Press Release: "Battle rages in valley of the tortoises"

[Mike Grissom <mikeg@SLAC.Stanford.EDU>]

Radsafers,

Field biology is a part of the political process!

Yet another press release related to the proposed radwaste
site at Ward Valley, California that appeared in the March
8, 1998 San Francisco Examiner (but originally by-lined Pat
Murkland, Riverside Press-Enterprise) is extracted below,
note that this is a long one.  Should the Ward Valley site
ever be completed, there will be some interesting biological
issues for the radiological environmental monitoring program
to consider.

As background information, the test well drilling mentioned
in this news item relates to the contention that it could
be possible to have ground water flow from the site into
the Colorado River (which is a major source of drinking
water for the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area--which
effectively extends all the way to Victorville in the high
desert).  There are a number of confounding factors, such as
rate of flow, vertically into the ground water and then
horizontally into the river, from the proposed site's
trenches (presumably unlined) which is believed to be very
slow as evaluated by previous hydrogeological assessments
and the general desert climate.

S.,

MikeG.

----------

           Battle rages in valley of the tortises

       Slow-moving desert creatures will come out of
  hibernation to a fight over nuclear dump on their turf

[Image not provided here, caption:  The desert tortoise,
threatened with extinction, may have a nuclear dump placed
in its Riverside County habitat.]

WARD VALLEY, Riverside County--Even after federal officials
avoided a confrontation recently with more than 200 protesters
and postponed tests at a proposed nuclear dump in Ward Valley,
some central figures in the desert drama stayed underground.

Ward Valley's desert tortoises are awake or asleep or if the
standoff between dump proponents and opponents is resolved,
federal and state officials still must contend with the
reptile once the drilling tests proceed and if the dump plans
move forward.

Tortoises are federally protected as a species threatened with
extinction and Ward Valley is officially named "critical
habitat," crucial to the species' survival.

While tortoise populations have plummeted elsewhere in the
Southwest, experts say Ward Valley is one of the last places
where the tortoises have such strong numbers and a relatively
unbroken habitat.

U.S. Bureau of Land Management [BLM] biologist Mike McGill
said the valley easily has more than 250 tortises per square
mile -- "a very high number."

Once test drilling begins, expert biologists will watch to
make sure big machines don't flatten any tortoises.  The
project may even halt temporarily if 10 or more tortoises
must be moved out of harm's way.

----------
Wilson supports plan

Plans call for the BLM to sell 1,000 acres of publicly owned
land in Ward Valley to California for an 80-acre dump that
would accept low-level radioactive waste from hospitals and
nuclear plants.

Members of conservation groups such as the California Turtle
and Tortoise Club oppose the dump.  And the coalition of five
American Indian tribes leading the protests say that the
tortoise holds a powerful and sacred role in their religios
heritage.

Debate continues over whether the radioactive waste would
invade groundwater and travel 20 miles into the Colorado
River, which provides water to Western states.  The tests
will study the way area water flows underground.

Gov. Wilson supports the plan while the Clinton administration
favors more study.  Federal officials had tried to evict
protesters so test drilling could begin but decided to avoid
a confrontation and postpone the tests.

Once the estimated two months of state and federal test
drilling begin, workers must follow procedures that U.S. Fish
and Wildlife biologists have approved, just as other projects
do in important tortoise areas.

Ed LaRue, a biologist who helped write guidelines that set the
standard in California, said tortoise safeguards also are part
of Fort Irwin's tank exercises and Interstate 15's planned
widening between Victorville and Barstow.

McGill, the BLM biologist, said that the limits for Ward Valley
drilling -- no more than two accidental tortoise deaths or
injuries and no more than 10 tortoises moved -- are for all
of 1998 and include all other projects on public lands that
are on less than two acres.

----------
Halt the project

Currently that involves one other project, a mining operation
at Mountain Pass near the Nevada border, and no tortoises
there have been touched or harmed, he said.  If a project
exceeds its limit, the rules call for it to halt while
everyone comes up with better procedures.

Officially qualified experts will monitor the work.  McGill
already has flagged burrows where tortoises are sleeping
the winter away.  He said he will watch the federal drilling
each day if it's during the months the tortoises are most
active.  Federal officials could not pinpoint how much that
would cost but said their tests will total $1.3 million.