ML18162A151
| ML18162A151 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | HI-STORE |
| Issue date: | 05/22/2018 |
| From: | Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards |
| To: | |
| Caverly J | |
| References | |
| NRC-3722 | |
| Download: ML18162A151 (167) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Public Scoping Meeting Docket Number: N/A Location: Albuquerque, New Mexico Date: 05-22-18 Work Order No.: NRC-3722 Pages 1-166 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3 + + + + +
4 PUBLIC SCOPING MEETING FOR THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT 5 STATEMENT FOR HOLTEC INTERNATIONAL'S HI-STORE 6 CONSOLIDATED INTERIM STORAGE FACILITY FOR SPENT 7 NUCLEAR FUEL LOCATED IN LEA COUNTY, NEW MEXICO 8 + + + + +
9 TUESDAY, 10 MAY 22, 2018 11 + + + + +
12 ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO 13 + + + + +
14 The Public Scoping Meeting was convened in 15 the Crown Plaza Albuquerque, Southeast Ballroom, 1901 16 University Boulevard, at 6:00 p.m., Chip Cameron, 17 facilitating.
18 19 NRC STAFF PRESENT:
20 CHIP CAMERON, Facilitator 21 BRIAN SMITH, Deputy Director, Division of Fuel Cycle 22 Safety, Safeguards, and Environmental Review, 23 Office of Nuclear Material Safety and 24 Safeguards (NMSS) 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 1 JILL CAVERLY, Environmental Review Project Manager, 2 Environmental Review Branch, NMSS 3 JOSÉ CUADRADO, Licensing and Safety Review Project 4 Manager, Spent Fuel Licensing Branch, NMSS 5 DAVID McINTYRE, Public Affairs Officer, Office of 6 Public Affairs 7 JOHN McKIRGAN, Chief, Spent Fuel Licensing Branch, 8 NMSS 9 ANGEL MORENO, Congressional Affairs Officer, Office 10 of Congressional Affairs 11 CINTHYA ROMAN, Chief, Environmental Review Branch, 12 NMSS 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 1 T-A-B-L-E O-F C-O-N-T-E-N-T-S 2
3 Opening Remarks and Introductions.. . . . . . . . 4 4 Welcome and Meeting Purpose.. . . . . . . . . . . 4 5 NRC Licensing Review/EIS Process. . . . . . . . . 10 6 Receive Public Comment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24 7 Closing Remarks.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 6:04 p.m.
3 MR. CAMERON: Well, good evening, 4 everyone. My name is Chip Cameron and it is going to 5 be my pleasure to serve as your facilitator for 6 tonight's meeting, and in that role I'll try to help 7 you all have a productive meeting tonight.
8 And this is a meeting that's been convened 9 by the NRC. That's the United States Nuclear 10 Regulatory Commission. And we're going to try to not 11 use many acronyms tonight. You will hear NRC. You're 12 also going to hear NEPA. That stands for the National 13 Environmental Policy Act. And you're going to hear 14 EIS. That stands for Environmental Impact Statement.
15 And that's the focus of the meeting 16 tonight, the NRC's environmental review of a license 17 application that they received from the Holtec 18 International Company to build and operate an interim 19 spent fuel storage facility in Lea County. So the NRC 20 is going to present information to you. It will be 21 brief, but they're going to present information to you 22 on the environmental review that they do and the 23 safety review. Those are the two main components of 24 the NRC review of the license application to help them 25 determine whether they should grant the application; NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 1 in other words, grant the license.
2 After the NRC presentations we're going to 3 go to the most important part of the meeting, and 4 that's to give the NRC an opportunity to listen to 5 you, to your comments, your advice on the issue of 6 scoping.
7 Now scoping is a term that's used in 8 connection with the preparation of an Environmental 9 Impact Statement. And it's very simple: It's what 10 should be evaluated in the EIS; what doesn't need to 11 be evaluated in the EIS? And scoping is the very 12 beginning of the NRC's licensing review, so we're 13 right at the start of this particular process.
14 Your comments are going to be on the 15 formal record tonight. We have Bruce Carlson over 16 here. He's our court reporter, or stenographer. He's 17 going to be transcribing your comments. That 18 transcript will be available to you within about two 19 weeks. And the NRC is going to tell you how you get 20 access to that transcript so you can read all the 21 comments that were given tonight.
22 Now I have a list of names of people who 23 want to speak tonight from the blue cards that you 24 filled out when you came in, if you filled out a blue 25 card to speak. And I'm going to call your name. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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6 1 I'll call a few names at a time so that you'll have a 2 preview of when you're coming up next. But I'll call 3 your name and I'll just ask you to join me up here and 4 to give your comment to us.
5 Now we have many speakers tonight, so I'm 6 setting a four-minute limit for each comment. And at 7 the end of that comment I'm going to ask you sit down 8 and we're going to the next speaker.
9 Now fortunately you can also submit a 10 written comment to the NRC so you can amplify on your 11 four minutes in writing. And the NRC will tell you 12 how to do that, how to submit comments in writing.
13 Now the NRC staff is here tonight to 14 listen carefully to your comments. They're not going 15 to be responding to any questions that you might 16 include in your comments, but they're going to be 17 listening and then we're going to carefully evaluate 18 your comments, your questions as they prepare the 19 draft EIS, the draft Environmental Impact Statement.
20 And you're going to hear about that in a few minutes.
21 And we do have a representative from 22 Holtec International here, representatives. They're 23 the license applicant. And they'll be available after 24 the meeting if you have any questions for them. And 25 I'll just introduce Joy Russell who's right here. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 1 I should tell you that we also offer the -- a 2 representative of the license applicant an opportunity 3 to speak for their four minutes during the public 4 comment if they want to do so, and I think we're going 5 to have a speaker from the license applicant. So I 6 don't want anybody to be shocked or surprised by that.
7 Let me introduce some representatives of 8 the congressional staff who are here tonight to be 9 able to tell their members what transpired here 10 tonight. And first of all, let me introduce Poqueen.
11 Poqueen Rivera is right back there, and she's from 12 Congresswoman Michelle Lujan Grisham's staff.
13 We have Barbara Romero. Barbara?
14 MS. ROMERO: I'm right here.
15 MR. CAMERON: There's Barbara. Barbara is 16 from Congressman Steve Pearce's staff.
17 We have Bill Goldman who's right back 18 here. And Bill is with Senator Tom Udall.
19 And we also have Joshua Sanchez. This is 20 Joshua. And he is with -- also with Senator Udall's 21 staff.
22 But thank you for being here and thank 23 your representative, your senator for sending you here 24 tonight.
25 Let me introduce the NRC staff to you, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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8 1 then we're going to get -- we'll get started with the 2 meeting.
3 First of all, we're going to hear from 4 Cinthya Roman. This is Cinthya. And Cinthya is the 5 Chief of the Branch -- Environmental Review Branch at 6 the NRC in the Office of Nuclear Material Safety and 7 Safeguards.
8 Then we're going to hear from the key 9 person here, Jill Caverly, who's right here. And 10 she's the project manager for the environmental 11 review. She's going to give you the most information.
12 We also -- she works for Cinthya in the branch.
13 And we do have a senior NRC representative 14 here, a senior manager who's with us, and that's Brian 15 Smith. Okay? And Brian is the Deputy Division 16 Director of the Division of Fuel Cycle, Safeguards and 17 Environmental Review.
18 I also mentioned the safety review. We 19 have representatives on the NRC staff who are here 20 from the safety side. And where's José? Ah, Jose 21 Cuadrado. He is the project manager for the safety 22 review. We also have José's branch chief John 23 McKirgan who's here, and that's the Spent Fuel 24 Licensing Branch.
25 Dave McIntyre back here is from the NRC's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 1 Office of Public Affairs. And if there's any media 2 people that haven't talked to Dave yet, please see him 3 and he'll fix you up.
4 MR. McINTYRE: And just if I could 5 interrupt. We had a couple of requests for the pass 6 code for the WiFi. It is in all caps HPHK.
7 MR. CAMERON: So hold on a minute. Let me 8 get that on a microphone.
9 MR. McINTYRE: We've had a couple requests 10 for the pass code for the meeting room WiFi. It is 11 HPHK, all capitals.
12 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Dave.
13 And finally we have a representative here 14 from the NRC's Office of Congressional Affairs in 15 Quantico, Maryland.
16 Thank you all for being here.
17 And the last thing is I would just ask 18 everybody to be courteous, all of us to be courteous.
19 You may hear opinions tonight that don't agree with 20 your own opinions, but just be courteous. And I would 21 have to say this is our fifth meeting in New Mexico 22 and the meetings have been pretty courteous, which is 23 wonderful, and we've had good comments. But there was 24 a slight kerfuffle, okay, at the Carlsbad meeting 25 about time keeping. So we have new time keepers.
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10 1 They fired me. Okay?
2 (Laughter.)
3 MR. CAMERON: I was the kerfuffle, I 4 guess. But any rate, we have time keepers down here 5 and we have Marla S. Morales, right, and Miriam 6 Jucket, and they're going to be here. And when you 7 have -- when three minutes has gone by, Marla is going 8 to hold this up so you know to finish up. And then 9 when the four minutes is up, she's going to hold this 10 up for you. And then we're going to go on from there.
11 So I just wanted you to plan accordingly for that.
12 And with that, Cinthya, do you want to 13 take us away here?
14 MS. ROMAN: Good evening. First I just 15 want to say a couple of remarks in Spanish.
16 (Foreign language spoken.)
17 MS. ROMAN: Good evening. As you 18 mentioned, staff in my branch will be working with the 19 Environmental Review Branch on the environmental 20 review and the application. Our main goal today is to 21 hear from you, so I'm going to be very brief.
22 First I want to give you a very brief 23 overview of what NRC does and our role in the Holtec 24 project. Our agency is charged by federal law to be 25 the nation's only regulator of commercial --
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11 1 PARTICIPANT: You're speaking too fast and 2 you're not loud enough.
3 MS. ROMAN: Okay. Can you hear me better?
4 PARTICIPANT: Yes.
5 MS. ROMAN: Our agency is charged by 6 federal law to be the nation's only regulator of 7 commercial nuclear materials in the (unintelligible) 8 ensuring these materials are used, handled and stored 9 safely and securely. Our nation is protective of its 10 health and safety for both the common defense and 11 security and protect the environment by regulating the 12 use of hazardous materials. So our mission we 13 currently review each license application we receive 14 before making a decision on whether or not to grant an 15 applicant's request.
16 Next slide. NRC regulates the operation 17 of many kinds of nuclear power reactors that generate 18 about 20 percent of the electricity in the United 19 States. We also regulate the significant use of 20 nuclear materials, research reactors at universities, 21 transportation of nuclear materials and their storage 22 and disposal. NRC is trying to be open and 23 transparent in its review. As such, stakeholders have 24 many opportunities to participate in public meetings 25 on environmental and safety issues. This scoping NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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12 1 meeting is one of those opportunities.
2 Next slide. As an independent regulator 3 the NRC determines whether it is safe to build and 4 operate a storage facility at those sites. The NRC 5 does not promote or build any nuclear facilities. We 6 also do not own or operate the facilities. Again, our 7 mission and our regulations are designed to protect 8 both the public, workers and the environment.
9 Holtec is applying for a license to store 10 waste. Holtec is not asking NRC for permission to 11 reprocess or generate more waste. NRC does not select 12 locations for a storage facility which is the impact 13 of building and operating a storage facility at a 14 location proposed by the licensee.
15 As we will explain later in this 16 presentation there is also an environmental review 17 that will be documented in an Environmental Impact 18 Statement, which is up on the documents. This 19 analysis along with other factors will form the basis 20 for this -- our decision to issue a license or not.
21 These are all of my remarks and now Jill 22 Caverly will provide additional details about the 23 Holtec project and the environmental review process.
24 Thank you.
25 MS. CAVERLY: So hello. My name is Jill NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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13 1 Caverly and I'm going to be acting as the 2 environmental project manager for this review.
3 The next few slides we have will be 4 specific to the Holtec storage facility application 5 we're reviewing.
6 So Holtec has applied for a license to 7 construct and operate a storage facility under 10 CFR, 8 Part 72. That's NRC's regulations governing the 9 storage of spent fuel and reactor-related greater than 10 class C waste.
11 So if granted, Holtec would receive a 40-12 year license to construct and operate a consolidated 13 interim storage facility. The current application 14 before the NRC requests construction and operation of 15 only the first phase of up to 20 planned phases. In 16 this current application Holtec is requesting storage 17 of up to 500 canisters of spent nuclear fuel. The 18 spent fuel would come from shut down and operating 19 power plants around the country.
20 Holtec anticipates applying for up to 20 21 phases of construction and operation of 500 canisters 22 of spent nuclear fuel for a total of 10,000 canisters.
23 However, these additional phases would require 24 separate applications from Holtec and would be subject 25 to their own safety and environmental reviews. The NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 1 Environmental Report provides information on the full 2 build-out of the site for 10,000 canisters.
3 Next slide, please. This slide shows the 4 approximate location for the proposed consolidated 5 interim storage facility in Southeastern New Mexico.
6 The facility will be located approximately halfway 7 between the cities of Carlsbad and Hobbs in Lea 8 County.
9 Next slide. Holtec plans to use a HI-10 STORM UMAX system for the storage of spent fuel. HI-11 STORM UMAX stands for Holtec International Storage 12 Module Underground Maximum Capacity, and it is an NRC-13 certified design, which means that we have evaluated 14 it and determined it meets NRC regulations and can 15 safely store spent fuel.
16 This system is a dry in-ground spent fuel 17 storage system. Each of these modules hold one 18 canister of spent fuel and Holtec has applied for 19 storage of 500 canisters. The canister transfer 20 facility will be below ground. And you can see from 21 the picture that this is a low-profile design. This 22 is the conceptual drawing from the Holtec application.
23 Next slide. So this flowchart provides an 24 overview of the license application process which can 25 be described as three -- a three-program reviews NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 1 process. So after the application is submitted NRC 2 conducts an acceptance review to determine if the 3 application has sufficient enough information to begin 4 a detailed technical review. If so, the NRC dockets 5 the application and this begins the safety and 6 environmental review task.
7 So from a safety standpoint we work 8 through a separate review to decide if the license 9 should be issued. The results of that safety review 10 is the Safety Evaluation Report. That's graphically 11 represented on the left column of the flowchart. The 12 environmental review results in an Environmental 13 Impact Statement which describes the impacts on the 14 environment of the proposed project.
15 On the right side you'll see the box 16 saying adjudicatory hearings. That blue box on the 17 figure refers to the opportunity for the public to 18 request a hearing on the application. These hearings 19 would be held if a petition to intervene was granted.
20 The results of these three processes is a 21 hearing if granted. The results of the environmental 22 review documented in an Environmental Impact Statement 23 and the safety review documented in a Safety 24 Evaluation Report will factor into NRC's final 25 decision whether or not to grant the license to Holtec NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 1 for the storage facility. It's important to reiterate 2 that the focus of tonight's meeting will be on the 3 environmental review process.
4 Next slide. So this flow diagram outlines 5 the environmental review process, or the middle column 6 of the previous slide. The opportunities for the 7 public involvement are highlighted in light blue. The 8 NRC starts the environmental review by publishing a 9 notice of intent to inform the public of our plans to 10 prepare an EIS and to conduct these public hearings.
11 The light blue box on the right side 12 identifies the current scoping process of which this 13 meeting -- of which this meeting is included. The 14 purpose of this phase is the added information to use 15 to help us to prepare the EIS. Comments gathered from 16 this meeting as well as other information collections 17 will be independently evaluated for the impacts to 18 this particular project. We will document your 19 comments today in a meeting transcript, and the public 20 can also provide written comments through the end of 21 the scoping period.
22 We'll analyze all the information 23 gathered, develop an EIS and issue it again for public 24 comment. At that time we will again invite public 25 comments on the draft EIS and that will be below the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 1 blue box. We'll come out and schedule to hear those 2 comments on the draft EIS. We'll evaluate your 3 comments and adjust our EIS if necessary.
4 Next slide, please. So our environmental 5 review is based on the requirements of the National 6 Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA. NEPA requires that 7 federal agencies apply a systematic approach to 8 evaluate impacts on the environment. NRC will prepare 9 the EIS in accordance with those regulations.
10 Next slide, please. So this is a 11 graphical representation of the types of sources of 12 information that NRC gathers when preparing an EIS.
13 We will conduct site visits. We'll meet with local 14 and state officials and other federal agencies. We 15 are currently gathering that information for scoping 16 comments to determine which issues should be 17 considered in our review. We also expect to request 18 additional information from Holtec after the 19 completion of this portion.
20 Next slide. So the NRC will gather 21 information on a wide range of topics related to 22 environmental issues. And this slide shows for a 23 period we will consider in our Environmental Impact 24 Statement.
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18 1 timeline for our anticipated environmental review.
2 This stepwise approach meets our responsibility under 3 the National Environmental Policy Act. We've started 4 the review with the notice of intent to conduct 5 scopings and prepare the EIS, and that started the 60-6 day scoping period. NRC received several requests to 7 extend the scoping period, and did so. The revised 8 scoping period will now end on July 30th.
9 We will continue to gather and analyze 10 information related to the review and develop and 11 publish the draft EIS. At that point we'll publish a 12 notice of availability, and that will start a 45-day 13 period for the public and other agencies to comment on 14 the draft EIS. Again, those comments will be 15 addressed.
16 Next slide. So the scoping process helps 17 the NRC to determine the scope of the EIS and identify 18 significant issues to be analyzed in depth. It also 19 identifies and eliminates issues which are not 20 significant. It also identifies other environmental 21 reviews and computational requirements related to the 22 proposed action.
23 Next slide. So the NRC is requesting 24 information that is specific to this proposed facility 25 regarding what should be included or excluded from the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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19 1 EIS. Some examples of that information are: Are 2 there local projects that are being planned or 3 developed nearby? Have you identified wildlife or 4 habitat that should be considered? Are there cultural 5 resources that should be considered in the evaluation?
6 Are there particular populations nearby that should be 7 considered? Are there any unique characteristics of 8 the project site or local community that the NRC 9 should consider in its evaluation?
10 Next slide. So these are the ways you can 11 submit comments on the scope of the EIS. You may 12 present your comments orally today in a public 13 meeting. You may submit comments through the 14 regulations.gov web site. And please search the 15 docket ID, NRC-2018-0052. And you may mail comments 16 to the address on the slide. And finally, you may 17 email your comments to an email address which we 18 recently added. So remember written comments are due 19 by July 30th, and we would appreciate it if you try to 20 get them in by that time.
21 Next slide. So these are ways to get --
22 to find additional information on the application.
23 You can look at the federal OMB web site, or the NRC's 24 public document, or to the NRC's project-specific web 25 site for the Holtec application, which is listed on NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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20 1 this slide here.
2 We've also provided copies of the 3 Environmental Report to the public libraries in Hobbs, 4 Carlsbad and Roswell for you to review.
5 If you'd like to be on the mailing list, 6 please make sure that your name and your email address 7 were provided to one of the NRC staff at the 8 registration table. This is one way to ensure that 9 you will be notified of upcoming meetings of issuance 10 the draft and final EIS. At the bottom of the slide 11 are the NRC's points of contacts for this application.
12 And that concludes my portion of the 13 presentation. Please remember that the scoping period 14 will end on July 30th.
15 MR. SMITH: Good evening to all of you and 16 thank you for attending the public scoping meeting 17 tonight. My name is Brian Smith. I'm Deputy Director 18 for the Division of Fuel Cycle Safety, Safeguards and 19 Environmental Review at the NRC Headquarters Office in 20 Rockville, Maryland. Jill and Cinthya work with my 21 division has responsibility for preparing and 22 conducting the environmental review for the Holtec 23 application. It's a responsibility they take very 24 seriously.
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21 1 supportive of project and there are those of you that 2 may be against the project. We're going to hear from 3 both sides tonight, but most importantly we want to 4 hear from you.
5 One thing I'd like to address like I did 6 last night is in some of our previous scoping meetings 7 the consent-based process was addressed by a number of 8 commenters. This is not a process that the NRC 9 follows. It is a process that DOE undertook an 10 initiative on a while back which they later then 11 stopped. Under the NRC process the NRC writes the 12 regulations that individual applicants have to meet to 13 be able to obtain a license to do work with 14 radioactive materials. An applicant will choose a 15 site and then prepare their application based on 16 regulations and then submit that application to us 17 prior to review.
18 As we complete our review, go through the 19 safety review, security review, environmental review 20 to decide how well we have met all of the regulations.
21 If we determine that those regulations have been 22 satisfied, we can then issue a license. With this 23 particular license application we are nowhere near 24 that point. We're in the very early stages of our 25 review and no decision has been made yet on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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22 1 whether to issue a license on this project or not.
2 Finally, I'd like to make an apology. In 3 an effort to be more open and transparent for these 4 two meetings we prepared -- we actually had an Navajo 5 translator translate our slides into Navajo.
6 Unfortunately, due to a computing error, when the 7 slides printed off a number of errors worked their way 8 into the slides. So we did not catch that and we did 9 pass out those slides at the meeting and some of you 10 in the audience identified those errors. So we 11 apologize for that.
12 The next slide. Finally, we do want to 13 hear your comments tonight. We look forward to 14 hearing those. This is our sixth meeting that we've 15 conducted on the project. We've received a lot of 16 great comments so far, so we want to hear what you 17 have to say tonight. So with that I'll turn over to 18 Chip Cameron.
19 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, 20 Cinthya and Jill and Brian. And let me follow up that 21 apology with another apology to all of you. We have 22 well over 60 people who signed up to talk tonight.
23 And I originally was going to give everybody four 24 minutes. We're going to have to go down to three 25 minutes. And it's not because the NRC staff wants to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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23 1 end the meeting at 9:00. Okay. We're going to stay 2 until we hear from all of you. But I just want to 3 make sure that all of you can get out of here before 4 midnight. Okay?
5 So just try to be brisk in your comments.
6 And if you need to follow it up, send in a written 7 comment. I at three minutes you're going to get the 8 point across. I know many of you who we've heard 9 before, you get the point across right away. We know 10 what it is. So if you could do that.
11 And let me just introduce two more 12 congressional staff. Where's Jennifer? Jennifer 13 -- is it Cataychiss?
14 MS. CATECHIS: Catechis.
15 MR. CAMERON: Ah, Catechis?
16 MS. CATECHIS: Yes.
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Jennifer. And 18 she's with Congressman Ben Ray Lujan. Thank you for 19 being here.
20 And we also have Mike Solomon who's with 21 Senator Martin Heinrich.
22 Okay. Let's get started. And we're going 23 to State Senator Cisco McSorley first.
24 If you could come up here?
25 Then we're going to go to John Heaton, H.
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24 1 Vern Payne, Joe Mumley and Ed Mayer.
2 Senator?
3 MR. McSORLEY: Thank you. I have worked 4 on nuclear waste disposal repository systems since the 5 1970s. I was tasked with researching the low-level 6 nuclear waste site, the WIPP site. At that time 7 UNESCO promised that we'd have a veto. When it became 8 evident New Mexico never agreed to such a ridiculous 9 site, the veto was withdrawn. It was just the first 10 long line of lies that's been told to the people of 11 the State of New Mexico.
12 I have been in the legislature since 1985.
13 Since that time I've served on virtually every 14 committee that -- in both the House and the Senate 15 dealing with the environmental initiatives. We have 16 never had a presentation to the legislature on this 17 site. Your public representatives are totally in the 18 dark.
19 Then a few years ago when Mr. Heaton was 20 giving us a tour of the WIPP site, he claimed that the 21 WIPP site was able to take high-level nuclear waste.
22 I disagreed with him in public and I still disagree 23 with him. That's not true.
24 (Applause.)
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25 1 look at what the NRC is supposed to do with it, it's 2 not enough. New Mexico has borne the brunt from the 3 mining of uranium to the atomic bomb to the sites at 4 Los Alamos and each and every time promises were made 5 and not yet -- even right now we're in the process of 6 changing the person -- the group that oversees Los 7 Alamos, and they have a horrible record of safety as 8 it relates to uranium.
9 The idea that we are going to give a 10 company, a for-profit company the ability to handle 11 uranium that is going to be radioactive and deadly for 12 600 years, the ability and the license to do so with 13 a 20-year bonding capacity to me seems absolutely 14 ridiculous --
15 (Applause.)
16 MR. McSORLEY: The other thing I want to 17 say is this: We were promised with WIPP that these 18 safety regulations would be in effect and there would 19 never be a 10,000-year accident like the one we just 20 experienced. My God, if that happened at WIPP, what 21 can happen here?
22 And lastly, this whole thing is like to me 23 saying the sailing of the Titanic was a great success, 24 because after all there were four great things. Well, 25 ladies and gentlemen, 20 years are not the four great NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1 things that my daughter will be living and your 2 daughter and our people after us. Please require more 3 input by the state legislature, not just the Executive 4 Branch, and expand your consideration of what we must 5 do, because it is certainly not enough. Thank you.
6 (Applause.)
7 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, senator.
8 John Heaton?
9 MR. HEATON: Good evening. My name is 10 John Heaton and I am the Chair of the Eddy-Lea Energy 11 Alliance, and we are the owners of property where the 12 site will occur. We've been involved with Holtec with 13 this and they are absolutely a great company and we're 14 proud to be associated with them. I am a private 15 citizen and a volunteer. For five meetings now I've 16 heard so many what-ifs, and bogus, not factual 17 information. And I'd like to if I could straighten 18 out a couple of those.
19 First, it's illegal to license or build a 20 private storage facility. If it's illegal, why are 21 there 70-some private storage facilities at the sites 22 in the United States?
23 Utilities are responsible for their spent 24 fuel until moved to a repository. Yes, that's true, 25 but in 1998 they were supposed to -- DOE was supposed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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27 1 to take the fuel and didn't take the fuel. The 2 utilities sued and they won. And now you the taxpayer 3 are paying for the maintenance of this material at 4 these sites. And that number is about $500 million a 5 year.
6 The casks -- another point is the casks 7 will break and leak, destroying land everywhere.
8 That's nonsense. Triple-containment -- fuel cladding, 9 the canister and then the cask form a triple 10 containment. These shipments are managed very 11 carefully. Can't say that there won't be a leak, but 12 I can say there -- there won't be an accident, but I 13 can say there won't be a leak.
14 The rail can't handle the weight of the 15 cask and rail car. This too is a ridiculous 16 statement. The train engine that -- weighs more than 17 the rail car and the cask itself and goes up and down 18 the rail every day. Weight is managed with more axles 19 and can distribute the weight.
20 A cask passing me will contaminate me and 21 my children. Again, the outside of the cask is five 22 times less than the NRC standard. You'd have to stand 23 in one place for many, many hours to even get the dose 24 of a dental X-ray, and that would be very close, two 25 meters from the cask. People get X-rays, CT scans, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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28 1 various other scans, valium stress tests with impunity 2 in the U.S. and never are concerned. In fact, there 3 are 50 million of these procedures done in the United 4 States on an annual basis. So is there so much 5 hysteria about a project like this?
6 This is a great project, job-creating and 7 clearly is a very important environmental project. If 8 you are concerned about the environment and where 9 waste is being stored now, you would support this 10 project because it is the responsible action to take.
11 Thank you.
12 (Applause.)
13 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank 14 you, John.
15 And this is Mr. Payne coming up join us at 16 the podium.
17 MR. PAYNE: Ladies and gentlemen, I was 18 born and raised down in Southwestern New Mexico.
19 PARTICIPANT: We can't hear you.
20 MR. PAYNE: I'm sorry. Can you hear me 21 now?
22 MR. CAMERON: That's much better. Thank 23 you.
24 MR. PAYNE: I was born and raised in 25 Southwestern New Mexico and early one morning in July NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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29 1 of 1945 I was outside and saw a great flash, orange-2 ish/black flash cover the sky. So I probably am the 3 only person in the room that saw the birth of the 4 atomic age.
5 I've watched closely over those years as 6 work been done and I can't say whether the site in Lea 7 County is good, bad or indifferent, but what I have to 8 offer is that there has been a recent development of 9 an improved cement; it's called ceramic cement, that 10 has about an 85 percent improvement of shielding the 11 rays, gamma rays and other rays, and -- over cement.
12 It has a much longer life. It doesn't leak like 13 colored cement. And there are many, many other 14 favorable things that has been developed.
15 Unfortunately, it wasn't developed 30 16 years ago or 40 years ago, but the scientists from 17 North Carolina State University have improved it. I 18 have provided a white paper and a little summary 19 statement of what this product will do to give comfort 20 to people that are concerned about the containment.
21 And we believe that this would offer an alternative 22 that would solve many of the current problems when we 23 have the storage of radioactive or nuclear waste.
24 I recommend that you get into the 25 transcript of this meeting and read those summaries.
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30 1 I feel that we finally have a breakthrough in terms of 2 a product that will help keep up with the concerns of 3 every single one of you in this room, whether in favor 4 or disfavor of the site and the account. I can only 5 say that if I lived next to a site, I would sure want 6 this product. And it's named ARMAKAP, A-R-M-A-K-A-P.
7 My time is up. I could take five hours 8 and tell you my experiences with the first, last and 9 thereafter, but I shan't do that tonight. Thank you 10 so much.
11 (Applause.)
12 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Mr. Payne.
13 Is Mr. Mumley her, Joe Mumley?
14 Mr. Mumley?
15 MR. MUMLEY: Okay. Thank you. I signed 16 up basically because my wife and I started going to 17 fracking meetings in San Juan County, and we've had 18 quite an education that basically there was no 19 protection for the water and air. Wasn't enough air 20 monitors or inspectors for the state. There was no 21 federal input to date. It might exist somewhere, but 22 nothing that protects the water. The Albuquerque 23 geologist that worked for oil and gas is pretty 24 positive that the water is going to be polluted here.
25 Nobody has tried to refute him and it continues.
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31 1 I retired here from Brooklyn. We lived a 2 couple blocks from the nuclear waste storage site. A 3 local school discovered it was there during a project.
4 They went in and took pictures; nobody stopped them, 5 and discovered all the regulations were being broken 6 and not followed.
7 I have a friend in New Hampshire. He 8 worked on the first atomic nuclear reactor's safety 9 features and he said that it was just too expensive 10 and that 40 percent of them had to be eliminated.
11 They couldn't -- and so basically what I learned from 12 the fracking is that the infrastructure, including the 13 rows, the number of inspectors, the monitors will not 14 be -- will be not done in a responsible way. So I'm 15 against this project. Thank you.
16 (Applause.)
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Mr. Mumley.
18 And I mentioned that the representative of 19 the license applicant was going to take three minutes 20 to talk to you about their intentions. And we have Ed 21 Mayer right here.
22 Ed?
23 MR. MAYER: Okay. Good evening. My name 24 is Ed Mayer and I'm a program director at Holtec 25 International, and specifically I'm a program director NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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32 1 for the interim storage facility, and it's really an 2 honor to be here tonight to brief you.
3 First I'd like to provide Holtec's 4 commitment to the NRC, that we're going to provide all 5 responses in a timely manner to a short and accurate 6 submission, and also to ensure this NRC schedule 7 review process is met. But I think more importantly 8 we're here tonight to provide the facts about the Hi-9 STORM facility, the consolidated interim storage 10 facility, and to ask for your support for the project.
11 The Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance, also known 12 as the ELEA, is our partner, and it was formed in 2006 13 with the express mission of bringing economic benefit 14 to New Mexico. Another thing, what they do, all of 15 its members are long-time proud members, or I should 16 say citizens of New Mexico. So ELEA brings the deep 17 understanding of their communities to the team, and we 18 really appreciate the team.
19 Holtec International is a strong 20 technology company. Our core business for the past 32 21 years is safe and secure storage of used nuclear fuel.
22 All the equipment supplied by Holtec has been 23 designed, engineered, licensed, applicated and in many 24 cases operated by Holtec employees.
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33 1 have three manufacturing facilities: one in Orrville, 2 Ohio. That's mostly our aluminum work. Pittsburgh, 3 Pennsylvania. Makes sense. Steel work. And then our 4 newest in Camden, New Jersey that does both aluminum 5 and steel work.
6 We have an impeccable safety record. None 7 of our equipment has ever experienced a safety issue 8 that leaked or caused any personal injury. The 9 members of ELEA asked Holtec to be their partner in 10 2013 after careful evaluation of the safety and 11 security of our used fuel storage and transportation 12 equipment.
13 Holtec with outstanding support from ELEA 14 will obtain the NRC license to construct and operate 15 the consolidated interim storage facility. The name 16 of the facility is facility HI-STORM.
17 So once the appropriate contract and final 18 revisions are in place Holtec will construct and 19 operate the facility. Local residents and companies 20 will be hired for the construction and operations, and 21 both will bring high-paying jobs to New Mexico. We 22 expect about 100 construction jobs over the life of 23 the construction, which will be about a decade, and 24 about 100 operations jobs in the facility. And it 25 will pay 60 to $80,000 a year to the operations jobs.
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34 1 The people of New Mexico are rich in 2 technical knowledge, especially nuclear technology 3 with two national laboratories, three alternate flow 4 path bases and an Army base, the Waste Isolation Pilot 5 Plant an URENCO.
6 The geology site characteristics and 7 environment and other factors for the proposed site 8 are ideal for the storage of used nuclear fuel. Our 9 mission, Holtec's mission is to offer a temporary safe 10 and secure storage facility for the nation's used 11 nuclear fuel. And temporary is measured in decades 12 and the final repository will be the Yucca or another 13 deep repository will be where the fuel will go after 14 this interim storage.
15 MR. CAMERON: Okay. I'm going to have to 16 ask you to finish up.
17 MR. MAYER: I guess the last thing I have 18 to say is that I'll be at the table in the back. I've 19 had some great conversations with some of you and we'd 20 like to continue those conversations. So please come 21 back to meet with us.
22 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much.
23 (Applause.)
24 MR. CAMERON: We're going to Barney 25 Magrath next and Greg Mello, Stan Fitch, Yemane NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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35 1 Asmerom and Terry Sloan.
2 And, Barney? This way the NRC staff will 3 be able to --
4 PARTICIPANT: Can we raise that 5 microphone? It's hard to hear. And they lean down a 6 little bit at the beginning and then we can't hear 7 after they stand up. So can we can raise that? We 8 have the technology, right?
9 (Laughter.)
10 (Simultaneous speaking.)
11 MR. MAGRATH: All right. Thank you. My 12 name is Barney Magrath. I'm from Santa Fe and I'm 13 with the Santa Fe Democratic Party. I have a BS in 14 physics and I know the science. And I want to 15 highlight the false assumption that a centralized 16 facility would be safer for our national security.
17 In 2001 Allison McFarland published a 18 paper entitled, "Interim Storage of Spent Fuel in the 19 United States." This 41-page report presents the 20 concerns -- security concerns of interim storage, and 21 I'll quote it.
22 "One of the principal arguments for a 23 centralized interim storage facility is based on the 24 notion that a single facility will provide a much 25 higher level of physical security against sabotage or NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 1 theft than many nuclear reactors in which the spent 2 fuel currently resides. Although this may be true in 3 the abstract, an actual practice it is not likely to 4 be so."
5 First, there is no evidence to suggest 6 that spent fuel which is currently stored in reactors 7 poses any unacknowledged security threat for which the 8 reactors are not already prepared.
9 Second, a centralized site would put all 10 of the spent fuel in one place. There would not --
11 with all this spent fuel in one place it would simply 12 add one more place to the list of spent fuel locations 13 because reactors as they continue to operate will 14 continue to have spent fuel on site.
15 And last of all, the most ominous problem 16 with the argument that a centralized facility is more 17 secure is the fact that all spent fuel would have to 18 be transported with literally thousands of shipments.
19 For those concerned about security, that translates 20 into thousands of opportunities for attacks or thefts 21 of spent fuel. In actuality, spent fuel will be at a 22 much higher risk for sabotage or theft on the roadways 23 than at reactors. Reactors are relatively well-24 guarded and well-monitored places, whereas spent fuel 25 presents a more plausibly security risk. Thank you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 1 very much.
2 (Applause.)
3 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, 4 Barney.
5 Greg? Greg Mello?
6 MR. MELLO: Hello. Greg Mello with the 7 Los Alamos City.
8 (Applause.)
9 MR. MELLO: Thank you, NRC and Holtec, for 10 coming here and listening. I want to talk briefly 11 about things to analyze carefully in the EIS and 12 reasonable alternatives.
13 There's -- you need, Mr. Heaton, you 14 really do you need to look at some of the black swans 15 here. You need to look at the bankruptcy of Holtec, 16 bankruptcy of its subsequent operators, gaps between 17 management. Forty years is really a long time. Even 18 DOE doesn't issue 40-year contracts.
19 The problems of transportation which were 20 just mentioned are quite real and need to be looked at 21 very carefully. The -- how fuel will be transferred 22 to additional different casks for disposal once the 23 fuel is at the facility is going to be a problem 24 because of different disposal facilities and different 25 storage -- different cask needs. We don't know what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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38 1 that disposal facility is.
2 We need to assume that there are broken fuel 3 rods in casks and how will those be handled. What 4 will the infrastructure be for managing loose fissle 5 material and how one could be do the waste processing, 6 the subsequent disposal of that secondary waste 7 stream. Where will the spent fuel pools be, and so 8 on.
9 We need to look -- terrorism is now big 10 business and there's a lot of people funding it in the 11 Middle East and elsewhere in East Asia. We need to 12 look at attack scenarios that involve heavier weapons 13 than we're used to seeing. And at our DOE facilities 14 in force-on-force exercises there's been unfortunate 15 successes in breaking into DOE facilities, even 16 heavily-guarded ones.
17 We need to be looking at power failures, 18 even long power failures. We need to be looking at 19 scenarios of civil unrest and how this would affect 20 the security of the facility. We need to look at --
21 very carefully at the ultimate longevity of the 22 facility. How many years of operations once open 23 we're really talking about here and what kind of --
24 what's our ability to look so far into the future.
25 We need to look at the contagion of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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39 1 contamination such as we saw with Fukushima where 2 there was an accident. There is contamination in one 3 place that prevents handling, contamination of your 4 body.
5 We need to look at insider threats. It's 6 very important.
7 And we need to look at the socioeconomic 8 analysis at the reputational impact and on the 9 attractiveness of this state for businesses and 10 residences. I think it would be quite severe and it's 11 really a serious danger. Part of it is any job that 12 would be created by this and the reputational --
13 practically our only asset is -- at this point is our 14 attractiveness and our natural environment.
15 We need to look at the clean-up costs if 16 a canister is breached in a successful attack.
17 On question of alternatives, there is a 18 fundamental problem because it's difficult for an 19 alternative to appear reasonable because there's not 20 a multimillion dollar applicant process of -- so we 21 have the one alternative, but there really are other 22 alternatives which are much more reasonable, but we 23 don't have an applicant. So the privatization process 24 that lies in the NEPA process severely -- and it's a 25 structural problem of our whole -- everything.
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40 1 MR. CAMERON: Well, thank you very much.
2 I'm going to have to you ask you to --
3 (Applause.)
4 MR. CAMERON: Mr. Mello's comments just 5 reminds me to ask all of you to follow up with written 6 comments to the NRC, because there's going to be 7 excellent ideas presented here tonight. We don't have 8 a lot of long speaking time, but if you can just 9 simply write those into the NRC, it would be really 10 appreciated.
11 And, Stan Fitch?
12 And then we're going to go to Yemane.
13 MR. FITCH: Good evening. I appreciate 14 the NRC coming. First, I realize they're required to 15 under international law and the Environmental Policy 16 Act, but I appreciate them coming. And the purpose of 17 this hearing is to accept feedback on siting. So I'll 18 address my initial comments on that.
19 It appears that the location is an ideal 20 location both from a geology standpoint and a 21 hydrological standpoint. Also it satisfies a lot of 22 the environmental justice issues. You have a ready 23 and willing group and a public that's more receptive 24 than Southeastern New Mexico, much as the rest of the 25 state.
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41 1 My name is Stanley Fitch. I am a resident 2 of Sandia Park, New Mexico. I live in the Sandia 3 Mountains. My family came here 150 years ago. Now, 4 that's probably relative newcomers, because my wife's 5 family came here 400 years ago. But I'm a New 6 Mexican. My great-grandfather Asa Metz Fitch co-7 founded the New Mexico Institute of Mining and 8 Technology.
9 I'm a former manager for the Green State 10 Program and the Radiation Control Program at the New 11 Mexico Environmental Department. While I was there I 12 participated in a number of issues both in defense of 13 the state and review of the environmental projects 14 such as the National Enrichment Facility. I was the 15 state's technical lead on the review of that 16 application.
17 I have an undergraduate degree from New 18 Mexico State University, I have a graduate degree in 19 radiation safety from Thomas Edison State University 20 in Trenton, New Jersey, and a nuclear engineering 21 degree from the University of Texas, Austin. I'm 22 certified by the American Board of Physics, which is 23 the world's premier certifying organization for 24 radiation protection. I believe I know what I'm 25 talking about when I say I think that's a good NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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42 1 location.
2 Now when I look at New Mexico and what's 3 going on with our cash flow and our problems with 4 infrastructure and various issues, it's a totally a 5 different state than what my great-grandfather came 6 to. It was a much more progressive state at that 7 time.
8 My one piece of advice is do thorough, 9 thoughtful regulation. I know, because I helped write 10 significant parts of the Energy Policy and Amendments 11 Act of 2005 related to terrorism. I also wrote many 12 of the regulations that the NRC implements to this day 13 protecting materials from terrorists.
14 The NRC is not even credible. The people 15 in this state are tired of being locked up. They're 16 tired of being neglected. And so I would say also to 17 the Holtec, be open to people. Be fair with people.
18 Thank you.
19 (Applause.)
20 Thank you. Thank you, Stan.
21 Yemane? This is Yemane Asmerom.
22 MR. ASMEROM: First thank you to the NRC 23 for coming to hear our voices and I challenge you to 24 listen carefully and honor our input in the final 25 decisions.
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43 1 My name is Yemane Asmerom. I'm a 2 professor of geochemistry at the University of New 3 Mexico. I'm not here to represent the university.
4 I'm here as a citizen of New Mexico.
5 First let me just say I think that the 6 spent fuel would be treated materially are stronger.
7 These materials are more radioactive than the material 8 that starts at the reactor. By the end of the process 9 what will happen is the fore mentioned materials 10 that's being changed -- the variety of chemistries 11 across the periodic table through all kinds of stuff.
12 That's why the process is not given. So we're 13 actually spending much more material than we started 14 with.
15 So let me address the germane issues of --
16 the issue at hand. To me the most critical thing is 17 long-term storage. The company has been negotiating 18 for nearly 40 years. The outcome of the project is no 19 more real than it was 40 years ago. By burdening us 20 with this facility will just simply delay the long-21 term eventuality of this material. And my concern is 22 that in 20 years or 40 years this material is going to 23 be (unintelligible). I am charging the federal 24 officials here if you can -- how can you say you will 25 take care of this? The fact is you haven't taken care NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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44 1 of hundreds of sites right now that are burdening our 2 community.
3 (Applause.)
4 MR. ASMEROM: -- how can we know the 5 ability to assure anyone?
6 Secondly, I think the company assures us 7 this is safe material. Yes, it's zirconium and it's 8 safer than steel and all that stuff. If it's that 9 safe, then why are you that this is an environmentally 10 suitable place? It should be then safe to store it in 11 California, in Michigan or New York.
12 (Applause.)
13 MR. ASMEROM: There is an underlying truth 14 though. You came to this community or want this 15 community support you because of economic distress.
16 So this is an issue of economic justice.
17 My challenge to all of our citizens and 18 our representatives' staff, please don't let these 19 communities be vulnerable to these things. We can't 20 just simply say no and not give our opinion. These 21 communities are so filled and everything else. We 22 need to come up with alternatives such as renewable 23 energy.
24 (Applause.)
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45 1 move in. Thank you.
2 (Applause.)
3 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank 4 you, Yemane.
5 Dr. Terry Sloan. Terry?
6 DR. SLOAN: Thank you. That was a great 7 entrance. Good evening and thank you to the NRC for 8 allowing us to speak and be heard today.
9 My name is Terry Sloan and I am the 10 director of Southwest Native Cultures out of 11 Albuquerque, New Mexico, where I'm an accredited 12 member of the United Nations Department of Economic 13 and Social Affairs. I'm also a board member for the 14 New Mexico Interfaith Power & Light, a board member 15 for the Community Development Corporation and a member 16 of the United Nations Association of Albuquerque 17 Chapter.
18 I'm here to say that we need -- first and 19 foremost I think about Mother Earth and her 20 inhabitants --
21 (Applause.)
22 DR. SLOAN: -- and our families, and our 23 children and their children and their children. And 24 Native Americans, we think seven generations ahead.
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46 1 possibly if there is an accident or a spill in that 2 area. And it terrifies me to think that having 3 nuclear waste pass through our great city of 4 Albuquerque and to our State of New Mexico and a 5 possible spill that could occur during the process.
6 Thousands of chances could happen, as previously 7 mentioned.
8 I also think of Chernobyl and WIPP, those 9 disasters and those problems that happened, the most 10 current nuclear reactor disaster in Japan. Those are 11 things that we could face and we're still feeling the 12 effects of -- Japanese are still feeling the effects 13 of those now. They can't even move back to that land 14 yet.
15 And I also think about possibly their 16 disposing of the cavity of one of our great landmarks 17 in New Mexico, which is Carlsbad Caverns. My family, 18 my children love to go visit Carlsbad Caverns. And 19 possibly one day they're not being able to have it and 20 -- you know it concerns me. But I also would suggest 21 that for those investors or the land owners of this 22 land, they should consider other alternatives, like we 23 just heard about renewable energy. And we could build 24 solar power farms, plants. We could build wind farms.
25 We could build -- they could build another a casino.
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47 1 They could build --
2 (Laughter.)
3 DR. SLOAN: -- a resort, anything but a 4 nuclear waste storage site.
5 And another thing I'd like to mention it 6 is a human right to have clean air, clean land, clean 7 water and a safe environment.
8 (Applause.)
9 DR. SLOAN: And we all have that human 10 right. So as mentioned previously, let's all get out 11 and get your voice heard and speak up. Send in the 12 comments, make the comments, whatever you can. Let's 13 be heard. And let them hear what our real scoping 14 thoughts are on this. We don't want nuclear waste in 15 our backyard --
16 (Applause.)
17 DR. SLOAN: Thank you.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you very much.
19 We're going to go to Carol Merrill, Chris 20 Timm and then we're going to go to Pastor Erica.
21 And is. Carol Merrill -- oh, here she 22 comes.
23 MS. MERRILL: Because it's difficult to 24 get on the web site I thought I would just print it 25 out and hand it to you.
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48 1 I am Carol Merrill, a retired librarian 2 and teacher from North Valley, Albuquerque, published 3 author a member of CARD, Citizens for Alternatives to 4 Radioactive Dumping.
5 I speak for Dorrie Bunting who just 6 entered.
7 (Applause.)
8 MS. MERRILL: Dorrie was a founder of 9 CARD, Citizens for Alternative to Radioactive Dumping.
10 Two days ago I asked her how do you feel 11 about this issue? She said outrage. Outrage. She 12 said why do they generate electricity in this way?
13 What people will be able to use that electricity when 14 they're all dead from nuclear poisoning? Thank you, 15 Dorrie, for your guidance. In your mid-90s. Thank 16 you.
17 (Applause.)
18 MS. MERRILL: One of my greatest concerns, 19 it was recorded by The San Diego Union-Tribune 20 Thursday, May 10th, 2018. There was a loose bolt 21 inside one of Holtec's canisters designed to store 22 spent radioactive fuel at the Waterfront site of San 23 Onofre Nuclear Power Plant, which halted work for 10 24 days. Looks like there are some serious problems with 25 Holtec's engineering. Are these those canisters that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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49 1 they're planning to send here?
2 One additional concern: If there was an 3 serious accident a derailment, and I don't mean an 4 populated urban area, who pays the billions of dollars 5 for the cleanup? Who is insuring this company? How 6 can we know they're not going to go bankrupt and leave 7 us holding the waste?
8 The other thought: A small bomb from a 9 done in centralized surface location with 20 rods 10 could wipe out half this state. What will they say 11 then?
12 The puppies of Chernobyl. In the 13 exclusion zone at Chernobyl where radioactive waste 14 and atoms melted down decades ago, now free of humans 15 for 20,000 years. When it will be safe again? There 16 are nearly 900 wild dogs of those left behind by their 17 families 31 years ago. Playful puppies play around 18 the cantina near reactor 4. The sign for tourists 19 reads, "Don't touch the puppies. There are 20 radioactive particles in their fur." They've never 21 had a toy. No one has cuddled them. They have no 22 water dish. What's to become of them? Someday will 23 we put lead-lined sweaters on our dogs in winter, 24 nuclear winter just to take them for a walk, if it 25 comes to that, with nuclear waste in the world? I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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50 1 hope not.
2 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
3 (Applause.)
4 MR. CAMERON: Chris Timm?
5 MR. TIMM: Thank you, NRC, for the 6 opportunity to speak. Welcome, Holtec. About the 7 issue of nuclear waste disposal, safe disposal.
8 Think about it, spent nuclear fuel has 9 been essentially around since 1968, so 50 years we've 10 been dealing with spent nuclear fuel and haven't had 11 one accident. Along the way things have happened big 12 time. And I actually appreciate the people who were 13 bringing up Chernobyl and Fukushima, because every 14 time we've had an accident we've proved how we go 15 forward and do better and better. We're not perfect; 16 we'll never be perfect, but we learn and we try to do 17 the best we can.
18 And I really think that Holtec is a very 19 good location. Yes, they're will be issues with 20 respect to transportation is a concern. But the issue 21 with WIPP, I think. I know WIPP is involved in 22 oversight work for five years. I know the nuclear 23 industry is warmed up for more than 50 years. And 24 with WIPP the transportation record has been very, 25 very good. WIPP's safety record. The worst was a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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51 1 fire, not in an underground facility like Holtec.
2 Believe me, that fire would have been a lot less 3 hazardous. There's a lot of pluses to an underground 4 storage facility. Think about it: You're 5 underground. You have a something fall and kill 6 somebody. Kind of hard to do that above ground.
7 So we do have a problem, but the point is 8 every accident, every incident, everything that went 9 wrong safety-wise will be taken into consideration.
10 And people in the industry say how do we better next 11 time and prevent such a thing from happening? I'm 12 convinced the NRC will look at that very hard and 13 Holtec will not have to answer many, many, many 14 questions in that area and I think they can do a good 15 job. And I think, by the way, there's less accidents 16 in this business than there is in oil and gas, which 17 you all count on, or even solar. So think about what 18 you want.
19 (Simultaneous speaking.)
20 MR. CAMERON: That's been an ongoing 21 issue. Okay.
22 (Applause.)
23 MR. CAMERON: Pastor.
24 REV. LEA-SIMKA: Good evening. My name is 25 Reverend Lea-Simka and I'm a pastor in Albuquerque NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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52 1 Mennonite Church. I'm not a scientist. I'm a pastor 2 and a student of world religions, so I'm going to stay 3 in my lane this evening.
4 I'm a Mennonite which means a lot of 5 things, including an excellent baker and I'm very 6 modest about it.
7 (Laughter.)
8 REV. LEA-SIMKA: It also means that I 9 value simplicity and community. It also means that as 10 Mennonites we value the Bible. We are Christians.
11 And my Bible says that we should love our neighbors.
12 Maybe you're not religious, so work with me on this.
13 (Laughter.)
14 REV. LEA-SIMKA: What would Mr. Rogers do?
15 (Laughter.)
16 REV. LEA-SIMKA: Mr. Rogers I feel 17 confident would not dump garbage in his neighbor's 18 yard.
19 (Applause.)
20 REV. LEA-SIMKA: New Mexico is not a 21 wasteland because we're a desert and New Mexico is not 22 a wasteland because we're a poor state, and New Mexico 23 is not a wasteland because we have a lot of ground and 24 Native people.
25 (Applause.)
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53 1 REV. LEA-SIMKA: -- communities is sending 2 is that New Mexico is unimportant and it's disposable.
3 So what would Jesus do, or Moses, or 4 Buddha, or Muhammad, peace be upon him, or Visna or 5 Sophia or Oprah or Mr. Rogers?
6 (Laughter.)
7 REV. LEA-SIMKA: I cannot say for sure 8 exactly what they would do, but I feel reasonably 9 confident that they would not dump waste in their 10 neighbor's yard. I am your neighbor and New Mexico is 11 your neighbor. Thank you.
12 (Applause.)
13 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you.
14 We're going to go to Peter Clark, then 15 Danny Rupper, Lynn Buck, Susanne Brown and Deborah 16 Reade.
17 So, Peter?
18 MR. CLARK: Good evening. As introduced, 19 I'm Peter Clark. I've been here in Albuquerque for 20 about 15 years. I'd like to start out tonight by 21 acknowledging that we're all meeting tonight on 22 occupied homelands of the Sandia and as well as Pueblo 23 people.
24 (Applause.)
25 MR. CLARK: I have been employed in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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54 1 transportation industry for about 25 years with 2 experience in rail and aviation as an inspector, 3 safety inspector. I have extensive education in 4 systems -- safety management systems, human factor 5 errors and so forth.
6 The United States Congress charges the 7 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission with protecting 8 people and the environment from unnecessary exposure 9 to radiation. Approval of this proposal to the 10 transfer of high-level nuclear waste throughout the 11 country would be captured under the NRC's mandate.
12 Every 40 years the American Society of 13 Engineers provides a comprehensive assessment of the 14 nation's 16 major infrastructure categories in an 15 infrastructure report card with grades A through F.
16 The most recent was 2017 and the transportation sector 17 in the nation probably got a D-plus. Doesn't instill 18 a lot of confidence in our roads. I'd like to quote 19 from that report card.
20 It says, "While the nation's 21 infrastructure earned a D-plus in 2017, New Mexico 22 faces infrastructure challenges of its own. For 23 example, driving down the roads in need of repair in 24 New Mexico costs drivers $594 per year. And 258 of 25 the 397 bridges are structurally deficient. This NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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55 1 deteriorating infrastructure impedes New Mexico's 2 ability to compete in an increasingly global 3 marketplace. This miserable D rating means that the 4 infrastructure is in poor to fair condition and mostly 5 below standard."
6 Annually from 2009 through 2017 there were 7 5 to 700 with the max being 870 HAZMAT train 8 derailments and damaged cars.
9 New Mexico already has 16 superfund sites 10 on the national priority list. We don't need more.
11 I'm going to cut myself short here to 12 allow more time for others, but I do want to say this, 13 that the NRC follow proper procedure as prescribed in 14 the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of 15 Indigenous Peoples of the Organization of American 16 (Applause.)
17 MR. CLARK: -- rights of indigenous 18 peoples and seeking the fair prior informed consent to 19 the sovereign indigenous nations of this continent 20 through whose lands these materials will be 21 transported. Proper consultation does not simply mean 22 inviting tribal governments to these type of meetings.
23 Proper consultation must include government-to-24 government dialogue. Thank you.
25 (Applause.)
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56 1 MR. CAMERON: Danny Rupper?
2 MR. RUPPER: Thank you for giving me a 3 chance to speak. I'm here as just a citizen of New 4 Mexico. If I say "we," I know there are many others 5 that feel the way I do.
6 We don't want this. I'm sorry, this is 7 just wrong --
8 (Applause.)
9 MR. RUPPER: Nuclear radiation has harmed 10 this state in some many ways that, I'm sorry, NRC has 11 no credibility in regards to radiation or safety. We 12 still have people trying to keep -- seek compensation 13 for the first nuclear tests here 70 years ago.
14 (Applause.)
15 MR. RUPPER: We actually had one of the 16 worst nuclear accidents in history, which was totally 17 covered up, and I'm talking about the uranium tailings 18 pond spilling causing generations of birth defects on 19 the Navajo Nation.
20 (Applause.)
21 MR. RUPPER: -- renewable energy. This is 22 going back. Nuclear energy for generating electricity 23 is a dying industry. That needs to go away. We want 24 clean renewable energy.
25 (Applause.)
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57 1 MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank 2 you, Danny. And Lynn Buck?
3 MS. BUCK: My name is Lynn Buck. I'm a 4 retired APS librarian and I'm speaking as a private 5 citizen.
6 I stood on the bridge on Carlisle over by 7 40th to protest the first WIPP truck. I wanted a 8 bypass route like Santa Fe got. Albuquerque is 10 9 times more populated. I-40 passes a half a mile from 10 my middle school. We didn't the bypass route, nor did 11 we get any emergency training at my school.
12 The nuclear industry has not been good for 13 New Mexico. With two of the three national labs, New 14 Mexico has not benefitted. We are 50 in child 15 welfare. We're 48 in education. Thanks to 16 Mississippi and Alabama we're not 50. We're number 17 one -- we're way up there on poverty. We're number 18 one in home theft and home burglaries. We're a poor 19 state. This is environmental racism to shove more 20 nuclear waste --
21 (Applause.)
22 MS. BUCK: -- financial benefits to our 23 state. New Mexico, we already have our share of 24 industry fallout both in waste disposal and high 25 pollution. Nuclear accidents are not supposed to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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58 1 happen. These new Holtec containers are supposed to 2 be safe. If these Holtec containers are so safe, 3 let's leave them where the waste is produced.
4 (Applause.)
5 MS. BUCK: Better still, let's use them 6 for landscaping around the U.S. Capitol or maybe --
7 (Applause.)
8 MS. BUCK: -- I would like to talk to the 9 downwinders. And for New Mexico why can't we put this 10 to a vote?
11 (Applause.)
12 MS. BUCK: -- about Holtec. Holtec is a 13 for-profit company. They're not after -- a world 14 industry trying to make nice things for nuclear 15 safety. They're in there for the bottom line for 16 their investors. And we have a cap on health care and 17 accident stuff, not Holtec. They're --
18 (Applause.)
19 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, Lynn.
20 We're going to go to Susanne Brown.
21 Susanne? Oh, here she is.
22 MS. BROWN: Thank you. I'm happy to be 23 here tonight. I really appreciated listening to the 24 speakers. It was incredible. And it talked to all my 25 points.
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59 1 (Laughter.)
2 MS. BROWN: You know, I guess I just want 3 to reemphasize that there's an elephant in the living 4 room, and that's the fact that we're not talking about 5 the fact that we continue making high-level nuclear 6 waste.
7 (Applause.)
8 MS. BROWN: -- we have alternatives for 9 energy. We all know that this is a state that's so 10 well-positioned to do something other than receive 11 nuclear waste. We can be on the edge of just standing 12 out with nuclear waste.
13 The other thing is that, you know, I'm 14 just struck by the fact that the Nobel Prize this year 15 went to a group of people; that are young people 16 actually, internationally that are trying to continue 17 to get more and more countries to sign up to stop 18 making nuclear weapons. And so there would be -- we 19 could sign up for that, too. That would decrease our 20 nuclear waste for sure.
21 The other thing I wanted to just emphasize 22 that other people have been talking about is that --
23 the fact that there are alternatives to transporting 24 all the waste here. That's what we're meeting about 25 tonight. That's the scope that we're supposed to be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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60 1 talking about is alternatives.
2 And I really appreciate the man who talked 3 about the crystalline or ceramic cement, or whatever 4 it was. I mean, there are other inert substances, 5 there are solutions that we can keep nuclear waste at 6 the sites that are well-guarded now and keep it above 7 ground where we see it. And it's not -- I don't feel 8 good about out of sight, out of mind. And I think 9 that's what this is all about. Thank you.
10 (Applause.)
11 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much 12 Deborah Reed?
13 MS. READE: So I do have some materials to 14 hand you afterwards: 60 names on a petition, a signed 15 letter, an article about how across the nation many 16 people speak -- do not speak English in the home, and 17 also two maps, one of threats to all New Mexico and 18 threats to Southeastern New Mexico.
19 One of the things that's important to look 20 at is this map -- this little inset map here, which is 21 a map of cancer mortality. Note that all the highest 22 cancer mortality is in the south and southeast portion 23 of the state of New Mexico. This is the area that has 24 WCS in Texas. They're trying to put in Triassic Park.
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61 1 Holtec. We have URENCO. We have massive oil and gas 2 development. This all contributes to this, plus the 3 social factors that do not have good access all share, 4 these kind of things. So this needs to be looked at 5 more carefully.
6 And I did find it a little disturbing for 7 people to talk about how this is safe and that you 8 know so much about the geology, but in fact I've seen 9 years of studies on the geology around Holtec, as we 10 had around WIPP, and in WIPP they said, oh, you know, 11 this is an island of a non-karst, which is a porous 12 type of geological formation where water can run both 13 vertically and horizontally easily underground. And 14 they said but WIPP is on an island. There's no karst 15 in this huge karst area. What are the chances that 16 Holtec is also an island of non-karst in this huge 17 area? We need years of studies on the geology and 18 hydrology around this site before we can say whether 19 it is safe or not.
20 The other thing that I find disturbing is 21 that in all of these presentations here there was one 22 word to transportation once. This -- the 23 transportation is the killing seal here. And we need 24 many more meetings across the nation and other cities, 25 and just as robust as we had for the Yucca Mountain NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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62 1 project.
2 We need also to have materials in other 3 languages, not just Spanish, but Spanish is a primary 4 language that people speak in the home when they don't 5 speak English in the home. But there are other 6 languages in some of these cities as well. These 7 materials need to be up online well before the 8 hearings and we need more time before the hearing 9 actually occurs.
10 So I think there's a lot of magical 11 thinking here. You have these canisters that are 12 going to sit there possibly up to 300 years according 13 to Holtec. A hundred and twenty years may be 14 considered short term. It could be as much as 300 15 years. These materials are then working, working, 16 working -- the radiation is working away on this -- on 17 the concrete no matter how good it is. This could 18 easily make the canisters too delicate to move and we 19 could end up with a shallow high-level waste landfill 20 forever.
21 (Applause.)
22 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
23 We're going to go to our next group, which 24 is Kathleen Cody, Marcus Nells, Frank Giles, Juan 25 Reynosa and Denise Tessier.
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63 1 MS. CODY: My name is Kathleen Cody and 2 I'm a resident of New Mexico. I do not consent to the 3 proposed Holtec high-level waste site.
4 New Mexico has given enough to nuclear 5 radiation. As the first state to have a nuclear bomb 6 explosion, putting hundreds of people's health and 7 welfare at stake, more than 70 years later, people in 8 the area, and downwind are still suffering from 9 cancer, tumors, and other life-threatening illnesses.
10 WIP waste isolation pilot projects started 11 at the lower level of radiation waste, had to shut 12 down for the radiation leak just 15 years after it 13 went into operation, affecting 21 employees. And some 14 of the radiation did get back to the air outside of 15 the plant. Residents in the area could also be 16 affected.
17 The incident was initially caused by human 18 error and escalated. The cleanup took three years.
19 There will always be human error. Putting such high, 20 putting this much high radioactive material in one 21 place would be disastrous, and on so many levels.
22 I do not consent to highly radioactive 23 materials being transported through my community. Due 24 to human error, natural disasters, or any one of many 25 unforeseen events, rail or truck transport across the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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64 1 highway and through our state poses way too many risks 2 to be plausible.
3 I firmly believe each state that has 4 nuclear reactors needs to decide how to store it in 5 their state and not transport it for long distances.
6 MR. CAMERON: Marcus Nells.
7 MR. NELLS: Hello, my name is Marcus 8 Nells. I am one of the Party for Socialism and 9 Liberation. I stand here today to denounce 10 transportation and storage of nuclear waste in New 11 Mexico. I say no to Holtec's plan to endanger my 12 people and community.
13 Between 1940 and 1970, New Mexico and 14 Arizona have been at the front of nuclear 15 weaponization. From nuclear testing, i.e., the 16 Manhattan Project, to uranium extraction, the uranium 17 mining on Native American reservations, the indigenous 18 populations in the Southwest have been at risk for 19 contaminations since the beginning of the century.
20 Safety guarantees were raised by the 21 extraction companies in the 1940s while Native 22 Americans suffered at the risk of radiation poisoning.
23 In the past few years, the University of New Mexico 24 has released a study that has shown high levels of 25 radiation still existing in New Mexico currently.
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65 1 We say no to this project. In the words 2 of the indigenous leader Crazy Horse, one does not 3 sell the Earth upon which the people walk. Thank you.
4 MR. CAMERON: How about Juan Reynoso. Oh, 5 this is Frank? Okay.
6 MR. GILES: Good evening, ladies and 7 gentleman, and I thank you for your attendance here 8 and going through the formalities and the procedures 9 to make sure our voice is heard. But where do these 10 voices go after this hearing? You say you wouldn't 11 want to argue to them. Are the plans to have gone to 12 a trash can, or are they actually taking into 13 reconsideration about some issue that we have.
14 This is a very important subject, 15 especially for me and my people. My people come from 16 the Pine Ridge Reservation. I'm Oglala Lakota Sioux.
17 Our people have been poisoned by uranium for decades.
18 Even after the NRC said they were going to enforce 19 cleanup and enforce regulation, we're still dying. To 20 kidney failure, to arsenic poisoning, to alpha 21 emitters that are in our body.
22 We all have a responsibility for tomorrow, 23 for our children. Our people, yes, we do believe in 24 giving towards the next seven generations. My family, 25 I am the seventh generation. I stood tall on the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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66 1 front lines of the Standing Rock for the water. I 2 stood for all of you, all of you out here. I laid my 3 life on the line for you. And once again we still 4 have threat coming to us in corporate form.
5 We have to make our voices heard not just 6 here, not just in this room, but across the nation, 7 across the world. We have to lift ourselves up in 8 humanity, or we will all perish. We only have one 9 water on this earth. None of us can live without 10 that. Radiation, once in the water, can never be 11 removed.
12 As a parent myself, I'm very, very 13 concerned about what this be brought here. And I look 14 back on the reservation where I come from and the many 15 lies that were told to us about how they're going to 16 handle this stuff, how they're going to handle the 17 radiation, how they're going to handle the arsenic 18 poisoning. And it hasn't happened yet.
19 So we need to do everything we can to make 20 our voices heard. Speak to your neighbors, speak to 21 other people who may be on the fence about this. And 22 especially bring it up in intellectual debates, not 23 just emotional rantings. We all are very emotional 24 about this, we all know the dangers that are presented 25 to us through radiation.
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67 1 There are safeguards, there are protocols, 2 they are doing nothing. Thank you for your time.
3 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. This is Juan 4 Reynoso.
5 MR. REYNOSO: Good evening, everyone, Juan 6 Reynoso. I'm with the Southwest Organizing Project, 7 but I also grew up in Hobbs. I still have my mom, my 8 four sisters, six nephews, and two nieces who live 9 there.
10 I'm in extreme opposition to this. Holtec 11 is only trying to paint the picture that everyone 12 involved is super down for this, but I've been 13 conferring with my family and many friends there, and 14 they're not. So do not try and beat on us and do not 15 paint that false picture that everyone there is just 16 willing to sacrifice their health for you to gain some 17 property.
18 I grew up with asthma. I saw many of the 19 community members that I grew up with have cancer. So 20 their citizen populations already there. They already 21 have to build water contamination, air quality issues 22 still.
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68 1 that jobs are going to pay these people, whether it's 2 to the Navajo Nation with the coal-fired power plants, 3 or in my community around how jobs are more important 4 than people's health issues.
5 In regards to health issues, I've seen in 6 cancer as, I forget her name, she noted there's many 7 clustered related in my community. Air quality, 8 groundwater issues. And just be sure, this is an 9 environmental injustice for a community that has 10 already been recognized as paying their dues.
11 And I think it's completely wrong to not 12 store it where you already have it. It's 13 irresponsible. It's all based on greed, which we're 14 all communities waking up to that. That's just not 15 the way we need to live anymore.
16 I will note that there's many sinkholes in 17 that area. So for folks noting the great geology, 18 there's many sinkholes popping up all around that 19 area. My friend's mom in Carlsbad has a two mile-wide 20 sinkhole right near her home. So that's going to be 21 great for nuclear storage, right, when it all 22 collapses and floods everywhere. Also, tornadoes, a 23 tornado passed right by my house as a kid, how is this 24 kind of reactor going to hold up to that.
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69 1 continuing to disregard environmental justice in New 2 Mexico from the uranium that they mined that to now 3 they're trying to bring it here. And New Mexico is 4 not your dumping grounds. So once again we have white 5 men come into our state trying to inflict violence on 6 our land and our people. And it's enough, thank you.
7 MR. CAMERON: So first I'm going to adjust 8 the speaker, and then we're going to go to Dieter 9 Hanbicki.
10 MS. TESSIER: Hi, my name is Denise 11 Tessier. I've been a newspaper reporter most of my 12 life. So it's unusual for me to be a speaker at one 13 of the hearings.
14 I'm here today because for three years, 15 from 1978 to 1981, I covered the hearings and steps 16 that led to the opening of WIPP, the waste isolation 17 pilot plan.
18 During those three years, I was in 19 continuous contact with Sandia scientists, the DOE, 20 environmental scientists at the state level, New 21 Mexico's oversight panel, the Environmental Evaluation 22 Group, citizen environmental activists, watchdogs, the 23 Secretary of Energy, and our congressmen. This was a 24 long, multi-step process.
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70 1 process with Holtec, I just want to iterate what Cisco 2 McSorley said and remind the NRC and everyone else 3 that throughout the WIPP steps, throughout the years 4 of discussions, New Mexico was told if we would accept 5 low-level transuranic waste, we would not be asked to 6 take high-level commercial waste in the future.
7 We do not have this in writing. In 8 January 1981, the DOE announced that it would start 9 shifting the waste to WIPP in 1987, that it did not 10 need to sign an agreement with New Mexico in order to 11 do so. All it needed was cash from Congress, and 12 permission from the BLM, which owned the land. It's 13 its own agency.
14 But despite this lack of formal agreement, 15 I submit that there was an understanding, based on 16 federal promises, that if New Mexico accepted this 17 waste, it would not be asked or required to accept any 18 high-level commercial waste. That New Mexico, we were 19 told, we will have done our part in dealing with the 20 nation's continued nuclear waste problem.
21 Years of scientific, political, and public 22 input went into the WIPP process, and we were talking 23 then about low-level transuranic waste, which was 24 gloves, tools, rags and booties contaminated in the 25 research and production of nuclear weapons.
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71 1 But bringing spent fuel rods into New 2 Mexico is, in my view, a violation of the spirit of 3 years of discussions and efforts that went into the 4 opening of WIPP, and that it can and should factor 5 into rejection of Holtec's proposal.
6 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. This is Dieter 7 Hanbicki.
8 MR. HANBICKI: Hello, I'm Dieter Hanbicki.
9 I'm, in the fall, I'm going to be a senior at the 10 University of New Mexico in nuclear engineering.
11 So currently in the United States we have 12 around 60, I believe, operational power plants, 13 nuclear generation stations. In addition to these 60 14 plants, we have other decommissioned plants that have 15 been returned to green field. Essentially, it looks 16 like there was never any plant there, with the 17 exception of a pad for spent nuclear fuel.
18 One of Holtec's reasons for creating the 19 consolidated interim storage is to get rid of these, 20 what we call orphan sites. They are, there is no more 21 generation of the spent nuclear fuel there.
22 And between these sites and all the other 23 dry pack storage systems in America, it costs about 24 $500 million to keep those secure. And that's from 25 taxpayer money, due to various laws and lawsuits from NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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72 1 the different generation companies.
2 As for transportation, I believe that WIPP 3 has never had a transportation issue in the 4 approximately 20 years that it has been moving waste 5 from all over the country to WIPP. And this site is 6 going to be, I believe, 16 miles north of WIPP. So it 7 will be using the same transport corridors. So we can 8 assume that --
9 It is as close to WIPP, so it will be 10 using the same transportation.
11 MR. CAMERON: Let's let him finish. You 12 can disagree, but let's let him finish his comment, 13 please. Go ahead.
14 MR. HANBICKI: Additionally, Bill Gates, 15 who used to be the number one richest man in the 16 world, now number two, has invested in terrapower. He 17 invented a company that will be creating a fast 18 reactor, which will be using this waste to power and 19 create energy. So in some ways, this isn't even 20 waste.
21 Additionally, this transuranic fuel is a 22 solid, it cannot be, even if there was a breach in the 23 containment, it is a solid fuel, and it is covered in 24 cladding that has been submerged in water for anywhere 25 between five to ten years on average. So there really NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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73 1 is no danger to any of the water in New Mexico due to 2 this spent nuclear fuel.
3 I was at, me and four other people from 4 UNM, were at the Roswell meeting earlier or last 5 month. And we submitted a petition to the NRC with 6 approximately I believe 30 signatures on it. One of 7 those signatures was the American Nuclear Society 8 President. Thank you.
9 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much, Dieter.
10 Thank you. Next group of speakers, Erica Leashuka, 11 Nick Maxwell. Oh, sorry. Nick Maxwell, then we'll go 12 to Don Conklin and Brandan Shaughnessy. This is Nick 13 Maxwell.
14 MR. MAXWELL: I had a piece of paper. Can 15 I come up next? Let me go get a piece of paper, I had 16 it written down.
17 MR. CAMERON: Why do you go do that and 18 we'll go and hear from Don Conklin while you're 19 getting that paper. So Nick Maxwell will be back on, 20 but we're going to hear from Don right now.
21 MR. CONKLIN: Thank you. I'm a retired 22 pastoral associate from Our Lady of Most Holy Rosary.
23 And my question is why New Mexico? Why would we dump 24 nuclear waste in New Mexico? Except for those who are 25 benefitting from this, we in New Mexico do not want NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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74 1 nuclear waste in our state.
2 New Mexico has paid its price for nuclear, 3 from the uranium miners to the windfall from Trinity 4 sites to the atomic bomb in Los Alamos, enough is 5 enough.
6 They made the decision that they want 7 nuclear plant to receive the benefits of that 8 electricity, jobs. Those states, I say to you, you 9 take care of your waste. Whether you like it or not, 10 it's your responsibility with the technology from 11 Holtec to help you.
12 MR. CAMERON: And now we have Nick 13 Maxwell.
14 MR. MAXWELL: Hello, my name is Nick 15 Maxwell. I'm one of the people of Lea County. I 16 traveled here tonight to talk to you all about a 17 couple of concerns of mine. We really don't want it.
18 I'm ashamed of how far this has gone.
19 They have actually shamed me. They claimed that they 20 support this project, and I wonder if they only 21 support this project because of the revenue sharing 22 agreement they cut with Holtec requires them to.
23 So the county kingpins over in Lea County 24 decided that we needed this. And so I'm going to 25 request of the NRC one more time to extend this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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75 1 deadline beyond July 30 to at least a total of 180 2 days, 180 days to get information along likely 3 transportation routes including, but not limited to, 4 Dallas, Fort Worth, San Antonio, Atlanta, Boston, 5 Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Kansas City, Los Angeles, 6 Miami, Minneapolis, St. Paul, Nashville, New York, 7 Newark, Omaha, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, 8 and that's just to name a few.
9 The opposition has been overwhelming, 10 primarily because of the risk of a fuel leak, 11 explosion, criticality, or canister breach in any of 12 these urban areas. And the questions of whether and 13 how much we the people should even bear the risk of 14 this massive scene. This should be decided in a 15 process that's truly national, visible, and far more 16 extensive than the reigning government of New Mexico.
17 I believe you quite understand what people 18 are capable of, and I keep hearing this thing about 19 security. How much security? I've heard 15 people, 20 I don't know if that's right. But I can tell you 21 this: I hope they're ready to repel anything that 22 comes their way. But let's also talk about security, 23 because it would seem as if security's going to be 24 privately provided to this company.
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76 1 unfortunately, that security business has been tied to 2 one of the Board members of Eddy Lea Energy Alliance.
3 I could tell you a lot of things about Eddy Lea Energy 4 Alliance. They're all bad, every one of them. You 5 think we support this process, look around you. You 6 are outnumbered. Thank you.
7 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. And before we 8 ask Brandan Shaughnessy to come up. We're going to 9 put a new mic stand up here that'll make things a 10 little better for anybody. Is Brendan here? Oh, 11 Brandan, Brandan.
12 MR. SHAUGHNESSY: Chip thinks he's funny.
13 He's not. I do not consent to bringing the nation's 14 highest level of nuclear waste to New Mexico. I ask 15 that the scoping period be extended and that 16 additional hearings be added in communities on and 17 around the proposed transport routes.
18 The Environmental Impact Statement needs 19 to include maps of all possible transport. This 20 includes all methods of transport, whether it be on 21 roadways, railways, or waterways.
22 In addition, impacted areas around the 23 transport routes need their environmental impacts 24 studied. We ask to have additional scoping meetings 25 in areas that will be impacted by transport and extend NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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77 1 the scoping period so that transport communities can 2 learn about the project and have time to comment.
3 And we ask you to listen to the people of 4 New Mexico and deny Holtec's proposal. In lieu of a 5 vote, we ask that our opportunity to voice our 6 concerns at these hearings -- we have used the 7 opportunity to voice our concerns, the only 8 opportunity we have. And letters, electronic 9 comments, and we ask that you take these seriously and 10 in consideration.
11 The people have spoken and overwhelmingly 12 oppose this proposed project. We do not consent to 13 bringing the nation's highest level nuclear waste to 14 our state. Thank you.
15 MR. CAMERON: Okay, Rosemary Blanchard, 16 Pat Duncan and Hara Lovato and then Jamie Phillips.
17 This is Rosemary.
18 MS. BLANCHARD: Okay, am I in the right 19 place in relation? Good. Okay, my name's Rosemary 20 Blanchard, I am the Chair of the Albuquerque Chapter 21 of the United Nations Association, USA.
22 And I'm also a resident of Albuquerque, 23 and a mother and grandmother of people who live in 24 Albuquerque. My eleven-year-old grandson came with me 25 last night to the City Council to ask the City Council NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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78 1 to protect kids like him from the transportation of 2 nuclear waste to the city of Albuquerque. The 3 Albuquerque City Council agreed.
4 Now, I am a retired person now, but prior 5 to my retirement, one of the places I worked was in 6 the Navajo Nation. I had come there having grown up 7 in Connecticut, so it was new territory to me. And 8 one of the significant life events for me took place 9 in 1987, sitting in a meeting representing the 10 Division of Dine Education at a meeting to decide how 11 to provide services to the Navajo people who were 12 being exiled to the New Lands Chapter.
13 And an official from the federal 14 government, in this case the Indian Health Service, 15 told us that he was digging deep artesian wells for 16 their houses because of the radioactivity in the 17 aquifer that would normally be used for the water for 18 the houses in that area. This is 1987.
19 And I asked the gentleman, I said, These 20 kids are going to Sanders School. Have you told the 21 school district what you found, because the school 22 district is using that aquifer.
23 This federal official told me that the 24 federal laws did not require him to guarantee decent, 25 safe, and sanitary education facilities, only decent, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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79 1 safe, and sanitary housing. And that he had no legal 2 obligation to tell the school district.
3 I bring this up because we need to 4 understand how our federal agencies have no 5 credibility when it comes to dealing honestly with the 6 people of the Southwest. And they cannot rebuild a 7 credibility they've never had. The only way they can 8 prove their honesty is to have the courage to store 9 this stuff where they live. Thank you.
10 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, 11 Rosemary. Is Pat Duncan here? We're going to go to 12 Pat Duncan, and then we're going to hear from Hara.
13 MS. DUNCAN: Hi, my name is Pat Duncan, 14 and I'm speaking as a citizen. I find it difficult to 15 believe that this is actually illegal why we're going 16 ahead with this. Because technically the Holtec site 17 is a private place, private facility.
18 And basically, the spent fuel is supposed 19 to be sent to a Department of Energy site, as well as, 20 either that or DOE owns and operate and monitor a 21 retrievable storage facility. And we sit thinking 22 we're actually even here listening to this.
23 I also don't understand why the ER report 24 is not complete. It shouldn't have any copyright 25 restrictions or condoned actions on it as well. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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80 1 the Environmental Report is also inadequate because 2 they didn't bother to check the impacts of those fuel 3 over time. After all, 40 years is a long time, and 4 most of us in this room will be dead, to be plain.
5 And then maybe the rest of us that are 6 here, it they extend it to 120, will also be dead.
7 But we don't really particularly want to die of 8 cancer. They should be checking into what happens to 9 a fracking area and earthquakes that go to varying 10 degrees, being caused by fracking as well.
11 The NRC is breaking its mission statement 12 protecting health and safety risk from the environment 13 going ahead with this project, as far as I'm 14 concerned. I'm definitely against it, and I think we 15 should extend the comment period, as well as go along 16 with all the routes that are brining the fuel.
17 If you look here on this paper that's been 18 handed out, it's pretty small, but it shows that New 19 Mexico got picked as the prize to send everything 20 here. But all these other states are impacted as well 21 because they bring the fuel from there as well. And 22 as an ex-California resident, I'm sorry, but 23 California can keep its own fuel. If it's so safe then 24 why don't they use it.
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81 1 cask and put it in the other areas as well. And if 2 you notice, when you walk around your kitchen and you 3 drop a ceramic dish, what happens to it? It doesn't 4 really make me feel comfortable. Thank you very much.
5 MR. CAMERON: Now we'll move on.
6 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: I wake up every 7 morning in a cold sweat, you know. And wanted a 8 chance to speak, because 85% of all the audience are 9 going to speak. And it's the correct fact of 10 everything we're doing, everything. Have you done an 11 analysis of that? It's the global warming, it's all 12 the fact that everything human being belongs to this 13 planet.
14 The nuclear industry has been the most 15 deadly, radioactive and peril-laded for this planet.
16 The reason we created the nuclear also known as the 17 atom bomb. It was hate, it's called Dust of Sin.
18 It's a deep, expertly, deep, spiritual disease that's 19 eaten into you at the molecular level, the chemical 20 level, deeper and deeper, the disease is eating into 21 the whole planet onto the atomic level.
22 They didn't know it would unravel the 23 whole world and the whole universe, so they stuck 24 methane with an atom, split the atom's heart and 25 created an exploding sun. This stuff is not something NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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82 1 that you control. This stuff is so dangerous and so 2 long-lasting, for a half a million years. Who's going 3 to have a cult of generation after generation to 4 recontain and recontain?
5 I've been fighting nuclear, my mother and 6 my father, our whole family, been fighting nuclear 7 since I was 15 years old. And now they're saying 8 we're going to make a whole new generation of usable, 9 new, small atom bombs. We already have 10,000, now 10 we're going to make a whole bunch more ways. And this 11 is atomic energy.
12 They knew, they knew that it would destroy 13 the world, and they've been making it. They knew that 14 the power plants, they knew. They said it would 15 generate waste that nobody could contain . You know, 16 is there intelligent life on this earth, or are we 17 slime mold?
18 You know, a disease is wiping out 19 everything. And nuclear, I'm going to just say, we 20 should outlaw everything that can destroy the planet.
21 Nuclear waste can destroy the planet, just as much as 22 the nuclear bombs can destroy the planet.
23 And we are in deep trouble. And as human 24 beings, we need to look each other in the eye, and if 25 there's any nuclear regulatory experts that know how NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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83 1 to contain this stuff, we'd better do it and contain 2 it where it is.
3 And don't bring it and contain it for 4 260,000 years. And the cult shifts that are willing 5 to contain it again and again. Because that stuff is 6 strong, it bombards everything. The rain bombards the 7 truck drivers and the train drivers and the people 8 passing by. Just the rain. This is the sun, it is 9 very powerful.
10 We created this, you know, and it will 11 destroy us. This will be like Mars, we'll have no 12 life, there's no microorganisms. Every inch of this 13 life is covered with blood. And every single life 14 organ is dying. What are we going to do? We only 15 have a little bit of time, and then we're going to 16 pay. Guess what? We did this, we're the people right 17 here. We couldn't stop ourselves.
18 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you.
19 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: We destroyed the 20 planet, or we destroyed most of life. So how are we 21 going to explain to our kids, if our kids are lucky 22 enough to survive. One in every --
23 MR. CAMERON: All right.
24 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: Cancer right now, 25 is already affected.
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84 1 MR. CAMERON: Please, please everyone.
2 Jamie, are ready? You wanted to wait till 8:10, but 3 are you okay? All right, go ahead.
4 MR. PHILIPS: I just got back in here, so 5 I didn't follow what was said earlier. But yeah, WIPP 6 is like, what, 20 years old and it's already had a 7 significant spill dealing with high-level waste.
8 And I always, we're looking at a high-9 level waste project that was, from what I've put 10 together, proposed on the basis of bringing more waste 11 here with not really, I guess the plan is to bring 12 energy jobs. I don't really understand how they could 13 be worth it, you know.
14 And with what we're talking about with 15 high-level waste. And 20 years, the consequences of 16 that one spill that happened 3 years ago. I don't 17 know whether we can assess that yet, but you know, I'm 18 sure that there are numerous consequences that are 19 still yet to come or be detected.
20 I just want to do one quick little thing.
21 If you're listening to me clap once. If you're with, 22 if you're digital listening, can any of us here clap 23 once? Worth a try.
24 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. We're going to 25 Jim Schippers, Randella Bluehouse, Steven Verchinski, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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85 1 and Lucia Cordova. Jim Schippers. Here's Jim.
2 MR. SCHIPPERS: Hello everyone, I'm Jim 3 Schippers. I'm an old retired geezer. Not a 4 scientist, not an anthropologist. But my stomach 5 hurts, and my stomach's been hurting a lot since I've 6 been hearing about this project. And when the stomach 7 hurts, you pay attention.
8 I just want to say that in the old days, 9 I used to be a dreamer, and I dreamt that someday 10 they'd take all this money that they're putting into 11 nuclear energy and waste disposal and buy everyone a 12 solar collector for their houses. I don't think that 13 dream's ever going to come true. But there is one 14 thing that is making my stomach feel a lot better, and 15 that's you people here tonight. Wow, it really goes 16 to show.
17 I wish I had your knowledge and your 18 information, and you've expressed yourself well, and 19 thank you very much.
20 MR. CAMERON: Randella, Randella 21 Bluehouse.
22 MS. BLUEHOUSE: Hello everyone. I came 23 here with the intention of listening, not speaking, 24 but I think it's important that we all have a voice.
25 My concern is that, well, I'm Navajo. (Native NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 1 language spoken.)
2 So I'm Navajo. And I know the devastation 3 of what the uranium mines have done to our community.
4 My father died of cancer. Many of our friends up 5 there died of cancer. You can begin to understand 6 what a horrible effect it would have on our community 7 here in New Mexico if something like that were to 8 happen here.
9 So I think we have a lot more to lose than 10 those wonderful people who own that little section of 11 land if they sell it, or to charge for it, maybe they 12 can gain something from it, or those industries that 13 are for profit that can profit off of our backs.
14 I think it's senseless. How can you sell 15 the wind, how can you sell the air and the water? And 16 the earth. You can't sell them. Our people were here 17 far beyond what anybody else is here. Did we sell the 18 land to you? No. It was taken.
19 And now all of sudden, it's like this is 20 my land, this is my section of land, you can't have 21 it. Law says, law this, law that. Well, the law of 22 nature says all of that doesn't exist. The law of 23 nature says we are to share and protect Mother Earth.
24 That is our nation.
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87 1 should believe is not the divine law and anybody else.
2 It's really, the reality of it is we breathe the air, 3 we drink the water, we live together, we need to 4 protect our land. And for those people that are 5 profiting off of our backs, shame on you.
6 MR. CAMERON: Steven Verchinski, and then 7 we're going to go to Ray Garduno. Garduno, thank you, 8 thank you very much.
9 MR. VERCHINSKI: My name is Steven 10 Verchinski of the Green Party US, member and National 11 Representative for New Mexico, so I may speak to our 12 party platform.
13 The Green Party strongly opposes any 14 shipment of high-level nuclear waste across the United 15 States to the proposed nuclear waste repository Yucca 16 Mountain, or any other centralized facility. The 17 Green Party believes that these proposals are part of 18 a move to still and refine a fast track commercial 19 nuclear reactor industry, providing decent, safe 20 disposal.
21 We deny that there is such a thing as safe 22 disposal of nuclear waste. We propose to make spent 23 nuclear fuel and other high-level waste safer by 24 vitrification at the site where it is produced or now 25 stored.
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88 1 And as to why should New Mexico be helping 2 Holtec in its destructive industry when the cost of 3 nuclear power is fourteen times higher than it was 4 four decades ago. It's higher than renewables.
5 Westinghouse reactors went into bankruptcy. And my 6 UNM engineer over here, but hey, you can always work 7 at Los Alamos since our concerned politicos want more 8 nuclear weapons made.
9 Germany is shutting down their nuclear 10 power plants and fully decommissioning for the entire 11 country. This is happening despite being 20 on the 12 list of 100 carbon reduction items in the book of 13 allowances. Of the hundred almost all of them are 14 known to crack once.
15 However as Paul Hawken the author notes, 16 nuclear is a regrets solution. The regrets are 17 Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, Fukushima, Rocky Flats, 18 Browns Ferry, Windscale, Church Rock.
19 So what if we close down the facilities, 20 well there's over 2,000 of these thin-walled storage 21 canisters that are a half inch thick across the United 22 States. They can't be inspected inside or out, they 23 can't be repaired or maintained, they cannot be 24 monitored to prevent radiation leaks. The thin wall 25 stainless steel can crack and leak in short-term for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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89 1 various environmental manufacturer's conditions.
2 They can leak 16 years after the cracks 3 start, and there's no plan in place to deal with this.
4 The NRC said this in 2014. The covert Nuclear Power 5 Plant in South Africa can't account for any container 6 leak in only 17 years.
7 Now for New Mexico and DOE, there's no 8 plan to prevent leaks in storage and transport, and no 9 plan if it does leak. You don't even have any spent 10 fuel pools here for transferring out the materials if 11 you do have a problem.
12 The infrastructure problems for 13 transportation is still not addressed. And for 14 scoping, this should also include climate impact.
15 Adequate transport and creation of new spent fuel 16 pools for emergencies at the front end and back end of 17 the processes, the transport upgrades and 18 retransporting it to a final repository.
19 And since the cement proposed, now it's 20 going to be ceramic, this is an additional climate-21 impacting gas. And for this scoping, you must include 22 full cost accounting and a process for no corporation 23 that's currently operating nuclear power facility to 24 add this waste without including that long-term 25 costing and then their full bonding be made item by NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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90 1 item. Thank you.
2 MR. CAMERON: And Ray Garduno.
3 MR. GARDUNO: Thank you for correcting 4 that, I couldn't have said it better myself. I'm Ray 5 Garduno. And you know, I'm proud to say that Cisco 6 McSorley, Senator Cisco McSorley, was here, and he's 7 a dear friend of mine. But I ask, where the hell are 8 the rest of the elected officials?
9 You know, I served for eight years for the 10 City Council in this city. And for many years, we 11 fought all kinds of fights, and it was amazing how a 12 lot of those folks sided with the landowners, the 13 bankers, and all of those folks who I guess butter 14 their bread.
15 Let me just tell you that, I just want to 16 know, who wants this stuff? Who doesn't want this 17 stuff? Anybody taking notes? I'd like for you to 18 note that.
19 You know, for many years, we've been 20 following this issue. We've heard about it, what 21 devastation it's created in the state. There's no 22 good that's come of it. And yet, we have plenty of 23 people who want to tell us that we're wrong. Well, 24 let me tell you, this stuff kills. It'll kill every 25 one of us.
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91 1 And it's interesting to follow all of 2 these acronyms, abbreviations, and assumptions. You 3 know, it's harder than reading a Russian novel, to try 4 and remember all that. I suggest something simple.
5 Instead of going through all this dog and pony stuff, 6 the folks that want this stuff, one of these mornings, 7 take the high-level stuff, sit, and then if nothing 8 happens, we'll go on with the plans that you guys 9 have.
10 Otherwise, let's just make sure that we 11 follow the money. You know, we've been proudly told 12 by folks that, you know, it's going to be great. It's 13 going to be great for the Southeast. Some of these 14 folks, guess what? Or are landowners, right, or 15 bankers or contractors. Or they are betting on the 16 fact that we're done and we'll accept all this stuff.
17 And what for? For a hundred jobs. I 18 mean, that's ridiculous. We're supposed to go in 19 there, nonsense. Otra vez, gracias.
20 MR. CAMERON: For next group, we're going 21 to start with Susan Rodriguez and go to Tom Stark, 22 Kevin Kirby, Anna Maldonado, Susan Tiano, Robin 23 Seydel, and Hope Alvarado. So how about Susan 24 Rodriguez. Tom Stark, and if Susan comes back, we'll 25 put her up. But this is Tom.
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92 1 MR. STARK: Hi, Tom Stark. I'm a retired 2 firefighter here in Albuquerque, NM. Twenty years I 3 was paramedic, 20 out of the 21 years. I've lived 4 pretty much my whole life here in New Mexico, and on 5 our license plate, it says, Land of Enchantment. It 6 doesn't say Land of Nuclear Waste.
7 And I wonder if, especially amongst the 8 poorest states, that the federal government would be 9 trying to shove this stuff down our throat all the 10 time. I just get this, I mean it's wrong, I think 11 it's wrong for the people. It's wrong for the 12 economy. We should be growing more towards nuclear 13 energy -- or excuse me, more toward renewable energy.
14 Store this waste where it was made, in 15 plants where the nuclear energy is made. Why does it 16 need to be transported? That's just one more way of 17 out getting it out, and then before making bad things 18 happen. Keep it where it's at. I'm tired of having 19 New Mexico be the dumping ground for nuclear energy.
20 MR. CAMERON: Kevin, Kevin Kirby.
21 MR. KIRBY: Great idea, Ed Mayer. Just 22 lend me a few bucks and I'll take your nuclear waste 23 and dump it in New Mexico.
24 Holtec is a really slick idea. Think 25 about it. Moving nuclear waste may simply be a slick NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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93 1 and easy way of moving costs and shifting liability 2 away from the nuclear power plants that created that 3 waste. And who can stand to create that waste? Does 4 the liability stay with the waste?
5 A couple of other questions. How much 6 insurance will the transportation company carry to 7 move this waste? Is it enough? How much insurance do 8 the container manufacturers carry on their containers?
9 Is it enough? And how much insurance is Holtec 10 carrying on this project and for how long? Six 11 hundred years? Is it enough?
12 Remember, nuclear power plants don't pay 13 for their own insurance. It's underwritten by the US 14 Government. In other words, we pay for nuclear power 15 insurance.
16 Bottom line, moving radioactive waste from 17 one place to another doesn't make the waste go away.
18 We're just rearranging the nuclear deck chairs on the 19 SS Holtec.
20 MR. CAMERON: Anna Maldonado. This is 21 Anna.
22 MS. MALDONADO: Hi, my name is Anna 23 Maldonado, and I'm here, I'm a UNM alum, and I'm 24 representing UNM's Mission Innovation Initiative.
25 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: We can't hear you.
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94 1 MS. MALDONADO: I'm here representing the 2 UNM Mission Innovation Initiative and the Nuclear 3 Study Group. And so basically on why I'm here today 4 is I want to address the issue of transport and 5 toxicity.
6 On a daily basis, we're faced with so many 7 different toxins in our environment, and you know, 8 basically, you know, GMOs, things like that, just 9 various toxins. And I feel that with transport 10 issues, with transport that, you know, from different, 11 coming from different states and things like that will 12 put our community at risk and other people in other 13 states at risk as well.
14 And I also represent farmers in the 15 community, and I look to support our farmers. And 16 they're already at risk, they're already facing 17 challenges like climate change and drought, GMOs, 18 pesticides, the large Iowa chemical companies. And 19 just recently, Dupont is buying out Monsanto.
20 And so basically there's things like that 21 that they face, and that they get, if they get, 22 basically if there's an accident, you know, in the 23 transport process, then they can be faced with a 24 higher level of toxicity with farming. That's going 25 to affect everybody, especially, you know, we support NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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95 1 local farmers.
2 And so with the radiation and the nuclear 3 waste, it's far-reaching. And I can give an example.
4 My doctor told me, she said that, she diagnosed me 5 with acute and chronic radiation poisoning. And I 6 don't know how that happened. We were trying to 7 figure it out. Basically, my mom, she grew up in the 8 Curro and she's one of the downlanders. And that's 9 how far-reaching radiation can be.
10 And so we don't need any more of that, we 11 don't any more of this radiation toxicity in our 12 environment.
13 MR. CAMERON: This is Susan Tiano.
14 MS. TIANO: Hello, my name is Susan Tiano.
15 I was a professor of sociology of UNM for 35 years and 16 retired a couple years ago. And I would like to speak 17 a little bit more about the sociology of all of this.
18 I'll leave it to the technical engineering 19 people to talk about whether these canisters are safe 20 or the transportation issues that are good or bad.
21 But I want us to think a little bit about three 22 sociological points. I could probably talk forever, 23 but I'll try to make this short.
24 One is that if we sweep away the, I'll 25 call it anti-wealth, or the pollution that these guys NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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96 1 are creating in their own town from the spent fuel.
2 If we whisk it away and put it into New Mexico, it's 3 going to keep being generated.
4 One of the reasons that the nuclear energy 5 industry has slowed down the pace of new factory 6 production is that, or new nuclear site or plans , you 7 know what they call them right now, but nuclear plans 8 being generated was that there was no place to put the 9 spent fuel. If we whisk it away and dump it in New 10 Mexico, they're going to keep generating it over and 11 over.
12 The second point I want to make is our 13 perception to the rest of the world. I did my, a lot 14 of my studies in the East and I've lived in lots of 15 places, I'm actually from Los Alamos, which may help 16 explain why I'm a little bit anti-nuclear.
17 But most people, most places look at New 18 Mexico and think we're idiots and that it's very 19 unsafe here. Many people have said, Well, at least 20 I'm not in New Mexico, at least I don't glow in the 21 dark. At least I haven't been exposed to radiation my 22 entire life.
23 If we do this Holtec activity or 24 initiative, it's going to hurt tourism in the 25 community, especially for parklands, none of these NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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97 1 jobs matters if, for 90 jobs we're going to screw up 2 our tourist industry.
3 The third point I want to make is actually 4 the socio-political business about we can't really 5 trust the government. I'm sorry, NRC. You lied to us 6 about WIPP, and I'm afraid you're going to lie to us 7 about Holtec. We are seeing deregulation going on all 8 across our Administration right now.
9 There's a final thing I want to make, 10 point I want to make about Holtec. This came up on 11 their website, and it's talking about the meetings 12 that they had in, their open house scoping meetings in 13 Roswell, Hobbs, and Carlsbad.
14 And it says, The Agency felt unequivocal 15 support from local elected officials, community 16 leaders, members of the public, and university 17 students. Joining the few local dissenters were 18 activists from Texas and California, whose opposition 19 lacked clarity and specificity.
20 In other words, if we object to this, 21 we're activists from out of state? I would suggest to 22 you that the actors from out of state that are the 23 biggest threats to our environment are Holtec 24 International.
25 MR. CAMERON: Here's Robin Seydel, and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 1 then we're going to hear from Hope Alvarado.
2 MS. SEYDEL: Hi, folks. I want to thank 3 you all for showing up today because it's really short 4 notice and to see about 200 of you fill all these 5 chairs and speak against the approval of this 6 application. Most heartening and hopeful, and I want 7 to thank you all for being here.
8 And I also wanted to set the record 9 straight. As the previous speaker noted, Holtec in 10 their press release, after the three meetings done in 11 southern part of the state, said there were very 12 little opposition. And I was there, and 90% or 95% of 13 all the people who spoke were opposed to the Holtec 14 site. And some of those --.
15 Some were indeed from here in Albuquerque 16 because that was, at the time, the NRC had refused to 17 hold hearings up here, even though we have a great 18 railroad crossroads, and we were going to be part of 19 the transportation issue. And so thank you NRC for, 20 thanks to our two senators for pressuring you for 21 having this hearing. But thank you so much for having 22 this hearing.
23 And I want to speak just briefly to the 24 health issues that a lot of people have talked about.
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99 1 how safe this is all going to be, and we know that 2 there are going to be accidents. But even if there 3 are not accidents, the NRC allows routine, 4 permissible, acceptable releases.
5 And I'll just read for a minute here, NRC 6 regulations allow up to ten million rad per hour of 7 gamma radiation to be emitted, about 62 meters away 8 from a shooting test experienced during the --.
9 That's about one to two test x-rays' worth of gamma 10 radiation per hour of exposure. And that's NRC 11 regulations.
12 I also want to read, Since the radiation 13 dissipates with the square root of the distance, this 14 means that the NRC regulations allow for up to 200 15 millirad per hour at the surface of the cask exterior.
16 That's 20 to 40 chest x-rays' worth of gamma radiation 17 per hour which the NRC allows to stream out of the 18 casks' surface.
19 And I was talking, at the Roswell meeting 20 I believe it was, to John McKirgan from the NRC, right 21 there, right, yeah. And he informed me that there are 22 vents in these casks, because they have to vent some 23 of the gasses that are around. So we know that some 24 of these routine releases are going to occur.
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100 1 acceptable and routine releases are done at cost-2 benefit analysis. And that cost-benefit analysis 3 weighs public health and human health, thank you, give 4 me one more second, against the profits of the nuclear 5 industry.
6 And I say that there is no safe level 7 radiation, that cost-benefit analysis is not 8 appropriate, and we should not accept your permissible 9 levels of exposure. Thank you all.
10 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
11 MS. ALVARADO: (Native languages spoken.)
12 My name is Hope Alvarado. I am tribally enrolled in 13 the Diné Nation, but I also belong to the Mescalero 14 Apache and Comanche Nations. And I am tribally 15 enrolled underneath the Navajo Nation and we do not 16 consent.
17 (Applause.)
18 MS. ALVARADO: As a member of the Red 19 Nation my organization does not consent. My 20 organization is an international grassroots 21 organization and we do not consent.
22 I speak for my entire family, who is 23 spread across the entire Navajo Nation, as well as 24 other reservations, as well as other townspeople, and 25 we do not consent.
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101 1 Our bodies, our Mother Earth, our 2 children, our elders, and all our nonhuman relatives 3 do not consent. We are not a sacrifice zone for toxic 4 waste, nuclear --
5 (Applause.)
6 MS. ALVARADO: -- waste, fracking, and the 7 list goes on. We are concerned about the 8 transportation risks, the permanent contamination.
9 And due to the people have been here since time 10 immemorial, yet there is no prior informed consent.
11 There was no tribal consultation or consent.
12 New Mexico is not only home to the Diné 13 people, but 19 pueblos, the Jicarillo and Mescalero 14 Apache Nations and the Ute Nation. Why has there been 15 no government-to-government consultation? We are 16 sovereign --
17 (Applause.)
18 MS. ALVARADO: We are the original 19 caregivers of this land and we care about future 20 generations to come and we will not allow for just 21 greed and money to contaminate our Mother Earth. We 22 do not want radioactive waste, Native and non-Native 23 alike.
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102 1 of Indigenous Rights. If you bring this here, we will 2 fight it and we will teach our children and our 3 grandchildren to fight your capitalism, environmental 4 racism and injustice.
5 (Applause.)
6 MS. ALVARADO: You don't need to have a 7 nuclear engineering or science degree in order to 8 recognize that this is racism. This is environmental 9 injustice. There are over 100 uranium mines and other 10 forms of toxic waste spread across New Mexico and we 11 demand, no more.
12 (Applause.)
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, Hope.
14 Okay. Our next group is Jennifer Marley, Michael 15 Pitula, Torgen Johnson, Leona Morgan, and Willard 16 Hunter. Jennifer?
17 MS. MARLEY: Good evening. I'd just like 18 to acknowledge that I (unintelligible) was located, 19 but hundreds and hundreds of acres of land was stolen 20 from us by the U.S. Government to build the largest 21 nuclear bomb facility in the country, Los Alamos 22 National Labs.
23 This land was blatantly stolen from us to 24 be sold for a pitiful price. And to this day, it gets 25 used to contaminate some of our most sacred sites. If NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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103 1 you all are familiar with the Bandelier National 2 Monument --
3 PARTICIPANT: Can you slow down just a 4 little?
5 MS. MARLEY: Yes.
6 PARTICIPANT: We can't hear you.
7 MS. MARLEY: If you are familiar with the 8 Bandelier National Monument, you should know that 9 there are at least three parts to it that are wholly 10 contaminated, some to the point that we can't even 11 visit our own dwellings without an escort and full 12 protective gear.
13 So, that being said, it's no -- New Mexico 14 is not new to the dangers of nuclear poison. The 15 nuclear bomb was created here, it was first dropped 16 here, and most of the waste is stored here.
17 New Mexico and the nuclear industry is set 18 up as such that nuclear weapons can be produced and 19 disposed of all within the state. This place is 20 nothing more than a sacrifice zone the U.S. Government 21 and to all these companies.
22 (Applause.)
23 MS. MARLEY: My people, not just the people 24 of Los Alamos, but also the people of Santa Clara, the 25 people of (unintelligible), the people of Cochiti, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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104 1 have already been suffering for generations from the 2 impacts that this has had on us.
3 It's contaminated our groundwater. It's 4 contaminated our air and soil. It's moved downstream.
5 People here in Albuquerque are still suffering from 6 the effects of Los Alamos National Labs. This stuff 7 is not regulated the way it should be. And if it was, 8 people wouldn't be dying at alarming rates. Our 9 elders wouldn't have cancer.
10 There wouldn't be inter-generational 11 genetic trauma that's been done to us because of the 12 impacts that mothers -- because of the changes that we 13 are -- radiation that mothers pass on to their 14 children.
15 This stays with us forever and alters our 16 DNA. And it targets Native people and poor brown 17 communities disproportionately.
18 (Applause.)
19 MS. MARLEY: That's all I have to say.
20 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Is this Torgen?
21 Torgen, let see, is Michael? Yes. Oh, 22 MR. PITULA: So, first, you're welcome, 23 NRC. Last month was tax day and you're welcome for 24 being allowed to have the means to do this with that 25 money. And, frankly, this is what you decide to do NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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105 1 with the money?
2 I'm here tonight in solidarity with my 3 indigenous sisters, people of color, other siblings 4 who oppose the environmental and economic racism of 5 this plan.
6 (Applause.)
7 MR. PITULA: I moved here about four years 8 ago from Illinois, Illinois is one of the leading 9 states that uses nuclear power. I was never taught 10 about any of this.
11 I was appalled when I came here and was 12 educated by New Mexicans about a debt that we owe. I 13 was totally appalled at everything that people have 14 shared here tonight. And it's clear that my state, 15 where I came from, where I was born, has to share some 16 of this burden. I oppose Holtec's plan.
17 (Applause.)
18 MR. PITULA: First of all, the EIS has to 19 include the climate impacts of a two to four degree 20 Celsius increase that administration after 21 administration is locking us into, probably not been 22 factored in.
23 Second of all, the comment period needs to 24 be extended calendar-wise and geographically. As has 25 been established. And finally, this just shouldn't be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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106 1 done.
2 As has been said, New Mexico's a sacrifice 3 zone. And it's really disingenuous of Holtec and the 4 NRC to bring a waste zone and say, to call it economic 5 development.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. PITULA: This is the second time that 8 I've had to hear, like, we're bringing a dump and it's 9 going to be great. And the first one was defeated.
10 So, you're next.
11 So, either this is unsafe and, therefore, 12 it should not be done. Or it's safe in that the 13 canisters are safe and shouldn't be moved, right? And 14 in that case, it's a boondoggle, it's a corporate 15 boondoggle.
16 So, I'll close by saying that, this is not 17 a democracy, this is sham democracy, this is 18 capitalism. And under capitalism, our health, our 19 safety, our equity are not the primary concern.
20 Maximizing corporate profits to 21 shareholders of companies like Holtec is what is the 22 primary concern. That's usually done by cutting 23 costs. Cutting costs on labor, cutting costs on 24 materials, cutting costs on safety. And this could 25 best be described as privatizing the benefits and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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107 1 socializing the costs.
2 (Applause.)
3 MR. PITULA: Holtec will reap the benefits, 4 along with the NRC, and the costs will be socialized 5 to all of us. But we are here to struggle and the 6 struggle will continue. Thank you.
7 (Applause.)
8 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you. And 9 Torgen?
10 MR. JOHNSON: I'm Torgen Johnson from San 11 Diego. I'm a father of four and trained at Harvard as 12 an urban planner. I also represent the Samuel 13 Lawrence Foundation tonight.
14 A few days ago, I was watching a video of 15 the Roswell NRC hearing. And I couldn't believe it, 16 I thought, I've got to get on a plane and share some 17 information with all of you.
18 We're experiencing the same kind of crisis 19 in California, San Onofre. For over 40 years, the 20 communities around San Onofre have had no say in any 21 of the decisions around the nuclear power plant.
22 And now, with the waste plan, which has a 23 short-term plan, which is to leave it down at the 24 beach, 100 feet from where children play in canisters 25 that are susceptible to cracking and hydrogen NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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108 1 explosions, we'll give you the technical info on all 2 that. But it's planned to come here, to New Mexico 3 and from what we've heard, this is a happy community 4 looking forward to receiving it.
5 So, I'm pleased to connect with everybody 6 here and I just want to let you know that we have a 7 tremendous amount of research that we've done over the 8 past many years.
9 We have a great group of people in 10 California and in Japan that we've built coalitions 11 with, including the Prime Minister of Japan who dealt 12 with the Fukushima disaster. I will tell you that 13 he's on your side too.
14 We did eight conferences with him, three 15 in the United States and the rest in Japan. We also 16 worked with the former Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear 17 Regulatory Commission, who spoke on behalf of the 18 public safety.
19 What we found with our experience so far 20 with Holtec is, they've made a lot of promises and 21 have not delivered. They've talked about emergency 22 response actions that are virtually impossible, 23 because the facilities that they've promised to deal 24 with these leaking canisters, that facility was 25 demolished in 2007.
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109 1 So, we're listening to things like this, 2 just like you are. And I want to state, these are 3 upscale communities along the beach, that have 4 political outreach and connection, and even they're 5 marginalized.
6 This is the intense issues that all of us 7 are up against. And what I would encourage is that 8 California and New Mexico join forces and address 9 this.
10 (Applause.)
11 MR. JOHNSON: There are a lot of very sharp 12 people digging into NRC documents and pulling out 13 relevant facts. And I'll give you just a few. The 14 fuel that they're loading in these canisters that 15 they'd like to send your way is called high burnup 16 fuel.
17 It stays in reactors longer and when it's 18 pulled out, the fuel is more damaged. And it gets 19 these hydrides that build up on the surface of the 20 fuel.
21 I'll finish right now. I have six bullets 22 of -- so, you're being handed a time-bomb. And we'll 23 share more information on that with you. Those all 24 come from the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, 25 the 7/20/17 report.
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110 1 I hope to get the chance to talk with many 2 of you after this, I only have three minutes, like we 3 do in California. Thank you.
4 (Applause.)
5 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much. And 6 Leona? Do you want to bring everybody up?
7 (Laughter.)
8 MS. MORGAN: Good evening. My name is 9 Leona Morgan and I am here with the Nuclear Issues 10 Study Group. We have attended four out of five of 11 these NRC meetings.
12 And just for some of you who were not at 13 any of these other meetings, I just want to say, thank 14 you for being here tonight, especially everyone who is 15 staying around to listen to all the talks, because 16 this is a long process.
17 And I'm really glad that Chip got an 18 official timekeeper, because there's a lot of issues.
19 I think we're going to comment on later, about the 20 process. The issues we've had with these NRC 21 meetings, not just the timekeeping, the facilitation, 22 the locations, and the lack of meetings, and the lack 23 of notice.
24 We only had about ten days to get folks to 25 the meeting in Gallup last night. And we had 100 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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111 1 people there talking about impacts from uranium 2 mining. Which will probably be thrown out, because 3 they're not germane to the scope of the EIS for this 4 site.
5 But I want to ask the NRC to consider all 6 of the comments you heard last night, because they're 7 very important to hear directly from the people who 8 have been impacted the most. Especially people 9 dealing with uranium mining, because we have already 10 lived with these impacts for decades.
11 We don't know what Holtec is proposing 12 down south, because not all of it is available in the 13 ER that's online. So, some of the issues that we 14 have, all need to be included to the public. We need 15 to know all of -- we need to have access to all of the 16 pages of all of their applications.
17 And then, there's another issue with the 18 location of the Ogallala Aquifer. I think any tests 19 that are done need to be also vetted by a neutral 20 third-party. So, we don't trust Holtec. And I think 21 you've heard tonight that we don't --
22 (Applause.)
23 MS. MORGAN: And so, we need to do some 24 studies on the actual location of the Ogallala 25 Aquifer, as well as have third-party investigators and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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112 1 researchers look at all of the impacts to the 2 environment, the wild life, and as I keep mentioning, 3 to the sacred places that you'll be passing.
4 We'd like to see all of their transport 5 routes, whether they're on roads, waterways, or 6 railways, published, because how can we comment on 7 things that are not publicly noticed?
8 They're not available to us and all of the 9 other people along the transport routes. So, for that 10 reason, we need more meetings in communities along 11 transport routes, as well as an extension to the 12 comment period, so that they have time to learn about 13 this project and the possible transport through their 14 communities.
15 Also, I'd like to request that you all do 16 an actual test of the cask, the drop from 30 feet is 17 something that is very questionable. We would like to 18 see an actual test of what would happen if one of 19 these casks were dropped from a height of higher than 20 30 feet and how much radiation is actually coming out, 21 because we know that we are going to be exposed all 22 along the route.
23 And we do not consent to these exposures, 24 we do not consent to these additional x-rays, we do 25 not consent to the project or the transport.
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113 1 And I just want to say thank you, because 2 last night, I also said thank you for coming out, and 3 I hope that you continue to do so, because we need a 4 lot more of these meetings.
5 It's ridiculous what we have to go through 6 to get people to these meetings, when you give us such 7 short notice and people don't have time to review the 8 entire application. So, please extend the comment 9 period and have more public meetings. Thank you.
10 (Applause.)
11 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you very 12 much, Leona. And Willard? Mr. Willard Hunter? Thank 13 you.
14 MR. HUNTER: My name is Willard Hunter. I 15 am a proud member of Veterans for Peace.
16 (Applause.)
17 MR. HUNTER: When I talk about this issue, 18 I always start out with a joke. One day, all the 19 parts of the body were arguing about which was the 20 most important.
21 And the brain said, well, I'm the most 22 important, because I do all the thinking. The heart 23 said, no, I'm the most important, because I pump all 24 the blood.
25 Finally, the asshole chimed up and said, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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114 1 I'm the most important part of the body. All the 2 parts of the body laughed, so the asshole shut down.
3 (Laugher.)
4 MR. HUNTER: So, three or four days later, 5 the brain got really queasy, the heart got very 6 sluggish. Finally, all the parts of the body said, 7 asshole, you are the most important part of the body.
8 And it's a silly joke, but it's a very 9 profound insight. And that is that any living system 10 has to be able to get rid of its waste in order to 11 continue to exist. And that's also true for nuclear 12 power plants.
13 And we know, from the very beginning 72 14 years ago, that that has always been the problem with 15 the nuclear power plants. And it continues in 2018 to 16 be the major problem with anything related to nuclear.
17 So, we know the government -- and it has 18 deep pockets behind it. It has the federal 19 government. Holtec International, we know is a for-20 profit company. And, as far as I'm concerned, it will 21 walk away from an accident, just like the uranium 22 mining companies did back in the 1940s and 1950s.
23 (Applause.)
24 MR. HUNTER: The point there is that the 25 NRC needs to require something like a $2 billion NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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115 1 surety bond that the company puts up if it's going to 2 build this facility. And if this project is so good, 3 why doesn't Holtec International just put these 4 canisters at its Camden, New Jersey headquarters?
5 (Applause.)
6 MR. HUNTER: And if a permanent storage 7 facility is developed, how will the spent tube rods be 8 moved? And we know, we know that if it goes into this 9 area, that is going to become the de facto permanent 10 storage area, and it's only designed to be an interim 11 facility.
12 And finally, I say (native language 13 spoken). We lost the fight against WIPP, we cannot 14 afford to lose this fight against Holtec 15 International.
16 (Applause.)
17 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. All right. Next 18 group is Laura Watchempino, Tommi Tejeda. This is --
19 here she is.
20 MS. WATCHEMPINO: Thank you to the Nuclear 21 Regulatory Commission and to those of you that are 22 staying with us. I respectfully submit some comments 23 tonight that I will followup with more comments. And 24 I actually wanted to give my time to the gentleman 25 from California to tell us more, but I do need to get NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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116 1 this on the record.
2 I live in the Grants Uranium Mining 3 District in Northwestern New Mexico. And our area, 4 like everywhere else that was talked about that deals 5 with the nuclear fuel chain, whether it's the 6 generation of power, the uranium mining, 7 transportation, or the disposal of waste, we should 8 not have to risk the contamination of our land, our 9 waterways, air, the health of our plants, wildlife, 10 and livestock, from the transport and storage of this 11 highly hazardous material.
12 It poses a long-term risk to present and 13 future generations and it was very disheartening to 14 hear about the trans-generational impacts. The path 15 -- leaving this legacy problem for future generations 16 is also very disturbing, because that's not the kind 17 of legacy that many of us want to leave behind.
18 (Applause.)
19 MS. WATCHEMPINO: All spent nuclear fuel 20 storage and interim disposal poses future retrieval 21 risk after a permanent repository is finally opened, 22 because those fragile, thin-walled barrier casks are 23 very likely to be leaking.
24 And I have been reading about the problems 25 with the same cask at the San Onofre Power Plant in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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117 1 California. The consolidated interim storage is not 2 the solution.
3 Interim transport and storage of dangerous 4 high-level radioactive waste is an illusory solution.
5 It's only going to expose more communities along the 6 transport route to the dangerous radiation.
7 Once these casks, if they ever are removed 8 to a permanent repository, it's going to be even more 9 dangerous, because it's very likely that those casks 10 will crack and leak.
11 The NRC, it seems, wants to abdicate its 12 responsibility for protecting our human health and the 13 environment from the spent nuclear fuel that's 14 accumulating at nuclear power plants around the 15 country and to relieve itself of liability for failing 16 to find permanent homes for this long-lived 17 radioactive waste.
18 It's an environmental injustice to dump it 19 on New Mexico when past and present generations are 20 already suffering daily exposures from the 97 legacy 21 uranium mines and uranium mills in the Grants Mining 22 District.
23 And several generations of New Mexicans in 24 the Tularosa Basin that were exposed to radioactive 25 ash and fallout from the atomic bomb tests without NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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118 1 their knowledge or consent are also suffering.
2 Workers in the uranium mines and National 3 Labs, members of our Armed Forces, have been exposed 4 to dangerous radioactive material without their 5 consent and continue to suffer health impacts.
6 Holtec International is a Limited 7 Liability Company, and its partner, the Eddy Lea 8 Energy Alliance is also a Limited Liability Company.
9 So --
10 MR. CAMERON: Could I get you to finish up, 11 Laura?
12 MS. WATCHEMPINO: Okay, thank you. I do 13 not consent and our communities do not consent to this 14 project. Thank you.
15 (Applause.)
16 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, Laura.
17 Tommi? And then, Tsosie next after Tommi. And then, 18 Kevin.
19 MS. TEJEDA: I am speaking against this 20 proposed project. There are numerous reasons why this 21 project should not move forward, but the reason I'd 22 like to speak toward is the nuclear legacy and history 23 of New Mexico and its lack of accountability to the 24 people and environment, who bear the brunt of the 25 unavoidable and inevitable consequences of nuclear NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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119 1 activity.
2 We have a deplorable track record when it 3 comes to owning up, to cleaning up, and caring for 4 those who have experienced cross-generational 5 sickness, such as the Tularosa Basin Downwinders and 6 others.
7 There is no reason I see to trust that a 8 private company will fare any better in such matters.
9 Thank you.
10 (Applause.)
11 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. And, Tsosie?
12 MR. TSIHHNAHSINNIE: Over here.
13 MR. CAMERON: There he is.
14 MR. TSIHHNAHSINNIE: My name is Tsosie 15 Tsihhnahsinnie. My comments are going to be pretty 16 brief. I am opposed to the nuclear waste dump site by 17 Holtec. And I think that nuclear energy, the waste, 18 if it was treated as other hazardous waste, such as 19 asbestos, they would have to stop producing it.
20 (Applause.)
21 MR. TSIHHNAHSINNIE: And also, there were 22 some -- someone was talking about the nuclear plant in 23 Georgia, they had gone into bankruptcy and they had 24 actually lost $9 billion. And if you think about what 25 $9 billion could do for solar or wind projects in the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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120 1 United States --
2 (Applause.)
3 MR. TSIHHNAHSINNIE: I also reiterate what 4 a few were saying about states that choose to build 5 nuclear reactors, if they choose to build nuclear 6 reactors, they need to also commit to taking care of 7 their own waste.
8 (Applause.)
9 MR. TSIHHNAHSINNIE: I would like to also 10 firmly ask for the NRC to extend the hearings to other 11 states where the transportation is going to happen and 12 will affect the other populations.
13 When I think about producing energy and 14 the research and the delivery, I want to feel good 15 about it. I don't want to have a lump in my throat or 16 like a tightness in my chest or anything.
17 I want to be able to say, have the same 18 feeling I have with wind and solar and/or geothermal 19 energy. When I think of Iceland and I think of their 20 geothermal activities there, I'm sure some of the 21 innovations, they're from Iceland. This is what I'd 22 like for New Mexico.
23 Also, with the, I guess, with the NRC and 24 the nuclear industry, I would say that, in your 25 planning, I believe there is a flawed element in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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121 1 planning.
2 If you are producing nuclear waste and you 3 haven't thought out the cost and where you're going to 4 put it in the future, this is not only a very flawed 5 way, as it has been in the past, it's in keeping with 6 the future. Thank you very much.
7 (Applause.)
8 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much. Is 9 Kevin Bean?
10 MR. BEAN: All right. I think the Nuclear 11 Regulatory Commission should, as a Commission, for 12 states that have a nuclear facility require that those 13 states make a binding commitment to transitioning to 14 100 percent renewable energy.
15 (Applause.)
16 MR. BEAN: And I think the NRC can do, 17 because the NRC, like every government agency, has 18 authority under the law and under the Constitution, to 19 protect people's health, safety, and welfare.
20 That is the government's primary 21 responsibility. The Department of Energy has not 22 unfortunately taken that responsibility, the federal 23 government has not carried out that responsibility.
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122 1 that happen. And you can make that happen, because 2 you're in charge of a serious problem, something has 3 to be done with it, make that a condition that we deal 4 with this problem once and for all.
5 Right now we have to address the real 6 problem and address it in a holistic manner and make 7 that a condition for states that want to participate 8 in this project.
9 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, Kevin.
10 (Applause.)
11 MR. CAMERON: All right. The next group is 12 John Comstock, Sarah Kelly, Michael Holland, Melissa 13 Tso, and Noel Marquez. John?
14 MR. COMSTOCK: Okay. Hello, my name is 15 John Comstock, and I'm a former teacher at Highland 16 High School. I'm also a former railway employee. And 17 I worked for the railroad, the Chicago, Milwaukee, St.
18 Paul, and Pacific, for three years.
19 And I witnessed numerous derailments, and 20 that's my contribution tonight. I really appreciate 21 all the comments that have been made, thoughtful 22 comments.
23 I think this planned site is a poor idea 24 and I agree that there should be more discussion in 25 the various places that the nuclear waste would be NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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123 1 transported through. Thanks everybody for being here 2 and for caring about this state, for caring about your 3 fellow person.
4 (Applause.)
5 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, John.
6 Sarah? Sarah Kelly? Michael? Michael Holland? And 7 Melissa?
8 MS. KELLY: Did you say Sarah Kelly again?
9 MR. CAMERON: I'm sorry, I can't hear you.
10 MS. KELLY: I'm sorry, did you say Sarah 11 Kelly again? Maybe I didn't hear you.
12 MR. CAMERON: I just called Sarah Kelly.
13 MS. KELLY: Ok, I didn't hear if she went 14 or not.
15 MR. CAMERON: Yes, go ahead. Go ahead.
16 MS. KELLY: So, it's wonderful that all of 17 these speakers have had things with which I strongly 18 agree, because I don't speak in front of large crowds 19 very well. In fact, even more poorly.
20 But I will say, environmental racism is 21 not exactly what it is, although it's not quite what 22 it is, because New Mexico is too -- it's not just 23 about someone's race, but whether or not they were so 24 poorly cared for or disorganized that even if they 25 were decently informed, really don't have the time or NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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124 1 means to stand up for themselves.
2 But people were not informed, were not 3 informed at all. So, people were not informed, but 4 environmental racism, reiterating all the points that 5 were made that don't all come to mind right now. This 6 is a terrible idea. We are not interested. Send it 7 to, if you have to send it somewhere, Texas.
8 (Laughter.)
9 MS. KELLY: The people who create this 10 waste should be storing it. They make it, they can 11 store it. Thank you.
12 (Applause.)
13 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you. I'll 14 call Michael Holland and Melissa Tso, again, but I 15 don't think they're -- oh, this is Melissa, okay. And 16 next, we'll go to Noel.
17 MS. TSO: Hi, everybody. My name is 18 Melissa Tso and I am a member of the Navajo Nation, 19 have been for the past three years. I just wanted to 20 come here, I literally just walked through the door, 21 and I wanted to express my opinion as an Indigenous 22 American here in the United States.
23 I want to -- again, I don't know what 24 comments you're looking for, but I want everybody to 25 recognize that indigenous communities have been NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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125 1 affected continuously, over and over by environmental 2 racism, as a way to further erase our people, to 3 further genocide.
4 We are on the front lines, because we are 5 impacted by uranium mines, we're impacted by -- I 6 don't know if you've been familiar with the different 7 abandoned sites on Navajo Nation, but it's our 8 national government and it's continuing, sadly.
9 And like someone said earlier, we need to 10 have more meetings like this. And I hate to see that 11 these meetings are not advertised as well as they 12 should be. Like, more members from the community 13 should be here, and not to consult with us, but to ask 14 for our permission.
15 Like I said, this is indigenous land and 16 we still, to this day, are under occupation and always 17 remember that. Thank you.
18 (Applause.)
19 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. And Noel Marquez?
20 MR. MARQUEZ: I am from Artesia, New 21 Mexico, same place as John over there. And I've been 22 to four out of the five NRC meetings. In Roswell, the 23 oil companies came out against the Holtec plan because 24 geology is unsuitable.
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126 1 to fracking and then, something they hardly ever speak 2 about is the water flooding of potash mines in Eddy 3 County and Lea County. This has caused a lot of 4 severe sinkholes. Carlsbad is in the middle of a 5 sinkhole problem due to injection wells.
6 The dairies came out against Holtec.
7 There's a lot of valuable business, in counties, a 8 prosperous community, 55 jobs. It's madness. And the 9 dairies spoke about contamination of feed, cow milk, 10 disease, all caused by radiation.
11 And the worst part is that still 80 12 percent of our Southeast communities know nothing of 13 the Holtec plan. They're just not being informed.
14 It's something that's being rushed to reach a quick 15 settlement of bringing this poison to our lands.
16 In Gallup last night, I was not there, but 17 you can watch it online, Holtec, they had a beautiful 18 livestream, and the community spoke strongly about the 19 impact of the uranium mining, contamination on the 20 Navajo Nation. They have been suffering for over 80 21 years from environmental injustice there.
22 And then, in Carlsbad, after the pro-23 business Holtec group spoke, they froze our butts in 24 the garage.
25 (Laughter.)
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127 1 MR. MARQUEZ: And we will never forget 2 that. They have no idea about how to regulate the air 3 conditioning. They want to be in charge of storing 4 the worst poison in the world, but they can't control 5 the air conditioning.
6 (Laughter.)
7 MR. MARQUEZ: Finally, not only did my 11-8 year-old daughter spoke in a clear language about the 9 connection in our ecology between all life, she 10 doesn't understand why some of the people in the 11 Carlsbad business community favor poisoning 12 themselves, except that they favor money.
13 And then, she said, some, like the 14 mistreatment of our old who will not be around to 15 suffer the effects like children, mothers, and the 16 unborn.
17 The NRC is a system of power that favors 18 the nuclear industry over communities. For me, the 19 NRC stands for Nuclear Risk for Communities. We don't 20 want it coming. New Mexico people do not give their 21 consent. Thank you.
22 (Applause.)
23 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. All right.
24 Stephen Picha?
25 MR. PICHA: Good evening. And I want to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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128 1 also thank everyone for coming this evening. I would 2 like those from the NRC, if they could just kind of 3 raise their hands, so I know that this is who I'm 4 speaking to.
5 So, just the two of you? Wow, okay. So, 6 the four of you? Okay. I think it's just important 7 and a fair questions, because you have come here to 8 listen to the voices of people and you've done that 9 now, this is the fifth time.
10 And I was at the first hearing in Roswell, 11 New Mexico, as I know many of you were as well. And 12 I do not disbelieve that the people of Holtec think 13 that this is good. I mean, I sat and had 14 conversations with them.
15 But I think it's very important, and it's 16 been brought up on about three occasions tonight, of 17 their statement following that first hearing in 18 Roswell, New Mexico, where they basically said there 19 was unequivocal support.
20 Joining the few local dissenters were 21 activists from Texas and California, whose opposition 22 lacked clarity and specificity. You sat there and you 23 heard those people talk.
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129 1 commissioner from Texas, who basically, Texas doesn't 2 want this, because they've already said no, this isn't 3 something we're going to take.
4 I've always been taught, it's how you do 5 the little things is how you do the big things. And 6 if this is how Holtec is going to do the little things 7 of reporting, what they heard and knew happened that 8 night, what can we expect of the big things?
9 (Applause.)
10 MR. PICHA: People of Holtec, you are a 11 business and you have obligations to your 12 stakeholders. We are citizens and we have obligations 13 to our children and to the people who have suffered 14 the most.
15 And I, as a white Anglo male, have to ask 16 forgiveness to my Native brothers and sisters, to my 17 Hispanic brothers and sisters, and to my sisters in 18 general, because if you've noticed and are collecting 19 the data tonight, where are one them saying, we 20 support this?
21 Have you heard one woman who has gotten up 22 here this evening, unless I missed it at the very 23 beginning, in their wisdom, who have said, we support 24 this?
25 So, please pay attention to the data.
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130 1 Don't let the shell game or what is best in the 2 business interest decide the lives of the people here 3 in New Mexico. Thank you.
4 (Applause.)
5 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Let's go to Tina 6 Cordova and Deborah Gaudet and to Janet Greenwald.
7 Tina?
8 MS. CORDOVA: Good evening, ladies and 9 gentleman that are left.
10 (Laughter.)
11 MS. CORDOVA: My name is Tina Cordova and 12 I'm co-founder of an organization in New Mexico called 13 the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium.
14 (Applause.)
15 MS. CORDOVA: And I want to thank all of 16 you who tonight mentioned us, because this is where it 17 all started, with the group that I represent. And I 18 want to make sure that you hear what I have to say.
19 We had no opportunity to give consent in 20 1945. And representing the people that I represent 21 tonight, I want to say that we do not give consent in 22 2018 either.
23 (Applause.)
24 MS. CORDOVA: I am a cancer survivor. I 25 had thyroid cancer. And the first thing they asked me NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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131 1 when they diagnosed me was, when were you exposed to 2 radiation?
3 I buried my father five years ago. He 4 never had risk factors for the cancer that he died 5 from. He suffered for over eight years in a way 6 that's hard for me to describe.
7 He got oral cancer. He never smoked, he 8 didn't drink, he didn't use chewing tobacco, he didn't 9 have viruses. He got two different oral cancers. I 10 can't tell you the number of people that I have buried 11 in my extended family, aunts, uncles, grandmothers.
12 I know about the numbers of people who are 13 affected by being exposed to radiation. I buried a 14 friend last week. I have thousands of health surveys 15 I've collected, I've read every single one of them.
16 A hundred jobs? When you put 100 jobs up 17 against the tens of thousands of people that we know 18 were affected after the test at Trinity, it doesn't 19 equate. And there's no way to make it right.
20 And let me tell you what that means. That 21 means that I'm fighting right now to be included in a 22 hearing that's scheduled for June 27 in the Seventh 23 Judiciary Committee as they consider the amendments to 24 finally recognize the 73-year injustice that was done 25 to the people of New Mexico.
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132 1 They have compensated and given people 2 healthcare coverage cards other places. They've given 3 people $2.2 billion to help them get medical care that 4 they need. They get a healthcare card that entitles 5 them to the best healthcare available any place in the 6 world. And you know what we get in New Mexico? Zero.
7 If you think I trust that a private entity 8 is going to come back and take care of people after 9 their health is destroyed, you've got to be kidding 10 yourself, because our own government hasn't done that 11 in 73 years.
12 So, I'm here to say, 100 jobs is not worth 13 the thousands of people we could potentially bury. I 14 have looked in those people's eyes as they're dying, 15 all across this state. I have heard their stories, I 16 have read their health surveys.
17 And guess what, folks? It doesn't end 18 with us. My genetics are changed now and I passed 19 those genetics on to my children and my grandchildren.
20 The plutonium that went up in that bomb has a half-21 life of 24,000 years. Ten pounds didn't fission, it 22 got joined to our soil and to our water forever more 23 and is now part of our genetics.
24 The indigenous people of this state do not 25 consent. My family's roots can be traced back for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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133 1 over five generations, they aren't consenting, I don't 2 consent. And I'm here to tell you all that this is 3 the wrong thing for New Mexico. It was wrong 73 years 4 ago and it's wrong today.
5 (Applause.)
6 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. And now, we're 7 going to go to Deborah Gaudet. And then, Janet 8 Greenwald and next, Barbara Endicott.
9 MS. GAUDET: Hello, my name is Deborah 10 Gaudet, and I'm a member of the Red Nation. And I'm 11 an LPCC in New Mexico, I have my master's degree in 12 counseling psychology. And I'm nothing if not a 13 scholar.
14 So, I'll start off by mentioning some 15 books. I think the most important, one of the most 16 important books that I've read is -- oh gosh, I'm 17 standing up here before you all my mind just went 18 blank, hang on. Yes, one of the most important books 19 that I've read is God is Red by Vine Deloria. Another 20 important book that I've read is Ceremony by Leslie 21 Marmon Silko.
22 And it's important for us to understand 23 this settler colonial condition that we're in and how 24 settler colonialism means death and madness for the 25 colonizer.
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134 1 It's like looking at the land, I grew up 2 in North Dakota and I just want to mention something 3 that was recently in the news, the Air Force in North 4 Dakota lost a box of grenades from a military vehicle.
5 They were looking for those grenades and 6 put out a reward. Think they turned up? No. And 7 that's the Department of Defense. This is private 8 company. No.
9 It's also very sad for me to see how the 10 land has been wastelanded by USDA policies. And it's 11 important to look around and understand that almost 12 everything has been killed off by settlers colonialism 13 and the policies of the United States Government 14 already.
15 And it's like, we need to understand and 16 think about the fact that the land would be way more 17 abundant if we let it be what it is here in the West.
18 There would be buffalo.
19 In Montana, they made a huge tourist 20 industry out of the buffalo. Here in New Mexico, the 21 buffalo are killed off. And they would come back, but 22 they're continually not allowed. They're continually 23 excluded.
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135 1 is our number one industry. And to kind of poison our 2 land, poison our water with fracking and with nuclear 3 waste, and that's our own, by the way, that's our own 4 very lives as well as the tourist industry that we 5 have.
6 So, I echo a lot of things that other 7 people have said and I also don't give my consent.
8 And please reflect on the last two hundred years of 9 U.S. colonial policy.
10 And also reflect on, the current 11 government is at a low point, this is the Trump 12 administration and the NRC represents the Trump 13 administration at this point in time as well. Thank 14 you.
15 (Applause.)
16 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Janet?
17 MS. GREENWALD: I have been following these 18 hearings around the state, as has NRC. And in 19 Roswell, I listened to the dairy farmers, the oil 20 industry, pecan farmers say no. In Hobbs, I listened 21 to educators and mothers. That was the main part of 22 the speakers saying no.
23 In Carlsbad, I listened to the boosters, 24 the same people that have been promoting nuclear 25 project as economic boons. I listened to them speak NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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136 1 for the project, but I also listened to more people 2 than those people speak against it.
3 I wasn't in Gallup, but I've seen some of 4 the footage. There was a whole room full of people 5 who spoke against this project. So, I'm going to 6 second the man who asked NRC to please take that press 7 release down that said New Mexicans consent to this 8 project. That is a falsity.
9 (Applause.)
10 MS. GREENWALD: You want us to trust you 11 and, yet, you lied to everybody. You lied to the 12 whole nation about what is happening here in New 13 Mexico.
14 I've also been to a couple of meetings 15 that NRC hasn't been to. One was when I went to 16 Tularosa, where Tina is from. My friend Silviana 17 (phonetic) and I went down there. And Tularosa is a 18 community of several thousand people.
19 And Silviana and I went down there to hear 20 people acknowledge who died of cancer in that 21 community. Guess what? It took hours. It took 22 hours2.546296e-4 days <br />0.00611 hours <br />3.637566e-5 weeks <br />8.371e-6 months <br />. For each name, they hit a drum and a triangle, 23 and we were there for hours.
24 Another meeting that you weren't at was a 25 City Council meeting last night, where the City NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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137 1 Council passed a memorial saying that they don't want 2 any transportation of this high-level nuclear waste 3 through Albuquerque.
4 (Applause.)
5 MS. GREENWALD: And I'm sure they'll be 6 sending that memorial in to you. So, what we have 7 here in New Mexico are people that are saying no. And 8 the government has said that they're trying to do this 9 by consent.
10 They spent millions and millions of 11 dollars in Nevada trying to put a waste dump in there 12 that people didn't want. And then, they spent more 13 millions of dollars in Utah, trying to put this waste 14 on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation, and people 15 said, no.
16 And eventually, Utah and Nevada were able 17 to build a wilderness area around the Skull Valley 18 Goshute Reservation, because NRC had licensed them to 19 take nuclear waste. But because now there's a 20 wilderness area around the Reservation, no one can 21 bring in nuclear waste.
22 (Applause.)
23 MR. CAMERON: And, Janet, can you wrap up 24 for us, please?
25 MS. GREENWALD: I'm sorry?
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138 1 MR. CAMERON: Could you wrap up for us, 2 please?
3 MS. GREENWALD: I just want to thank all of 4 you for resisting, because I think that there's a path 5 forward here. I think we have a path forward. Thank 6 you.
7 (Applause.)
8 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Janet. Now, 9 Barbara Endicott and then, Judy Kaul and Karen Bohime.
10 MS. BOHIME: Bohime.
11 MR. CAMERON: Yes. And Lauro, Lauro Silva.
12 MS. ENDICOTT: My name is Barbara Endicott.
13 And since I heard about this proposed nuclear waste 14 dump, I've been very frightened.
15 And so glad that I came tonight, because 16 I feel very encouraged by everybody and what everybody 17 has said, hearing that the big majority of the people 18 that came here tonight do not want this waste dump.
19 We do not want it.
20 (Applause.)
21 MS. ENDICOTT: -- part as human beings and 22 what this could mean to our health. Health is 23 everything. And we all know that. And I just -- I 24 hope everybody here spreads the word, because it is 25 not being -- a lot of people don't even know about it.
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139 1 And so, I hope everybody goes home tonight 2 and calls their friends and talks about this to 3 everybody that they meet, because it's important that 4 we defeat this. And we will, we will. Thank you.
5 (Applause.)
6 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Judy Kaul? Oh, 7 Judy? Do you want to use this microphone, is it 8 easier for you?
9 MS. KAUL: Yes, thank you. Thank you. I'm 10 Judy Kaul. I'm a New Mexican. And I want to say, 11 there was a woman who was talking about, is there 12 intelligence on the planet? And I think there is, but 13 we still, as a species, have human error. And this is 14 what the NRC needs to remember, that mistakes do 15 happen.
16 I mean, in New Mexico, we -- somebody made 17 a mistake between one kind of kitty litter and the 18 other and then caused a fire in WIPP. I mean, this 19 kind of thing does happen. So, we're in -- there are 20 mistakes and other places can keep their own nuclear 21 waste.
22 (Applause.)
23 MS. KAUL: Contrary to others opinion, New 24 Mexico is not your place. And we want to keep New 25 Mexico clean. And thank you for listening.
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140 1 (Applause.)
2 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much. Karen?
3 Here's Karen.
4 MS. BOHIME: Hello, everybody. My name is 5 Karen Bohime. I'm a retired teacher and I have time 6 to fight this thing. And I hope everyone will take 7 the time to fight this thing. And I welcome the offer 8 of the gentleman from California to collaborate with 9 us and share information to fight this thing.
10 One thing I took away from the Roswell 11 hearing was, not only the presence of the oil and gas 12 people from Midland, Texas, but a woman who is the 13 head for all of Texas of the League of Women Voters.
14 No one, I don't think, has mentioned her yet.
15 She spoke for the women and, actually, for 16 all people of Texas, but especially for the League of 17 Women Voters. They arrive at decisions that are 18 general enough to apply to many situations.
19 They take a long time to arrive at a 20 consensus, but when they do, that is written in stone.
21 And they said, something to the effect of, this is a 22 threat to air, water, and plant and people's health.
23 And I was very grateful that she came all 24 the way from Texas to add her voice and the voices of 25 the women voters of Texas. Thank you very much. I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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141 1 have her contact information, her name is Susiebell 2 (phonetic) that's her first name, I can't remember her 3 last name.
4 I've been thinking about the 5 transportation risks and it occurs to me, with all 6 those thousands of miles of railroad track, who's 7 going to protect thousands of miles of railroad track 8 from sabotage?
9 How hard would it be for some deranged 10 person or terrorist to attach an IED, an improvised 11 explosive device, or perhaps something more 12 sophisticated to the track, so that as the train 13 passes over, it explodes? And maybe it's planted on 14 a bridge over a deep canyon? Has Holtec tested their 15 casks for a 200-foot drop from a railroad bridge? I 16 doubt it.
17 One last thing, I echo the person who said 18 that there's human error in everything. And since 19 there is human error, you can't say anything is risk-20 free, you have to do a risk-benefit analysis. And it 21 just does not add up.
22 There is no benefit to New Mexico, there's 23 a huge threat. The very existence of a national high-24 level nuclear dump in New Mexico will discourage 25 tourism, our major industry.
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142 1 As the dairy man said, one little leak 2 would be enough to destroy the whole dairy industry of 3 Southeast New Mexico, because people would just say, 4 oh, that's where they had that leak, don't drink that 5 milk, don't eat that cheese.
6 And the pecan farmers, same thing. No one 7 will want -- some people would probably give up pecans 8 period, because they think they all come from New 9 Mexico or something. People think that way.
10 MR. CAMERON: Karen, I'm going to have to 11 ask you to wrap up, please.
12 MS. BOHIME: Certainly. This is just the 13 beginning, folks. We're going to keep our hearts 14 strong and we're going to fight this thing with every 15 cell in our bodies. Thank you.
16 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you.
17 (Applause.)
18 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Lauro Silva?
19 Lauro Silva? Here he is. And then, Denise Brown and 20 Athena, if you're here, I apologize that I don't know 21 how to pronounce your last name.
22 MR. SILVA: (Native language spoken.) May 23 the light within you shine ever more brightly, in the 24 language, our ancient language of our ancestors, my 25 family ancestors.
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143 1 May the light shine brightly within you 2 every day. Because as luminous beings on this Earth, 3 we walk and we try to live the best way we can. And 4 all of you here are those folks that are continuing to 5 shine your light brightly to your families.
6 My name is Lauro Silva. I've been an 7 organizer for many years. I happen to be a lawyer by 8 profession, but I still need to make a living so I can 9 get paid.
10 But the point being that I grew up in 11 Southeastern New Mexico, I worked in the fields there, 12 in the cotton fields and alfalfa fields. And I worked 13 very diligently on the project.
14 I'm one of the founders of the Citizens 15 for Alternatives to Radioactive Dumping, CARD, as it's 16 known. It's called Alternatives. For 40 years, since 17 1978, we've been working. Forty years later, today, 18 this year, we're still fighting against the national 19 sacrifice area that is our community.
20 Corporations like Holtec and others, GE 21 and many others, have contaminated already substantial 22 areas of our communities. The impact that it has on 23 the DNA and the future generations, future generations 24 and the unborn, is something that's incalculable.
25 I'm a grandfather, I have six children, I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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144 1 have nine grandchildren, and I have 12 great-2 grandchildren. I'm one of the downwind folks, because 3 I was born in Capitan, New Mexico, Southern New 4 Mexico.
5 The exploitation of Native peoples, 6 Chicano peoples, Mexicanos, is part of the 7 environmental racism that we're dealing with today.
8 I already turned in my comments, my written comments.
9 I have extra copies, if anybody wants to see a copy of 10 those.
11 I'm not going to dwell on the point 12 anymore, because I agree with everything you've said.
13 All of you that have those beautiful spirits that have 14 been here all day long, all night long, enduring some 15 of our profound knowledge with each others.
16 I hope that Holtec and the companies, the 17 NRC, that's been promising that they would never take 18 high-level radiation or radioactive materials from 19 fuel rods, would stand at a 50-yard line in front of 20 one spent nuclear fuel rod for ten minutes before they 21 come and talk to us about what they plan to do.
22 (Applause.)
23 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Ms. Denise?
24 Denise Brown?
25 MS. BROWN: I'm Denise Brown. I'm with the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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145 1 Nuclear Issues Study Group. And first of all, I want 2 thank the NRC for coming out and listening to our 3 comments. And thank you -- all right, got it.
4 So, thank you, sir, and the NRC for 5 adjusting the Gallup meeting, where there is a 6 pamphlet in Navajo that was incorrect. I will talk to 7 you after to find out more about that.
8 So, first of all, I want to make a comment 9 in regards to the Department of Transportation. And 10 it is the joint responsibility with the NRC and the 11 Department of Transportation for the transportation of 12 the nuclear waste.
13 So, where is the Department of 14 Transportation at this hearing and the meetings prior 15 to this? Because clearly, their presence should be 16 here. As many have said prior, the routes need to be 17 addressed. So, how can we comment without those 18 routes?
19 (Applause.)
20 MS. BROWN: People are talking about the 21 reactor facilities across the country. Where's the 22 discussion with them? Obviously, I would like to 23 thank Mr. Torgen Johnson for coming here all the way 24 from California, San Onofre.
25 (Applause.)
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146 1 MS. BROWN: As he had mentioned, and has 2 informed us that there is a miscommunication between 3 New Mexico and the waste that is being stored at 4 reactor communities across the country.
5 Somebody else mentioned Plant Vogtle, 6 which the NRC is also in charge of, and the licensee, 7 and how the bankruptcy of private corporations, such 8 as Westinghouse, has done. But also, the situation 9 with Holtec and Eddy Lea Energy Alliance, as private 10 corporations in that community as well.
11 So, the company and Georgia Power have 12 done a great injustice to the people of color in those 13 communities that are affected, because that is a black 14 community and houses the -- where Plant Vogtle is 15 situated.
16 So, this is clearly environmental racism 17 at its core. Indigenous communities and nations in 18 New Mexico and across the country, including black 19 communities, such as the Shell Bluff Community in 20 Georgia, and the brown communities in Southeastern New 21 Mexico, do not want this.
22 Under the Clinton administration, there 23 was Executive Order 12898 that states that federal 24 actions shall address environmental justice in 25 minority populations and low-income populations. So, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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147 1 I think the NRC needs to address those questions.
2 Thank you so much.
3 (Applause.)
4 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Denise. And 5 Athena? Is Athena here? There she is. And then, 6 we'll go on to Susan Schuuman.
7 MS. CHRISTDOULOU: New Mexicans keep 8 fighting against becoming more of a sacrifice zone.
9 NRC failed the New Mexicans, and especially the people 10 who spread the word to bring the regular people like 11 myself here.
12 My first job, I was actually interviewed 13 at the NRC. I taught nuclear power. It was awesome.
14 But when I taught reactor power principles, any 15 changes in lessons, any notes that were changed along 16 the way, were written in blood.
17 And then, when I finished teaching for the 18 Navy, I learned environmental engineering. Wow. That 19 nuclear power needs to be safely nine million miles 20 away in the sun.
21 (Laughter.)
22 MS. CHRISTDOULOU: Not in my backyard.
23 That's a favorite term in environmental engineering, 24 NIMBY, not in my backyard. Because this is going to 25 be so out of sight and out of mind for the rest of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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148 1 nation, that they will consider nuclear power as a 2 possible source to continue on making electricity.
3 And yes, this is part of a bigger issue, 4 actually, the future. Because climate change is 5 happening, so say the scientists and I believe them 6 over our wonderful fossil fuel people.
7 From what? From fossil fuel burning. We 8 need to ditch those fossil fuels. We need to stop 9 burning our future. I myself am going fossil fuel 10 free by 2023.
11 But neither should we continue with 12 nuclear power. End this, for the sake of clean air, 13 water, and soil. So, let's keep it in everybody's 14 backyard and in their minds. There's even been talk 15 of putting nuclear in Four Corners.
16 And human memory is too short, making this 17 plan too much of a risk. No, Holtec, don't even 18 consider it. Keep resisting, my friends. Keep 19 fighting against becoming more of a sacrifice. Thank 20 you.
21 (Applause.)
22 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you very 23 much. And, Cody will be next, and then we're going to 24 go to Ace and Sharon Hoffman.
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149 1 still here. I've spoken at three previous meetings, 2 but I do have some new comments that I want to share 3 with the NRC Commissioners. Welcome to Albuquerque.
4 We too have a high nuclear IQ, especially when it 5 comes to our experience with WIPP, as you heard 6 tonight.
7 I do have three points I want to make.
8 And one is health studies, two is employee concerns, 9 and three is about consent. Number one, please look 10 at two documents when you do your draft EIS.
11 One is the Navajo Birth Cohorts Study.
12 The Navajo Birth Cohorts Study, you can find it via 13 the Southwest Research and Information Center website, 14 that's SRIC.org.
15 They've studied, they've taken a lot of 16 blood samples from pregnant moms and fathers and 17 infants, and they've been tracking it for years.
18 There's a lot of data that I think would be very 19 helpful to you when you're deciding what kind of 20 impact this project could have.
21 The second document I want to share, this 22 is to followup on the comments that Tina Cordova made 23 from the Tularosa Basin DownWinders Consortium, they 24 put a lot of effort into a health impact assessment.
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150 1 Basin DownWinders Consortium, it's entitled, this came 2 out in February of 2017, and the title is Unknowing, 3 Unwilling, and Uncompensated: the Effects of the 4 Trinity Test on New Mexicans and the Potential 5 Benefits of Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) 6 Amendments.
7 So, I urge you, when you're assessing your 8 impacts, to include both of those in your research and 9 the record. So, that's the health studies. And then, 10 there was a lot of correlation between the Trinity 11 Test and health issues that are experienced by people 12 living downwind and their descendants.
13 Number two, employee concerns. I was 14 doing a little bit of research on Holtec International 15 and I was surprised how quickly I found this, and the 16 source is, Working at Holtec International: Employee 17 Reviews. And you can find that at indeed.com. I'll 18 repeat that. Working at Holtec International:
19 Employee Reviews.
20 I'm going to quote from three different 21 reviews. And anyone can find this, you can research 22 this yourself. But to me, there's some safety 23 concerns with this company and their application.
24 Number one, quote, one employee said, "you 25 get in trouble for asking questions." This is from a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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151 1 former Holtec employee. Number two, many injuries and 2 accidents and safety does not fix the safety issues.
3 I assume they mean the safety department.
4 And the third quote alarmed me from a 5 former Holtec employee, they have a questioning 6 attitude policy. Like they have a policy that's, it's 7 called questioning attitude. And that is part of 8 their culture, supposedly.
9 It's supposedly encouraging workers to 10 question things that they feel are wrong or 11 inefficient. But if you practice this policy, you 12 will soon be labeled as a troublemaker that is 13 unwilling to conform to the company's culture.
14 So, I invite you to go to that site, 15 Working at Holtec International: Employee Reviews. I 16 was really astonished at the negative reviews by 17 former Holtec employees.
18 And finally, about consent. I noticed 19 your motto, I never noticed it before, your motto is 20 protecting people and the environment. And one of 21 your slides had environmental justice listed.
22 And yet, I also hear, in the introduction, 23 that you don't need to obtain our consent. And I just 24 don't know how you can jive those two things. If you 25 do believe in environmental justice and that's one of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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152 1 your factors, you have to seek our consent.
2 And I want to rebut the Holtec press 3 release that said there was overwhelming support in 4 Southeast New Mexico. I've got the numbers right 5 here, numbers are really important to our group. And 6 I forgot to identify myself, I'm with the Nuclear 7 Issues Study Group.
8 MR. CAMERON: Could you just --
9 MS. SCHUUMAN: I'm summing up.
10 MR. CAMERON: -- sum up?
11 MS. SCHUUMAN: Yes, I'm summing up.
12 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you.
13 MS. SCHUUMAN: I'm also the Outreach 14 Coordinator for the Albuquerque Center for Peace and 15 Justice.
16 At the Maryland National Call, it was 23 17 against, zero for. At the Roswell NRC meeting, it was 18 45 against, seven for. At the Hobbs NRC meeting, it 19 was 33 against, 14 for. At the Carlsbad NRC meeting, 20 it was 32 against, 28 for.
21 At the Gallup NRC meeting, it was 36 22 against, one for. Tonight, so far, we're at, 59 23 against and six for. So, anyway, I think it's pretty 24 obvious, we do not consent. Thank you very much.
25 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
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153 1 (Applause.)
2 MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Cody? This is 3 Cody, Cody Sloma.
4 MR. SLOMA: All right. Hello, everyone.
5 Thanks for hanging in there, it's been a long night.
6 How many people are left? Can we get a number?
7 MR. CAMERON: We've got two more.
8 MR. SLOMA: Cool. Good to know. All 9 right.
10 MR. CAMERON: Carlsbad and --
11 MR. SLOMA: All right. So, we've got 12 Carlsbad.
13 MR. CAMERON: And California.
14 MR. SLOMA: Cool, there's California, okay.
15 Carlsbad, California, cool. Okay. So, anyway, thank 16 you all. Thank you NRC for coming out here and coming 17 to Albuquerque, I know that was a request of mine and 18 many others, too. So, thank you for doing that.
19 One thing I want to request is that you 20 all go into other communities along the transport 21 routes, other communities in New Mexico. There is a 22 lot of places you could go here, perhaps Santa Fe 23 would be a good place. Yes, so, think about that.
24 I want the staff to be considerate to go 25 into the Environmental Impact Statement, and that is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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154 1 that we don't want this waste. So, yes, consider 2 including that in there.
3 There's a few other things I would like 4 you to include in your Environmental Impact Statement, 5 but I'll get to those in a second. One thing I'm 6 requesting is that you add additional days to the 7 scoping comment period.
8 One of these reasons is that 9 regulations.gov hasn't worked in the last four days.
10 I'm not sure if you all are aware of this, but, yes, 11 your website hasn't worked in the last four days. So, 12 at least an additional four days, or however long it 13 hasn't worked, needs to definitely be added.
14 And then, one thing I want to bring up is 15 that, here in Albuquerque, we have a rich 16 environmental justice community. And that means that 17 there's a lot of organizations here working for 18 environmental justice, as well as throughout New 19 Mexico, because we deal with a lot of environmental 20 injustice.
21 So, we're not -- in your Environmental 22 Impact Statement, of course, you all have to include 23 a section on comments, make sure to include a lot of 24 that, because environmental problems go deep.
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155 1 here, if you care to reach out to. They help find or 2 found the key principles, so that's something to 3 definitely look at.
4 I'm not sure how, like, familiar you all 5 are with environmental justice. There's the Southwest 6 Organizing Project, the Albuquerque Center for Peace 7 and Justice, Citizens for Alternatives to Radioactive 8 Dumping, Red Water Pond Road Community Association, 9 the Alliance for Environmental Strategies, and of 10 course, the Nuclear Issue Study Group.
11 And I'm sure any of these groups would be 12 glad to talk with you all, but maybe try reaching out 13 to us, because you all haven't reached out to us at 14 all.
15 So, yes, I'll actually provide quick 16 contact info and we'd be glad to hear from you all and 17 help you out with getting the Environmental Impact 18 Statement.
19 Another thing that you should include in 20 your Environmental Impact Statement, and I'm asking 21 you to take this very, very serious, that being, 22 consent.
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156 1 really look that over and try to figure out how you 2 can include consent. Without consent, you've got 3 nothing.
4 MR. CAMERON: Cody, could you wrap up for 5 us, please?
6 MR. SLOMA: Yes. And this would help, this 7 would definitely help, because it would give a more 8 ethical approach to this. A lot of what you all are 9 doing is based on science, which is fine, we need to 10 be sure that whatever you all are regulating is based 11 off good physics, but you also need to include ethics, 12 right?
13 You need to have the moral stance figured 14 out of what you all are doing. I would strongly 15 recommend including that in your Environmental Impact 16 Statement and really considering whether this is good 17 or bad.
18 And then, my last thing I would like to 19 say is, there needs to be more time for this. As many 20 people have said, this issue has been going on for a 21 long time, this waste stays dangerous for a very, very 22 long time.
23 So, don't rush the process, take it slow, 24 extend the comment period. There's no reason why you 25 all can't extend the comment period, why not, right?
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157 1 We'll --
2 MR. CAMERON: And Cody, I'm going to have 3 to ask you to wrap up.
4 MR. SLOMA: Yes, so, we'll continue helping 5 you all get comments, because, yes, I know you all 6 don't do too much outreach.
7 (Applause.)
8 MR. CAMERON: We'll go to Judy Smith. And 9 then, we'll go on to Ace Hoffman and Sharon Hoffman.
10 MS. SMITH: Can you hear me? Okay. My 11 name is Judy Smith and I've lived in New Mexico since 12 1979. I love this state. I'm a retired teacher, 13 after 29.75 years. And that gives me some sense of 14 the passage of time. I'm also a mother and 15 grandmother of a darling three and a half year old 16 grandson.
17 I would like to make three comments. The 18 most disturbing to me is one that came to light when 19 I read the Holtec review of Roswell, because I was 20 there, you may remember me. And it wasn't what they 21 said.
22 I don't want to name-call, but to have a 23 company -- I really approach this project, trying to 24 have an open mind. I studied about nuclear energy and 25 I know the dangers, but I know we have a problem in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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158 1 this country, we need to find something to do with 2 this waste that we've created.
3 So, I came with an open mind. But to have 4 the company try to explain to me how safe and how 5 reasonable and how wonderful their engineering and 6 their project is, to deceive the state through their 7 report, does not encourage me to feel comfortable in 8 trusting --
9 (Applause.)
10 MS. SMITH: The reason that I'm here 11 tonight again is because of that particular incident.
12 I wanted to be sure to address that, because I 13 consider misrepresentation at this stage to be a big 14 red flag.
15 But in addition to that, I'm coming back 16 again because of my Jewish faith. I was taught as a 17 child and lived my life looking toward the future 18 generations.
19 Our faith has been living our traditions 20 for 5,775 years. So, that puts things in a long-term 21 perspective. So, it encouraged me to take a look at 22 this issue through the long view.
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159 1 responsible for that site? Who will be responsible to 2 take care of it?
3 I also wonder how an interim site might 4 become permanent, which other people have addressed, 5 and we're ending up with a permanent site that was 6 only meant to be interim.
7 Why not identify a permanent site, a 8 permanent plan based on the science and based on input 9 from the entire country that's affected, and then, 10 maybe build an interim site while you're creating the 11 permanent site? And I also wanted to --
12 (Applause.)
13 MS. SMITH: One other issue that I hope 14 you'll address, because we've heard misinformation at 15 these hearings that I've been to, is the geology 16 underneath the site.
17 There was a geologist in Roswell who said 18 that there was sandstone and limestone, I believe he 19 said, that the earth under there is moving. Of 20 course, we know geology, the earth moves and changes.
21 And that there's an aquifer running through there.
22 Others have said it's the perfect, ideal 23 geology. And I'd really like to know more about that, 24 what makes it so perfect, and is it perfect, and how 25 long will it be perfect?
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160 1 MR. CAMERON: Judy, could you wrap up for 2 us?
3 MS. SMITH: Yes.
4 MR. CAMERON: Thank you.
5 MS. SMITH: Thank you very much.
6 (Applause.)
7 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much. Ace 8 Hoffman?
9 MR. HOFFMAN: I never thought I'd be saying 10 this, but Holtec was very honest today, they said they 11 didn't have any safety issues. Let me explain why 12 they didn't have safety issues.
13 To give you an example, when San Onofre 14 was shut down in 2011, it was because tubes about the 15 size my pinky finger vibrated badly and one of them 16 got a little crack in it and started spewing coolant 17 into the secondary system. And then, they noticed the 18 radiation and they shut it down, and they never 19 restarted it, because those tubes were vibrating so 20 much.
21 As a lot have said, two of those tubes, 22 not just one, maybe even one, but certainly if two of 23 those tubes had broken out completely, there would be 24 four jets of water coming out. And that could have 25 been a meltdown, could easily have been a meltdown.
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161 1 The NRC referred to that as a non-safety 2 issue, that lack of a -- that vibrating problem they 3 had was not a safety issue. That is how come Holtec 4 hasn't had any safety issues.
5 Four of those casks that broke in shins 6 are in use and they're going to get shipped here 7 eventually, if you let them. That's not a safety 8 issue either, I guarantee it. So, when Holtec says 9 they don't have any safety issues, you can thank the 10 NRC for that. That's how that works.
11 A nuclear reactor, when it's operating, is 12 allowed to release about a thirtieth of a teaspoon of 13 tritium. And you guys don't have to worry too much 14 about tritium, because it's created in the reactor, as 15 far as I know, there's not really any of it in the 16 spent fuel.
17 But a thirtieth of a teaspoon is all 18 they're allowed to release in an entire year, with 19 probably -- so-called low-level radiation, it's the 20 same deadly stuff that is going to get shipped here.
21 I would bet that it's entire load is less 22 than maybe one cask of what is in a dry cask. That's 23 how much lower low-level radiation is. What they want 24 to ship here is extremely deadly.
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162 1 are going to have damaged cladding. One of the people 2 got up and -- one of the six, got up and said that 3 there's three elements of protection.
4 There's the cladding, there's the casing 5 of the canister, and then, there's the cement. Well, 6 the cement is nothing, because there's four vents and 7 they're each about a square-foot.
8 I was talking to the Holtec people 9 yesterday, and I have a lot of problems with what they 10 told me. They said if a jet were to crash into the 11 thing and fuel spilled down the sides, it would go 12 out, because there was no way for the air to get in.
13 Well, that's how the thing cools, is 14 there's convection, the air comes in, the hot air goes 15 out. You start a fire there and the hot air can't go 16 out any faster and the cool air's going to come in.
17 And the National Academy designs this study and said 18 that they could last about 20 minutes.
19 One last thing, I see my time is up. We 20 went to the Los Alamos today, my wife and I. And they 21 had a pill-shaped container about this big, which was 22 used for testing some sort of explosive. So, they put 23 explosives in there and it just tore the half-inch 24 thick steel completely apart.
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163 1 attack, they're going to have no problem tearing that 2 half-inch steel completely apart. There's plenty of 3 explosives that can do that and planes can do that 4 too.
5 MR. CAMERON: Thanks, Ace.
6 (Applause.)
7 MR. CAMERON: Thank you very much. And 8 Sharon Hoffman?
9 MS. HOFFMAN: You guys are a tough act to 10 follow. You are so awesome. New Mexico is awesome.
11 I had never been to New Mexico until we came for the 12 Carlsbad hearing. I've had a wonderful time, I've met 13 wonderful people.
14 And I hope the NRC is listening, because 15 I heard a lot of environmental impact issues tonight.
16 Everything from geology to environmental justice, and 17 lots of things in-between.
18 So, if you think that you can look at this 19 project and say, there are no environmental impacts, 20 then you haven't been listening. And that's a real 21 shame. You've spent a lot of time, you've spent a lot 22 of money, you're supposed to be listening. I hope you 23 really were listening.
24 And the thing that I want to say to all of 25 us is, the NRC has control. They're the group that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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164 1 can say whether or not this can happen. They control 2 whether we can continue to make nuclear waste. And 3 that, as several people have mentioned, is the biggest 4 problem here.
5 As long as we're making it, then we cannot 6 solve the problem. And I'm from California and I 7 agree with you completely, this should not be, the 8 places where it's coming from shipping it away and 9 then allowing more to get created.
10 But as long as it's being created, people 11 are going to try to do that. And it's not really the 12 people that live there. It's the nuclear power 13 companies, it's the NRC, it's Holtec, it's everybody 14 who profits from this. So, we need to work together, 15 we need to stop making more nuclear waste. It's the 16 most important thing we can do.
17 And the final thing that I want to say is, 18 and I have this t-shirt that says, danger, radioactive 19 material, we all know that, everybody in this room 20 knows, like everybody in New Mexico knows that.
21 Everybody all over the country needs to 22 know that and needs to pay attention to this problem.
23 This is all of our problem. The radiation is not 24 going to stop at state lines, it's not going to stop 25 being a problem unless we stop creating it.
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165 1 And then, we still have a really big 2 problem. If they had thought of this 72 years ago, we 3 would not be in the problem we are now. Thank you 4 very much.
5 (Applause.)
6 MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Sharon. And thank 7 all of you for your patience tonight and comments.
8 And before I turn it over to Brian Smith to close the 9 meeting out for us, I just want to thank our 10 stenographer, Bruce Carlton.
11 (Applause.)
12 MR. CAMERON: And also, I want to thank the 13 gentleman in the back of the room, who helped out with 14 the microphones. So, thank you back there.
15 (Applause.)
16 MR. CAMERON: Brian?
17 MR. SMITH: Well, thank you once again for 18 coming out tonight and for sticking with us to the 19 end, for all of you that stayed with us. And to some 20 of you that came to all of our meetings, we appreciate 21 that.
22 Just like the first five meetings, we did 23 receive a lot of good comments tonight. We will take 24 those into consideration as we prepare our draft 25 Environmental Impact Statement.
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166 1 We have plans to issue that next summer, 2 in that general time frame. And it will be out for 3 public comment, we will do additional meetings around 4 that same time to get public comment on that draft 5 document, and we will then consider any comments for 6 the final draft.
7 So, earlier tonight, there were a couple 8 of commenters who suggested consultation with the 9 tribes. I just want to let you know that we have 10 initiated that process, we're in the early stages of 11 that. There will be a lot more of that to come in the 12 near future.
13 So, once again, thank you very much, we 14 appreciate your comments. Have a good evening.
15 (Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went 16 off the record at 10:15 p.m.)
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