barnwell

["Migliore, Charles W" <Charles.W.Migliore@nspco.com>]

Thought this item is of interest to RADSAFErs.

Charles Migliore RRPT
mglc98@nspco.com
 
 Task force to study South Carolina' nuclear policy

By CHUCK CARROLL, Staff Writer
THE STATE, Columbia, SC  June 11, 1999

Gov. Jim Hodges is now actively in the hunt for a way to get South Carolina
out
of its role as the dump site for much of the nation's low-level nuclear
waste.

The Democratic governor signed an executive order Thursday creating a task
force
charged with bringing him a final report by November. Hodges is seeking to
reverse the policy of his predecessor as he promised during the 1998
campaign.

He named former Democratic U.S. Rep. Butler Derrick, a leading architect of
the
nation's laws regulating low-level waste disposal, to head the 13-member
group.

Under state policy dating back to the early days of the David Beasley
administration, the state's low-level waste disposal site in Barnwell County
is
open to waste from every state except North Carolina. Barnwell is by far the
largest of three such facilities in the country and the only one east of the
Mississippi River.

"The charge of this task force is to formulate recommendations for me and
for
the Legislature to address this problem of low-level nuclear waste," Hodges
said
at a news conference in his office. "My stated goal would be to get South
Carolina out of the business of taking nuclear waste from the rest of the
country. I think that is a policy that is strongly supported around the
state of
South Carolina."

Hodges said the task force should examine two possible alternatives:


? Go it alone. Under this option, he said, South Carolina would take care of
low-level waste generated within the state but close the disposal site in
Barnwell County to all other states.

? Enter or re-enter a regional compact for low-level waste disposal. Under
this
plan, member states would negotiate a schedule under which each would assume
responsibility for disposing of the group's waste on a rotating basis. Other
states would be excluded and presumably would be under pressure to find
their
own solutions.

South Carolina was in such a compact with six other Southeastern states
until
1995.

Under the compact, the Barnwell facility was to close at the end of that
year.
North Carolina was to open its replacement site and operate it for the next
20
years.

But North Carolina's efforts to open a suitable site foundered in the face
of
environmental and political opposition, despite spending $110 million that
came
from fees charged on waste dumped at Barnwell.

That's when former S.C. Gov. David Beasley pushed through the General
Assembly a
plan that withdrew the state from the compact, banned North Carolina from
using
Barnwell and opened the site to all other states.

Critics of that policy say it unwisely provided a relief valve for states
and
allowed them to avoid facing the difficult technical and political problems
involved in opening their own dumps as part of a regional plan.

Hodges said many states "realize that things have changed and that we're
committed to changing a policy that was very comfortable to them."

He said other states didn't have to worry about being part of a compact as
long
as they knew South Carolina would take their waste.

"If we indeed are able to move forward and are able to rejoin a compact,"
Hodges
said, "then those that aren't a part of that compact will have to find some
solution to their nuclear waste problem. So . many states, many regions,
want to
be a part of exploring a new compact with South Carolina."

"We've got all the leverage in the world. We're the guys who have the site,"
added Sen. Phil Leventis, D-Sumter, a longtime Barnwell critic who hopes to
be
named to the task force.

Leventis said the low-level waste problem is at least as symbolic as it is
substantive. He said South Carolina needs to stand up for itself.

"If we're ever going to get out of the problems we have with all kinds of
waste,
we're going to have to stop letting other states set our course and we're
going
to have to set our own course," he said.

Not everyone is a fan of the idea of rejoining a compact.

Rep. Bob Sheheen, D-Kershaw, who chaired a Hodges transition panel that
recommended closing the Barnwell site to other states, is one such person.

He said he does not support rejoining the Southeast Compact with North
Carolina
as a member. He's not sure why the remaining members would want to return to
the
pre-1995 policy, because under the current policy, their turn to accept the
waste may never come. "We've already tried that once and it didn't work,''
Sheheen said.

But Dell Isham, director of the Sierra Club, which has been running radio
spots
in the Midlands against the Barnwell dump, was glad to see Hodges tackling
the
issue. 
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