Beyond Nuclear comments to the New Mexico Environment Department, opposed to the expanded Forever WIPP (Waste Isolation Pilot Plant)

See Beyond Nuclear's public comments, posted at our Repositories website section.

See the backgrounder, "WIPP History: The Forever WIPP Expansion & the New Shaft Permit Modification," dated July 20, 2020, posted at the CCNS (Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety) website.

The WIPP site is only 16 miles from the proposed Holtec/ELEA highly radioactive waste consolidated interim storage facility (CISF). And just 40 miles from there, is the Waste Control Specialists national "low" level radioactive waste dump, and propsed CISF, in Andrews County, west Texas, immediately upon the New Mexico border at Eunice. This attempt to turn the majority minority State of New Mexico, and the majority Hispanic and Native American southeast of NM, into a national radioactive waste sacrifice zone, is an outrageous environmental injustice. Learn more about the CISFs at our Centralized Storage website section.

TRU (trans-uranic) military wastes dumped at WIPP are considered "low-level" radioactive wastes, even though contents, such as plutonium, are ultra-hazardous in microscopic quantities, and are very long lasting (plutonium-239 has a hazardous persistence of 240,000 years).

VLLW: "Very Low Level Radioactive Waste" = Very Large Lies, Very Long Lasting

The nuclear power industry and its lapdog regulator (Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NRC), even more toothless under Trump, has invented a new and deceptive name for nuclear power waste, calling it “Very Low Level,” or VLLW. 

The fact is that VLLW is not only Very Long-Lasting Waste, but also extremely dangerous to human health and the environment.

Despite the dangerous nature of VLLW, the NRC wants to 'authorize' regular landfill operators and hazardous waste site operators to dispose of radioactive waste even though they have no provisions to isolate nuclear waste! This would almost certainly result in nuclear waste leaks into our water, air, crops, and communities. We've stopped em before--We need YOU to help stop them again!

50 to 90% of the waste from decommissioning nuclear power reactors plus waste from operations could go to regular local trash landfills!!

ALL of the nuclear power waste except irradiated fuel could go to places without licenses for nuclear!

Individuals can send a letter to NRC and their congressmember by going to the LANDFILLS ALERT on the nirs website under ACTIONS then ALERTS.

The deadline for submitting public comments to NRC is July 20, 2020.

Update on July 16, 2020 by admin

Need more groups VLLW Action Needed: Sign-on by Thurs7-16 midnight Stop Nuclear Waste out of control to Landfills and more!

ACTION ALERT

Say NO to dumping nuclear waste at landfills and municipal waste sites!

July 15, 2020

Dear Friends,

This is one of the most unethical proposals ever put out by the NRC.

It’s not just an environmental justice violation, it is a Civil Rights outrage. (We all know where landfills and hazardous dumps get sited.)  

The proposal is also deceptive. NRC is calling a dramatic rule change a proposal “to expand the interpretation” of a rule. The NRC is also using the semantics of “VLLW” – “very low level waste” – to refer to any type of nuclear waste besides spent fuel. This includes intensely radioactive material/waste that will remain dangerous for literally centuries to come.

So PLEASE add your ORGANIZATION/ group name to the list of people who care about whether low-income and communities of color get poisoned generation-after-generation. Even with the best available technology, these dumps will emit radioactivity into the air, leach into the ground, and leak into groundwater and waterways..

The broader environmental and general public health issues here are also extremely serious.  Radioactive particulates – hazardous for decades and centuries – present a particularly grave danger to ecosystems, infants, children, adolescents and women. 

The Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) has prepared Comments for groups to support. Please take a minute and sign-on by Thursday July 16, 2020.  Sign On By Thurs July 16th midnight on this Google Form 

https://forms.gle/bWMtmV2gLHfG6e2PA

Also consider submitting your own submission to the NRC at: VLLWTransferComments.Resource@nrc.gov. The final deadline is July 20, 2020.

Many thanks.

Michel Lee

Council on Intelligent Energy & Conservation Policy

Promoting Health and Sustainable Energy

NRC Proposes Allowing Nuclear Waste at Dumps, Recycling Sites

As reported by Public News Service.

NRC Stages Swift Sweeping Rollback During Pandemic

Vast Amounts of Rad Waste Slated for Disposal by Unlicensed Operators

As reported in a press release by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

Saugeen Ojibwe Nation votes to block two of three radioactive waste dumps targeted at Great Lakes shoreline!

Beyond Nuclear wishes to express our heartfelt congratulations and thanks to the Saugeen Ojibwe Nation (S.O.N.) for its courage and wisdom. See the S.O.N. vote results, as well as press release. S.O.N., by an 86% margin, turned down Ontario Power Generation's (OPG) offer of $150 million, in exchange for the First Nation of less than 5,000 people agreeing to "host" a provincial dump-site. The dump would have been less than a mile from the Lake Huron shore. It would have been for so-called "low-," and highly radioactive "intermediate-," level radioactive wastes (L&ILRWs) from 20 atomic reactors. OPG proposed that 200,000 cubic meters of L&ILRW be buried at deep geologic repository #1 (DGR1), at its Bruce Nuclear Generating Station (BNGS) in Kincardine, on S.O.N. territory. But OPG was forced to admit that its DGR3, for another 200,000 cubic meters of L&ILRWs, from decommissioning its nuclear power plants, was also targeted at BNGS, instantly doubling the size of the dump. However, unfortunately, DGR2, for all of Canada's high-level radioactive waste (many tens of thousands of tons of irradiated nuclear fuel), is still targeted at S.O.N. country, just 20-some miles from BNGS. So the fight goes on, but the S.O.N. have shown that these dumps can, and must, be stopped.  

 

A large U.S.-Canadian coalition of environmental groups, including Beyond Nuclear, as well as elected officials and municipalities representing the majority of the Great Lakes Basin's population, stand ready to continue to join with S.O.N., to block DGR2 as well, and to shut down BNGS. The Great Lakes (see photo from outer space, above) need protection against a large array of reactor and radioactive waste risks -- they represent 21% of the world's surface fresh water, and 84% of North America's, and they serve as drinking water supply for 40+ million people in eight U.S. states, two Canadian provinces, and a large number of Native American First Nations. After all, as Ojibwe wisdom has long taught, water is life; and S.O.N. has given us all the precious gift of showing that such daunting battles can be won. For extensive media coverage in the immediate aftermath of the S.O.N. vote, and links to other groups fighting against radioactive waste dumps on the Great Lakes shore, see this link. See updates since, as well as media coverage of the lead up to the vote (including S.O.N. anti-dump statements, and even tribal marches), at Beyond Nuclear's Canada website section. And see what you can do to help, in both the U.S. House of Representatives, and the U.S. Senate! Please take action, and spread the word!