HANFORD WATCH NEWSLETTER
May 23, 1999
DOE 3161 PROGRAM: THE JOB IS NOT OVER
Tri-City Herald editorial – May 21, 1999
A key reason the Tri-Cities has weathered a net loss of 6,000 Hanford
jobs so well is a government program that assists communities with Department
of Energy sites with creating new jobs to replace those lost to work
force cuts and retraining workers.
While there has been prosperity in the Tri-Cities, there have also
been devastating downturns. Our community leaders have used the 3161
program as one of many tools in their increasingly successful efforts
to diversify the economy away from dependence on Hanford. And it is
one of the reasons we did not have another devastating economic downturn
in 1994 after major Hanford layoffs.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/OPINION/0521.html
BERYLLIUM POSES PROBLEMS FOR HANFORD OFFICIALS
The Oregonian – May 21, 1999
A killer dust from a toxic metal used at Hanford may still rest in some
of the site's aging buildings. U.S. Department of Energy officials are
still trying to assess the harm that people who once worked around the
material might still face. The metallic dust is from beryllium, used
widely in aerospace and defense manufacturing. Beryllium no longer is
used at Hanford, but officials there estimate that 230 workers might
have come into contact with the metal in its most dangerous form from
1960 to 1986.
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/99/05/st052115.html
HOUSE COMMITTEE RECOMMENDS $25.5 MILLION MORE FOR HANFORD CLEANUP
Tri-City Herald – May 21, 1999
A U.S. House committee added a potential $25.5 million to the Clinton
administration's fiscal 2000 budget request to clean up Hanford. The
proposed extra authorizations are:
-- $3.9 million, mostly for environmental restoration projects to study
converting B Reactor into a museum, and for studying and dealing with
subterranean contamination in the 200 Area.
-- $11.4 million to increase the budget to "cocoon" F and DR Reactors
to $22.2 million.
-- $10.2 million to speed up neutralizing scrap plutonium stored at
the Plutonium Finishing Plant.
-- Another $10 million would be added to a nationwide pool of money
for basic science research for environmental cleanup.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0521.html#anchor596920
HANFORD HEARINGS
Spokesman-Review – May 16, 1999
The U.S. Department of Energy is holding public hearings in Richland
and Spokane on land-use plans for the Hanford Reach of the Columbia
River. The proposal would create a national wildlife refuge from the
old Hanford Nuclear Reservation, protecting the Wahluke Slope and 90,000
acres of shrub-steppe habitat. Tri-Cities-area local governments have
proposed an alternative plan that would open about 60,000 acres of the
of the Wahluke Slope to agriculture.
http://www.spokane.net/news-story.asp?date=051699&ID=s578394&cat=section.Environment
CDC LOOKING FOR LINKS BETWEEN RADIATION AND LUNG CANCER, LEUKEMIA
Tri-City Herald – May 16, 1999
The Centers for Disease Control is investigating whether external doses
of radiation received by workers at Hanford and other Department of
Energy sites might be tied to lung cancer or leukemia deaths. The design
of the study is under review, with results several years away.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0517.html#anchor596414
HANFORD DISARMING ITS BOOBY TRAPS
The Oregonian -- May 19, 1999
Hanford quit making plutonium in the late 1980s but still has 11 metric
tons on site, including 3.8 metric tons of portable material stored
in the heavily guarded Plutonium Finishing Plant. Because it takes only
a few pounds of plutonium to turn a small city into a crater, Hanford
keeps track of the risky element to the smallest fraction of an ounce.
Computer-connected motion sensors and alarms make sure that the most
vulnerable part of the stockpile -- which is kept in cans like ordinary
fruit or vegetable cans in the plutonium plant's vaults -- never moves
without authorization.
Vic Forney, a Lockheed Martin Services Inc. computer bug expert who
works for most of Hanford's contractors, said the Y2K problem in the
plutonium-tracking system was fixed by replacing the whole system. http://www.oregonlive.com/news/99/05/st051916.html
'MISTRUST' FOILS U.S. NUCLEAR SECURITY
USA TODAY – May 19, 1999
A USA TODAY examination of the DOE's security record shows it has spent
two decades frustrating efforts to bolster protections against spies,
thieves and terrorists across the network of plants and labs where it
develops, maintains and decommissions U.S. nuclear weapons. Time and
again the Department of Energy has shelved critical reports, ignored
proposals for corrective action and punished officials who dared to
speak out about concerns.
The department's fiercely autonomous plants and labs have resisted
dictates on all sorts of security issues. Many of those facilities,
which employ thousands of people, have built strong ties to local congressional
delegations, insulating their budgets and building political clout so
they have little need to heed agency directives.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/acovwed.htm
SECURITY CZAR:NOT A SIMPLE TASK
Tri-City Herald editorial -- May 13, 1999
In the wake of the questions about possible security breaches at the
Los Alamos National Laboratory, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson has
announced a halt to the aggressive declassification of Energy Department
secrets. It is difficult to assess how much impact renewed secrecy at
Hanford will have on the Tri-Party Agreement. The belief that the culture
of secrecy was at last being whittled away gave some Hanford critics
encouragement that the government was prepared to deal with the local
community in a more open way. Secrecy should not be an excuse to button
up so tight that honest criticism is made impossible.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/OPINION/0513.html#anchor596414
SENATE PANEL DELAYS ACTION ON NUCLEAR WASTE BILL
Yahoo – May 19, 1999
A Senate panel on Wednesday delayed action on a plan to build storage
sites for the nation's nuclear waste, saying it would take two more
weeks to try and smooth out White House and industry objections. President
Clinton has vowed to veto any legislation which seeks a temporary site
for storing highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel from the country's
103 commercial nuclear plants.
The nuclear industry has demanded that the Energy Department take some
30,000 tons of waste currently being stored on-site at reactor facilities,
transporting it first to a temporary home and later to a permanent location
in Nevada. A compromise being floated in the Senate Energy and Natural
Resources Committee would have the DOE take title to the waste and build
temporary storage at individual power plants. That would create some
40 ``interim'' sites until a permanent repository is constructed at
Yucca Mountain, about 90 miles from Las Vegas, Nevada.
http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/990519/biq.html
NUCLEAR WASTE SHIPMENTS BRING ACTIVISTS HERE FOR CONFERENCE
The Cincinnati Enquirer – May 21, 1999
Activists from neighborhoods around the nation's former nuclear weapons
production sites are circling their wagons this weekend in Cincinnati.
Officials and Crosby Township neighbors of the former Fernald uranium
processing plant will tell about low-level radioactive waste shipments.
They will share their experiences and seek advice on how to blaze transport
trails west. They will compare trains and trucks, barrels and bins and
discuss the cheapest, safest ways to move millions of tons of contaminated
waste from sites across the country to dumps in Nevada and Utah. They
will talk about the roadblocks likely to crop up along the way.
http://enquirer.com/editions/1999/05/21/loc_nuclear_waste.html
CLEANUP CHANCES BY 2006 LOOK WEAK; REPORT EVEN DOUBTS 2010
Denver Rocky Mountain News – May 18, 1999
A new federal report casts doubt on plans to clean up and close the
plutonium-contaminated Rocky Flats site by 2006. In fact, the General
Accounting Office study questions whether the defunct nuclear weapons
plant northwest of Denver can even close by 2010, the federally mandated
deadline. Laden with about 14.2 tons of plutonium, Rocky Flats has already
"fallen behind the existing schedule for closing the site in 2010,"
the GAO report reveals.
http://insidedenver.com/news/0518fla1.shtml
NUCLEAR DATA AVAILABLE ON INTERNET
The Seattle Times -- May 17, 1999
China doesn't need to use spies to obtain precise details and sketches
of America's most modern thermonuclear weapons, ballistic missiles and
re-entry vehicles. These days, anyone with an Internet account or a
library card can get some of the same military secrets that China is
accused of stealing from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
http://archives.seattletimes.com/cgi-bin/texis.mummy/web/vortex/display?storyID=374208af22&query=nuclear
DAVID TEMPLETON'S SELDOM SEEN: THIS SHIPMENT TOO HOT TO HANDLE IN CANTON
OR ANYWHERE ELSE
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -- May 16, 1999
The University of Pittsburgh's health study in Strabane added scientific
data to theories that there's no magic threshold for health risks from
radiation exposure. Any increase in radiation exposure can spawn health
effects.
http://www.post-gazette.com/magazine/19990516dave5.asp
IDEA TO SHIP NUCLEAR WASTE OVERSEAS IRKS ACTIVISTS
The Boston Globe – May 20, 1999
Frustrated at the glacial pace of federal efforts to open a nuclear
waste disposal site, the owners of three closed New England nuclear
plants quietly discussed shipping their high-level radioactive waste
to Britain, raising alarms among British anti-nuclear groups when the
talks were disclosed this week.
High-level radioactive waste, which remains dangerous for millennia,
has long been the Achilles' heel of nuclear power. Under federal law,
the US Department of Energy is responsible for finding a permanent repository,
but possible sites -- from the Kansas salt domes to the wilds of eastern
Maine -- have flopped in the face of intense opposition. For the past
decade, the agency has been trying to develop a waste site at the Nevada
Missile Test Site [Yucca Mountain], but environmental reviews and political
battles have pushed the opening date back to 2010, and many observers
say 2015 is more realistic.
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/140/metro/Idea_to_ship_nuclear_waste_overseas_irks_activists+.shtml