Re: AP LLRW Story

[JMUCKERHEIDE@delphi.com]

Hi David,

1. No time, but Gov Riley (D-SC) was appointed to head Carter's "State
Planning Council o Radioactive Waste Mgmt" following the DOE John Deutch-led
"Interagency Review Group on RWM". His mission tended to ignore HLW and focus
on his own backyard, Barnwell. He initiated the philosophy of "each state
should be responsible for its own". I forget the precise number, but there
were about 8 Governors plus reps from State leg's, localities, indian tribes.
They bought it and sold it through a couple of years of meetings and taking
the proposals to the Congress. Everybody thought state-types would know what
could be done better at state/local levels than by the (then and now)
massively discredited DOE. I failed then too (not just in supporting costly
wasteful controls for LLR that have killed nuclear technologies. I supported
the legislation in my work with the SPC, and with our industry and state
review process. 

So note: Congress got this proposal from the states, and to some extent
against its better judgement! Also, in the '80 elections, and when Reagan came 
in '81 (before this was passed) the era of "the new Federalism" (Murry
Weidenbaum from Hoover and all) took a large pass in many areas of government
at "allowing" the states to assume Federal programs that could better be done
by the states and industries. (I also had no idea that industry would
gleefully sit back and laugh at the state people who were pathetic, who now
had suddenly gotten some "responsibility" that they had no capacity to
undertake instead of harrassing utilities and industries from the sidelines,
instead of working with them to solve the problem with the local publics.) 

I also had no idea that states would find junior flunkies to run these
programs way down in nowhere since it was not really a problem on the Gov's
agenda nor something that could be "managed" in political terms and they had
no clue how to deal with technical issues, neither structural, managerial, or
scientific. So they flubbed around for years, OR took "instant actions" -
because the industry "wisdom" was that it only needed "political will" to be
solved, like they kept saying about HLW (and WIPP ha!). "Instant actions" only 
got their heads handed to them. Anybody remember the late 80's in NY? and that 
was the lame best of the lot. 

2. At the time there was "enough LLW" (nobody anticipated so many compacts due 
entirely to management and political incompetence of states - they didn't know 
how to "negotiate" among themselves, so they could only get a few states to
agree to anything with the programs undully loaded with unnecessary baggage -
there are no State Dept and UN negotiators in states). BUT, only NOW with the
failure of 15 years and massive escalation of costs (disposal was something
like $25/ft3?) do we have the results of generators incentives to waste
massive funds in reducing volumes to trade off against giving to disposal
fees. ALSO, nobody but robbers and brigands would have ever thought a site
would be so incompetently designed to cost/price at todays concepts. 

The good thing about spending $400 million is that nobody is dumb enough to
build one of these monstrosities. 

Finally, people who note that "$$ for disposal went up a factor of 20, but
volume went down a factor of 20, so it's a wash, fail to consider the massive
cost that has been invested to reduce volume a factor of 20 (including
terminating use of nuclear technologies, the ultimate criminality). 

Thanks, David. Nice to "see" you again :-)

Regards, Jim 
==
Jim Muckerheide
jmuckerheide@delphi.com
Radiation, Science, and Health, Inc.
=============================

>         RADSAFERS more knowledgeable in LLW disposal history than me:
> 
>         This LLW disposal thread yesterday and today has been interesting.  From
> my fuzzy recollection, I seem to recall that before this whole
> congressionally mandated COMPACT business, there were two or three sites
> where LLW could be disposed of that were operated by commercial companies.
> Then magically, congress intervened and basically left it up to the States
> to figure out a way to dispose of LLW which gave rise to the COMPACT
> system.  What I have not yet heard elaborated upon, however, is the
> distinct possibility that Congress, itself, made yet another political
> blunder (the first was killing nuclear fuel reprocessing).  This blunder
> was simply failing to realize that there was not ENOUGH LLW generated in
> this country to ever make it profitable for even 3 companies to stay in the
> commercial LLW disposal business, let alone make the naive assumption that
> forming almost a dozen additional COMPACT sites--that they all could at
> least pay their own way to stay financially afloat!  IMHO, Congress,
> itself, bears the lion's share of responsibility for the status of the
> present LLW disposal situation.
> 
> REGARDS  David W. Lee, Los Alamos National Laboratory, lee_david_w@lanl.gov
>  (505) 667-8085 Los Alamos, NM  87545  
> 
> 
> 
> At 02:08 PM 16-07-97 -0500, you wrote:
> >     Radsafers -
> >
> >     I was wondering when people where going to notice that we have spent
> >     almost half a billion dollars on this "process" with nothing to show
> >     for it!  When the Supreme Court struck down the "take title' provision
> >     to the Siting Act, the states had no reason to seriously pursue siting
> >     with any sense of urgency.  As a result we (taxpayers and llrw
> >     generators) have wasted hundreds of millions of dollars on
> >     consultants, lawyers, state siting boards, regional compact
> >     commissions, and other bureaucracies so the sited states would not
> >     deny access to their facilities.  Well, South Carolina bailed out of
> >     the process last year.  The Midwest Compact has voted not to pursue a
> >     site and Illinois has delayed everything for nine years.
> >
> >     It has been seventeen years - it's time to admit the process has not
> >     worked and never will.  Since I cant' think of any way to fix it, the
> >     Siting Act should be repealed.  Let the free market determine how many
> >     disposal sites are needed and where.  South Carolina is earning about
> >     $80 million a years in surcharges alone.  Perhaps somewhere in this
> >     nation there is an enlightened community willing to accept a disposal
> >     site for a mere $40 million a year.
> >
> >     The larger pharmaceuticals has begun discussions among themselves to
> >     address this issue at the federal level.  We have not decided on a
> >     course of action yet, but I suggested to repeal the Act.  I would be
> >     greatly interested in hearing anyone's opinion or ideas.  I am
> >     particularly interested in how South Carolina may react to the repeal
> >     of the Siting Act as well as Texas and California.
> >
> >     We will be better off with the Siting Act or without it?  Hope to hear
> >     from you.
> >
> >     Mike Vala
> >     Bristol-Myers Squibb
> >     mvala@usccmail.bms.com
> >
> >     ****************************************************************
> >
> >     Date: Tue, 15 Jul 1997 05:11:03 +0000
> >     From: Jim Muckerheide <muckerheide@mediaone.net>
> >     Subject: LLW status according to AP: a fair story
> >
> >     Nothing to show for millions spent toward nuclear waste disposal
> >
> >     The Associated Press
> >
> >     RALEIGH, N.C. (July 5, 1997 12:38 p.m. EDT) -- It's the same story
> >     everywhere -- regional compacts Congress created 17 years ago to bury
> >     low-level radioactive waste have spent hundreds of millions of dollars
> >     with virtually nothing to show.
> >     ******************************************************************
> >
> >
> David W. Lee
> Los Alamos National Laboratory
> Radiation Protection Services Group (ESH-12)
> PO Box 1663, MS K483
> Los Alamos, NM  87545
> PH:   (505) 667-8085
> FAX:  (505) 667-9726
> lee_david_w@lanl.gov