The Anti-Crowd Speaks

["Gerry Blackwood" <gpblackwood@justice.com>]

FYI no comment, besides it would make no differnece to

them anyway....



*** P R E S S    R E L E A S E ***



CITIZEN ACTION COALITION OF INDIANA · CITIZEN ALERT ·

NEVADA DESERT

EXPERIENCE · NEVADA NUCLEAR WASTE TASK FORCE · NUCLEAR

INFORMATION AND

RESOURCE SERVICE · NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL ·

PUBLIC CITIZEN

 

For Immediate Release: Jan. 14, 2004

 

CONTACT: Judy Treichel, Nevada Nuclear Waste Task

Force, 702-248-1127;

Michele Boyd or Brendan Hoffman, Public Citizen,

202-454-5134; Kevin

Kamps, Nuclear Information and Resource Service,

202-328-0002 ext. 14;

or Geoff Fettus or Karen Wayland, Natural Resource

Defense Council,

202-289-6868

 

STATEMENT by the plaintiffs in the case against the

EPA's radiation

release standards for the Yucca Mountain repository:

 

We are convinced that the U.S. Environmental Protection

Agency's (EPA)

radiation release standards for the Yucca Mountain

repository will not

protect the health of future generations. We are

optimistic that the

D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears oral

arguments today in a

lawsuit seeking to block the new standards, will come

to this conclusion

as well.

 

The EPA arbitrarily gerrymandered the site boundary to

meet radiation

release standards to compensate for Yucca Mountain's

unsuitable geology.

Written specifically for Yucca Mountain, the new

boundary allows

radiation that leaks from the high-level waste to

pollute the aquifer

and migrate with the groundwater south to a farming

community. An

unprecedented 18-kilometer "controlled area," in which

people are not

supposed to access the water for 10,000 years, is being

contested by

this lawsuit. Outside this huge sacrifice zone, the

groundwater is not

supposed to be contaminated above standards set under

the Safe Drinking

Water Act.

 

The EPA claims that it would be too expensive to drill

wells in this

18-kilometer area, but two drinking water wells already

exist in this

area, and the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) own

research has found

that drilling in a similar geographical area in

Colorado is economically

viable. It is also unreasonable to assume that the

government will be

able to maintain institutional control over any region

for the next

10,000 years to prevent future generations from

drilling there.

 

The site boundary is only about eight miles from

Amagosa Valley, an

agricultural area where groundwater is used for

irrigation. Moreover,

the EPA rule arbitrarily limits the regulatory

compliance period to

10,000 years, even though studies show that the maximum

doses from the

repository are likely to occur in 300,000 years or more.

 

While the Nuclear Waste Policy Act gives the EPA

discretion in setting

public health standards at the repository, the current

EPA rules were

written to enable the site to be licensed, not to

protect the health of

future generations.

 

We seek to have the EPA's Yucca Mountain rules set

aside and sent back

to the agency to be made consistent with the standards

now in effect for

other repositories and adjusted to protect people and

the environment

for the dangerous lifetime of the waste.  Because the

financial and

public health impacts of the Yucca Mountain project

will affect people

well into the future, we believe that any decision with

respect to

licensing Yucca Mountain should be based on prudent

analysis and public

health standards, not political expediency.  If the

court sends the

rules back to the EPA, the project could be delayed for

years, and even

permanently abandoned if radiation release limits

cannot be met. The

Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) Yucca licensing

rules, which

depend on EPA's rules, would also have to be redrafted.

 

At the same time, this court's decision is not the end

of the

opposition to the Yucca Mountain repository. DOE must

still apply and

get a construction license from the NRC, and crucial

questions about the

adequacy of the site remain to be answered. We will

remain involved in

that process as long as it takes.



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