ML20244A154
| ML20244A154 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | HI-STORE |
| Issue date: | 08/25/2020 |
| From: | NRC/OCM |
| To: | |
| Caverly J | |
| References | |
| NRC-1031 | |
| Download: ML20244A154 (129) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Title:
Public Commenting Meeting for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Draft Environmental Impact Statement for a Consolidated Interim Storage Facility (CISF) for Spent Nuclear Fuel in Lea County, New Mexico Docket Number: (n/a)
Location: teleconference Date: Tuesday, August 25, 2020 Work Order No.: NRC-1031 Pages 1-123 NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.
Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433
1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
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Public Commenting Meeting for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Draft Environmental Impact Statement for a Consolidated Interim Storage Facility (CISF) for Spent Nuclear Fuel in Lea County, New Mexico
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TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 2020
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TELECONFERENCE
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The Public Commenting Meeting was convened via Teleconference, at 2:00 p.m., Chip Cameron, facilitating.
NRC STAFF PRESENT:
CHIP CAMERON, Facilitator KEVIN COYNE, Deputy Director, Rulemaking, Environmental and Financial Support, NRC JILL CAVERLY, Environmental Review Project Manager, Environmental Review Branch, NMSS STACEY IMBODEN, Co-Environmental Review Project Manager, Environmental Review Branch, NMSS NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 JOSE CUADRADO, Licensing and Safety Review Project Manager, Spent Fuel Licensing Branch, NMSS DAVID McINTYRE, Public Affairs Officer, Office of Public Affairs JESSIE QUINTERO, Acting Branch Chief, Environmental Review and Materials Branch ANGEL MORENO, Congressional Affairs Officer, Office of Congressional Affairs KELLEE JAMERSON NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2:01 p.m.
THE OPERATOR: Welcome and thank you for standing by. At this time, all participants are in a listen only mode until the question and answer session of today's conference. At that time you may press *1 on your phone to ask a question.
I would now like to turn the conference over to Chip Cameron. You may begin. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Madison. And good afternoon everybody. Everyone. Welcome to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's virtual public meeting on the NRC's draft environmental impact statement on the Holtec International Company's application for a NRC license to construct and operate a spent fuel storage facility in Southeastern New Mexico.
It's going to be my pleasure to serve as a Facilitator for today's meeting. And I'll try to help all of you to have a productive meeting.
I just wanted to go through a few pieces of what the meeting is going to be like so that you know what to expect.
First of all, we're not going to go into NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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4 a lot of acronyms. But you will hear NRC, I just used that. That's Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
You will also hear EIS, that's the acronym for the Environment Impact Statement.
You might hear NEPA, N-E-P-A. That's for the National Environmental Policy Act. And NEPA is the statute that provides for the preparation of an environmental impact statement. Such as the one under consideration today.
This is a draft EIS. And the NRC is here today to listen to your comments, your concerns, your recommendations about the draft EIS on the Holtec application.
And the project manager for the environment review, Jill Caverly, is going to give you a summary of the draft EIS in just a few minutes. And that draft EIS is a key part of the NRC's evaluation of whether, and I'll stress that word, whether, to grant the license to Holtec.
The other key component, besides the environmental piece, is the public health and safety piece. That looks at public health and safety issues.
And that requirement comes from the Atomic Energy Act and will be reflected in what's called a safety NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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5 evaluation report, an SER, that the NRC will prepare.
Both the final EIS and the SER are going to be available approximately mid-year 2021.
Now, the NRC is not going to finalize the draft EIS or use it all in any decision making until it evaluates all of your comments on the draft EIS.
There won't be, the Staff that's here won't be engaging in a dialogue with you tonight after your comments. They won't be answering any questions. But they will carefully evaluate what you say when they prepare the final EIS.
So, we're in a virtual setting and we're taking comments by phone. Madison, who you heard a few minutes ago, is our Operator. And she'll instruct you on how to sign in and address the NRC staff that's here today.
You can also get the slides for Jill's presentation by going to Webex. And we have, Kellee Jamerson is our Webex expert.
And if you have a question about the process, and I'll emphasize that word, process, for preparing the EIS, you can post that question in the chat box on Webex and we'll see if we can answer it before the evening is over.
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6 As well as if you have any technical difficulties. You can't hear one of the NRC speakers, post that on Webex and we'll try to fix things.
Now, I have been asking people to keep their comments to four or five minutes because if you remember the meeting a few weeks ago we had about 80 commenters and we were here for about five and a half hours. I don't think we're going to be that crowded today so I'll be able to give you a little bit more leeway, five, six, seven minutes. So you can relax a little bit on that.
And just as with the other virtual meetings, this is the fourth, fourth, fourth virtual meeting. And we're doing another one tomorrow, and we're doing another one next Wednesday. Okay.
Transcripts from those previous virtual meetings are available. And Jill is going to tell you how you can get access to those.
But Graham is our stenographer tonight, so he will be taking the transcript, and that should be available in about two weeks.
So, when Madison puts you on the phone, please introduce yourself, give an affiliation, if you want, and then we will listen attentively to whatever NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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7 your comments are.
I just want to tell you who the main NRC staff players are, that are either here in the room with me at the NRC headquarters or they're on the phone.
I'm going to start with our managers. We have Kevin Coyne here, who is the Deputy Director of the Rulemaking, Environmental and Financial Support Division at the NRC.
We also have Jessie Quintero. Jessie is the Acting Branch Chief of the Environmental Review and Materials Branch. And that's where our Senior Project Manager, Jill Caverly, she works in that branch.
And we also have Stacey Imboden, who's the Co-environmental Project Manager. They're focusing on the environmental impact statement.
We have Jose Cuadrado, who is our Technical Project Manager, Atomic Energy Act, public health and safety.
We have Kellee Jamerson, who I said is our Technology Expert.
We have Angel Moreno, who is our Office of Congressional Affairs contact.
And we do have Dave McIntyre. Can we show NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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8 a slide with Dave's contact information? And the reason we're giving you that is --
PARTICIPANT: On Slide 3 please.
MR. CAMERON: For anybody who is with the media, Dave is with our Office of Public Affairs and he'll be glad to talk to you about any, with questions that you might have.
Now, before I go on with just a few more words, let me ask Jose Cuadrado, who is our Spanish speaking expert, to give us some information in Spanish. For anybody out there who might need some interpretation help. Jose?
MR. CUADRADO: Thank you, Chip. Yes, this is Jose Cuadrado. I'm going to have to read a couple of brief remarks in Spanish in case there is any Spanish speakers today in this meeting. And I would like to make a statement.
(Foreign language spoken.)
MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you very much, Jose. And we're going to go to Kevin Coyne for a welcome right now. Kevin. Okay.
MR. COYNE: Thank you, Chip. Good afternoon and welcome and thank you all for attending this webinar.
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9 My name is Kevin Coyne and I am the deputy director of the division of rulemaking, environmental and financial support, which is the group responsible for the development of the draft of the environmental impact statement.
The draft's environmental impact statement, which is the subject of today's meeting, is the result of the NRC Staff's evaluation of the environmental impact associated with Holtec International's proposal to construct and operate an interim storage facility.
This afternoon we are asking for your comments on that report. It's important to note that any comments received in this webinar forum are handled in the same manner as those comments received at an in-person meeting.
As Chip mentioned, your comments presented here this afternoon are recorded and transcribed. Our Staff will review and analyze them and will update the final environmental impact statement report as appropriate.
Comments received during this webinar will be made available in a transcript of this afternoon's meeting that will be posted to the NRC's Holtec review NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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10 website shortly after the meeting.
The NRC Staff and its commitment to openness in this license review, has planned for five in-person public meetings. Unfortunately, under the current public health emergency, these meetings cannot be held as planned.
The NRC Staff is adhering to the New Mexico governor's guidelines for public gatherings. And they're following similar guidance from the state to its own agencies for converting in-person meetings to a virtual format.
Our Staff is disappointed that we won't be able to meet you face-to-face and host open houses prior to the meeting. However, if you should have any questions regarding this licensing action you should feel free to reach out to the NRC project manager, Jill Caverly.
Again, thank you for time this afternoon.
And I'll turn it over to Jill to present the Staff's draft environmental impact statement results.
MS. CAVERLY: Okay. Thanks, Kevin.
Okay, so thanks for joining us today.
As Kevin said, we're here to collect your comments on the NRC's draft environmental impact NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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11 statements. And that's what we'll be doing for the majority of the evening. We'll dedicate it to that activity.
As Chip mentioned, I have a short presentation. I'll begin with an overview of the application process, including the differences between the environment review and the safety review.
Next I'll move on to the overview of the application submitted to the NRC. Then summarize the results of NRC Staff analysis.
I will cover some of the public comments received during the scoping process and the NRC environmental evaluation and results.
Finally, I will end with information on how you can access the report and make comments on the draft environmental impact statements.
As we go through the presentation, I will use the term facility and proposed project interchangeably. The abbreviation, CISF stands for Consolidated Interim Storage Facility.
I may also interchange the Applicant and Holtec, which is short of Holtec International.
Environmental impact statement will be abbreviated to EIS.
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12 And finally, Staff and NRC Staff will be referred to, and this is the Staff of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Next slide please. So, the purpose of this meeting is to receive your comments on the draft environmental impact statement, EIS, for a consolidated interim storage facility, CISF.
NRC is requesting that you review the draft EIS document and provide comments that are pertinent to the licensing action and the draft EIS report. You have access to the report at the NRC's website where it can be downloaded and read.
There are also three ways to comment.
Either by email, website or regular mail. The information and method to comment will be summarized at the end of my presentation.
Any comments that you make in this forum, as well as the three other methods mentioned, will be recorded and entered into the public docket for the licensing action.
Next slide please. Okay, so we're going to get into the review process for the application.
So I'd like to clarify the NRC's role.
And as an independent regulator, the NRC determines NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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13 whether it's safe to build and operate a storage facility at a proposed site in Lea County New Mexico.
The NRC evaluates an application for a facility and determines if a license can be issued.
The NRC does not promote or build nuclear facilities.
Also, the NRC doesn't own or operate nuclear facilities.
Our mission and our regulations are designed to protect the public, workers and the environment. Holtec International, or the Applicant, has proposed the location for the interim storage facility application.
So, in this role as a regulator, NRC Staff will perform both safety evaluations and an environmental review of the application.
Next slide please. So, this is a slide that's very similar to ones from our scoping meetings in 2018. It's a schematic of NRC's licensing decision process.
So it's here to show you that the NRC has current reviews occurring during its evaluation process. You'll see from the slides that the process of licensing is based on three foundational activities.
The environmental review, the safety review and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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14 adjudicatory process.
The safety review results in a safety evaluation report, is based on the Atomic Energy Act and regulations in the Code of Federal Regulations.
These regulations must be met in order for the license to be granted.
The environmental review results in an environmental impact statement. The action is taken because issuing a license is considered a federal action under NEPA. The National Environmental Policy Act.
NEPA requires federal agencies to evaluate and disclose environmental impacts of federal action.
In the middle is the adjudication process that can be used for dispute.
And we one of our commenters mentioned, it is a involved process but it's a legal process, so I'm not going to get into the details of that.
Okay, next slide please. So, to look at the safety review in a little bit more detail, I want to show you the slide.
And it shows many of the areas of the safety review which are required by the NRC to assure that this design can be constructed and operated while NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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15 protecting human health.
The NRC safety staff will evaluate the design of the CISF and the characteristics of the construction site to ensure that it will be built and operated safely, that it will be protected from manmade and natural hazards and that it will protect public health and safety.
The NRC Staff evaluates the physical security practices to assure that the facility is protected from intrusion, theft and sabotage.
The design of the structure of the facility is evaluated to verify its integrity and ability to withstand accidents. Other areas, such as financial qualification, are reviewed to ensure it meets NRC standards before a facility can be licensed.
The Staff will evaluate the facility, is capable of withstanding external hazards, which may include extreme temperatures, floods, tornados and earthquakes.
So the safety evaluation determines that whether the facility could be constructed and operated to protected human health. You can say that the safety review, in part, evaluated how the environment will impact the design and whether that design is capable NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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16 of providing protection and safely storing spent fuel.
Next slide please. So on the other hand, the parallel environmental review evaluates what the project will do to the environment. The environmental review starts with current environmental conditions as its baseline.
In the EIS we call this the affected environment. Each of the resources you see listed here will be evaluated for impacts to that baseline.
Using the baseline data, the Staff will evaluate the changes or impacts to each of the listed resource areas should the facility be constructed and operated. So that delta, or the change in the resource, is evaluated. And that change is what we call the impact to the resource. And that is what is disclosed in the environmental impact statement.
Next slide please. So, in order to quantify the impacts, the NRC uses definitions for significant levels for environmental impacts. Small, moderate, large.
And you'll see the scale rises based on the destabilizing influence to the resource. These definitions are found in NRC Staff guidance.
Next slide please. Okay, we're going to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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17 go into a short summary of the license application.
Next slide please. The propose project is located halfway between the towns Carlsbad and Hobbs in New Mexico.
Holtec's project includes a storage facility, related buildings and a rail line. So, a portion of the rail line is shown on the diagram on the right. And that is the loop that you see on the east side of the facility.
What you don't see is that the rail line continues off this diagram to the south and then turns to the west and continues for approximately five miles to tie into an existing rail line. The area of the rail line not shown on this diagram is on Bureau of Land Management controlled land.
Holtec is seeking a permit for that action so the Bureau of Land Management, or BLM, is a cooperating agency with the NRC on the development of this EIS.
In addition, New Mexico environment department worked as a cooperating agency with NRC on the resource areas of surface and groundwater.
Next slide please. So, on the left side of this slide is an artist rendering of the proposed NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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18 action. And the project diagram is, again, shown on the right.
The picture on the left and the area circled in red on the diagram, on the right, represents a current licensing action which is to build Phase 1 of a set fuel storage facility.
So if licensed, Holtec would be granted a license to build and store 500 canisters of spent fuel. So the additional support buildings I mentioned, transfer facilities and the rail line, are included in the impacts evaluated for Phase 1.
Holtec has stated its intention to apply for amendments for up to 20 phases. Which are represented by those additional rectangles in black on the diagram.
So at full build out, or all 20 phases, the facility would cover about 330 acres. If Holtec applies for these additional amendments, NRC would perform both a safety and environmental review on them.
Next slide please. So, the proposed project would be an in-ground, low profile design.
And on the right is a similar design used for spent fuel storage to give you perspective.
The proposed project would use what is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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19 called the HI-STORM UMAX system for storage of spent fuel. And the HI-STORM UMAX is Holtec International Storage Module Underground Maximum Catastrophe. Each of these modules holds one canister of spent fuel.
Next slide please. So, to give you some perspective, we're looking again at an artist rendering of Phase 1, or the proposed licensing action.
This would include 500 canisters of spent fuel stored in an underground system using the Umax canisters. On the left, the Umax canister is, there's a cutout of the Umax canister on the left, and you'll see that it's an engineered canister to passively cool and store spent fuel for long periods of time.
It's constructed from stainless steel and has been certified by the NRC for storage of spent fuel at power reactor site.
So this means that the manufacturing and design of the canister is engineered to meet NRC requirements for safety. And those include structural integrity, material integrity and longevity.
The canisters contain spent fuel rods.
And there is no liquid inside the canisters that could leak into the environment.
The thickness, internal characteristics NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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20 are also designed to prevent radioactive materials from escaping under normal and accident scenarios. This is achieved by using redundant welded seals and a robust structural design.
The HI-STORM design, which is being proposed in the current license application, will store Umax canisters for an initial license term of 40 years.
That means that the NRC is currently evaluating the design process of the facility to ensure that the facility meets those requirements.
Okay, next slide please. So, I've added this slide to help clarify with the project. As I mentioned earlier, the proposed action is Phase 1 for 500 canisters of spent fuel.
The Applicant has made it known its intentions to request up to 19 additional phases in the licensing amendment. So, throughout the EIS you'll see those are referred to full build out or Phases 2 through 20.
You'll also find in the EIS that the Staff evaluated all 20 phases in its environmental impact.
And that was at the discretion of the NRC Staff.
So, it's important to understand that the NRC is not licensing all 20 phases right now. The NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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21 decision to evaluate all 20 phases by the NRC Staff was to provide an additional perspective of the environmental impact that could ultimately occur.
So, to kind of clarify the difference between phases and stages, the Staff evaluated the project in stages. So construction, operation and decommissioning. Because each of those stages has a unique environmental impact.
So when appropriate, the Staff evaluated the maximum impact for combined stages for different phases of a project. So, for example, the Staff may have evaluated construction stage for Phase 2 in conjunction with operation stage of Phase 1. Because this would represent the peak impact to the resource.
Okay, next slide please. All right, I just wanted to talk to you a little bit about the scoping comments.
Next slide please. In March 2018 we opened a scoping period and we did hold one webinar and five in-person meetings in areas around New Mexico.
During that time we received 6,665 correspondents and approximately 3,900 unique comments. The Staff put together a scoping report.
And that can be found on the NRC's web page for Holtec.
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22 And the direct link is given to you on the slide.
Next slide please. So, in some of those comments that we received in scoping, you'll see on the left we received quite a few about transportation, location and land use, geology, the volume of material that was expected, both water resources, groundwater, surface water, socioeconomics and external events.
And some of those comments that we've received, we identifies that they were out of scope.
So as you can see from my earlier presentation, that some of those comments that might have been made on flooding, external hazards, subsurface, stability, compatibility of the Umax system, may be out of scope for the environmental review, but our safety reviewers are evaluating those as part of the safety evaluation.
Okay, next slide please. So now I'd just like to talk to you a little bit about the environmental review.
Next slide please. So, Staff evaluated a 40 year licensing term for this application. The spent fuel would be removed before any decommissioning stage would begin.
The Staff impact evaluation characterized the groundwater at the facility and evaluated storm NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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23 water overflow or runoff to nearby playas and lakes.
Next slide please. So, for transportation and accidents, the Staff evaluated traffic and road degradation from workers and construction vehicles during all stages and phases of the project.
Staff evaluated the movement of the entire 20 phases of material, or 10,000 canisters, using conservative representative routes.
Radiological doses and health effects to the public and workers along the route were conservatively estimated and found to be low relative to background radiation and expected cancer, expected baseline cancer risk. Impacts of transportation accidents evaluated doses to first responders, workers and members of the public.
The NRC rules requires spent fuel transportation canisters to withstand severe accident conditions. So an assumption of no release during accidents was used in the Staff analysis.
Previous NRC technical analysis involving spent fuel in canisters support this no release assumption.
So the land use and the location of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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24 facility was also evaluated by the Staff. The location of the facility was proposed by the Applicant, but the Staff evaluated the Applicant's site selection process. Land use was evaluated within six miles of the facility.
Next slide please. The environmental justice impact evaluation evaluated the impacts on human health and the environment using well known guidance from the Council on Environmental Quality, the Federal Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice and NEPA Committee. And also NRC's internal guidance and policy statement.
The region of influence for the analysis included 115 block groups, which are geographic areas that include between 600 and 3,000 people within ten counties that fall completely or partially within a 50 miles radius of the proposed CISF project area.
The socioeconomic impacts were evaluated based on workers, tax revenues and resource availability for the community. Tax revenues and economic growth for the proposed project, and from the additional workers in the area, were evaluated for impacts to public services, schools, housing demands, all based on the, due to the increased population in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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25 the area.
Next slide please. So this slide and the next one will tabulate the results of the environmental review as it's laid out in the draft.
So it summarizes the proposed action, which we are calling here Phase 1. And it separately addresses the additional phases. And here we're calling those, additional phases are Phases 2 through 20.
So as you can see in this slide, most of the impacts are small for both the proposed action and the additional phases. Except for ecology.
And if we'll go on to the next slide, please, Kellee, here are the additional resource areas.
And again, most of these impacts are small. You'll see that there is a moderate in the waste management resource area.
Okay, move on. Next slide, Kellee. So here we have the information resources. The draft environmental impact statement is available at this direct link.
If you would like a summary of the environmental impact statement, the Staff's analysis, you can look at the reader's guide first. It's about NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 20 pages.
It's also in Spanish. So if you'd like a Spanish language version it's available.
And all of the other application materials, including information from our meetings, our transcripts, our slides in Spanish and in the Navajo language, Dine, are available at the NRC's project website. Which is listed there.
Okay, next slide please. So, how to comment. Well, we're going to take your comments here today. And like Chip said, we have a court reporter on the phone. So we'll be transcribing your comments today.
You can also go online to regulations.gov and search for NRC-2018-0052. That's the docket ID.
And then you can leave a comment there.
You can mail comments to our office administration. And the easiest way may be to email comments to holtec-CISFEIS@nrc.gov.
And all comments should be submitted to the NRC by one of those methods, by September 22nd, 2020.
So, with that, I guess I'm going to turn it back over to Chip, and then we'll skip forward.
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27 Thanks.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you very much, Jill. And before we go to hear the comments, we're going to go back to Kevin Coyne for a short message.
And as I said, Kevin is the deputy director of the division. Kevin.
MR. COYNE: Thanks, Chip. Before we begin the commenting portion of today's meeting I want to ask that you direct your comments to the Holtec interim storage facility project and the draft environmental impact statement and refrain from any personal attacks on our staff or other participants in this meeting.
This is a reminder, the NRC Staff are career civil servants that have worked diligently on the project to ensure that the environmental impacts are properly disclosed.
While you may not agree with the draft report or have different perspectives, we respect your views and we want to get your input on the evaluation and the draft environmental impact statement. So let's have a polite and productive meeting.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you very much, Kevin.
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28 And, Madison, we're ready to hear from the public, can you queue them up for us please?
THE OPERATOR: Yes, absolutely. We will now begin the question and comment session. If you would like to ask a question, please press *1, unmute your phone and record your name clearly. If you happened to need to withdrawal your question, please dial *2.
Again, to ask a question please dial *1.
And we'll take a few moments for the first question to come through. All right, our first question comes from Cynthia Wheeler. Cynthia, your line is open.
MS. WHEELER: Hello, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, we can, Cynthia.
MS. WHEELER: Okay. This is Cynthia Wheeler. My name is Cynthia Wheeler. I'm from Santa Fe and Roswell.
And I'm making these comments under protest because we can't verify that the NRC decision makers are receiving them. To that point, when I click on the link to today's Webex event, that is for the 25th of August, it says that the event has passed.
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29 transcripts for July 9th. Although you said that the transcripts would be available on the cites.
So, to be relevant, these hearings must be conducted in person, at site locations in New Mexico as the NRC promised. It was mentioned at the beginning of this session by Chip that because of a public health emergency we can't have those five meetings at various sites, and my point is, yes, we can't because of the public health emergency therefore we need to wait until we can and the emergency is over.
These hearings must extend the comment period, I just said that, when it's safe to have mass gatherings. And the hearings must include New Mexico's congressional delegation. Or their staff, so they can verify the validity of the hearing format.
There is no compelling reason, except to accommodate Holtec, for these meetings to be rushed during the pandemic. The NRC says that waste can be safely stored at the reactor sites for 120 years.
There are no contracts with waste generators or railroads that Holtec must honor.
I opposed the Holtec plan, as do the Governor of New Mexico, the Governors of 20 tribal nations and the large majority of New Mexicans.
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30 With these blind online meetings it's apparent that you have no interest in understanding our concern. Every state in the nation has clearly said no to hosting a storage site for this waste. The people of New Mexico also say no.
NRC exists to predict that you protect the people and the environment. This comes from your mission statement on your website.
And it does not have the public's permission to use the public health emergency as an excuse to cancel in-person meetings with the public.
Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you very much, Cynthia. And Cynthia, I'm going to have Jill come on to address a couple of comments you made at the beginning about the July 9th transcript and the other comment. Jill, go ahead.
MS. CAVERLY: Yes. Cynthia, actually, Kellee, if you could go up one slide please.
So, Cynthia, if you go to the NRC's application website, which is https://www.nrc.gov/waste/spent-fuel-storage/cis/ho ltec-international.html, that website has the July 9th transcripts. It has the June 23rd transcripts. And NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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31 that's where the transcripts from last week will be posted as soon as they're finalized. Probably tomorrow or the next day.
You need to scroll all the way down to the bottom. It's on that page but you need to keep going all the way down to the bottom. And those transcripts are, it says transcripts. Just click on that and it will open up a transcript page for you.
MS. WHEELER: Can you still hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, we can hear you.
MS. WHEELER: Okay. Because what I said at the beginning is I can't access the Webex webinar page. It says, the events have passed.
MS. CAVERLY: Okay. You might be trying the Webex information for August 20th.
MS. WHEELER: No, ma'am, I was very careful about that. I didn't want to say it if I hadn't made a mistake. I did not make a mistake, I am clicking the one for August 25th.
MS. CAVERLY: Okay. Just a second.
Kellee, could you go back to the opening slide so we can read out the information. Kellee, thank you.
So, ma'am, you need to go to https://usnrc.webex.com. And then you need to type NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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32 in the event number 199 973 2733.
MS. WHEELER: And where do I put that, because it doesn't let me get past events --
MR. CUADRADO: Okay. I think what may be happening is you may be clicking a link that directs you to the previous direct link.
It's important that on your browser you only enter usnrc.webex.com and then you press enter.
That's very important. You don't want any additional information after the .com.
Because that will take you to the main page for NRC. And what you'll see is a promote to what is the event number. And that event number, that prompt right there, that icon right there, is where you'll enter the event number, which is 199 973 2733.
MS. WHEELER: Okay. I'm not sure why then, how many events address, well, it took me right to that. Exactly the same one that you said. But it didn't give me access --
MR. CUADRADO: Okay.
MS. WHEELER: -- to webex.com and ending there. That's where I ended.
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33 information after the .com.
MS. WHEELER: I did.
MR. CUADRADO: And that will prompt --
okay.
MS. WHEELER: I did. And I'm still getting this page that directs me to a previous event.
It says, events have passed. Although the instructions from the instruction page said I have, give me exactly what you're saying to put in. Maybe it's me.
MS. CAVERLY: Perhaps you need to clear your browser. I think that might be because we have 47 participants, so --
MS. WHEELER: Okay.
MS. CAVERLY: -- I think maybe your browser may be stopping you from, could you clear your browser and try again?
MS. WHEELER: I will. Thank you. Go ahead and take the next comment please.
MS. CAVERLY: Okay.
MR. CAMERON: Cynthia, we apologize for any difficulties you're having. And keep trying to see if you can get on and then we'll try to revisit you later on and see if you had success with that.
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34 So thank you.
We will go to --
MS. CAVERLY: Oh, let me add. Cynthia, if you need to contact me you can email me at jill.caverly@nrc.gov. And I'm watching my email right now, so if you need to get in touch with me I can, I'll respond.
MR. CAMERON: Okay.
MS. WHEELER: Thank you, Jill.
MS. CAVERLY: You're welcome.
MR. CAMERON: And, Madison, who is next?
THE OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Robert Gould. Robert, your line is open.
MR. GOULD: Can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes.
MR. GOULD: You can hear me?
MR. CAMERON: We can hear you.
MR. GOULD: Okay. I'm sorry, I was just getting my phone in order.
My name is Robert Gould, M.D. I'm a physician in the San Francisco Bay area and I'm president of the San Francisco Bay Chapter Physicians for Social Responsibility. I'm also on the National Board of Physicians for Social Responsibility.
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35 Just for information purposes as well, I'm an associate adjunct profession within the program on reproductive health and the environment within the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at the UCSF School of Medicine.
So, I am largely speaking on behalf of physicians for social responsibility. And first off, want to echo what the previous speaker spoke to the fact of myself supporting, making any of my testimony under protest.
We don't know if the NRC decision makers are receiving all of the comments from people. And we also think that these hearings to be most relevant, to really drawn on the local knowledge of people within New Mexico, that these hearings should be conducted in person, as in New Mexico, as the NRC initially promised.
And because of the particular emerging impacts of COVID, that should require many people to shelter in place for the basis of their health, that we think that the comment period needs to be extended until our, the current public health emergency has ended and it is indeed safe to have mass gatherings to people can really show up and be able to register NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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36 their concerns.
We think that these meetings, again, supported as many other people have spoken to, either today or prior hearings that this needs to include the New Mexico's congressional delegation staff so they can also verify the validity of the format.
I would also say that in addition to being able to facilitate maximum input from people in New Mexico, there is also a need to be able to provide testimony from many of the communities who are along the proposed transportation routes because they could be impacted with potential accidents, radiation exposures anywhere along the line, from where these, the way it's generated to the area in which they're intended for storage.
One of the issues that I have in noticed in reading through the report, and what was considered within the domain of the NRC's concerns, was an exclusion of consideration about more fundamental and basic issues of nuclear power. Whether there is alternatives to nuclear power.
We are certainly seeing in the present environment that the cost of alternative fuel could be of concern, such as global climate change or a common NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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37 ground. We don't want these type, the other type of storage of nuclear waste to be able to open up a potential error increasing the reliance on nuclear power by dumping the waste that will last for tens of thousands of years, out of sight of most people and compounding the issues for New Mexico residents who've already been exposed to nuclear waste from a variety of atomic tests and other operations that expose those communities.
As such, and we will contend the NRC conclusion that nuclear waste can be safely stored at the sites for 120 years. This, like many other projections for nuclear waste storage, are not based on any realistic scenarios in my view of can happen over time.
Particularly, they need to be concerned about the still unknown impacts of rapidly increasing global warming that need to be addressed. In contrast to such assurances, these issues will include the potential corrosion of casks and associated contamination of playas and aquifers in the area that need to be considered all the time in terms of what that represents in the public health of the community.
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38 New Mexico for being burdened by these plans. We join with those who are posing this plan, including the Governor of New Mexico, those who govern the 20 tribal nations, the position of the large majority of New Mexicans.
So we are opposed to this plan and want to register that with these strong concerns. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, Dr. Gould, for those comments. Thank you very much.
And, Madison, can we have the next speaker.
THE OPERATOR: Our next speaker is Jonathan Block. Jonathan, your line is open.
MR. BLOCK: Yes. It's Jonathan Block, J-O-N-A-T-H-A-N, B-L-O-C-K, of Santa Fe, New Mexico.
And I'm on the line today, August 25th, 2020, to make comments concerning U.S. NRC's draft EIS, the way Holtec proposed licenses for high-level waste storage facility near Carlsbad, New Mexico.
And I address the following to the Commission and its delegated staff in this matter.
I have some specific comments about deficiencies in the draft NEPA EIS, but first I want to make a couple of objections.
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39 Actually, three objections of what I consider to be violations of law. The National Environmental Policy Act, statute council on environmental equality regulations. And binding federal court decisions.
And these are as follows. One, all of these meetings are supposed to be conducted in New Mexico, the affected state.
There is no pandemic exception in the laws, regulations or court decisions affecting application of NEPA. Moreover, there is no rush to take this matter forward without adequate opportunities for public participation, such as law and regulations require.
Therefore two, under the current pandemic circumstances, where the NRC is not holding public state location meetings, the NRC must, under law, extend the comment period for a reasonable time after the public health emergency is over to allow for the proper level of participation. So that people may participate in a meaningful manner, as has been described in court decisions interpreting NEPA.
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40 representatives to such meetings.
This is to assure the proper form of the meetings and that congressional members who represent this state are adequately informed of what's going on.
They need to be participating in this.
Now, as for my objections to deficiencies in the draft EIS for the Holtec license, I contend that the NRC has failed to make an assessment of one of the most likely probabilities connected with this license.
The obvious consequence of granting the license at issue is that there is a considerable likelihood the site will take much of the nuclear reactor waste from around the United States and place it in casks for 120 years or more.
Given that the NRC has only found a safe storage duration, it's more the proposed manner of a reactor waste storage of 120 years, this is not an adequate situation. In other words, a situation is being created where it is likely that the waste storage will exceed the period that the NRC has found to be safe.
Even if the NRC doesn't consider that to be a high-level likelihood, which I happen to. I think that under the existing regulations of NEPA, which I'll NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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41 get to in a minute, there is a general requirement for making this kind of consideration because it's within the realm of a reasonable possibility.
Now, at Yucca Mountain it was required that there be at least a 10,000 year cask qualification.
So in the event that this waste ends up sitting at this site for longer than the currently recognized 120 year safe period for such cask storage, there may be consequences.
Consequences to occupational public health and safety of a breached cask. Cask failure, accidents moving the cask, the material in the cask, from one place to another. And maybe these will have to be done under an emergency situation.
But clearly, once the expense has been undertaken to move nuclear reactor waste from all over the country without considering whether that's a safe issue or not, once that expense has been undergone it is highly improbable it will ever leave the site.
Therefore the NRC needs to undertake the same level of analysis, including occupational public health and safety consequences of a breach, as was undertaken to evaluate the consequences of storage at Yucca Mountain.
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42 The NRC, the New Mexico site is very likely is very likely to become a de facto storage site. And that was not contemplated under existing federal law controlling nuclear reactor waste storage and disposal.
So that's an underlying violation beyond the inadequacy of the EIS for failure to make the proper consideration of the issue I've raised. The violation of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act for even going down the road of creating a de facto high-level storage facility, other than Yucca Mountain, is something that is outside what the law contemplated.
So what you have here is, both of the inadequate EIS, violation of NEPA, and by going forward with the license at all. You're just ignoring the congressional words expressed in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and related laws.
So, I think that the NRC can't even met its NEPA requirement until, that is, to contemplate reasonably foreseeable consequences of these serious of licenses without doing it within the framework of a revised Nuclear Waste Policy Act, which doesn't exist. And therefore at the direction if Congress funded the act.
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43 So all activities for this application, prior to such a situation coming into existence, or the legal under both NEPA, Nuclear Waste Policy Act, and the subsequent related laws that modify the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.
I want to thank you for the opportunity to make this comment under protest of the violations of law I described earlier. Those three problems.
And just a quick hello to you, Chip, it's been a long time. Now you all take care.
MR. CAMERON: It has. And very articulate, Jonathan. Thank you for those comments.
And one of my colleagues here, Jose, wants to talk about a procedural issue to you.
MR. CUADRADO: Yes. Yes, thank you.
Okay, so we received a couple of comments related to the issue that our first speaker spoke about. I think we found the issue.
What happens is, many of you are using the Listserv email that we sent to you, that each one of them contained a link to the specific NRC web address.
But we just realized that each one of these links don't direct you to just a usnrc.webex.com.
You are correct that each one of them NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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44 directs, inadvertently directs you to the first webinar that we held on August 20th. So that was an oversight on our behalf and we seriously apologize for the inconvenience.
So, the way to address this issue is, instead of clicking on that link, what I will like for you to do is just to type of the address. Which is https://usnrc.webex.com and pressing enter without clicking on the link.
And that will direct you to the NRC Webex landing page where you can actually enter the event number, the event password. And that should bring you to the Webex, the live Webex that we are holding right now.
In addition to that, the page where Jill described earlier, the Holtec NRC web page, also contains copies of the same slides that we are showing on Webex. So you don't have to log into Webex to follow the presentations or look at what we spoke about, you can also look at those from our NRC web page for the time.
So once again, we're really sorry for the inconvenience. What we're going to do is tomorrow we will probably be sending a revised Listserv email with NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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45 the correct links for each one of the upcoming webinars.
The one tomorrow and the one next week on September 2nd.
And hopefully that will fix the issue.
Once again, we apologize for the inconvenience.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, Jose, for that clarification. We hope that all of you out there will be able to get to the Webex slides. As Jose said, there is another mechanism for that. Thanks, Jose.
Madison, who is next?
THE OPERATOR: Our next question comes from Jan Boudart. Jan, your line is open.
MS. BOUDART: Thank you very much. My name is Jan Boudart and I'm from Chicago Nuclear Energy Information Service. And as the previous questioners have said, I'm making these comments under protest because we can't verify that the NRC decision makers are receiving them.
And also, there is no hurry to conduct these meetings. It's really amazing how much time it takes to setup a CIS and transfer, how many casks, 10,000, maybe a 1,000 per year. That will take at least ten years or maybe 20 or 30 years to get the cask to the CIS, if it's ever actually created.
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46 And yet you want to rush these meetings up when we're in the middle of a pandemic, which will end, and the meetings then could be held according to law. Where people could come to the meeting, see one another, see the officials, the elected officials and the appointed officials at the meeting, which is a much more sensible way to conduct the meeting.
So, you know, like everybody said, we want we want to sit in New Mexico's congressional delegation here because it's really obvious that the congressional delegations don't understand these problems thoroughly. They have much on their minds. And this is an issue that should be, they should be very concerned about educating themselves on these issues.
We spend, really in the anti-nuclear community, spend a lot of money and time trying to educate our congressional delegations and make them understand the issue. And for them to come to these meetings would be a shortcut where they could get this information firsthand.
And I didn't have any trouble getting into the meeting, and I think it's because I cut and pasted the website. My only problem is that I have to re-register every time I come to a meeting.
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47 I think I'm already registered, but then every time I go into the website, the Webex website, they demand that I re-register. It's a wrinkle but it's not nothing that's very difficult to overcome.
My second, and then I have a comment about, the people at the NRC, when they come on, they're much harder to hear than we are. I mean, I heard Cynthia Wheeler very clearly and Mr. Block, Dr. Block, and all the other questioners, I hear them very well. But then when the NRC Commenters come on I can barely hear them.
And then I have a third comment. And that is, all the time that the NRC spends considering solutions to the storage of spent fuel and that the DOE spends considering solutions to the storage of spent fuel and the billions of dollars that they spent on this problem, and they ignore the nuclear, the anti-nuclear community who have also spent a great deal of time and have developed a solution to spent fuel called hardened onsite storage.
I do not see the NRC considering and going into the work that has been done by us and our nuclear engineers and our lawyers to create best practices for the storage of spent fuel. That is, the shorthand to it is HOSS, which means Hardened Onsite Storage.
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48 This is a solution to the storage of spent fuel that should be seriously considered by the Department of Energy and by the Nuclear, NRC, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. These things should be deeply studied and considered by these agencies.
But I see no sign of that.
And so, those are my comments. Also, I am well aware of Donna Gilmore's objections to the Holtec cask, et cetera, et cetera, which all that stuff I'm sure you're familiar with. But maybe the congressional delegations are not and they should be here.
Thank you very much for listening to me.
And I do appreciate what you're trying to do, but I do think that we should fall back, take more time, do this right and have human beings in the same room, looking at each other and talking to each other about these problems.
And I mean, human beings that are not necessarily elected officials, or, yes, the elected officials should be there, but I'm talking about employees of the DOE and employees of NRC. And I will try to stop talking. Thank you so much for listening to me. I'm done.
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49 MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you. Thank you, Jan. And we'll try to speak up and speak more closely into the microphones.
And we did have Donna Gilmore commenting at one of the previous meetings, so her comments are on the transcript. I don't know if she filed any written comments yet. But she made her views clear to the NRC. So, thank you, Jan.
Madison, who is next?
THE OPERATOR: Yes. Yes. Our next question comes from Ed Hughes. Ed, your line is open.
MR. HUGHES: Hello, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, we can.
MR. HUGHES: All right. I wanted to make sure I unmuted. I just first of all want to say how strongly I agree with Jonathan from Santa Fe. Very articulate, very much concur with his remarks.
Secondly, I had the same difficulty as Cynthia Wheeler signing on. We used the NRC admin resource, we'd assumed that would have been correct.
Apologies are fine, but it just underscores the difficulty and the shortcomings of having these webinars and not having face-to-face meetings.
The speaker can fail on a face-to-face NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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50 meeting, but you can still communicate, and that's not the case in this. So, I think this just underscores the difficulty.
I just had -- I commented on the 20th, I have a couple of comments to follow up with that. And one of them is, on the audio part of the presentation this afternoon, I heard that the only appropriate to talk about the environment and not the safety, and trying to separate those two things is absolutely ridiculous in my mind, because the Environmental Impact Statement says normal operating, no possibility of accident.
And we know, humanly speaking, that that is highly improbable. It's not if an accident happens, it's when it happens and where. And so, to say, to only evaluate for normal operation is completely unacceptable.
And as far as safety concerns go and the environmental impact, there is a report, it's called a gap report, others may be speaking about this, it's to guide DOE R&D in supporting extended storage, transportation, et cetera, issued by Sandia.
And in that, this has to do with welded canister and atmospheric corrosion, which is an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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51 environmental issue, and it talks about, there's been work in this area, but this does not -- a technical area that is not amenable to time accelerated types of tests.
In other words, what you're evaluating here are canisters that have not even been in function long enough or evaluated long enough to know whether they'll be safe, to know what their environmental impact is, but yet, we're pushing forward to saying it's going to be safe to store.
In fact, there is a background on high-burnup spent fuel issued by the NRC, this is on your website.
There's a comment of what the confirmatory research is being done, and it says in here that the primary focus of research today is to get more data to support the continued safety of dry storage systems for high-burnup spent fuel beyond the initial 20-year storage term.
The research is designed to ensure that the existing data is accurate as the fuel gets older.
Results are expected to confirm that the fuel remains safe for transport, even after extended storage.
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52 regardless of what the data says, that it will support not only transport, but extended storage. That is not a scientific approach to this problem. A scientific approach would be saying, is this going to be safe for extended storage, do we have the data? And you do not have the data.
One other comment, and this has to do with the fuel rods themselves. There was a report done by the Argonne scientists on high-burnup fuels, this was done to the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board evaluation of the technical basis for extended dry storage and transportation of used nuclear fuel, December 2010.
As far as -- and they show that there is a degradation of fuel rods, structurally and chemically, for the high-burnup fuels, which most of them are operating these days.
So, here we are saying that an environmental impact study of untested casks holding fuel rods, mechanical structures, that have been untested and have shown to have problems with extended storage and with high burnup, we're saying that this is going to be environmentally safe. I think that is completely wrong, you do not have the data to support NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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53 that.
I think also, again, I can't emphasize enough that having these webinars only in place of face-to-face meetings is completely disenfranchising New Mexicans, I believe is disrespectful and I believe it's unethical.
And that's not a personal attack to anyone on this call, but it is a view that I think the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the decisions it has made are wrong. Thank you very much.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, again, Ed. And I think people see your point about the environmental versus safety and one of the things that we wanted to make sure of is that we had a member of the technical staff, the project manager for the Atomic Energy Act Analysis, Jose Cuadrado is here to listen, to make sure that nothing that's said by any of you lot there is overlooked in the safety review. But thank you for bringing that up.
And who do we have next, Madison?
OPERATOR: Next, we have Patrice Sutton.
Patrice, your line is open.
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54 Social Responsibility, and I'm an environmental health research scientist and a public health professional with decades of experience studying the impact of our environment on our health, including relevant to exposures from radioactive and toxic waste.
And I'm also with the University of California San Francisco Program on Reproductive Health and the Environment. But I'm speaking today in my role as the chair of the San Francisco Bay Physicians for Social Responsibility Environmental Health Committee.
So, as with the previous speakers, I'm making my comments under protest, because we can't verify the NRC decision-makers are receiving them and as all the previous speakers have commented on, there may be also ethical, legal, many other reasons that these meetings should not be held in this format.
The NRC presentation that was just summarized had a long list of public health concerns, and the conclusion that all of the impacts will be small, which is apparently defined as environmental effects are not detectable or so minor that they will neither destabilize nor noticeably alter any important attribute of the resource. The resource being, of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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55 course, the air, water, land, and people that are living around this facility.
It really sounds like a Holiday Inn would have move of an impact. This is really simply not credible, scientifically, for long-lived highly toxic nuclear waste over periods of time that are really unimaginable.
So, I just want to say, I stand in solidarity with the communities that will bear a disproportionate effect on their health and harm from the Holtec plan, which I strongly oppose.
And not only do I oppose the Holtec plan, the governor of New Mexico, the governors of 20 tribal nations, and the large majority of New Mexicans do, and I really am here today to speak in solidarity of their concerns as a public health professional.
To be relevant and likely legal, based on the important testimony that we just heard, these hearings must be conducted in-person at site locations in New Mexico, as the NRC promised.
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56 can verify the validity of the hearing format.
I really don't know how long the pandemic will last, but compared to the storage of nuclear waste, it's going to be over in a blink of an eye. And rushing forward with these decisions that not only excludes legally required public hearings with the directly affected community, they exclude congressional members, but moreover, your decisions are going to impact the lives of people in future generations that we will never. It's really simply unconscionable.
We do need to find the best of all these terrible options we have for storing the waste created from the plague of nuclear power, but there's no compelling reason, except to accommodate Holtec, for these meetings to be rushed during the pandemic.
These blind online meetings send a signal that you have no interest in understanding our concerns. Every state in the nation has clearly said no to hosting a storage site for the waste and the people of New Mexico also say no.
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57 problem of nuclear waste containment. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Patrice. And, Madison, can you put our next commenter on, please?
OPERATOR: Yes. Next is Tony Aarons.
Tony, your line is open.
MS. ARENDS: Hi, good afternoon, my name is Joni, J-O-N-I, Arends, A-R-E-N-D-S. I'm a cofounder and executive director of Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety. I make my comment under protest.
I'm embarrassed, I'm totally embarrassed because CCNS has sent out notice after notice after notice to our members and other concerned citizens about these webinars. We have provided the information provided by the NRC. I'm receiving emails from people saying they can't get on.
This process is disenfranchising New Mexicans and concerned citizens around the world to participate in this process. This hearing, this public meeting right now needs to stop due to the lack of proper notice.
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58 notices.
Further, the comment period needs to be extended until this pandemic is over. And it should not end for six months, until six months after the pandemic is over.
The fact that today's public meeting did not provide proper notice with the proper correct information about how to participate is retraumatizing New Mexicans about this proposed storage.
We reiterate our request that this public meeting be stopped now, because proper notice was not provided to the public. Again, CCNS protests this meeting today.
We may provide comments another day, but the retraumatization by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission by not providing proper and correct notice is unacceptable. It's unacceptable. So, please stop this meeting now. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Joni, and we're sorry that there was a glitch. There is another meeting tomorrow, there's another meeting next week, and we've done several others. So, hopefully, no one was deprived an opportunity to comment. But thank you for your comments. And, Madison, who is next?
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59 OPERATOR: Yes, Greg Rase is next. Greg, your line is open.
MR. RASE: Good afternoon. My name is Greg Rase, I'm very honored to be in this meeting. It seems to me there's a lot of people who are a lot smaller than I am and a lot more informed.
But I'm just a citizen who lives probably closer than anybody on this call to the proposed Holtec site, I'm probably within 70 miles. And I was very
-- I'm just tickled to be here, because it's important that citizens get involved.
I'm very pleased to see (telephonic interference) New Mexico and you're only 40 miles away from the site and go out and visit where it's going to be, you'd probably (telephonic interference) --
MR. CAMERON: Greg, you keep -- you're fading in and out, I don't know why that is, but that's the second --
MR. RASE: Can you hear me now?
MR. CAMERON: -- time that you --
MR. RASE: Is it better?
MR. CAMERON: Yes. Yes, yes, go ahead.
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60 meeting in light of the pandemic.
It's good that we have -- our government is moving forward with their job and not stalled or stopped because we have problems. To me, it speaks well of you that you have decided to move forward.
Congress meets with Zoom, my kids go to school in Zoom, I go to my doctor with Zoom, it seems to me that continuing doing business with something of this import is probably the right thing to do, to go ahead and move forward.
It seems to me that the objections, let's stop the meeting, stop the meeting, hold the meeting, is simply a way to slow things down. I understand it's a good tactic, but I don't know why in-face meetings are so important for this if my kid can't go to school and get, well, my grandkid, and get an in-face meeting with the teacher. So, I think is -- I commend you for continuing forward.
Our congressional district -- I'm a citizen in New Mexico, I'm interested in this issue, and I found out about this, I knew about it. If our congressional delegation cannot, if their staffs who are paid to do this don't have the initiative to follow it and to attend the meeting, I think that's on them, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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61 not on you.
And I would encourage the folks here who have brought up that we need to have our congressional delegation call them and ask them to attend the next meeting.
You probably won't get through because I've called my two senators and my congresswoman about this and I've left messages and no one has ever returned to me, and you can't -- all you get is, because of the pandemic, we're working from home. So, that's good.
I support this project because we have, in New Mexico, a governor and a legislature that is hellbent on doing away with all fossil fuels. That may be a noble goal, but that's a noble goal when we have to have renewables that are there and we can rely on.
I live in fear of being in New Mexico at 105 degrees heat, those in San Francisco probably wouldn't understand that, and having rolling blackouts like you have in California, going five hours or five days without electricity because we don't have a reliable source.
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62 and nuclear power is the most reliable of that. And we have to have, as a country, a place to store the spent fuel.
I understand the safety of it, I don't understand everything that goes into it, but I know it has to be safe. I would trust that the government would do that.
And I don't want to live in New Mexico next August or August five years from now with 15 straight days of above 100 degree weather and not have electricity because New Mexico did not do its part to provide a reliable source of fuel.
That is my comments, appreciate you letting me get on today, I've learned a lot. And I would like to welcome all those folks who are not from New Mexico to come down and visit us, we'd love to have you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you. Thank you very much for that comment, Greg. Thank you.
Madison, who do we have next?
OPERATOR: Yes, Linda Lewison is next.
Linda, your line is open.
MS. LEWISON: Hi, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes.
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63 MS. LEWISON: Hi, this is Linda Lewison.
I'm with the Sierra Club Nuclear Free Campaign and with Nuclear Energy Information Service, which is an almost 40-year watchdog on the nuclear industry in Illinois.
I want to make a few comments today. First of all, I also couldn't get in and there was the same problem with the link that other people mentioned, and I want to join in those comments. It just makes the point that we need to be meeting in-person, and especially to wait for after COVID and have hearings that would include the congressional delegation from New Mexico as well.
As the NRC has said, the radioactive waste can be safely stored onsite for 120 years, so we oppose the plan to move it anywhere else. It would just be the same amount of safety and the risks and dangers of transportation are too great. So, we, as does Sierra Club policy, oppose the plan.
I also have one other process issue to mention before I get to the subject matter hearing issues, and that is that the four-minute limit on the public who pays the bills for our government agencies is really not acceptable.
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64 These kinds of meetings should be open-ended. If you had to stay here all night, it really wouldn't matter. This issue is too important to be limited and too complex to be limited to these four-minute bits.
In terms of the real subject matter issues, I just want to, I first want to quote that Dr. Kris Singh, who is the president of Holtec, has said himself that, in public, that these casks and canisters are not safe for transport.
And that, as someone else has already mentioned, that the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board has also said that the technologies are not in place and won't be in place for this kind of movement to happen.
I also want to mention that Holtec is being investigated for criminal activities in three states, and I will cite them in detail in my written comments.
So, we are already dealing with a compromised and corrupted process.
We are concerned about a conflict of interest from the NRC, an agency that gets its income partly from fees from entities like Holtec, and we have to ask, what is the, quote, environmental impact of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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65 doing business with the applicant Holtec itself, who is under investigation in the first place?
There is a serious lack of trust and integrity that continues to put the public and the environment at extreme risk.
In closing, I want to quote the former Senator Bingaman from New Mexico, who said he refused to endorse any kind of centralized interim storage plan at all because, according to federal law, cannot have any arrangement like this without having it having a provision for a permanent repository in place, not just a plan, but in place in the first place prior to any other plans being put forward.
So, as other people previously have mentioned, this endeavor is illegal from the get-go.
Thank you very much.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, Linda. And I just want to remind everybody who is coming on to speak that we haven't been following a four-minute rule today and people have been going on for six or seven minutes, which is fine. But I don't want people to feel constrained by four minutes. But thank you for MS. LEWISON: Thank you very much for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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66 clarifying that, I appreciate that.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thanks again, Linda.
And, Madison, who are we going to now?
OPERATOR: Yes, next we have Kevin Kamps.
Kevin, your line is open.
MR. KAMPS: Hello, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, Kevin.
MR. KAMPS: Great, thank you. My name is Kevin Kamps and I serve as radioactive waste specialist at Beyond Nuclear, and I also serve on the board of directors of Don't Waste Michigan.
And under the legal counsel for Don't Waste Michigan, Terry Lodge, an attorney based in Toledo, Ohio, we as Don't Waste Michigan officially request that this meeting be renoticed and rescheduled in the future, and actually, that the August 20 meeting as well be renoticed and rescheduled in the future, because of the glitch that's been talked about, that there were incorrect notices published, incorrect links to documents.
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67 and rescheduled.
And of course, given the timing, that's going to require a significant extension of this public comment period.
And I would like to also say, as others have, that I am taking part today under protest, for all the reasons listed. And one that I would like to add was just mentioned by Linda Lewison of NEIS, and that's the fact that this entire proceeding from the start, years ago, has been illegal under the terms of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as amended.
And Beyond Nuclear and several other legal interveners have raised that legal objection throughout this entire several year process. So, that's certainly a part of our participation under protest.
So, in terms of substance comments today, I would like to start, because I know that different departments at the NRC don't talk to each other, which is kind of hard to get your head around, in terms of a good faith effort of taking a hard look under the National Environmental Policy Act, wouldn't be too hard for one area of NRC to look at the documentation from another, I wouldn't think.
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68 But what I'm going to do is read short summaries of the more than 40 contentions, four-zero contentions that have been filed in the licensing proceeding related to this, that was discussed during the NRC slides earlier.
These are contentions that opponents to this project have raised in the licensing proceeding. I would add that they were all rejected in rapid fire succession by the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, which is known to do such things, just maybe not in such an extreme fashion as they have done in this proceeding.
But it's all subject matter area that should be taken very seriously and given a hard look by the NRC staff in this draft Environmental Impact Statement. And I think it's fair to say that that has not taken place.
So, here's the list. It's labeled from the letter A to the letter T, so that's 20 different subject matter areas that were raised as contentions.
And here goes.
So, letter A, impacts on Native American and other historic and prehistoric properties on the site.
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69 Letter B, insufficient assurances of financing for construction, operation, and decommissioning.
Letter C, underestimation of so-called low level radioactive waste volumes that would be generated.
Letter D, improper reliance on NRC Generic Environmental Impact Statement presumptions under the continued storage rule.
Letter E, natural gas fracking and potash mining beneath the site.
Letter F, cumulative risks of future reprocessing, that is, plutonium extraction.
Letter G, the public health threat from the Start Clean Stay Clean philosophy and the risks of shipping damaged, leaking, or contaminated casks back to the atomic reactor of origin.
And I would just give one example of that, Maine Yankee. I believe it's 2,500 miles one way from Maine Yankee to the Holtec site. That would be a 5,000-mile return trip and it's incredible that that Start Clean Stay Clean philosophy, what we refer to as return to sender is still on the books in this proceeding.
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70 Letter H, incomplete and inadequate disclosure of transportation routes, road, rail, and waterway, and inadequate analyses of the substantial risks of these shipments through most states over many decades.
Letter I, inconsistent predicted links for so-called interim storage period from 40 years to 100 years to 120 years or even 300 years, time frames that could dangerously exceed the design and service life of these containers.
Letter J, unmet safety and security risk analyses for the scale of transportation and storage proposed.
Letter K, troubling geological formations and conditions beneath the site.
Letter L, no compelling purpose and need for the CISF.
Letter M, risk of the CISF becoming a de facto permanent surface storage parking lot dump.
Letter N, Holtec's improper reliance on the Blue Ribbon Commission for America's Nuclear Futures 2012 Final Report.
Letter O, earthquake risks at the site.
Letter P, impacts on endangered and NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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71 threatened species, such as the dune sagebrush lizard and the lesser prairie chicken.
Letter Q, questionable credibility of subcontractors used in the preparation of the license application reflected in the poor quality of the submitted documents and charges of major fraud against the company, Tetra Tech, related to a massive radioactive contamination incident in San Francisco, California.
Letter R, thermal concerns associated with corrosion of the containers.
Letter S, groundwater and brine concerns at the site, including threats of radioactive contamination reaching area drinking and irrigation water aquifers downstream.
And I would add that the New Mexico State Environment Department has provided NRC with significant information about surface and groundwater impacts that has largely to entirely been ignored by the NRC in this draft EIS.
And finally, Letter T, the risks of high-burnup irradiated nuclear fuel degradation and failure.
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72 has already been raised to the NRC and it has been inadequately dealt with or included or addressed in this draft EIS. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Kevin, as always, new information for the NRC. Madison, who's next?
OPERATOR: Next, we have John Heaton.
John, your line is open.
MR. HEATON: Thank you very much. This is John Heaton and I am a board member of the Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance. And I would like to address a number of comments that have been made about, pleas and protests about an unjust hearing.
And doing the last two, and including these, we've heard pleas and protests of an unjust hearing process, due to the inability of those without computers, phones, or internet having their due rights being violated by having virtual hearings.
These same people also leaned on our senators to write a letter to the NRC asking them to pause the hearings until they could be held face-to-face as public hearings after the COVID threat is removed via vaccine.
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73 and you think things aren't going well, what is the next course of action? It's delay, delay, delay.
We've watched this movie hundreds of times. Let me remind everyone of several facts that refute these pleas.
During the scoping hearings, the same people from Gallup, Albuquerque, and the Santa Fe area seemed to have no problem traveling 300 miles to speak in Carlsbad, Hobbs, and Roswell. And in fact, that intrusion took up time that crowded out our own local people from speaking.
It was the same people speaking over and over again at each location, just as it is in these hearings, saying the same thing.
In-person hearings are made into a circus by those opposing the project, and we have plenty of evidence showing that, with blow-ups, t-shirts, songs, chants, poetry, booing, clapping, jeering, and many other demonstrations that detract from the purpose and seriousness of the hearings.
These are not political rallies, they are serious fact-finding hearings, and even though in the Gallup hearing there were many in the room that may have traveled significant distance to be there.
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74 The point is, if there's a desire to speak at one of the six hearing webinars, there is no doubt that people motivated to speak could avail themselves of a library, chapter house, or a friend with a phone to enable their participation.
Furthermore, webinars or electronic hearings provide for a much broader possibility for comments from a much larger platform than just New Mexico. And in fact, just like today, even though I've not counted, but as many comments have come from outside New Mexico than New Mexico itself.
The comments being presented, in my opinion, are much more serious, better thought out, and better prepared to address the DEIS because of this webinar process. The quality of the comments from the vast majority of people commenting in this venue are more serious and it's obvious they have spent more time preparing their remarks.
The nature of the webinar venue creates a serious attitude to attempt to provide technical information, rather than just making emotional political comments that have no basis in fact.
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75 facts that the NRC, as thorough as they are, may have possibly missed.
We strongly support this process of hearings, they are more rational, more serious, more accessible to more people, and much more democratic.
Surely, we wouldn't expect people from around the country, Illinois, San Francisco, and others that have spoken today, to fly into a New Mexico venue to say their piece.
And we all know, no matter where you live, no matter what your access is to a computer, the internet, or a phone, everyone has until September 22 to write their points of fact or concerns to the NRC, which is every bit as important as saying them to the NRC verbally.
Frankly, if virtual hearings are good enough for Congress and our legislature, they should be good enough for us and the NRC. Thank you very much.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, John, for that perspective. Thank you.
OPERATOR: Next, we have --
MR. CAMERON: Madison --
OPERATOR: -- Stephanie -- yes. Next, we have Stephanie Balinko. Stephanie, your line is open.
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76 MS. BALINKO: Hello. I live in the Chicago area, in Illinois, and as you may know, we have the most nuclear reactors than any other state in the United States, so I'm kind of aware of the waste.
And I agree with Jan from a previous comment in regards to hardened onsite storage. To me, this makes more sense, because you wouldn't be transporting this stuff across the country, launching thousands of high-risk high level radioactive waste trucks or trains. And those shipments could be going via the Great Lakes, which is here in Chicago. And it's like mobile Chernobyls, dirty bombs on wheels, et cetera, et cetera.
The other thing I wanted to ask is, when will these meetings, the transcripts, be able to be read online? Hello?
MR. CAMERON: Hello.
MS. BALINKO: Hello?
MR. CAMERON: Hello, Stephanie.
MS. BALINKO: Yes?
MR. CAMERON: Stephanie, the question --
Jill, the question Stephanie asked is when will the transcript of this meeting be able to be accessed online?
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77 MS. CAVERLY: So, the transcript for this meeting will likely be available in about a week. I plan to post the transcript from the last Thursday's meeting tomorrow or the next day. So, we're at about a week's time to have it posted on the website.
MS. BALINKO: Okay. I attended last Thursday's, I didn't make a comment, but I attended.
And I was wondering, since there was a glitch with this one, I didn't have any problem last week, but this one, I did, will the updated right information be sent out to those who registered last week? Because I think I had to put my email down for that meeting.
MR. CAMERON: Let me check this with the NRC staff.
MS. CAVERLY: So, every webinar, you'll have to register. And so, you'll go to --
MS. BALINKO: Oh, okay.
MS. CAVERLY: -- the NRC Webex.com site and then, you'll have to reenter the specific number or the ID for that meeting. So, the meeting tomorrow will have a different ID than today's meeting, which was different than Thursday's meeting.
So, we're also not preregistering folks.
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78 We tried that, as Chip mentioned, at one of the earlier meetings and we felt that it was just smoother not to preregister speakers. So, we'll be taking speakers on a first come first served basis for tomorrow's meeting, as well as next Wednesday's meeting.
MR. CAMERON: And one further point on that, access to Webex gives you access to the slides on Jill's presentation. And as far as I know, that presentation has not changed. So, if you could access it one time, from any of the meetings, you could use those slides and you wouldn't miss anything new.
MS. BALINKO: Okay.
MR. CAMERON: So, Stephanie --
MS. BALINKO: That's what I --
MR. CAMERON: -- do you have --
MS. BALINKO: -- kind of figured.
MR. CAMERON: -- anything else?
MS. BALINKO: I am making this comment under protest, I'll revert back to the previous speaker.
In regards to the New Mexico's U.S.
senators, they sent a letter to urge the NRC chairman to keep their promise and hold the meetings in-person.
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79 of the people of New Mexico, I don't live there, but I have visited there and it is a land of magic. Those people in Mexico have been environmentally -- they've endured environmental injustice from the get-go, with uranium mining, with atomic testing, and now with this storage in their part of the world.
Let's see, and I think that's about it.
I just --
MR. CAMERON: Okay.
MS. BALINKO: -- think that it's a basic concept of morality is that each of us ought to leave the world a better place for those who come after us and I don't know that we are doing this. It's up to us and our conscience.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you very much, Stephanie. Madison, who's next?
OPERATOR: Up next we have both John Lowe and KC Cass on the same line. John and KC, your lines are open.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. John? KC? John or KC, are you, either one of you or both, with us?
Madison, is there any reason you can tell why we can't access their comments or can't hear them?
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80 are open right now. They may be muted on their own line. You can go ahead, John and KC, you can hit your mute button or you can dial Star 6 to unmute yourself if you are muted.
MR. CAMERON: And sometimes people have been on a speakerphone --
MR. LOWE: This is John. Sorry, I couldn't hear you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, John, welcome.
MR. LOWE: Good afternoon and thank you for putting this event together and allowing residents of Carlsbad and Hobbs to speak. Again, my name is John Lowe and I'm the City Administrator for the City of Carlsbad.
I've had the opportunity to review the draft EIS released by the NRC and appreciate their extensive efforts. And we understand the impacts are very small and the construction itself will have no impact on the oil and gas industry, which would have been one of our concerns initially.
So, I personally support the project and hope to see it move forward. Thank you for your time this afternoon.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you, John. Is NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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81 KC Cass with you or somehow or another, you two got MR. LOWE: KC is available as well.
MR. CASS: Hi, good afternoon. I'd like to thank everybody for their time and their comments today. We've heard a lot of negative things today, I think it's time to hear some positive things.
I think that we all know there's a problem out there, sitting on the ground. There needs to be a safe viable option for this waste.
We at the City of Carlsbad have spent a lot of time reviewing the EIS and we do take safety very, very, very seriously. We think these measures have been put in place and that it's time to find a site to put this stuff.
And it boils down to that. They can coexist with our oil and gas industry, bring additional revenue to our area, and safely store something that we already have on the ground.
And again, thanks for having me. You all have a good day.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, KC.
Thank you, John. Madison, is someone else?
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82 Austin. Wendy, your line is open.
MS. AUSTIN: Hi, this is Wendy, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, Wendy, we can.
MS. AUSTIN: Okay, great, thank you. I would like to echo what Greg said earlier, I didn't catch Greg's last name, but I'm also from the area.
And again, my name is Wendy Austin and I was born and raised in Carlsbad and I'm currently the Deputy City Administrator for the City of Carlsbad.
And I can assure you that there is huge support for the Holtec project in and around Carlsbad, and I have followed the project closely, I've attended meetings, and I have discussed it at length with technical members of our community, and I am absolutely supportive of this project myself.
In addition, I have a confidence in the NRC's environmental impact study and all information that's been presented in respect to this project. And all of this has concluded that this project is safe and has a small environmental impact and should be licensed.
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83 important. I learned that the casks are specifically designed for transporting used nuclear fuel and have been previously licensed and deemed safe by the NRC.
I'd like to add what makes the casks so strong is they are designed and fabricated with multiple layers of steel, lead, and other strong materials, and this heavy duty construction safely confines the fuel, shields workers and the public from any hazards.
Therefore, based on all the evidence, we should not worry about transporting material to Southeast New Mexico, and because of this, I support the Holtec storage consolidated facility project.
And again, I would like to just assure you that most in our community do support this project and we do have resolutions of support from Carlsbad City Council. And thank you for allowing me to speak today.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Wendy. And for your information, the speaker who you referred to, that was Greg R-A-S-E, Greg Rase, I think. Okay.
MS. AUSTIN: Great, okay. Well, thank --
MR. CAMERON: I may not --
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And again, I just would like to echo his comments from NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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84 someone that's actually living in the area. And we have such a great nuclear background in this area and it's a niche for us and we are just very proud to be a part of this project and most of the community here feels the same way.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you. Thank you for your comments. And, Madison, are you still with us?
OPERATOR: Yes, I am --
MR. CAMERON: Or --
OPERATOR: -- still here. Next is Patty Hughs. Patty, your line is open.
MS. HUGHS: Thank you. Can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes.
MS. HUGHS: Hello? Okay. I am part of a group called Northeast New Mexicans United Against Nuclear Waste that formed three years ago as a result of the DOE exploring drilling boreholes to store high level nuclear waste, we saw our property values plummet to zero. That group is made up of people, of citizens, ranchers, farmers, business people. We also own a ranch that borders a transportation route to the Holtec facility.
I'm making these comments under protest.
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85 To be relevant, these hearings must be conducted in person at site locations in New Mexico as promised by you. Two NRC officials have told me you are proceeding with these hearings to satisfy your own internal timeline.
It's clear you're not giving weight to the opposition to the Holtec facility from every sector of New Mexico's citizens. Every state in the U.S. has said no to being a storage site for this waste. New Mexicans have also said no, and I want to read just two of the reasons that New Mexicans are saying no.
The first is an economic reason. Holtec would store 173,000 metric tons of waste from over 97 operating reactors in 30 states, plus other existing stockpiles in several other states. None of those states think they can afford the risk of storing the waste that was generated in fueling their own economies. Apparently, the NRC thinks New Mexico can afford the risk.
Governor Lujan Grisham says that Southeast New Mexico's an economic driver for New Mexico and some estimate the contribution to New Mexico's revenue is upwards of 30 percent.
According to local, state, and federal NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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86 statisticians, only four industries in Eddy and Lea Counties, oil and gas, mining, tourism, and agriculture, bring in revenues of $5.6 billion per year and employ over 20,000 people, all of which would be at risk when, not if, an accident occurs.
We are told Holtec would bring construction jobs and 50 permanent jobs, although that number keeps changing, and add five million to the economy. One accident and Holtec is economic replacement, not economic development. Is that a fair trade if just one canister emits its radiation, radiation which is equivalent to all of the cesium-137 and three times the amount of plutonium that was released at Chernobyl?
Again, Governor Lujan Grisham says this facility is economic malpractice and an acceptable risk. How is it an acceptable risk to the NRC? Please answer this question.
Every New Mexico family needs to ask themselves if they can afford to be the nation's nuclear waste dumping ground? Do we have the means to risk our livelihoods, our homes, our children, our culture, and our future in order to save citizens of the rest of the country from the risk of spilling the most toxic NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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87 substance on the face of the Earth? Can we afford the reality and the stigma of being the nation's sacrifice zone?
Yet another reason that New Mexicans are saying no is a moral reason. You have said that risks are primarily small, with few moderate risks. We were told the canisters holding the waste are robust.
What does that mean in light of Sandia Labs' December 23, 2019 Gap Analysis to Guide DOE Research and Development in Supporting Expanded Storage and Transportation of Nuclear Fuel, which doesn't share your confidence?
That report says three criteria were used to determine the greatest need for R&D, research and development, for structures, system, and component gaps. These gaps are rated as of highest importance in licensing a facility.
Those three criteria are likelihood of occurrence, consequences, and remediation. Among the highest priority gaps is the consequence of canister failure. In order to address this gap, the focus of R&D would be to develop what is now undeveloped, a technically defensible assessment of gaseous and particulate releases and radiological consequences NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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88 through stress, corrosion, cracking, breaches.
I'm going to quote from that report. This new gap has been identified due to increased awareness of extended dry storage and potential for breach of canister confinement.
Quote again, currently, the release fraction from the canister to the environment through chloride-induced corrosion stress cracking is poorly understood and is of primary importance, end of quote.
These canisters will be sitting next to the potassium chloride, what's called potash, mines and many canisters will be coming to the Holtec site from near oceans, where chloride corrosion has already begun.
Another area of concern identified in the gap analysis is welded canister corrosion. The gap analysis states that high tensile stresses could occur in weld zones on SNF dry storage canisters.
A study determined that there were high through-wall tensile stresses in the welds and weld heat affected zones that were induced during the manufacturing process, end of quote. And that, quoting again, these stresses are potentially sufficient to support through-wall stress cracking, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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89 end of quote.
You stated that there would be no release during accidents. That's a very poor assumption. We know canister cracks can't be detected, can't be repaired, and to add to that, canisters are under pressure, with no relief valves and no monitoring capability.
When you characterize what you are sending us as robust, you're not being honest about their problems.
According to the Department of Energy database, New Mexico will contain, if this project goes through, New Mexico will contain over 90 percent of the radioactivity in the U.S.
Also, this temporary ground level dump would house two and a half times the amount of waste rated for Yucca Mountain.
The NRC rates the risk of amassing all of the nation's high level nuclear waste in a facility built to interim standards, or what Energy Rick Perry calls de facto permanent storage, as small to moderate for every impact it evaluated.
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90 is the waste not safe anywhere else but in New Mexico?
In your evaluation, you have ignored the information provided by our state government, the environment department, and our governor that the DEIS contains false information.
This waste site has every potential to eternally pollute New Mexico. This may well be the most important licensing the NRC has ever handled and certainly there is no precedent anywhere else in the United States for what you're trying to do in New Mexico.
It would seem that, despite your mission to protect people and the environment, you're not protecting us, you're not being forthright. At best, the NRC is minimizing or, worse, hiding the most maximum of consequences.
You apparently have power to deny the wishes of New Mexico's governor, U.S. senators, and congressmen, and the people of New Mexico in denying us face-to-face hearings. Apparently, in licensing the Holtec facility, you also have the power to set us on the most dangerous course any state can be on, if we continue to move forward in this process.
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91 pushed forward without a permanent solution in sight, it's based on questionable technology, and shows the greatest of disrespect to New Mexico citizens by not holding hearings face-to-face in the light of day.
For all these reasons I've mentioned and more, I believe that this effort is immoral. My appeal to you is to repackage the waste and leave it where it is. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay, thank you. Thank you, Patty. Madison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. We do have another comment from Ed Hughs. Ed, your line is open again.
MR. HUGHS: Thank you. Thank you for allowing me to have a second comment. One of the things that I neglected to mention was notification of this process.
As was earlier mentioned by Patty, we first learned about this and the DOE from being involved with the borehole, as has been mentioned. We started looking around, talking, seeing what was going on in the Southeast.
Fasken Oil and Ranch has properties adjacent to this site, they didn't know about it. They found out about that and have been very vigorously, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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92 rigorously opposing this by comments, as well as suit.
Two, at least two ranching families within the six-mile area did not know about this. They've also joined the opposition.
The City of Jal has issued, as well as the City of Eunice and their residents have also issued opposition to this, as well as other cities, and Las Cruces.
And by the way, I'm a native New Mexican, born and raised, and so, I want to see my state, I want to see the educational process of people out here, so that the opposition is adequate.
Mr. Heaton has said that the Southeast, the Carlsbad area, is for this. I was also attended the earlier scoping meetings in 2018. Even in Carlsbad, the majority of the people that spoke were against this. So, saying that that area is for it is absolutely not correct.
And so, that is what I have to say about this. I think we have to put things in balance, that the majority of people are opposed to this, and no --
it's a statewide issue, yes. This is a statewide issue, this is not a private issue, private contractors, this is a statewide issue.
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93 And so, it impacts all of New Mexico. I don't care whether you're from Gallup or Santa Fe or Albuquerque or Las Cruces or where you're from, this impacts New Mexico, all citizens. So, saying that it's a local issue and just local is given the most dangerous long-lasting destructive material on the planet is absolutely ridiculous.
So, thank you for allowing me the second comments. I appreciate it.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. All right.
OPERATOR: Next, we have --
MR. CAMERON: And --
OPERATOR: -- Rose Gardner. Rose, your line is open.
MS. GARDNER: Okay. Thank you all very much, everybody. I'm Rose Gardner. I'm from Eunice, New Mexico.
I live about 35 miles from the proposed Holtec site, about four miles from the waste control interim storage site as well that they want. So, you can just visualize that my hometown would be surrounded by nuclear waste.
I really take offense to those New Mexicans that are saying that there's no impact. Who are you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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94 kidding? You're officials elected to office and/or working for somebody that wants to bring nuclear waste to this state. How terrible of an insight you have.
I don't know who's paying you to make those comments, but I feel for you. You've got to go home one day, and one day, you'll come up with something that you want someone else to support and they won't be there for you.
I'm really disappointed also in the politician John Heaton coming out today. He claims he's with ELEA and that there's -- put this project on our back. He claims that all these other people on the line have no right to say what they need to say, that they won't be impacted.
What a lie, Mr. Heaton. What a lie. You went over to California and told all those people over there, New Mexico wants your waste, that's a bold face lie. My goodness. This is what politicians do, they don't listen to their constituents. And that's why I would never make a very good politician, because I like to say what's on my mind and I'm not beholden to anybody.
You're right, this is not a political, but it can be an emotional process. You're bringing high NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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95 level waste to my home. So close, in fact, that my family, my young son-in-laws that travel these roads, delivering tools and equipment to the oil fields would be going by these sites daily.
You say there's no impact, I strongly disagree. My family would be subjected to excessive radiation. Those canisters never stop giving off radiation. It's hotter now, little less wetter, but it never goes away.
And it appears that these waste dumps are considered de facto by the former Secretary of Energy.
What -- the Secretary of Energy Perry said this place would be de facto. They don't care about moving it.
That's another thing about these politicians, they don't care.
And yet, at the same time, I had to call on my politicians, Udall and Heinrich, to write letters to the NRC to protect me, give us some time so that we can get over this sickness that is surrounding me everywhere I go, so that I can be able to meet Mr. Heaton in person and tell him he's a liar.
So, that I can say, see Mr. Heaton in person and say he's bringing dangerous things to my hometown and he ought to just leave it here it is and fix his NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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96 company and make it a more legitimate and healthier place to work.
So, in fact, I'm very disappointed in these hearings, but still, I have to say these things, because I live here. If this thing comes here, I'm going to live with it, my kids will, my grandkids, on and on.
And the gentleman claims that Zoom is so wonderful, you might look at yesterday's news. Zoom went down for all the schoolchildren that were depending on learning online. So, see, this wonderful technologies that bring us together today aren't so awful dependable, are they?
Neither is human. The human errors that could occur in transporting these canisters that are 24/7 giving off radiation that could kill you. These radiation containers that could possibly break in case of an accident. The radiation that could leak and cause billions of dollars worth of damage.
And don't we know that that happened? One container or two or three that blew up in WIPP cost over $2 billion to remedy and it's still not fixed.
Going to throw some more money at it so they can fill it up to the top.
But I digress. Anyway, I oppose this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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97 project, Holtec, and I hope that the greater good is considered, that we are people that live here, we're not just here in the desert twiddling our fingers.
I have yet to hear of a rancher, an oil company man or owner, or anyone in agriculture speak in favor of this. So, that's just a little food for thought. I thank you again for a chance to speak.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. I know these are very emotional issues for people, and we have two more meetings, at least, coming up. And I would just ask people to try to, if you can, refrain from casting character aspersions about people. Madison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. Our next person is Bruce Montgomery. Bruce, your line is open.
MR. MONTGOMERY: Yes, thank you, Madison.
Can you hear me all right?
MR. CAMERON: Yes, we can.
MR. MONTGOMERY: Yes, thank you. Yeah, so my name is Bruce Montgomery. I am the Director of Used Fuel and Decommissioning at the Nuclear Energy Institute, or NEI.
We appreciate the opportunity to offer comments on the draft EIS, which we believe was done NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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98 thoroughly and independently as the terms of evaluating the impacts of the facility on the environment.
By the way, I'm fine with this virtual approach to conducting these meetings. This is the way business is done these days.
At NEI we conduct all of our business with regard to, whether it's official or unofficial with the NRC, with the Hill or what not. And it's all done very effectively.
And yeah, once in a while there's a glitch.
But, by in large, it's working very seamlessly.
We did provide our overall written comments on the EIS on June 23. But, since this afternoon, a lot of discussion has come up around the safety and transportation.
I think maybe a few words around those lines is warranted. I know the draft EIS did address the radiological and non-radiological impacts of transporting used fuel by rail lines to and from the proposed facility.
And the radiological impacts from transportation to either workers or the public, were found to be small. In practical terms, someone who stood 100 feet from the tracks and watched all 10 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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99 thousand shipments over 20 years, would receive a total dose of about six millirem of direct radiation emitted from the casks.
Which is less than a person would typically receive from a single round trip flight across the country, across -- a round trip ticket.
But contrary to what's been shared, there's a long history of safe transportation of used fuels. Since the early 1970s, there's been at least 20 thousand shipments of more than 80 thousand metric tons of used fuel worldwide, without any harmful release of radioactive material or personal injury.
More than 1,300 used fuel shipments have been completed safely in the United States over the past 35 years, most of it by rail. All with no harmful radioactive release or environment damage.
The Navy has completed nearly 850 shipments of used fuel from Naval reactors, and more then 250 transportation canisters using used fuel from foreign research reactors, has been transported within the United States in the past 30 years.
So, that's a quick snippet around transportation. That's something that we're -- it's not new to the U.S. by any means.
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100 But, I'd like to shift a little bit, my gears, to say a few words about how important the facility is to America.
The U.S. nuclear industry is unique in the way we pay forward for the end of the useful life of a commercial nuclear power plant. That's what we call decommissioning.
In the United States decommissioning is preplanned and prepaid at the time of initial licensing. And we do this through the Nuclear Decommissioning Trust Funds that are established by the operating facility before they get a license to even operate.
Similarly, the cost of disposing our used fuel, prepaid in advance with the Nuclear Waste Fund.
No other industry does this.
So far at least a dozen commercial nuclear power plants have been successfully decommissioned.
All with funds set aside for that purpose, and at no additional expense to the public rate plan.
These sites have been released by NRC for unrestricted use by their surrounding communities, except for that small parking lot sized concrete pads where the used fuel is being safely stored.
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101 With the proposed Holtec CISF, this fuel can be moved to a central location, and the process of decommissioning of these sites can be completed while we wait for a permanent disposal option to become available.
Since the mid 1980s, we've accumulated 1,100 years of experience operating these pads at 73 sites across 35 states. And the term operating is kind of a misnomer, because once the used fuel is in place, there's really not much to look at.
So, the bottom line is that these facilities are static, innocuous, unobtrusive, whatever term you want to use. And with 1,100 years of experience across this land, there's been reason for high levels of confidence that the impacts of the facility, whatever they are, will be small.
Now, there's been some discussions around corrosion and cracking and releases and what not. Some of the status did, and some of it relates to DOE activities, which are not related to commercial industry initiatives, such as this.
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102 in situ. And if necessary, repairs as certainly qualified by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
So, if there was any risk of a rupture of these casks or some sort of a cracking, we can identify and fix it before it results in any impact to the public.
Now, I've heard talk about Governor Grisham's letter opposing the facility. But, I've read that letter. And what was notable to me, there was really no discussion around the safety risks of the facility.
It was more about the perceived risks, or negative impacts on the economic activities around the fossil industry. And to some extent agricultural.
And this report demonstrates that those impacts are minimal. And the only areas where there are moderate impacts, they were positive impacts related to the impact on the, the good impact on the local environment workforce.
So, in conclusion, we support the recommendations provided by NRC and the Bureau of Land Management to issue an NRC license to Holtec, and to construct and operate a CISF for spent fuel at the proposed location, including a permit to construct and operate an associated rail spur.
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103 On behalf of NEI, I want too again, express my appreciation for the opportunity to offer comments on EIS. Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Bruce.
(Off mic comments.)
MR. CAMERON: Madison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. Our next person is Karen Hadden. Karen, your line is open.
MS. HADDEN: All right. Can you hear me?
(No response.)
MS. HADDEN: Hello, can you hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes. We can, Karen.
MS. HADDEN: I had an incredibly difficult time getting onto this meeting today. And I have, first of all, what I would like to say is that I agree with Joni Arends, this meeting shouldn't even be being held right now.
The notice was improper. I received by email, some information that appears to have come directly from the posting, the original posting.
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104 from August 20. The same was posted for August 25.
And that you could no longer access it.
The only way I managed to figure out how to go on, was to look up on the Federal Register. And maybe it's been corrected by now.
But, that is how I got the information.
Not everybody knows to do that. They don't know where the information originated. They're seeing things that look official from you that have links and pass codes, and they do not work.
And those have been shared around by members of the public based on what the NRC put out through the Federal Register apparently originally.
This is inadequate. We do not know how many people were on. Nobody could see me that I was on until just recently. I've been on for the whole call.
I am very frustrated by the fact that we have to use both a phone and a computer. In many homes, that ties up resources that are needed for school and other communications. And when there's limited bandwidth, that makes the problem worse.
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105 resources to be on here.
And to say that they can go to the library, oh, come on. How would they even know? How would they even know?
And if they got there, how would they know what to do once it said, oh, this is August 20, so you can't get on. It would be a wasted trip on their part.
This whole concept is ridiculous, because we are looking at an application that was illegal and unnecessary. And the analysis has not been done for hardened onsite storage, which would be released with the approach.
So, people are being put at risk of their lives and safety. If you are close to a cask that rips open, that's unshielded, you will die. It is lethal.
Let's get over that.
And these casks going down the road, the NRC admits that the transport casks are emitting radiation. Okay, so the calculations are done on the train going past you at 60 miles an hour or more.
But what about the people who live in the communities that are right next to rail stations?
These trains are going to stop like every other train does.
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106 You know, we're talking about this ideal world in the draft environmental impact statement, where nothing goes wrong. There's no accident.
And DOE studies said that there would be an accident with 10 thousand shipments by rail. And so, what are we talking about?
This is pseudoscience. Every single category in the DEIS is a wrong conclusion. Every single one of them.
The realistic impacts are not being examined. You know, it's the whole route. You've got water at the site. And saying it could never reach the waste.
Well, and then if you look at what would be done if there was a problem with water around the waste, I have read from the application documents that a hose would be obtained to suck out water. Oh, come on.
And by that time you could have radiation being released. Why is there not a pumping system built into this program, into this plan?
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107 in place.
This is not designed for the long term.
But, we all know that that is the plan. That it's going to be long term if the waste ever gets here.
Rick Perry has said it. Former NRC Commissioner Greg Jaczko said it. We know this. It's inadequate analysis. It's pseudoscience.
Small impact that is ridiculous. If there was a category of extra, extra large, we might be starting to talk about reality.
We think that you should do this over with proper notice, in person. Still, even today, despite our comments on previous meetings, when we get online for the Zoom, we see little boxes that have the names of the NRC and other personnel.
We don't get to see your faces. We don't get to see if it looks like you even understand a word that's being said.
We don't know if you're listening, or if you're playing games on your laptop. We do not know what is going on. It is not a real exchange.
These -- the legal questions around whether this meets the qualifications of a public meeting, also remains to be seen.
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108 I would urge you to start over and to do this right. This has not been proper noticed. The whole application does not meet any aspects of the law.
It's illegal under Nuclear Waste Policy Act. We've got NEPA violations. And you know, we wouldn't even be talking about any of this if it were not for the fact, the underlying fact, that the southwest region of the United States happens to be an area where there is a large percentage of people of color.
And especially a large Hispanic population. There are a lot of indigenous people.
We wouldn't even be talking about it if it weren't for that fact. Because this is environmental racism at its height.
To take the deadliest waste in the whole country, ship it across the country, and dump it on communities of color. And it needs to end.
It's not a moment too soon. These injustices need to be rectified. The businesses in the region need to be protected.
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109 is a huge increase in renewable energy in the whole region.
Nobody has to worry about any electricity, because there's going to be plenty. And we're going to get it in ways that do not produce radioactive waste that we do not have a way to handle.
The canisters need to be dealt with, and be improved. We should not be shipping thin canisters across the country under any circumstances.
Thank you very much.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you. Thank you, Karen. Madison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. Next we have Jan Boudart. Jan, your line is open.
MS. BOUDART: Hi. I wanted to talk about tourism in New Mexico. I think that an example of what happens when you have a nuclear waste dump in an area, tourism is deeply inhibited.
And I'm using the example of Carlsbad and Carlsbad Caverns. And the fact that the military has established a nuclear waste dump near there, and it's been very, very inhibiting to the tourism industry.
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110 who will be employed permanently, they are wrecking over what happens to the families that make their living with tourism.
And I don't mean they're making a killing.
They're making a living. And these jobs are passed down through their families, and can be passed down for many generations.
And if you count the people who make their living with tourism, and count the number of generations that those jobs present against the number of jobs that would be created by this kind of an installation, I think you'd come up short by the number of jobs created by the installation compared to the generations of a living that is provided by these families when people come to the land of enchantment.
That is my comment.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Jan for that comment on tourism. Madison, do we have someone else?
OPERATOR: I'm showing no further questions or comments at this time.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. We'll just wait a couple of minutes and see if anybody else. And Madison, do you have to leave us at 4:30?
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111 OPERATOR: I do. But my replacement is not here yet. So, I'll be hanging out with you for a few more minutes.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Good. Thank you.
Thank you very much.
OPERATOR: Bear with me here for just a few months. I do see a few more questions coming through.
Our next question comes from Jace Haus.
Jace, your line is open.
MR. HOFFMAN: Did that mean me? Did I say it wrong?
MR. CAMERON: What's the problem?
MR. HOFFMAN: If you -- if she meant Ace Hoffman, then that's me.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Let's go with you.
MR. HOFFMAN: All right. I'll try not to take too long. But, I wanted to first respond to the NEI person who said that the nuclear industry pays for the waste in advance.
The money that they've paid in was supposed to go to a place called Yucca Mountain. And it's really not much compared to how long this waste will have to be safely stored.
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112 So, it completely negates the -- the idea basically of all the coverages of shipping it and setting up a storage system.
But what's going to happen 100 years, 1,000 years, 10,000 years, a quarter of a million years from now? They haven't paid for any of that. So, forget it. That's not true.
And another point I wanted to mention is that if you build this waste, then we assume all 10,000 casks worth that are now available in America to be shipped there, or are too hot to handle, but have already been turned into place. It's going to be full.
And there's going to be an entire industry saying, look, we have a solution to the waste. But nothing that's being built after now, after this point right now, is going to fit there.
So, there's really not enough storage.
It's an endless, it goes on forever. And most of all, I wanted to say hi to Chip too, because I completely agree that it's nice to hear his voice and to have him doing these things.
I don't know if anyone's ever done them better than he does. And that's about all I want to say. If that's all, I'll do more tomorrow.
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113 MR. CAMERON: Well, thank you. Thank you very much. Madison?
OPERATOR: Yes.
MR. CAMERON: Anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. I apologize. We do have up next Kevin Kamps. Your line is open.
MR. KAMPS: Hello. Thank you. This is Kevin Kamps with Beyond Nuclear and Don't Waste Michigan.
And I just wanted to respond to some things that the NRC has said today out loud before too much time elapses.
One of them is what Chip Cameron said before the NEI speaker. He said, two more meetings at least to come. And yes, August 26 and September 2.
But, I do hope that that at least part is an indication that these botched meetings will be renotified to the public, and rescheduled for the future. And the public comment deadline be extended significantly to accommodate that.
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114 I guess you're going to send them out yet today or tomorrow, that's incredibly short notice for people who have already, as has been said by other commenters, received notification that had incorrect links in them.
So, there has to be a built in proper notification in advance. So, you're going to have to extend the deadline for public comments.
The other thing that Chip said right before the NEI speaker was please, no character aspersions.
And I have to assume Chip, that you were referring to an opponent to the dump who was speaking about the behavior of certain proponents of the dump.
And yes, indeed, I suppose if we all behaved more civilly toward each other, that would be one thing. But, I have to point out that it seems like those warnings only apply to opponents of this dump.
So, for example, Mr. Heaton, who is not only a proponent of the dump, he's a business partner in the enterprise, looking to make a lot of money personally, when he speaks about opponents of the dump carrying out circuses at previous public comment meetings, that is an insult to our side.
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115 of New Mexico driving down to those public comment meetings and crowding out supporters, which was dishonest. That is an inaccurate, false revisionist history he just put out there.
So, I would hope that the NRC staff would warn the proponents and the business partners when they speak disrespectfully toward opponents of the dump, who are doing no more than trying to protect their homes and their families.
And Joni Arends said earlier that this entire process, just the process, let alone the proposal itself, has traumatized people in New Mexico, whose nuclear trauma began on July 16, 1945 when the U.S. government decided to make them the first victims of nuclear weapons in the world, as has been said in the bulletin of the atomic scientists by Bob Alvarez and Kitty Tucker.
The first victims, the first people who died from nuclear weapons in the world actually were not at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. They were babies in New Mexico who lived downwind of nuclear weapons testing.
And that trauma and really in my mind, it's a form of terrorism being perpetrated by the U.S.
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116 government and by the nuclear industry against not only the people of New Mexico for all these decades.
And this is really perhaps one of the bigger nuclear traumas being targeted at the state of New Mexico. The world's largest high level radioactive waste dump.
One hundred seventy-three thousand metric tons of commercial, high level radioactive waste. Two and a half times as big as the Yucca dump proposal in terms of quantity of waste.
This is a trauma. It's really a form of terrorism for people who live nearby. And that includes along the transportation routes across this country.
So, there needs to be less bias, no bias by the NRC. Opponents and proponents of the proposal need to be treated equally. And that is often not the case.
Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Kevin.
Well taken about treating everybody the same way. And we hear many things from people at these meetings, both pro and con that disagree with other people.
I was just struck by the use several times NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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117 of the term liar, okay. So, that's why I tried to put out a little bit of a, you know, just maybe watch a little bit what we say.
But --
MR. KAMPS: But you're okay with what John Heaton had to say about --
MR. CAMERON: Hey, hey, hey, hey. Hey.
MR. KAMPS: Opponents of --
MR. CAMERON: Hey, Kevin. Kevin, I'm still talking.
MR. KAMPS: Yes, sir.
MR. CAMERON: I just said, --
MR. KAMPS: Okay, great.
MR. CAMERON: I said that I -- your comments were well taken. And that people should be treated neutrally.
MR. KAMPS: Yeah.
MR. CAMERON: So, I'm agreeing with you.
MR. KAMPS: Yeah. But you said nothing in response to John Heaton's comments, which were disrespectful to our side.
So, that's why I raised this issue.
MR. CAMERON: I didn't say that.
MR. KAMPS: And that's not the first time.
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118 This happened two years ago as well.
MR. CAMERON: Madison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: This is Alison now.
MR. CAMERON: Oh, we have Alison now?
Alison, do we have anybody else?
OPERATOR: Yes. Our next up we have Bill Turner. Your line is open.
MR. TURNER: Hello?
MR. CAMERON: Hello.
MR. TURNER: Can you all hear me?
MR. CAMERON: Yes.
MR. TURNER: Excellent. So, I'm Bill Turner. I'm a hydro-geologist and a geologist by training. I have a PhD. And I'm registered to practice in nine states.
I'm also an oil and gas producer and a former New Mexico Trustee for natural resources under the Johnson administration.
And so everyone is clear, I have no conflict of interest. I've been a consultant for 50 years. But, I do not have Holtec as a client.
But I am in favor of this project. I support it whole heartedly from a technical point of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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119 view.
And I'm really disappointed today, I thought we were talking about the environmental impact statement, and I have heard no quantitative evidence from anyone with regard to the EIS.
We've heard about cracking canisters.
Show me a reference. Give me a study. If you can't do that, don't hypothecate.
These environmental impact statements are intended to provide data which is concrete and verifiable rather than feelings one way or the other.
I've heard comments regarding radiation and people being harmed by this radiation.
I'm sitting here at my desk right now, and I have a technical associates model TBM 3S radiation detector. And when I turn that on, I find that I'm reading .03 millirems per hour. And that's hard data.
The EIS reports that at the parameter of their facility, they will have a reading of .03 millirems per hour. As though that's created by the Holtec operation.
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120 that a lot of people perceive.
I would simply conclude with a take off on the Jerry Maguire, who wanted to see the money.
Show me the data. If you can't show me data, quantitative technical data, then do some research until you can.
In any event, I thought the comments of Mr. Heaton were right on. These hearings commonly evolve into a circus. Let's talk about facts and data.
I thank you very much. I thought the EIS was extremely well done. Very neutral. Very factual.
And carry on.
Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Thank you, Bill for those comments. We have still 20 minutes to go in our meeting.
So, we'll take the comments up until that time. And Alison, who's next?
OPERATOR: Next we have John Hadden.
Your line is open.
MR. CAMERON: Is it John Hadden? Or John Heaton?
OPERATOR: It was pronounced --
MR. HEATON: It maybe me.
OPERATOR: Yes, Mr. Heaton. I apologize.
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121 MR. HEATON: It maybe me. Yes, I did --
I just simply wanted to make a comment. There have been numbers of implications that somehow board members of the Eddie Lee Alliance have some kind of personal gain from being on that board.
I want everyone to know that everyone on that board are strictly volunteers. And they serve only to help the economic and job situations in the area.
They have no personal gain from any, from this project or any other project that they're involved in. So, I think I want to clear that up so people understand that.
This is -- we're strictly have, the board members have absolutely zero to gain other the public service. Thank you very much.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, John.
And Alison, who is next?
OPERATOR: Next we have Patty Hughs.
Your line is open.
MS. HUGHS: Yes. The previous speaker, his first name is Bill, I didn't get his last name.
He seemed to indicate that the facts that I gave about cracking of the canisters were made up.
When during my comments I went at length NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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122 to give the whole title of the report that I was quoting.
The title of that report is gap analysis to bind DoD R&D in supporting extended storage and transportation of spent nuclear fuel, and FY2019 assessment dated December 23, 2019.
It was prepared for the U.S. Department of Energy by officials at the Sandia National Laboratories and Pacific Northwest National Laboratories.
And if that caller what I took, and he doesn't have to read the whole thing. He can call me, and I can give him page numbers for where those quotations came from.
Also, someone said, you know, what we're talking -- the NRC says that there's not going to be an economic, a detrimental economic impact. That we'll only gain from this.
At the same time, they say that there won't be any accidents. But, we know that -- I'm a mechanical engineer. We know we -- we were promised there would be no accidents from WHIP. We've already had an accident.
No engineer, when we're designing something, claims that there will never be an accident.
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123 If they are, then they're taking their project on a very dangerous path.
If there's any basic radiation from one of these 12 thousand canisters, one canister, and it has the impact of generated in other nuclear accidents around the world, every industry in southeastern New Mexico is at risk.
And not only southeastern New Mexico, the wind is always blowing in New Mexico. You may not experience that in Maryland or Washington, D.C., but it's -- the wind carries particulate matter from California into New Mexico.
This will spread. A 50 mile impact area is just obviously not adequate to moderate the impacts.
In fact, you're holding these hearings separately from safety reports, which would tell us what the likelihood of accidents are, what the impacts would be. Or it could tell us those things.
By piecing this process out, New Mexican citizens, of which I am one, born and raised, lived here all my life, we're not being allowed to have the hard conversation among ourselves with that.
We don't know our impact with the safety report that is, as a state, do we want to assume the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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124 risks for this waste facility that has no precedent anywhere else in the United States.
Do we want to see our future wrapped up in this? And that's the problem with the way the NRC goes about this.
A piecemeal approach, and an environmental impact statement that only says that -- it addresses normal operating conditions.
If every other state in the union, every other waste site were only worried about normal operating conditions, they wouldn't be saying things like Lindsey Graham said to our Senator Udall, when in a Senate subcommittee hearing, both him and Dianne Feinstein, he says, I want this -- I'm going to use his inflection, out of my state.
Well, I hope that the NRC will take a hard look at this. And give the citizens of New Mexico the chance to ask ourselves the real questions, can we afford, can the state of New Mexico, can New Mexican citizens be, the citizens in the United States, to afford the impact of what this site will be?
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125 heavy duty opposition to the board home.
And during that time we saw our land values go to nothing. We had people who go to banks to get operating funds. And thanks for asking for more collateral.
This is not, this is not economic development. It's economic replacement. It's replacement of a sustainable economy with the most polluted economy on the face of the earth.
Thank you.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Thank you, Patty.
Alison, do we have someone else?
OPERATOR: No further questions or comments at this time.
MR. CAMERON: Okay. Before we go to Kevin for our closing, I just would thank all of you for participating.
And we did do something a little bit unusual tonight. Usually we don't have the luxury of doing that, is giving people an opportunity for a second comment where they would respond to something that someone else said.
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126 meetings to get into round and round about that.
And that's why the useful meetings more than just being there in person for large scale townhall meetings, is to get people together from various view points on this. To have a dialog. It often leads to more understanding about what other people are interested and concerned about.
So, with that, I'll close. And thank you again. And Kevin, do you want to close it out for us?
MR. COYNE: Sure. Thank you, Chip. I want to thank everyone for your participation in this afternoon's meeting.
I think we had approximately 100 or so folks joining us this afternoon. And we very much appreciate your comments and perspective.
All of your comments will be captured in a transcript. And we will review and analyze these comments as we prepare the final environmental impact statement.
I also want to note that the NRC staff takes these meetings very seriously. Your comments provide important information for our environmental review.
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127 project managers, front line supervisors, and management team, actively participate in these meetings. And are hearing your perspectives.
There are two more webinars, tomorrow on August 26 at 4:00 p.m. Mountain time and September 2 at 9:00 a.m. Mountain time.
The notification is on our public meeting website at NRC.gov and in the FRN that provided the meeting announcement, and provides the webinar information and the phone bridge number for these meetings.
And just a reminder that we ask for your comments on the draft environmental impact statement by September 22. Thank you very much for your support of this meeting.
MR. CAMERON: And we're adjourned. And thank Madison and Alison and Graham for their help.
All right. See you tomorrow.
(Whereupon, the above-entitled matter went off the record at 4:52 p.m.)
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