HANFORD WATCH NEWSLETTER
May 30, 1999
HANFORD FINE TO COST FLUOR DANIEL $330,000
Tri-City Herald – May 28, 1999
Fluor Daniel Hanford's fine for numerous failures to ensure the quality
of work at a major Hanford cleanup project will total $330,000, Energy
Secretary Bill Richardson announced Thursday. The proposed fine covers
problems with supervising lower-level subcontractors, failures to properly
check and double-check work, failures to fix long-identified procedural
flaws and inadequate documentation on work matters. Most of the problems
are associated with work at the K Basins, two large pools near the Columbia
River in which 2,300 tons of spent nuclear fuel are stored. The K Basins
project has been plagued with increasing cost estimates, timetable extensions
and coordination and technical problems.
"DOE is especially concerned that these deficiencies are widespread
and recurring. Further, numerous commitments by (Fluor) to resolve the
quality problems have not effectively resolved them," stated a Wednesday
letter to Fluor Daniel Hanford President Ron Hanson from David Michael,
DOE's assistant secretary for environment, safety and health.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0528.html#anchor596920
SENATE PANEL PUSHES RAISE IN HANFORD FUNDING
Tri-City Herald – May 26, 1999
A Senate subcommittee Tuesday recommended a $40 million increase to
the proposed Hanford cleanup budget for fiscal 2000. The extra $40 million
includes $30 million for tank farm work and $10 million for demolishing
and sealing of old plutonium reactors. If Congress ultimately approves
the recommendation, that money would be added to the Department of Energy's
original fiscal 2000 request of $1.065 billion for Hanford cleanup projects
controlled by the agency's Richland office.
And legislation in both the Senate and House includes another $106
million -- DOE's full request -- to be set aside to eventually pay for
converting Hanford's radioactive tank wastes into glass. This set-aside
money, which is not to be spent until 2007 when the first glass is produced,
is counted separately from the basic cleanup budget funds.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0526.html#anchor596744
WPPSS SET TO APPROVE $25 MILLION SPENT FUEL PLAN
Tri-City Herald – May 25, 1999
Officials at the nuclear power plant at Hanford are expected to approve
a $25 million contract this week allowing radioactive spent fuel assemblies
to be stored outside in concrete. Holtec International would be responsible
for designing and providing stainless steel canisters that the fuel
assemblies would be placed in. Lids would be welded on. The canisters
then would be put in concrete casks, which would be about 11 feet wide
and 18 feet tall. The casks, which would hold about 68 assemblies each,
would be placed on end on a concrete pad north of the reactor building.
Construction of the new dry storage system could start in December 2000
and be ready by early 2002.
http://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/1999/0525.html#anchor596559
CLINTON, CONGRESS WRANGLE OVER NUCLEAR WASTE
Reuters – May 24, 1999
The White House opposes storing millions of tons of nuclear waste at
a temporary site in the Nevada desert, but might agree to the government
taking the radioactive fuel off utilities' hands, a Department of Energy
spokesman said. Congress and the Clinton Administration are at odds
over what to do with spent nuclear fuel piling up at more than 70 of
the nation's 103 working nuclear power plants. Currently, 30,000 tons
of waste is stored at individual reactors around the nation, and that
amount is expected to more than double in the coming years.
http://202.139.253.156/news/24059902.html
GROUP DEBATES NUCLEAR TRANSPORT
The Cincinnati Enquirer -- May 24, 1999
The members of citizens advisory boards (CABs) from 10 of the nation's
12 former nuclear weapons complex sites participated in a workshop on
how to ship nuclear waste across the United States. As the sites begin
to ship millions of tons of waste, a spider web of truck and rail routes
will crisscross the country. Virtually every state will be affected.
Workshop participants want to streamline the process and save taxpayers'
money. They want to let the public know when radioactive waste is passing
through their towns — and tell them whether it is relatively benign
low-level waste or more threatening transuranic material. [Transuranic
nuclear waste is higher than uranium on the atomic scale – mostly plutonium-contaminated
trash.]
Statements drafted at the workshop will go back to each site-specific
CAB and could be passed as official recommendations to the DOE. And
the department will take a look at the draft signed by most of the workshop
delegates. "I'm not going to say the DOE will agree with everything,
but there are some nuggets," said Bob Alcock, DOE senior adviser on
transportation policy and planning. And no matter how diverse their
experiences and challenges, CABs working together carry more weight
than any one CAB alone. [HW president Paige Knight attended this meeting
as a representative of the Hanford Advisory Board.]
http://enquirer.com/editions/1999/05/24/loc_group_debates.html
TRANSPORTATION OF SPENT NUCLEAR FUEL AND HIGH-LEVEL RADIOACTIVE WASTE
TO A REPOSITORY
Nevada Nuclear Waste Project Office – May 1999
The transport of spent nuclear fuel (SNF) and high-level radioactive
wastes (HLW) to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository site in Southern
Nevada has the potential to impact communities across the nation. Studies
by the State of Nevada and the Department of Energy (DOE) indicate that
43 states would be directly impacted by thousands of SNF and HLW shipments
to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository. At least 109 cities with
populations over 100,000 plus thousands of smaller communities could
be affected by such shipments.
While it is true that, since 1962, there have been no radioactive releases
as a result of transportation accidents, the amount of waste shipped
to a repository in the first full year of operations alone will exceed
the total amount shipped in the United States for the past 30 years.
In addition, the distances over which SNF and HLW would have to be shipped
will be much greater for future repository shipments than for past shipments,
which have often been shorter-distance transfers of spent fuel from
one utility location to another.
Between 35,000 and 100,000 shipments will be required during the 25-year
emplacement phase of the proposed repository, and most of these shipments
would be routed through the most heavily populated areas of major U.S.
cities. A number of unresolved safety issues have been identified. These
issues suggest that DOE's transportation planning process is, at present,
inadequate to assure safe and uneventful shipment of nuclear waste to
a repository or some other interim storage location.
http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/trans/trfact03.htm
COUNTY FEARS NUKE THREAT TO RIVER
Las Vegas Sun – May 21, 1999
A Clark County official outlined the risks to Southern Nevada's drinking
water over 70 years as thousands of nuclear waste shipments cross the
Colorado River. The Department of Energy estimates that for 70 years
up to 16 trucks a day loaded with low-level nuclear waste from 20 defunct
nuclear weapon sites nationwide will cross the Colorado River. The shipments
would then travel 65 miles northwest to the Nevada Test. That amounts
to 295,000 truck trips crossing the river, which supplies most of Southern
Nevada's drinking water through Lake Mead.
Another five shipments per day of highly radioactive waste heading
for Yucca Mountain could continue for 30 years if the site 90 miles
northwest of Las Vegas proves scientifically sound as a permanent waste
repository. That equals 37,000 trucks loaded with radioactive commercial
reactor wastes which remain deadly for 2,500 years inside a repository,
he said.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/text/1999/may/21/508828525.html
PLAN WOULD LET RADIOACTIVE WASTE STAY PUT
The federal government, facing legal and political pressure to deal
with 38,000 tons of high-level radioactive waste at the nation's nuclear
power plants, has come up with a new idea - just leave it where it is.
At least, until 2010. The federal Department of Energy would take title
to the material and pay the utilities for storing it. But it would remain
scattered across states, including New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Environmentalists and some state utility regulators charge the proposal
is only an expensive delay in finding a final resting place for this
mound of deadly waste, which is still growing at a rate of 2,000 tons
a year. Critics warn that the waste could end up stuck at the power
plants for 20 or 30 more years, creating de facto nuclear dumps. "These
are sites that never would be picked for storage because they are near
rivers and bays," said William Sherman, a nuclear power analyst for
the Vermont Department of Public Service.
http://www.phillynews.com/inquirer/99/May/28/national/NUKE28.htm
RHOMBIC CORP. TO PRODUCE DUST PLASMA
Infoseek -- May 26, 1999
Rhombic Corporation has acquired from Russian, German, and American
scientists a method of manufacturing a high efficient disperse deposit
material (DCM) or dust plasma, that is made up of a homogeneous interior
covered with a thin and strong connective coating. A special application
is a coating that leads to a very low cost conversion of long lived
nuclear wastes from nuclear reactors into stable nuclides or the elimination
of the radioactive plutonium by transmutation into uranium.
http://infoseek.go.com/Content?arn=BW1252-19990526&qt=%2Bnuclear+%2Bwaste&sv=IS&lk=noframes&col=NX&kt=A&ak=news1486
THREAT TO NUCLEAR POWER UNIT REVEALED
Los Angeles Times -- May 22, 1999
An American nuclear power plant recently was the target of a terrorist
threat, according to a letter from the head of the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission that was made public by Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.),
a frequent critic of the nuclear agency. Markey said the threat was
revealed to him in a May 3 letter from NRC Chairwoman Shirley Ann Jackson.
The NRC did not identify which nuclear plant was targeted for attack
or elaborate on the incident. The threat was "general in nature," and
the time frame for the threatened attack passed without a problem, the
NRC said.
http://www.latimes.com/excite/990522/t000045914.html
LETTER OF CONCERN
John W. Gofman, M.D., Ph.D., UC Berkeley -- May 11, 1999
By any reasonable standard of biomedical proof, there is no safe dose,
which means that just one decaying radioactive atom can produce permanent
mutation in a cell's genetic molecules. My own work showed this in 1990
for xrays, gamma rays, and beta particles (Gofman 1990: Radiation-Induced
Cancer from Low-Dose Exposure). For alpha particles, the logic of no
safe dose was confirmed experimentally in 1997 by Tom K. Hei and co-workers
at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York
(Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (USA) Vol.94, pp.3765-3770,
April 1997, "Mutagenic Effects of a Single and an Exact Number of Alpha
Particles in Mammalian Cells").
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/CNR/LetterOfConcern.html
RADIATION-INDUCED CANCER FROM LOW-DOSE EXPOSURE
Gofman – 1990
In this book, an expert who is independent of the radiation community
provides the human and physical evidence proving that carcinogenesis
from ionizing radiation does occur at the lowest conceivable doses and
dose-rates. This finding refutes current claims by parts of the radiation
community that very low doses or dose-rates may be safe. Because ionizing
radiation may turn out to be the most important single carcinogen to
which huge numbers of humans are actually exposed (environmentally,
occupationally, and medically), the practical implications of this book
for cancer prevention are very great.
http://www.ratical.org/radiation/CNR/RIC/
STATE CONSIDERS DISTRIBUTING DRUG TO RESIDENTS NEAR NUCLEAR PLANTS
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -- May 25, 1999
A pill that helps block the human body's absorption of radioactive iodine
may soon be distributed to people living near nuclear power plants,
under a plan being reviewed by federal and state health officials. If
taken within an hour or two before or after exposure, the pills saturate
the thyroid gland with iodine, preventing the gland from absorbing radioactive
iodine in the blood. The thyroid uses iodine to produce hormones crucial
to some bodily functions. Studies conducted after the explosion at Russia's
Chernobyl nuclear plant found a significant increase in thyroid cancer,
especially in children.
http://www.industrywatch.com/story/19990525/15/36/4120154_st.html
JACK KELLY: ON ORDERS FROM THE GENERAL
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -- May 23, 1999
The keynote speaker was retired Air Force Gen. Lee Butler. From 1991
to 1994, Gen. Butler was the first commander of Strategic Command, which
controls all Air Force and Navy nuclear weapons.
Due to their perilous financial condition, the Russians can only afford
to maintain about 2,000 of their nuclear warheads on alert status, Gen.
Butler thinks. The most dangerous Russian nukes may well be those they
can't afford to maintain, because these are the ones most likely to
find their way into unsavory hands. Few defense dollars could be better
spent than in buying Russian nukes, and in hiring Russian military scientists
to demilitarize them. But badly as the Russians need money, they won't
sell us their nukes unless we get rid of a lot of our own. We have about
6,000 nukes on alert status. Gen. Butler thinks we should unilaterally
reduce that to 2,000, the level the Russians can maintain.
http://www.post-gazette.com/forum/19990523edkelly5.asp
INVITATION TO NUCLEAR DISASTER
Washington Post -- May 25, 1999
Unless concerted action is taken soon to reduce nuclear dangers, conditions
will be coming into place for a dreadful accident, incident or even
a nuclear detonation of Russian origin. The problems posed by Chinese
nuclear espionage pale in comparison with the dangers inherent in Russia's
domestic plight, its aging arsenal, stressed-out command and control
and lax export controls. Moreover, the current U.S. nuclear posture
exacerbates current dangers by requiring the deployment of 6,000 nuclear
weapons, approximately half of which are on hair-trigger alert.
At present the Kremlin retains as many of its nuclear forces on hair-trigger
alert as possible. This is done to compensate for weaknesses in Russia's
conventional forces, for gaping holes in the old Soviet early warning
network and for the vast launch readiness of U.S. nuclear forces. Independent
estimates suggest that Russia maintains in excess of 3,000 nuclear warheads
in very high states of launch readiness.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-05/25/138l-052599-idx.html
SHARED VISION AND DC DAYS
Tri-Valley CAREs -- May 1999
Because not all computer chips will recognize the Year 2000, and because
the U.S. and Russia both have their deadly, massive nuclear arsenals
on a hair-trigger alert -- designed to "launch on warning" of an attack
with only about 15 minutes for humans to verify data and make decisions
meaning life or death for countless millions -- the potential that a
computer glitch in either nation's early warning systems (e.g. satellites
and radar installations) could result in a nuclear exchange is simply
too great to ignore. The possibility of nuclear war due to misunderstanding
or miscalculation, particularly if international tensions are still
high, must be dealt with in advance of December 31.
The activists recommended de-alerting all nuclear weapons, a mutually
reciprocal U.S. - Russian move that would buy valuable time before a
launch and build confidence and security in both countries. Recommended
as well is the resumption of high-level government to government cooperation
on Y2K problems.
http://www.igc.org/tvc/cwmay99.htm
SPACE EXPLORATION: POWER SOURCES FOR DEEP SPACE PROBES
US General Accounting Office – June 4, 1998
While the evaluation and review processes can minimize the risks of
launching radioactive materials into space, the risks themselves cannot
be eliminated, according to NASA and Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)
officials. Advances in solar array technology may expand its use for
some missions. However, there are no currently practical alternatives
to using nuclear-fueled power generation systems for most missions beyond
the orbit of Mars. Advances in nuclear-fueled systems and the use of
smaller, more efficient spacecraft are expected to substantially reduce
the amount of nuclear fuel carried on future deep space missions. NASA
and JPL officials believe these future missions may pose less of a health
risk than current and prior missions that have launched radio isotope
thermoelectric generators into space.
http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/news/gao04.htm