"Don't Waste Us", a citizens' group opposed to nuclear pollution and dedicated to a sustainable energy future, has been informed by sources within the Bureau of Land Management that a Record of Decision (ROD) will be issued on the Ward Valley "Low-Level" Radioactive Waste dumpsite on June 1. This means that a land transfer from BLM to the stateÑin rapid- fire approach to licensing and site development this summerÑwill take place in the interval between June 10 and June 30. This decisive material action will take place at the state level rather than at BLM's national headquarters. Never before, to their knowledge, has a land transfer of such significance been delegated to the state level.
Opposition groups are planning to enter an immediate appeal of the ROD. However, at this time, very few opponents have received their long- requested copies of the Final EIR on the site from California Division of Health Services (DHS). Accordingly, they are requesting BLM to extend the comment period on the ROD by at least 30 days. They urge all of us to join in this effort to keep BLM from ramming the Ward Valley transfer through with minimal public oversight.
Please send a request for a 30-day extension to Ed Hastey, California State Director, Bureau of Land Management, 2800 Cottage Way, Room E2841, Sacramento, CA 95825, with a copy to Douglas Romali, California Desert District BLM, 1695 Spruce Street, Riverside, CA 92507. For daily updates, contact Charles Butler, President, People Against Radioactive Dumping (PARD), Rt. 4 Box 161, Needles, CA 92363, (619) 326-4318. For biweekly updates on the fast-moving events of the national radioactive waste controversy, you may subscribe to their publication, "Atoms and Waste", for $20 per year.
There are many disturbing features of the Ward Valley situation that should urgently be brought before newspaper editors and legislators. It seems that, as a matter of regulation, all landfills in the state of California are required to have plastic liners (for what little good they do), - except landfills that contain radioactive waste. The Final EIR apparently confirms the California Division of Health Services' (DHS) position that liners aren't really needed at Ward Valley. This is at a location beneath which there are 8 to 16 million cubic feet of pristine drinking water - an underground Lake Tahoe.
Finally, California DHS has received written requests from 17 states nationwide to participate in the disposition of their radioactive wastes at Ward Valley. Most other "host" states in the national radwaste system mandated by Congress in 1985 are years behind the out-front siting process in California. State officials in Michigan and Massachusetts have openly expressed their wish to see Ward Valley nationalized for the 120 nuclear reactors presently operating coast-to-coast. These are some of the frightening trends in the siting process that brought the radwaste workshop at a large Chernobyl weekend conference in Washington to the unanimous decision that Ward valley is the number 1 national radioactive dumping issue at the present time.
For the nation's dumpfighters, the imminent BLM action is a part of the continuing speed-up of the siting process that has put California far out ahead of the other states. This action cheapens the public role in our national radioactive waste policy in the same way that the shallow trench design features planned for Ward Valley will cheapen our generation's investment in responsible waste management nationwide. The California agencies seem determined to move at "damn-the-torpedoes" speed through this crucial decision-making period. The problem is that these radwaste torpedoes are timed to explode below the soil long after our lifetimeÑ into the world of our children.
For more information, please contact DON'T WASTE U.S., 2311 - 15th St., NW, #101, Washington, D.C. 20009.
Copyright Mendocino Environmental Center 2004
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