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*** P R E SS R E L E A S E ***
For Immediate Release:
Oct. 22, 2003
Contact: Erica Hartman (202) 454-5174
Brendan Hoffman (202) 454-5130
Evidence Mounts That Yucca Mountain Dump Is Flawed
Statement by Wenonah Hauter, Director,
Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy and Environment Program
The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board's letter to the U.S.Department
of Energy (DOE) warning that man-made storage containers at Yucca
Mountain will probably leak should come as no surprise. Despite a mound
of sound scientific evidence demonstrating the flaws of the Yucca
Mountain plan, officials at the DOE have been influenced by the nuclear
industry instead of by fact in their drive to build a high-level nuclear
waste repository. The new finding by the board - the same body that in
January 2002 called evidence supporting Yucca Mountain "weak to moderate"
- further confirms that the project is unworkable and should be
abandoned.
The reliance on engineered barriers to permanently
contain dangerously radioactive waste for thousands of years is a huge
safety compromise. The original law mandating construction of a
permanent waste repository, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, called
for a geologic barrier to permanently isolate the waste from the
surrounding environment, not a man-made one. When it became apparent that
the volcanic rock forming Yucca Mountain could not adequately perform
that critical function, the government waived the requirement. This
concession is part of a larger pattern of making the laws fit the site,
not making the site fit the laws.
Yucca Mountain sits in an earthquake zone where a
magnitude 5.6 earthquake damaged a DOE field office in 1992. An
earthquake of 4.4 occurred as recently as June 2002. The site itself lies
over a freshwater aquifer supplying drinking water to thousands of
people; an earthquake could exacerbate the problem of water reaching the
tanks, further corroding them and carrying the resulting contamination to
the aquifer below. Again, instead of using this evidence to rule out
Yucca Mountain, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency changed the law,
making the expected level of radioactive contamination in drinking water
"permissible," a move now the subject of a lawsuit by Public Citizen and
the Natural Resources Defense Council. The DOE ought to heed the
board's warning and drop the Yucca Mountain project for a safer
alternative.
The letter is on the NWTRB website at
http://www.nwtrb.gov/corr/mlc014016.pdf.
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based in Washington, D.C.
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