservative, Bush has gone farther than any of his predecessors in the White House on this issue.
Kerry, of course, believes he has not gone far enough. "I will lift ideologically driven restrictions while ensuring rigorous ethical oversight."
I have to agree with Kerry on this one. Religious dogma should not be allowed to inhibit scientific research, especially research that bears such promise of finding cures for cancer, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other deadly diseases.
On the issue of space exploration, Bush has already initiated a program that will return humans to the moon in 10 years and then send explorers to Mars by mid-century. This I support heartily.
I firmly believe that the resources of energy and raw materials to be found in space can create an unprecedented era of prosperity for all the people of Earth.
Kerry, though, says "there is little to be gained from a space initiative that throws out lofty goals but fails to support those goals with realistic funding."
This is wrong, on two counts. First, Bush has already budgeted some $15 billion for his space initiative, much of it created by moving existing NASA funds within the agency. Secondly, funding depends on Congress. I hate to say it, but Congresses controlled by the Democratic Party have not been generous to NASA. It was Ted Kennedy, Walter Mondale and other Democratic liberals who stood passively and allowed President Nixon to kill the Apollo program and gut NASA's plans for the future.
On the issue of ballistic missile defense the candidates seem diametrically opposed. Bush has ordered the deployment of a first-generation defense system; Kerry believes it's a waste of money.
Could the system now being built in Alaska and aboard Navy vessels stop a North Korean missile attack? We don't know, but I suspect that the existence of such a defense system — with the promise of its continual upgrading — makes our allies in South Korea and Japan breathe easier.
Israel, Pakistan and India not only have missiles, they have nuclear weapons to put atop them. North Korea has been selling missiles to several Middle Eastern nations. Iran and North Korea are pursuing nuclear weapons programs.
Diplomacy might work to defuse these situations, but diplomacy works best when it is backed by credible power. If Kim Jong Il or Osama Bin Laden fired a nuclear-tipped missile today, nothing could prevent it from reaching its target and destroying it in a mushroom cloud.
We need to be able to defend ourselves against ballistic missiles. To do less is to invite nuclear blackmail on a global scale or, worse, nuclear destruction.
I believe President Bush is moving in the right direction on missile defense.
Naples resident Ben Bova is the author of more than 100 futuristic books, including "The Silent War," his latest novel. Dr. Bova's Web site address is www.benbova.net
---------------------------
The State
October 03, 2004
Bush, Kerry hitting on local issues in swing states
Malia Rulon
Associated Press
WASHINGTON - Going after voters in southern Ohio, Democrat John Kerry promised to continue paying for cleanup work at a major employer and help workers made sick by exposure to toxic chemicals.
In Michigan, Bush got cheers when he pledged never to permit water to be taken from the Great Lakes, a promise the Kerry campaign quickly echoed. Bush also promised voters in Oregon that he would get them $15 million to deepen 104 miles of the Columbia River.
Meanwhile, both campaigns have guaranteed money for clean coal technology to residents of West Virginia and told audiences in the West why they support or oppose drilling in Otero Mesa, N.M., or the disposal of nuclear waste at Nevada's Yucca Mountain.
Polls show that the top issues for voters are terrorism, the war in Iraq and the economy. But with the race hinging on only a handful of swing states, the candidate's positions on local issues could end up making the biggest difference.
"Some of these states are shaping up to be real close, so whatever they can do to motivate people and influence their vote might pay off," said Charles Funderburk, a political science professor at Wright State University in Dayton.
In Ohio, the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant, which enriched uranium, was closed in 2001. USEC Inc., which runs the plant, chose the site this year for a new facility that will use more modern technology.
Workers there say Bush's promise - in writing - to support funding for the plant in Piketon made a big difference in how they voted in 2000. Now they are comparing the president's record over the last four years to Kerry's pledge.
In a letter to Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, Kerry said he would make sure ill workers get speedy compensation and would continue to support funding for cleanup and the development of new technology.
The government has a compensation program for such workers but both Democrats and Republicans say it should be improved.
"There are maybe multiple other issues that you can go on and on about, but this is definitely one of the major ones for employees," said Bob Givens, a Republican from Lucasville who has worked as a uranium material handler at the plant for 27 years.
Dan Minter, president of the workers' union, said he has met with Bush and Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards about the plant's future.
"It certainly has been a primary issue. I have received invitations to events that I never would have expected," Minter said.
Both candidates have been campaigning hard in Ohio, a state Democrat Al Gore lost by just 3.6 percentage points after pulling his campaign in the last weeks of the 2000 campaign. No Republican has won the White House without Ohio.
In West Virginia, state Delegate Mike Caputo, a Democrat from Marion, says coal is the issue that can turn the race around for Kerry.
The Bush administration has budgeted $447 million for clean coal technology this year and proposes spending $2 billion on it over the next decade. Kerry has proposed investing $10 billion over 10 years to develop clean-burning alternatives for coal-fired plants.
As the state's political action coordinator for the United Mine Workers of America, Caputo recalls how West Virginia voters reacted to Gore's campaign, choosing Bush by a surprising 6 percentage points. Bush was just the fourth Republican, and the first who wasn't an incumbent president, to win West Virginia since 1932.
"Al Gore did not talk about coal enough in West Virginia," Caputo said of the environmentally friendly candidate. "Coal is a big concern to all West Virginians, regardless of what you do for a living."
Drilling for oil and gas in wilderness areas is a big deal to many residents out West, and especially to sportsmen, said Stephen Capra, executive director of the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance.
Bush recently announced a plan that would allow expanded oil and gas drilling on Otero Mesa in southern New Mexico. Kerry opposes all oil and gas development in the publicly owned grassland, which is home to more than 250 species of songbirds.
Capra says that while most environmentalists will probably vote for Kerry anyway, this issue could keep the state Democratic if it draws enough hunters, which traditionally vote Republican.
Gore won New Mexico by just 366 votes.
Kerry spokeswoman Debra DeShong said hitting on local issues is an important part of the Democrat's strategy because it helps make a personal connection with voters.
On a visit to Newark, Ohio, Kerry mentioned earlier job losses at Toledo-based Owens Corning, which filed for bankruptcy protection in 2000, and Kaiser Aluminum Corp. in nearby Heath. He mixed in comments about a local pizza joint and that night's high school football game against Zanesville.
"Voters want to hear from us where we will take the country, but they also want to hear from us where will we take their community," DeShong said.
The Bush campaign does the same thing. The president announced in Portland, Ore., that he was supporting funding to deepen a shipping canal that runs to the Pacific Ocean. Merchant carriers, farmers and ranchers say the channel is too shallow to accommodate newer ships.
"This is an important new step to enhance the vitality of this river," Bush told about 300 guests at Terminal 6 of the Port of Portland on Aug. 13.
"We essentially tailor the president's economic message to local concerns," Bush campaign spokesman Kevin Madden said. "It shows that the president is somebody who is actively engaged in local issues and how they affect people."
ON THE NET
Bush campaign: http://www.georgewbush.com
Kerry campaign: http://www.johnkerry.com
---------------------------
PhysicsToday
October 03, 2004
Presidential Candidates Speak Out on Science Policies
During the 2000 presidential election, in that time before the September 11th terrorist attacks, the stump speeches of George W. Bush and his Democratic opponent, Al Gore, focused on protecting Social Security, saving American education, expanding Medicare, raising or lowering taxes, and readying the military. If science was mentioned at all, it was usually in the context of missile defense, global warming, or Gore's role in creating the internet.
With the exception of the debate over stem-cell research, science remains a background topic in the current campaign. Democratic candidate John Kerry has occasionally highlighted US science policy and used it against President Bush, charging that the administration has put politics and ideology ahead of science. "Let scientists do science again," a headline on the Kerry election website says.
Bush has responded, primarily through his science adviser, John Marburger, by pointing to the 44% increase in federal R&D since fiscal year 2001 and the record $132 billion in the administration's FY 2005 R&D budget. "Kerry ignores President Bush's record science investments," reads a headline on the Bush reelection website.
Kerry answers by noting that most of the R&D money is going for weapons systems and defense spending related to the war in Iraq, not basic science programs. Marburger and other administration officials point to several R&D initiatives, including new nanotechnology centers, the Moon/Mars space initiative, and the program to develop hydrogen fuel technology.
In an effort to get the candidates to specifically address questions of interest to the science community, Physics Today has continued a tradition begun in 1976; it asked Bush and Kerry nine questions covering a range of science topics. Their answers, sometimes direct and sometimes vague, show fundamental differences on several key issues.
On missile defense, Bush says his request of $10 billion in FY 2005 for development and deployment of such a system fulfills a pledge he made to the American people. Kerry says we should not be "falsely comforted by an untested and unproven defense system."
On global warming, Kerry talks of both near— and long-term programs to deal with the problem. Bush promotes his "comprehensive climate change strategy." The candidates also address a host of other issues ranging from space exploration to energy policy.
Jim Dawson
1. Missile defense: The present administration is requesting more than $10 billion this year for development and deployment of a missile defense system. Many scientists say the system, given current and foreseeable technology, cannot be effective. What proof of effectiveness should be required before the system is fully deployed? Given the low-tech nature of terrorist attacks and the limited missile capabilities of North Korea and other hostile nations, does missile defense continue to be a wise investment?
Bush Our policy is to develop and deploy, at the earliest possible date, a weapons system that would defend the United States homeland against nuclear attack, including ballistic missile defenses drawing on the best technologies available. Early in my administration, I called for the examination of the full range of available technologies and basing modes for missile defenses that could protect the United States, our deployed forces, and our friends and allies.
The FY 2005 Defense Appropriations Act provides $10 billion that I requested for systems to defend against the threat from ballistic missiles. Later this year, the first components of America's missile defense system will become operational, and we are on schedule for the next stages of the project. My administration will develop and deploy the technologies necessary to protect our people, fulfilling a pledge I made to the American people more than four years ago.
Kerry A missile defense that works is a wise investment, but one that pours money into defenses at the expense of other immediate national security needs is not. And that's what this administration has done.
Missile defense should be one element of a comprehensive national security strategy. But a single-minded focus on this technology and the threat it is designed to meet ignores the very real danger of terrorism and our greatest danger— terrorists with weapons of mass destruction.
John Edwards and I will be committed to developing a missile defense system that works, is fully tested, and geared to the threats we face. But I will refocus our efforts on preventing the spread of nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons and dramatically accelerating the security of nuclear weapons and material in Russia and around the world. We will not sit by, falsely comforted by an untested and unproven defense system, while these threats continue to fester.
2. Climate change: Virtually all reputable research in recent years has reinforced the scientific conclusion that global warming is a real and growing crisis caused, at least in part, by the burning of fossil fuels. Do you accept that scientific consensus? Under what circumstances would you regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions?
Bush Global climate change is a serious long-term issue. In 2001, I asked the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) to provide the most up-to-date information about the science of climate change. The academy found that considerable uncertainty remains about the effect of natural fluctuations on climate and the future effects climate change will have on our environment.
My administration is now well along in implementing a comprehensive climate change strategy to advance the science, expand the use of transformational energy and carbon sequestration technologies, and mitigate the growth of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States and in partnership with other nations. I created the new US Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) to refocus the federal government's climate research programs, for which my 2005 budget seeks nearly $2 billion to fund research across the federal government. The NAS endorsed the CCSP strategic plan, noting that it "articulates a guiding vision, is appropriately ambitious, and is broad in scope."
I also committed the nation to a goal of reducing American greenhouse gas intensity by 18% over the next 10 years, which would prevent more than 500 million tons of carbon emissions through 2012. To help achieve this goal, I created the Climate Vision program in 2003 to reduce the growth of greenhouse gas emissions by energy-intensive industrial sectors. Participants in the Climate Vision program account for between 40 and 45% of US greenhouse gas emissions. I have strongly supported over $4 billion in tax incentives for renewable and energy-efficient technologies, including wind and solar energy and hybrid and fuel-cell vehicles. Also, in April 2003, my administration raised the fuel economy standards for light trucks and SUVs [sport utility vehicles] for the first time since 1996, saving 3.6 billion gallons of gasoline. And in my 2003 State of the Union [address], I announced a $1.7 billion hydrogen fuel initiative to accelerate research that could lead to hydrogen-powered, no-emission vehicles within a generation.
Additionally, my administration is participating in robust international partnerships to promote clean, renewable, commercially available fusion energy and to construct the $1 billion FutureGen project, which will test the latest technologies to generate electricity, produce hydrogen, and sequester greenhouse gas emissions from coal.
Kerry I recognize the risk of climate change, and I have outlined a balanced set of programs that will have impact both in the near term and over the long term. My plan will also provide balanced support for technology that can increase the efficiency and cut greenhouse emissions in transportation systems, buildings, and industry that are attractive to consumers and US producers. Our programs will encourage the use of renewable fuels such as ethanol and renewable electric generation that produce little or no net greenhouse gases. I will expand the production tax credit for wind and biomass energy to cover the full array of renewable energy sources and increase Department of Energy (DOE) research into renewable energy sources and their applications. And I will propose an aggressive program of research, standards, and incentives to accelerate electric generation from renewable energy. Clean coal technology can play a critical role, given technology to cut carbon dioxide emissions.
My plan would encourage energy efficiency with programs such as updated fuel efficiency standards, new tax incentives for automakers to build the new, more efficient automobiles of the future, and tax incentives for families to purchase more energy-efficient cars, trucks, and SUVs.
3. Science investment: There is concern in the science and economic communities that the US is losing its world leadership in the sciences, which they say bodes ill for future economic growth and global competitiveness. To address that concern, should the US increase funding for basic science, and should the administration fully fund the 2001 bill, signed by the president, to double NSF's budget? How would you reinvigorate science education for US-born students? What is the role of foreign scientists and students in the US scientific enterprise?
Bush Including my FY 2005 budget request, total federal R&D investment during the first term will have increased 44% to a record $132 billion in 2005. My FY 2005 budget request commits 13.5% of total discretionary outlays to R&D, the highest level in 37 years. In the context of the overall economy, federal R&D spending in the FY 2005 budget is the greatest share of GDP [gross domestic product] in over 10 years. Funding for basic research, the fuel for future technology development, is at an all-time high of $26.8 billion in FY 2005, a 26% increase over FY 2001.
Funding for NSF during the four years of my administration has increased 30% over FY 2001 to $5.7 billion in FY 2005. NSF's broad support for basic research, particularly at US academic institutions, provides not only a central source for discovery in many fields but also encourages and supports development of the next generation of scientists and engineers. Moreover, in fulfilling its mission, NSF has used its funding efficiently and effectively.
As for the American scientific enterprise, it is important in this information and technological age that our students receive a first-rate science education, just as they receive quality instruction in reading, writing, and math. The federal government has no control over local curricula, and it is not my job to tell states and local boards of education what they should teach in the classroom. Nevertheless, the No Child Left Behind Act, one of my proudest legislative achievements this term, is improving our schools and, consequently, the teaching of science. NCLB requires, for the first time, assessments in science to give us better information about how our students are performing and how to improve instruction in science.
I have also proposed creating the Presidential Math and Science Scholars Fund to provide $100 million in grants to low-income students who study math or science. This will ensure that America's graduates have the training they need to compete for the best jobs of the 21st century.
I also value the contributions that foreign scientists and students make to our nation's scientific enterprise, while recognizing the importance of safeguarding our security. We will continue to welcome international students and scientists while implementing balanced measures to end abuses of the student visa system. My administration has already achieved several notable successes in reducing delays now being experienced by some visa seekers. We have increased security while speeding up the clearance process; approximately 1000 backlogged applications have already been cleared out.
Kerry For three years, the Bush administration has squandered America's leadership in the world, putting politics before science and doing nothing to create jobs while our workers fall further behind. The administration has proposed cuts for scientific research and grossly distorted and politicized science on issues from mercury pollution to stem-cell research. This approach not only limits the research that our scientists are doing today, it undermines important discoveries of tomorrow and threatens America's critical edge in innovation. I will reverse this course by restoring America's scientific leadership, helping find new cures, moderating health-care costs, and developing new technologies that will create good jobs. I will boost support for the physical sciences and engineering by increasing research investments in agencies such as NSF, the National Institutes of Health, DOE, NIST, and NASA. This funding will help with the broad areas of science and technology that will provide the foundations for economic growth and prosperity in the 21st century.
4. Nuclear weapons: Does the US need to develop a new class of nuclear weapons to deal with the changing threats of the 21st century? Is there any circumstance in which you would support the resumption of nuclear testing?
Bush The Nuclear Posture Review, released by my administration in January 2002, noted that the nation's nuclear infrastructure had atrophied since the end of the cold war and that the evolving security environment requires a flexible and responsive weapons complex infrastructure. To that end, my FY 2005 budget reflects an increase over the 2004 enacted level in the weapons activities account, which encompasses the stockpile stewardship programs. There is no current need for testing due to the sophistication of computer modeling and other new technologies, but we must maintain the capability to test in case such testing becomes necessary in the future to ensure the safety and reliability of our defensive arsenal. We have not identified any need for developing new nuclear weapons.
Kerry No, and a Kerry-Edwards administration will stop this administration's program to develop a new class of nuclear weapons. This is a weapon we don't need, and it undermines our ability to persuade other nations to forego development of these weapons.
5. Nuclear proliferation: There is serious concern among many experts that terrorists could release radioactive materials, or even detonate a nuclear device, in a US city. Do you believe the US is doing enough to secure and control existing stockpiles of nuclear weapons and fissile material both in the US and elsewhere?
Bush No administration in history has done more to secure and control nuclear weapons and fissile material than mine. US weapons and materials are exceptionally secure and both the Department of Defense and DOE are working to make them even more so. My administration has substantially increased funding to secure weapons and material in the former Soviet Union and has accelerated by two years the schedule the previous administration prepared for security upgrades in Russia. We are working with Russia to end the production of plutonium and to eliminate enough weapons plutonium for thousands of weapons. Outside the former Soviet Union, my administration established the Global Threat Reduction Initiative to eliminate or secure fissile and radiological material worldwide. We have already removed weapons material from several countries. Most recently, our policies resulted in Libya abandoning its long-standing quest for nuclear weapons.
To guard against so-called dirty bombs, we led the international community in a global effort to account for, secure, and dispose of excess radiological sources that could be used in such devices. We initiated activities in over 40 countries on this effort, as well as with international organizations like the International Atomic Energy Agency. Through the Proliferation Security Initiative, the Container Security Initiative, and the Second Line of Defense program, we have dramatically improved our ability to interdict materials that could be a threat to us and to our friends and allies.
Finally, my administration launched the G-8 Global Partnership— a $20 billion initiative to support arms reduction, nonproliferation, counterterrorism, and nuclear safety projects in the former Soviet Union. This extraordinary mobilization of the international community is leading to a safer, more secure world.
Kerry Our nation's highest priority must be preventing terrorists from gaining access to nuclear weapons and the material to make them. We must work in a global partnership with other nations to prevent the spread of these deadly weapons. Unfortunately, the Bush administration's policies have moved America in the opposite direction. They have alienated the allies we need to advance our security. Even after September 11th, they have not done nearly enough to secure existing stockpiles and bomb-making materials. They sat on the sidelines while the nuclear dangers from Iran and North Korea have increased. Our security requires an immediate change of course. I have proposed a comprehensive strategy to
• safeguard existing stockpiles of dangerous weapons and materials, including an acceleration of programs to secure all nuclear weapons and materials within the former Soviet Union, and at research reactors in countries outside the former Soviet Union, within four years. end production of new fissile material for nuclear weapons by negotiating a global ban on production of new material.
• reduce existing stocks of nuclear weapons and materials by ending development of the new generation of nuclear weapons, accelerating reductions in US and Russian nuclear arsenals, and reducing stocks of dangerous highly enriched uranium in Russia.
• end nuclear weapons programs in hostile states, including by prioritizing negotiations with North Korea to ensure the complete, irreversible, and verifiable elimination of its nuclear weapons program and leading a global effort to prevent Iran from obtaining the materials necessary to build nuclear weapons.
• enhance international efforts to eliminate illegal trafficking networks by toughening export controls, stiffening penalties, and strengthening law enforcement and intelligence sharing as well as improving the proliferation security initiative.
• appoint a presidential coordinator to prevent nuclear terrorism who will focus exclusively on directing a top-line effort to secure all nuclear weapons and materials around the world and prevent a nuclear terrorist attack.
6. Energy policy: More than two decades of discussions and proposals still have not resulted in a comprehensive US energy policy. Looking 25 years into the future, what do you believe the US energy mix should be? How would you move the US in that direction?
Bush Reliable and affordable energy is critical to America's economic, national, and homeland security. We will be more prosperous and more secure when we are less dependent on foreign sources of energy. The passage of a comprehensive and balanced national energy policy has been one of my top priorities. During my first six months in office, I proposed a national energy policy that would modernize our energy production and distribution systems, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, promote efficiency and conservation, increase domestic production from all forms of energy including renewable energy sources, and continue to strengthen our economy and create new jobs. We will continue to work with Congress on the energy legislation needed to carry out the remaining recommendations.
My administration has implemented nearly all of the more than 100 recommendations in the comprehensive national energy policy that did not require legislation&mdsash; such as increasing electricity reliability R&D to help prevent electricity disruptions and filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its capacity of 700 million barrels to provide energy security in case of major supply disruptions.
Kerry I have proposed an ambitious program of research, incentives, and standards that would sharply increase the efficiency of energy use and stimulate use of new energy sources that can ensure a prosperous and safe America while greatly reducing the risk of climate change. The program would be supported in part by a $20 billion energy security and conservation trust fund, capitalized from existing federal offshore oil and gas royalty revenues.
Unlike the Bush-Cheney policy, developed in secret by special interests, I have reached out to innovators around the country and developed a diverse portfolio of technical opportunities that can meet US needs both in the short term and for decades in the future. Given the long time required to turn over energy investments such as fleets of cars and trucks, industrial equipment, and building equipment, we must move a broad set of new technologies as quickly as possible if we have any hope of influencing US energy use in 25 years.
In the near term, many of the most promising technical opportunities involve using advanced materials, control systems, biotechnology, and other technologies to greatly improve the energy productivity of transportation, buildings, and industrial production. It's essential that the US move quickly to reduce its dependence on oil imported from the Middle East, and I will set ambitious goals for alternative fuels such as ethanol.
I will support research and incentives that will dramatically increase use of electricity from wind and other renewable resources. And I will encourage development of advanced clean-coal technology and nuclear generation consistent with high standards for environmental stewardship and security.
7. Nuclear power/radioactive waste: A recent report by MIT suggested that nuclear power is the best "clean" energy source to meet the US demand while protecting the atmosphere until renewable energy can be deployed on a large scale. Do you favor increasing the use of nuclear power? If so, what would you do with the resulting radioactive waste?
Bush I support the further development of nuclear power technologies as a clean, affordable, and realistic option to meet this nation's future energy needs. Nuclear power today accounts for 20% of our country's electricity. This power source, which causes no air pollution or greenhouse gas emissions, can play an expanding role in our energy future while meeting the environmental challenges we face with energy production.
My national energy policy contained several recommendations to encourage increased use of nuclear power and to handle the waste products that result. For example, through the Nuclear Power 2010 program, my administration is working with industry to pave the way for an order of a new US nuclear power plant within the next few years. Second, through the Generation IV International Forum, the United States is joining with countries around the globe to develop a next generation of safer, more economic, and more proliferation-resistant nuclear reactors that can also produce hydrogen and electricity. Finally, my administration has made a strong commitment to resolving the nuclear waste challenge and making the construction of a long-term geologic repository at Yucca Mountain achievable. We are moving ahead with the submission of a license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission at the end of this year.
This administration is also committed to exploring and investing in advanced new technologies that will profoundly change the ways we generate electricity. For example, I committed the United States to join the international fusion energy experiment, known as ITER, early in 2003. ITER is a critically important experiment to test the feasibility of nuclear fusion as a source of electricity and hydrogen. Fusion holds the promise of a nearly limitless source of energy produced without the accompanying radioactive wastes that require long-term management.
Kerry Nuclear power can play an essential role in providing affordable energy while reducing the risk of climate change; however, key challenges such as nuclear waste disposal, nuclear nonproliferation, and plant security must be met. John Edwards and I will ensure safety and sound science come first. We oppose George Bush's plan to open Yucca Mountain over the objections of independent scientists. Instead, a Kerry-Edwards administration will
• proceed based on peer-reviewed science. John Edwards and I do not support Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste disposal site and will insist that nuclear waste disposal and transportation proceed only on the basis of rigorous peer-reviewed science and analysis that leads to public understanding and confidence.
• reject the Yucca Mountain license. John Edwards and I will immediately call upon George Bush and DOE to cease from submitting a license application for Yucca Mountain.
• initiate an NAS study to examine whether geologic disposal anywhere is still the best, safest option, as opposed to long-term storage and monitoring, or some other technology.
• establish an international independent blue-ribbon panel to recommend world-class, state-of-the-art scientific methods for nuclear waste storage and disposal.
• secure nuclear plants from terrorist attack. John Edwards and I will improve and strengthen security at nuclear plants. In addition, we will require nuclear plants to adopt adequate plans to improve security, including measures to reduce dangers to the public if an attack occurs.
8. National labs: Despite National Nuclear Security Administration oversight, the national weapons laboratories continue to be plagued with internal security problems, spending irregularities, and low morale. What steps would you take to improve conditions at the labs? Does the current plan of opening the labs' management contracts to competitive bids run the risk of disrupting the operations in the midst of the war on terrorism?
Bush Our national laboratories are doing great work to deal with the threats of the 21st century. These laboratories are a tremendous asset in our efforts to improve homeland security, are the source of unparalleled technological progress, and are helping America win the war on terror. With their budgets at the highest level in years, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and Sandia National Laboratories are also on the cutting edge of 21st-century defense research, like combating bioterrorism, protecting the nation's infrastructure from crippling terrorist attacks, and developing a laser that simulates the intense heat of a nuclear explosion.
This is why we spent $6.5 billion on weapons research and production in FY 2004 and why I am asking for $6.8 billion for FY 2005. We must keep morale and security high. My administration has made every effort to improve the way the weapons labs do business, and one of those efforts is allowing competitive bids like those that exist in all areas of government— including those central to the war on terror— so we can use our resources more effectively and let everyone focus on his or her own expertise.
Kerry Our national laboratories play a critical role in maintaining our nuclear weapons stockpile and assuring that our nation's nuclear weapons are safe, secure, and reliable. The national laboratories also have an important role in preventing the spread of weapons of mass destruction and in advancing science for our nation's security.
The laboratories have a proud history of advancing our nation's security, but this record has been blemished recently by poor management and sloppy security practices. Morale at the labs has been badly damaged. John Edwards and I are committed to strengthening laboratory management and oversight and restoring the morale at these critical national assets.
9. Space policy: NASA is being reorganized to reflect the president's long-term vision of manned missions to the Moon and Mars. Many scientists believe the reorganization will drain money from NASA's unmanned science missions. How do you define the relative importance of unmanned science missions versus manned exploration flights? What is the appropriate funding balance between the two?
Bush In January, I announced my vision for the future of America's space exploration program. Achieving this vision will require the combined strengths of both manned and unmanned science missions. Robotic missions will serve as trailblazers— the advanced guard to the unknown. Probes, landers, and other vehicles continue to prove their worth, sending spectacular images and vast amounts of data back to Earth. Today, we have unmanned systems on and around Mars, a system orbiting Saturn, and one on its way to Mercury. Yet the human thirst for knowledge cannot be completely satisfied by even the most vivid pictures or the most detailed measurements. We need to see and examine and touch for ourselves. And only human beings are capable of adapting to the inevitable uncertainties posed by space travel.
As we complete our work on the International Space Station, we are developing a new manned exploration vehicle to explore beyond our orbit. This vehicle will be tested by 2008 and conduct its first manned mission no later than 2014.
America will return to the Moon as early as 2015 and no later than 2020, and use it as a foundation for human missions beyond the Moon. We will begin with robotic missions to explore the lunar surface, researching and preparing for future human exploration. Manned lunar missions will follow, with the goal of living and working there for increasingly extended periods.
Kerry John Edwards and I will continue America's long tradition of leadership in aeronautics, Earth sensing, and space exploration as part of a well-balanced NASA program closely tied to broad payoff for this country. It will not tie NASA to programs such as the Bush administration's Moon-Mars Program that emerged from closely held meetings in the White House with no clear objectives or cost estimates. It will invest in bold new programs tied to priorities, set by scientific experts, in exploring weather, climate, oceans, astrophysics, and other areas. Our administration will rely on the advice of the scientific community to select the most appropriate goals for research and the most appropriate tools for achieving these goals— including the question of whether manned or unmanned missions are most appropriate to the task.
---------------------------
Cincinnati Enquirer
October 3, 2004
Fernald waste still needs home
Nevada's opposition forces search for alternative dumping areas
By Dan Klepal
Enquirer staff writer
CROSBY TWP. - The federal government is shopping around for a new place to dump 50-year-old nuclear waste from Fernald's three concrete storage silos.
Cleaning the three "K-65" silos at Fernald is the most complicated and dangerous project at the long-closed uranium plant in northwest Hamilton County. The plant has been the focus of a decade-long cleanup that has included hauling away millions of tons of contaminated dirt, cleaning an underground lake, disposing of radioactive building debris plus thousands of barrels filled with hazardous materials.
The government had planned to dump the silo waste in the Nevada desert, 70 miles outside Las Vegas. But state officials there threatened in April to file a lawsuit to stop that plan, which they say is illegal and unsafe.
Department of Energy officials wrote a letter last week to the contractor managing the $4.4 billion cleanup, directing the company to identify places capable of storing or accepting for disposal millions of pounds of nuclear waste that have been held at Fernald since the 1950s. A report on the alternatives is due Friday.
Energy officials insist they can legally dispose of the waste in Nevada, but have made no progress toward a resolution. They have promised Nevada a 45-day notice before waste shipments begin.
Bill Taylor, the Energy Department's director at Fernald, said the public will have a say if the disposal plan changes.
"Although a formal public comment period is not required ... DOE is committed to continuing full public participation and will have a 30-day public comment period and public hearing," Taylor wrote to the Environmental Protection Agency.
Bob Loux, director of Nevada's Nuclear Waste Project office, said there have been no discussions with the federal government on a possible solution.
"We've just been sitting tight and waiting to see if they give us the 45-day notice," said Loux, whose office reports to the governor. "I think this is recognition that Nevada's legal position is correct."
Nevada's threatened lawsuit came just weeks before shipments of powdery waste from Silo 3 were to begin.
The legal dispute has put on hold that work, while the contractor continues on "standby,'' ready to begin removing the waste on two-weeks' notice.
The decision to keep the crew on standby has cost taxpayers about $200,000, without an ounce of the waste being removed.
The more highly radioactive waste in silos 1 and 2 is being transferred into temporary holding tanks and will eventually be mixed with concrete for shipping. That waste also was to be buried in Nevada.
Dennis Carr, manager of the silos project for contractor Fluor Fernald, said the earliest a decision could be made on alternative disposal sites is the end of February.
E-mail dklepal@enquirer.com
---------------------------
Nevada Appeal
October 02, 2004
Decision on nuke dump funding to come after election
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS - Congress is putting off until after the presidential election a budget fight on spending for a national nuclear waste dump in Nevada.
Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Pete Domenici, R-N.M., leaders of the Senate energy and water subcommittee, have been unable to agree on spending for the Yucca Mountain project.
Analysts say lawmakers also might also look for a signal from voters whether to continue developing the repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic challenger, has told voters in Nevada he would kill the Yucca program if elected.
Republican President Bush backs the repository and authorized the Yucca project along with Congress in 2002.
The administration has asked Congress for $880 million to continue repository work in 2005. However, Congress has balked at a provision to tap $749 million by restructuring a national nuclear waste fund.
That leaves the Energy Department with $131 million to spend on the Nevada program in the fiscal year beginning Friday without making deep cuts in other energy priorities.
Brian O'Connell, nuclear waste director for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, said Yucca backers might try to increase spending on nuclear waste issues if Bush wins.
If Kerry wins, "Congress could go with a low number and say we need a time-out," O'Connell said.
The House and Senate this week enacted temporary spending bills to keep government departments operating beyond the start of the new fiscal year. Temporary spending bills will let the Energy Department spend the same amount on the Yucca project as it spent in fiscal 2004, officials said.
Lawmakers plan a lame-duck session after the Nov. 2 elections to complete work on 2005 spending and other unfinished business.
---
Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal, http://www.lvrj.com
---------------------------
Las Vegas SUN
October 01, 2004
Yucca budget may have to wait
Vote won't come until after election
By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Sun Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- A final Yucca Mountain project budget number will most likely not be known until after Election Day.
Congress will go home next week, after the start of a new fiscal year, and has left some government agencies operating at 2004 levels until Nov. 20. Lawmakers will have to come back to pass a handful of the 13 spending bills still not done, including the energy and water spending bill that funds the Energy Department.
The House approved a $131 million budget for the planned nuclear waste repository at Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas earlier this year, leaving it $749 million short of the department's request. The Senate did not come up with a number for the project, although negotiations are said to have taken place.
Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that controls the Energy Department's budget, said he did not expect anything to change on the impasse until after the election.
Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., had suggested charging nuclear ratepayers an additional fee to help make up the difference, drawing criticism from the nuclear industry.
The Nov. 2 election will likely have an effect on the project, depending on who wins the presidential race and which party controls the House and Senate. While the newly elected would not take office until January, the outcomes could be felt during a lame-duck session.
Steve Kraft, director of waste management at the Nuclear Energy Institute, did not want to speculate on what Congress would do after the election. Kraft said regardless of who wins, he would want them to look at the situation and realize this is a project the needs to move forward.
"This program is not a done deal," Kraft said. "It still has to go through a lot of scientific and regulatory wickets."
In addition to requesting the highest budget for the project since its inception, the department also wanted to change the budget rules for the project. The House approved letting the department tap directly into the Nuclear Waste Fund, an account support by nuclear power ratepayers to fund the repository, but House supporters admitted it would be extremely difficult to get the idea through the Senate, based on Reid 's and Sen. John Ensign's, R-Nev., opposition to it.
Ensign sits on the Senate Budget Committee and stopped the change from getting into the overall budget resolution that guides the spending process.
Until a new budget is established, the department will continue to receive the $577 million it did for this fiscal year. Energy Department spokesman Joe Davis said he had no comments on the Yucca budget.
---------------------------
Las Vegas SUN
October 01, 2004
Letter: Bush should keep Yucca promise
It's been four years since George W. Bush promised our governor he wouldn't support Yucca Mountain unless the science did too. I certainly haven't forgotten that, or the fact he broke his promise and signed legislation that will send 77,000 tons of nuclear waste from all over the country into our communities.
Our own Nevada Commission on Nuclear Projects predicts well over 100 accidents to occur during the decades this toxic material will rumble through our neighborhoods. Just one accident could contaminate 40 square miles.
Nevadans owe it to themselves to urge President Bush to keep his commitment and use his power to stop Yucca Mountain. Bush may not have thought much of it when he made his promise, but it sure meant a lot to us.
Courtney Purcell
---------------------------
Las Vegas Review-Journal
October 01, 2004
NUCLEAR WASTE: Congress stuck on Yucca Mountain
Unable to agree on 2005 funding, legislators to wait until after Election Day
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Unable to break a stalemate over Yucca Mountain funding for next year, Congress has decided to put off the fight until after Election Day.
Lawmakers might receive a signal from voters whether to continue developing a nuclear waste repository in Nevada or to scrap the project, depending on who they elect as president, analysts said.
The House and Senate on Wednesday enacted temporary spending bills to keep government departments operating beyond Friday, the start of the new fiscal year.
The agencies were given authority to continue spending money at this year's levels until Nov. 20. Lawmakers plan a lame-duck session after the Nov. 2 elections to complete work on 2005 spending and other unfinished business.
Ballot returns might influence what Congress does on Yucca Mountain during the session, said Brian O'Connell, nuclear waste director for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners.
If Sen. John Kerry wins the presidency, "Congress could go with a low number and say we need a timeout," O'Connell said. Kerry has told voters in Nevada he would kill the repository program if elected.
If President Bush wins, O'Connell said, Yucca backers "presumably would try to boost up" spending on nuclear waste.
The Defense Department is unaffected by the stopgap spending bill because Bush signed its fiscal 2005 share into law in August. But Congress has not finished 12 other bills that set spending levels for other government agencies, including the Department of Energy.
Lawmakers have been unable to finish the spending bill for energy and water projects because of Yucca Mountain. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., the leaders of the Senate energy and water subcommittee, have been unable to agree on an amount for the repository program.
Reid said other problems exist with the energy and water bill besides Yucca Mountain. Legislators disagree over studies for "bunker buster" nuclear weapons and spending for water projects.
"Once again, the Republicans have failed to move Congress to get its work done in a timely manner," Reid said in a statement.
The temporary spending bills allow DOE to spend prorated portions of $577 million on Yucca Mountain, the same amount they were given for 2004, officials said.
Nevada might be entitled to part of the temporary funding, said Bob Loux, director of the state's Agency for Nuclear Projects. He said he planned to ask DOE for $80,000 or more, a pro-rated share of what the state received last year.
Congress has been stymied all year over the Yucca Mountain budget.
The Bush administration asked for $880 million to continue repository work in 2005 but added a wrinkle that had the effect of undercutting its request.
The administration assumed that $749 million would come from restructuring the nuclear waste fund that pays for the Yucca project. But Congress refused to go along, leaving the Energy Department with only $131 million to spend on the Nevada program without making deep cuts in other energy priorities.
Domenici, the Senate subcommittee chairman, proposed a one-time surcharge on nuclear utilities to raise $466 million. But he ran into resistance from the nuclear industry and fiscal conservatives who saw the plan as an energy tax.
Twenty-six conservative leaders sent a letter to Domenici on Sept. 22 that urged him to abandon the idea.
"Imposing a half-billion dollar tax hike on this important industry and forcing them to pay for government mishandling of the budget is not the way we as conservatives believe a Republican-controlled Congress should proceed," the letter said.
---------------------------
Las Vegas Review-Journal
October 01, 2004
Low-level waste repositories draw interest
Senator says Congress might have to set up sites for disposing of growing volumes of medical, industrial materials
By Steve Tetreault
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Congress might consider establishing federal repositories for low-level nuclear waste, after states have failed to open new facilities on their own, a Senate committee chairman said Thursday.
Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said he was interested in the idea, which was raised during a hearing on disposal for growing volumes of medical and industrial materials that become contaminated with radioactivity.
"I like the suggestion as a practical one," Domenici said. "We have a lot of public land" that could host repositories.
Licensed commercial sites in South Carolina, Washington and Utah that accept low-level radioactive waste will run out of storage capacity or face volume restrictions later this decade, while efforts to open new sites have failed so far, members of the Senate Energy Committee were told.
Domenici said the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will begin work on a low-level nuclear waste bill next year.
"While not an immediate problem, we must now play close attention to prevent a potential future crisis," he said.
Low-level waste is distinct from and not as radioactive as high-level waste generated by power plants that the Energy Department plans to bury at a Yucca Mountain repository over the objections of Nevada leaders.
Domenici did not mention possible locations for low-level nuclear waste repositories.
But a California official who appeared before the Senate Energy Committee said a low-level waste disposal area the Energy Department operates at Frenchman Flat on the Nevada Test Site is underutilized and might be able to store more material while Congress considers a long-term solution.
A 2001 DOE study concluded the test site and a burial site at the Hanford Reservation in Washington are being used at less than 50 percent capacity, said Alan Pasternak, technical director of the California Radioactive Materials Management Forum.
Nevada leaders plan to closely watch the issue, believing the state could be proposed as a possible recipient for more nuclear waste, according to Bob Loux, director of the state's Agency for Nuclear Projects.
"Clearly, most people in Nevada would just as soon see importation of low-level waste halted to Nevada," Loux said. "Most people believe Nevada has done its share."
A commercial low-level radioactive waste dump that operated in Beatty was shut down in 1979 by then-Gov. Bob List after a series of environmental and safety problems, Loux said.
Michele Boyd, energy legislative director for the Public Citizen watchdog group, said ongoing fights over the Yucca Mountain Project should discourage the idea of creating a national repository for low-level nuclear waste.
"The government's attempt to force a high-level waste dump at Yucca Mountain has been a fiasco and does not bode well for a federal low-level waste dump," Boyd said.
But Brian O'Connell, nuclear waste director for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners, said burial for low-level radioactive material might be "somewhat easier to sell."
Plans for regional repositories have run into opposition from potential host states. Nebraska was sued and has been ordered to pay a $151 million judgment after leaders were found to have plotted to keep a dump from being built in a rural county.
Pasternak urged senators to get the federal government more involved.
"States have failed to provide the necessary disposal infrastructure and are unlikely to do so," he said.
"A long-term national solution might include congressional authorization for one or two disposal facilities, possibly by the Department of Energy or commercial entities, on federal land," he said.
The California Radioactive Materials Forum is an association of public and private groups that promoted nuclear waste disposal at Ward Valley, 21 miles west of Needles.
Efforts by U.S. Ecology to open a Ward Valley dump were abandoned five years ago after meeting strong opposition from American Indian tribes and environmentalists.
---------------------------
Las Vegas Review-Journal
October 01, 2004
Nuclear shipment delivered to test site
By Tony Batt
Stephens Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- The government on Thursday completed the first shipment of weapons-grade nuclear materials from New Mexico to the Nevada Test Site, according to the National Nuclear Security Administration.
The shipments are being made because the Device Assembly Facility at the test site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is considered far more secure than the current storage location: Technical Area 18 at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
The NNSA, an agency of the Department of Energy, plans to transfer the most sensitive nuclear materials, which include plutonium and highly enriched uranium, from Los Alamos to the test site by September 2005.
The rest of the materials would be moved to the test site by 2008, the NNSA said. The total amount of the nuclear materials is estimated to be 2 tons.
"NNSA remains focused on consolidating Technical Area 18 nuclear materials in a manner that supports safety and security (requirements)," Everet Beckner, NNSA's deputy administrator for defense programs, said in a statement.
The shipments may be guarded by air support, according to an NNSA document released last month by the Project on Government Oversight, a nonprofit watchdog group.
Other information in the Aug. 20 document, which was described as a final coordination draft, reveals:
• Roughly 340 transportation containers will be needed to accommodate the early shipments, which are scheduled to be completed by September 2005.
• The estimated cost of completing the shipments ranges from $125 million to $148 million. The money would come from a congressional line item construction account.
• Los Alamos National Laboratory will be responsible not only for relocating the nuclear materials to the Device Assembly Facility but will establish a permanent management presence there to support "mission activities."
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., will retain overall management responsibility for the Device Assembly Facility.
Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, had expressed skepticism in congressional hearings earlier this year about whether NNSA really intended to transfer all of the nuclear materials from Technical Area 18.
But after learning of Thursday's shipment, Brian praised NNSA.
"This really is a significant step toward improving homeland security," Brian said. "A vulnerability is being addressed, and I commend the people who made it happen."
---------------------------
Tahoe Daily Tribune
October 01, 2004
Swing Nevada: Presidential vote could go either way
Gregory Crofton, gcrofton@tahoedailytribune.com
George W. Bush won the state of Nevada by only 20,000 votes in the 2000 presidential election.
This year another tight contest for president is under way with Nevada being dubbed one of 13 "swing states" meaning its five electoral votes could go to either candidate and determine who is elected president.
"The race is close enough that either candidate has a realistic chance this year," said Eric Herzik, a political science professor at the University of Nevada, Reno. "(Nevadans) tend to have a history of going to either party. We voted for George Bush Sr. in 98', Clinton in 92' and 96'. In 1992, Ross Perot got 26 percent of the vote."
The state's increasing political value is evident in the record number of visits from presidential candidates this year. Bush and Sen. John Edwards each visited Reno. Bush and Sen. John Kerry visited Las Vegas three times, and Vice President Cheney stopped in Elko, Herzik said.
"I just had lunch with paid staff from the Bush-Cheney committee," said Robin Reedy, chair of the Douglas County Bush-Cheney Re-election Committee. "They said Bush cannot win without Nevada. Last election, they had two paid staffers in Nevada. This election they have 40."
Nevada's voter are typically grouped in three areas, Herzik said. Northern Nevada tends to vote Republican but it is not that conservative; Eastern Nevada is very conservative to the point that it is almost libertarian; and Southern Nevada tends to vote Democratic.
Herzik said he thinks the issue of whether nuclear waste should be deposited at Yucca Mountain - Bush supports the move, Kerry does not - will not have a major impact on the state's electorate.
"Yucca mountain has been overplayed and it has been from day one," Herzik said. "There's fatigue on that issue. It's been around for 25 years."
---------------------------
Pahrump Valley Times
October 1, 2004
County second guesses Swanson
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
By a unanimous vote, the Nye County Board of Commissioners voted to disregard the professional advice of its staff scientist in awarding a $60,000 contract to a consulting company considered less qualified by the acting manager of the county's Department of Natural Resources and Federal Facilities.
In the absence of former Chairman Henry Neth, the board dismissed acting administrator David Swanson's considered recommendation that Yucca Mountain Solutions Group Inc. be named the county's consultant on the National Transportation Project.
The project is planned as the rail link between Caliente in Lincoln County and the Yucca Mountain Repository in Nye County. The so-called Caliente Corridor is the Department of Energy's planned method of transporting high-level radioactive waste 300 miles across the width of Nevada for long-term storage at the desert repository.
Instead, on a motion from Commissioner Patricia Cox, Wilbur Smith Associates was awarded the contract - lesser qualified in Swanson's technical judgment, but the best qualified in Cox's view because of the firm's detailed report addressing the county's economic development desires.
Wilbur Smith has extensive experience building railroads around the world. Its submitted "Economic Impact Evaluation and Planning" prospectus is notably more detailed in specifically addressing economic development opportunities for Nye County.
Swanson said only that he had received six responses to the county's request for qualifications and that five were "in the excellent category." He didn't say whether Wilbur Smith was included among the top five.
Swanson recommended Yucca Mountain Solutions principally because its chief consultant, Tom Erickson, had extensive experience in the design of the type of rail project involving the transport of nuclear fuels and had previously done rail consulting work for Nye County in connection with Yucca Mountain.
The other applicants had good experience but not in the specialized area of nuclear transport, Swanson said. Yucca Mountain Solutions had "a slight advantage" over the other four, he said.
But commissioners Cox and Trummell thought differently. Cox said the RFQ was sent out to find a consultant to show how to bring economic development to the county through the railroad initiative. Trummell was quick to concur with Cox, saying the purpose of the RFQ was "to get DOE to agree with (Nye County's economic development needs)."
DOE runs the federal Yucca Mountain project.
Wilbur Smith Associates was "the only company (applying) that responded accurately and in detail on how to bring economic development," Cox said. Therefore, Wilbur Smith was "more qualified" than the others, she said. Yucca Mountain Solutions had experience in the design of railroads, but not in business development connected to Yucca Mountain's railroad, Cox opined.
Swanson said there were "other factors involved" in the criteria selection of "best qualified," factors holding higher priority than economic development. The latter didn't matter as much, he said.
"Yes, it does matter," said Cox. "They were the only firm to address this."
In Nye County's RFQ the general goal was "to acquire professional expertise in the field of rail transportation, economic impact evaluation and planning." A list of objectives followed:
• Identify the availability and location of construction materials.
• Identify the availability and location of a construction workforce, equipment and commercial supplies.
• Provide options for the location of work camps and access to work sites from existing roads.
• Provide options on local desires for operations of the rail lines, including common carriage use.
• Provide options on local desires for locations of rail sidings.
• Gather opinion and comment on economic factors affecting rail alignment decisions.
• Provide information on possible commodities that could be shipped on the rail line to and from local communities - providing a decision is made to allow common carriage on the rail line.
• Provide opportunity for comment and other input from the perspective of Lincoln and Nye counties on the viability of the rail system, its integration of local needs and expectations for mass transit between rural communities along the rail corridor.
Swanson appeared to be primarily focused on the technical qualifications and expertise of a firm in designing a nuclear waste-transport railroad and appropriate sidings for Nye County; Cox and Trummell, more interested in its marketing and merchandizing potential as a business developer.
The issue came up earlier at last week's commission meeting, when Cox first stated her intention to disregard Swanson's recommendation and wanted to substitute her own favored consultant. Neth lambasted her for trying to second-guess the expert advice of the county's staff scientist responsible for dealing with the energy department as the county's liaison.
Erickson, Swanson's choice as lead consultant for the contract, submitted a resume showing rail project experience consulting for Nye County and doing feasibility studies for Amtrak and Canadian Pacific. Erickson formerly was in charge of Conrail's network of rail-truck trans-loading terminals, where he "promoted and expanded private bulk transfer terminals run by truck lines and shippers."
Additionally, Erickson has been recognized for his research and publication on short-haul railroads and on Hazmat risk reduction. Specifically mentioned was Erickson's experience as a business development analyst for Conrail and as a sales representative for CSX Transportation.
In the latter he specialized in intermodal - a product's transportation by more than one form of carrier in a single journey - and forest products accounts.
Erickson performed due-diligence analyses for privatized rail projects abroad, in Eastern Europe, Central America and Africa. From these experiences he has "intimate knowledge of sidetrack facilities and bulk terminal operations," according to the submitted qualification package.
Swanson was unavailable for comment.
---------------------------
KESQ
October 01, 2004
Decision on Nevada nuclear dump funding to come after election
LAS VEGAS It's going to be after the presidential elections before Congress decides how much money to spend next year on a national nuclear waste dump in Nevada.
That's because the leaders of the Senate energy and water subcommittee -- Senators Harry Reid, a Democrat from Nevada, and Pete Domenici, a Republican from New Mexico -- haven't been able to agree on spending for the Yucca Mountain project.
Analysts say lawmakers also might also look for a signal from voters whether to continue developing the repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Senator John Kerry has told voters in Nevada he'd kill the Yucca program if elected.
President Bush backs the repository and authorized the Yucca project along with Congress in 2002.
For now, temporary spending bills are letting the Energy Department spend the same amount on the Yucca project as it spent in fiscal 2004.
Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
---------------------------
Joplin Independent
October 01, 2004
Bush disregards nuclear waste warnings
Las Vegas - Tomorrow [9/28/04] marks the four-year anniversary of George W. Bush's letter to Governor Kenny Guinn promising to authorize the storage of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain only with backing of the best science. A review of Bush's record on Yucca over his Presidential term shows that he has broken that promise not once but multiple times, even when faced with warnings from different research bodies.
"As I've said before, I believe the best science must prevail in the designation of any high-level nuclear waste repository," Bush wrote to Governor Guinn in a letter dated September 28, 2000. "As President, I would not sign legislation that would send nuclear waste to any proposed site -- either on a permanent or temporary basis -- unless it has been deemed scientifically safe."
Despite that promise, the record shows that whenever Bush has been faced with major scientific concerns about Yucca Mountain, he has responded by redoubling his commitment to the project.
* In 2002, President Bush officially recommended Yucca Mountain as a national storage facility despite receiving a General Accounting Office report documenting 300 different scientific concerns about the designs for Yucca.
* In 2003, President Bush pledged to deliver nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain by 2010 only months after the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board warned that the designs for Yucca were unsafe.
* In July 2004, the Bush administration reaffirmed its plans to deliver nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain by 2010 despite a U.S. Appeals Court ruling that the administration's Yucca designs failed to meet safety standards set by the National Academy of Science.
"I urge all Nevadans to tell President Bush that if he's a man of his word, he'll stop ignoring the warnings from scientists and dump his plans for Yucca Mountain," said Tara Smith, speaking for the Sierra Club in Las Vegas.
Added Smith, "This is one flip flop Nevadans shouldn't tolerate."
---------------------------
Knoxville News Sentinel
October 01, 2004
Focus on: Nevada
Kerry eyes GOP state with growing Hispanic numbers, dump site battle
By Ron Fournier
Associated Press
John Kerry is betting on Nevada as he scours the political map for a Republican state he can call his own.
Four years after President Bush defeated Democrat Al Gore by 4 percentage points in Nevada, Democrats have found hope in the state's growing Hispanic population and a controversy over a nuclear waste site.
Nearly 5,000 new residents flock to Nevada each month, many of them Hispanics who tend to vote Democratic. Republicans, however, have seen gains in the growing suburbs around Las Vegas.
Nevada is fighting the Bush administration over the Yucca Mountain dump site 90 miles from Las Vegas. Kerry has voted against it. Bush supports it.
But a recent poll by Mason-Dixon raises questions about the dump site's impact on presidential politics. Only 3 percent of voters listed it as their top issue, and two-thirds said Bush's position would have no influence on their vote.
In most battleground states, jobs and the economy top the war on terror on voters' lists, but Nevada has gained nearly 90,000 jobs since Bush took office. Three Nevada troops have died in the Iraq war.
Several public and private polls give Bush a slight lead in the state.
After Ohio and Florida, both won by Bush in 2000, Nevada may be Kerry's top target on the GOP state list. Colorado, New Hampshire and West Virginia, all won by Bush four years ago, are also high on Kerry's list, while Arizona, Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana and Virginia have fallen off.
Quotable:
"I don't know how people can know what policies Kerry stands for because he's changed his position so many times on so many issues, like war." - Gregory Green, 24, a Reno college student who served five years in the Air Force including a brief stint in Iraq.
"He's trying to take away women's reproductive rights." - Darcy McCormick, 23, of Reno, on Bush. "Enough said."
Notable: Almost evenly divided between registered Democrats and Republicans, Nevada has voted for the winner in the past six presidential elections.
Paper-trail electronic voting machines are in use in much of Nevada this election season. Seven of 17 counties used punch-card machines in the last election.
Nevada is fighting the Bush administration over construction of a high-level nuclear waste dump in the desert 90 miles from Las Vegas.
On election night, watch: Clark County accounts for about 70 percent of the statewide vote, and its returns will be among the earliest on election night.
Watch for returns that tend to come in later from Washoe and Douglas counties and Carson City, all with more GOP voters than Democrats.
Democrats say Kerry could benefit from the turnout for a statewide ballot initiative that would add $1 to the state's $5.15 minimum wage for employees lacking health insurance.
Between now and Election Day, Focus On will highlight various aspects of the presidential campaign.
---------------------------
Common Dreams
September 30, 2004
New Study Finds Billions Wasted on 'Nuclear Pork'
WASHINGTON - September 30 - Funding for at least 10 nuclear programs proposed in the FY2005 budget now pending before the Senate appropriations committee will waste over $2 billion this fiscal year and at least $8.7 billion in the next five years, according to a study released today by the Alliance for Nuclear Accountability. The network of 33 non-profit organizations says the budget proposal includes billions of dollars in "nuclear pork" while undercutting US security, public and environmental health, and non-proliferation goals.
The report, entitled "Top Ten Department of Energy Radioactive Pork Projects in the 2005 Budget," was delivered to members of Congress today as a reference guide and a set of proposals for cutting funding for these specific programs while enhancing US national and energy security.
The full report can be viewed on-line at www.ananuclear.org/topten.html
"The administration's FY05 budget would ramp up nuclear weapons programs including research into new weapons designs, designs for a new nuclear bomb plant, and preparations for a potential return to nuclear testing," says ANA director Susan Gordon. "These programs are more than simply wasteful. They undermine U.S. commitments to nuclear arms control and disarmament, compromising our international credibility at a time of heightened proliferation concerns."
"With work on spending bills unfinished as Congress prepares for elections, we have more time to inform lawmakers of our concerns," says ANA program director Jim Bridgman "Congress should prioritize addressing the environmental and health legacy of nuclear weapons production and abandon wasteful and dangerous nuclear weapons and energy programs."
The US has negotiated deep cuts in its Cold War nuclear arsenals with Russia and has ongoing treaty commitments which building new nuclear weapons would contradict. Yet despite this, proposed nuclear weapons funding for FY05, adjusted for inflation, is nearly equivalent to the previous all-time high in 1983, at the height of the Cold War. The pending FY05 programs the report finds most wasteful and destabilizing include:
o The Advanced Concepts Initiative (ACI) research and development program that includes provocative new concepts, such as "mini-nukes," or low-yield nuclear weapons. Such programs will make nuclear weapons more "useable politically" while making a return to weapons testing more likely.
o The Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP) program to modify existing nuclear warheads into nuclear bunker busters, yet conventional bunker busters already exist which do not cause the enormous radioactive fallout and collateral damage threatened by RNEP.
o Stockpile Life Extension Programs (LEPs) which refurbish and in some cases make improvements in existing weapons in the stockpile. Stockpile reductions agreed to with Russia should slate many weapons for dismantlement rather than indefinite preservation or improvement. Yet since they both use the same facility, LEP crowds out dismantlement work. LEP is also redundant with proposed maintenance activities under the Department of Energy's "Stockpile Systems" programs.
o The $30 billion National Ignition Facility (NIF), the most expensive US nuclear project in history, which may never actually achieve ignition. NIF is not essential to maintain the safety of existing fission weapons. The facility will allow the United States to go further in designing new and destabilizing nuclear weapons.
o Funding for production and extraction of tritium, the radioactive hydrogen isotope used to boost a nuclear bomb's yield. The US has a reserve tritium supply, and future production needs are obviated by commitments to reduce the nuclear arsenal. Tritium is being produced using commercial reactors, violating the longstanding non-proliferation norm separating nuclear weapons programs from commercial power production.
o A program to shorten the time required to resume nuclear testing to 18 months, threatening the United States' 12-year moratorium on nuclear testing and creating an incentive for other countries such as China, India and Pakistan to test new weapons in a renewed arms race.
o The Modern Pit Facility (MPF), which would build new plutonium triggers for nuclear weapons at the rate of 125-450 a year, approaching Cold War levels, while enabling the production of new-design weapons.
o A plutonium fuel program for converting surplus weapons grade plutonium into fuel for nuclear reactors, intended to keep parity with a Russian program which remains underfunded and behind schedule. Compared to immobilization (sealing plutonium into glass or ceramic logs for storage) conversion to plutonium fuel is a more dangerous, expensive, proliferation-prone, waste-producing and slower form of plutonium disposition. A significant amount of US surplus plutonium cannot even be converted to fuel.
o The Yucca Mountain project to build a repository for commercial reactor and nuclear weapons waste in Nevada would require transporting 70,000 metric tons of highly radioactive material across 43 states, in the course of which, the Department of Energy admits, accidents will happen. The site is seismically active, sits on an aquifer used for drinking and irrigation, and is vulnerable to water penetration. The DC Court of Appeals has invalidated the project's proposed standards for protecting the public.
o FY05 federally funded programs for reviving the nuclear power industry including development of new power plants and new plant designs, fuel cycle research and an initiative to use nuclear power to generate hydrogen for fuel cells. These allocations would add to the already staggering $150 billion in public subsidies since 1947 to the nuclear power industry, which has severe unresolved environmental risks and waste issues, and absent massive subsidies is not cost competitive with other forms of generation.
The report includes specific proposals for measures Congress could take in the current budget process to eliminate nuclear pork.
---------------------------
Guardian
October 01, 2004
First Los Alamos Nuclear Materials in Nev.
Leslie Hoffman
Associated Press Writer
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - Federal officials said Thursday that the first shipment of weapons-grade nuclear material has been sent out of a steep canyon at Los Alamos National Laboratory that some warned was vulnerable to a terrorist attack.
The Energy Department has been working since December 2002 to move the highly enriched uranium and plutonium from Los Alamos' Technical Area 18 to the Device Assembly Facility, a high-security storehouse in a remote area of the Nevada Test Site, northwest of Las Vegas.
The first transfer was completed Thursday.
TA-18 was built in the 1940s at the bottom of a steep canyon, and critics have raised security concerns about the site. Lab officials have said they are able to protect the material, but add that the cost of maintaining security there is high.
The transfer is aimed at consolidating the National Nuclear Security Administration's nuclear materials in a newer, more secure facility, officials have said. The NNSA is an arm of the Energy Department responsible for overseeing the department's nuclear complex.
Lab watchdogs have pushed for the transfer, arguing it will improve national security and save taxpayers money.
It was temporarily put on hold last summer when cost estimates soared to $310 million - a more than threefold increase from initial estimates.
The NNSA plans to relocate the most sensitive weapons-grade nuclear material by September 2005 and move the remaining material by 2008.
Completion of the first shipment reinforces ``NNSA's commitment to relocate TA-18 activities to a newer, more secure location,'' said Everet Beckner, deputy administrator for defense programs.
NNSA spokesman Bryan Wilkes said only that a ``specialized transportation system with very high security'' was used to transport the material on unspecified roads. He said the agency, for security reasons, would not disclose the amount of material transferred.
Lab employees at TA-18 study nuclear materials to see how they will react in certain situations, train Nuclear Emergency Search Teams and International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors, and support nonproliferation efforts, among other tasks.
---
On the Net:
National Nuclear Security Administration: http://www.nnsa.doe.gov
Los Alamos National Laboratory: www.lanl.gov
---------------------------
Inyo Register
October 01, 2004
Water workshop plies options
County officials continue to put heads together on ways to address future of department
By Jon Klusmire
The Inyo Register Staff
Trying to parcel out the chores and duties of the Inyo County Water Department is a task akin to slicing a river into separate streams.
However, the Water Department is in charge of several tasks that are more like tributaries, and could be cut off from the main flow of the department's work.
County officials and staff spent Tuesday brainstorming about which other county departments could do some jobs currently handled by the Water Department, and came up with a surprisingly broad band of options. The exercise in winnowing down the department's essential tasks and goals from those deemed less important will be critical in two respects.
The tasks that form the core responsibilities of the Water Department must be maintained, all agreed, even if the Board of Supervisors decides to change the structure and organization of the department. Possible organizational changes under consideration include simply shifting some of the Water Department's responsibilities to other county departments, redefining the department's mission but keeping the Water Department a stand-alone operation, or some sort of merger that would make the Water Department simply another part of an existing department, such as Planning.
Plus, any changes to the current way the department operates will be a key consideration when the board addresses the vexing question of how to replace outgoing Water Director Greg James.
James is unique among county department heads because he's a lawyer, thus is able to both manage the Water Department and do its legal work. James will leave his full-time post at the end of this year, but will remain the department's part-time legal counsel through 2005.
Deciding what skills and expertise any new Water Department director possesses represents "the crux of our considerations" about the future direction of the department, observed Fourth District Supervisor Butch Hambleton.
If Tuesday's workshop is any indication, there are a number of programs currently under the care and direction of the Water Department that a new director might not have to deal with.
But the workshop also provided a good indication of what will likely consume most of the new director's time.
At the end of the workshop, participants identified four issues as "the most important" facing the department: groundwater and surface water management; the Lower Owens River Project; disputes and litigation; and enhancement and mitigation projects.
Those four top picks were chosen from the 15 "ongoing and future activities and issues" currently handled by the Water Department and addressed at the gathering.
The biggest challenge facing any reorganization or change in the focus of the Water Department is that "all the issues are interrelated," noted Doug Daniels, Water Department program manager. Groundwater and vegetation monitoring are linked, and also come into play when enhancement projects are considered, for example.
Unsaid but understood was that the full range of expertise and knowledge, plus relevant historical data from ongoing monitoring and field work, come together when the department crafts a legal dispute.
The county's University of California Cooperative Extension Farm Advisor Rick Delmas, who is paid by the state, not the county, facilitated the workshop. Delmas noted the workshop would not delve deeply into specifics or the mechanics of the work being discussed. Instead, the goal was having a broad, general discussion about what activities can be handled only by the Water Department, if any other county department was duplicating that effort or what departments could, conceivably, assume some or all of the tasks being discussed. Also a consideration was "contracting out" jobs or activities to consultants.
The first issue addressed, groundwater and surface water management, brought to the fore James' dual role as manager and lawyer.
Ellen Hardebeck, president of the Eastern Sierra League of Women Voters, said monitoring and managing water was "the primary purpose of the Water Department," and no one disagreed. And the Water Department staff are the only qualified, experienced employees for the job, it was agreed.
But First District Supervisor Linda Arcularius brought up a key concept driving the entire exercise: "Can the work and people be managed in a different place?" besides from inside the Water Department.
At a previous workshop, James said he spends about half his time on legal issues with the other half devoted to both managing the department and helping shape ongoing projects.
James' split duties opened the door to two possible ways to handle another key issue, disputes and litigation.
One proposal for handling those legal issues when James leaves is to have the County Counsel's Office perform the Water Department's legal work, and add a full-time attorney to do so.
But Fifth District Supervisor-elect Richard Cervantes suggested the department's legal work could be contracted out to an outside attorney, with James being the first choice.
Either option assumes it will be highly unlikely, or too expensive, to find a new Water Department director who will have both the legal and management expertise needed to do the same amount, and type, of work James currently performs.
The dual nature of the last two of the top four needs also produced dual ideas about how to get the work done.
Both the Lower Owens River Project and completing enhancement and mitigation projects are two-phase operations. Arcularius pointed out the county is in the first stage, essentially working the water- and legal-related issues involved in getting LADWP to complete projects. But once those projects are completed, the county's role will shift into a less intense, and time-consuming effort to simply monitor and regulate the finished products.
The County Counsel's Office could handle the legal work, it was noted, while Arcularius said several county departments - Public Works, Parks or Planning, for example - have the ability to manage timelines, work to reach consensus with Los Angeles Department of Water and Power on schedules and "get projects going," then continue to monitor them.
Another key Water Department function is staffing the Water Commission, Technical Group and Standing Committee. Those duties not only require the precise expertise of Water Department staff, but are also mandated chores and procedures that the county uses to interact with and sometimes confront LADWP.
Although under previous consolidation schemes the Planning Department had been identified as a likely choice for assuming the oversight and management functions of the Water Department, when it came to actually doing Water Department work, the Agriculture Department was the most-mentioned alternative.
Agricultural Commission George Milovich pointed out most of the valley floor is covered by ranchland or pastures. The Ag Department was mentioned as one source of "skills and expertise" that could be applied to activities or issues that involve a link between plants and water, or monitoring vegetation. Those are significant parts of the Water Department's key tasks.
A variety of combinations and permutations were mentioned as possible routes to handle some of the less splashy (pun intended), but important Water Department tasks. Those include the Saltcedar Program, the Big Pine Ditch System, GIS programming and management, database management and well permits.
Four of the 15 activities were identified as candidates for takeover by "outside contractors." Those included the sporadic work involved in protesting Las Vegas' groundwater pumping project, the Water Department's public information program and the issue of exporting of water not owned by LADWP.
In addition, consultants or contractors could assume most of the Water Department's chores revolving around providing consulting advice and legal work to other county departments. James pointed out that, for example, a developer must pay for water studies for a housing project, and the Planning Department only recently included the Water Department in Yucca Mountain-related studies, which are funded by the federal government.
The next Water Department workshop will see the completion of the "facilitated discussion" about the future direction of the Water Department and include direction from the supervisors about potential organizational options. That workshop will be held near the start of the next Board of Supervisors' meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 21.
---------------------------
State of Nevada
Agency for Nuclear Projects
www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/
nwpo@nuc.state.nv.us
775-687-3744
---------------------------