ML20248L186
| ML20248L186 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | 07200022 |
| Issue date: | 06/02/1998 |
| From: | NRC |
| To: | |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 9806100484 | |
| Download: ML20248L186 (147) | |
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OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS L"O UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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Title:
SCOPING' MEETING FOR y.
. PREPARATION OF AN EIS FOR THE PRIVATE FUEL STORAGE FACILITY
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l : Case No.:.
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- Work' Order No.:
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' LOCATION:
Salt' Lake City, UT.
'DATE:
Tuesday, June 2,1998
' PAGE 1 - 145
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 2
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4 5
SCOPING MEETING FOR 6
PREPARATION OF AN EIS FOR 7
THE PRIVATE FUEL STORAGE FACILITY C
LICENSE APPLICATION 9
10 11 The Little America Inn 12 500 South Main Street 13 Salt Lake City, Utah 14
(
15 Tuesday, June 2, 1998 16 17 The above-entitled meeting commenced, pursuant to 18 notice, at 6:30 p.m.
19 PARTICIPANTS:
20 CHARLES HAUGHNEY, NRC 21 ERIC LEEDS, NRC 23 MARK DELLIGATTI, NRC 23 MURRAY WADE, NRC 24 HONORABLE MERRILL COOK, U.S. House of 25 Representatives
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PARTICIPANTS:
[ Continued]
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2 JOHN DONNELL, Private Fuel Storage
.h 3
HONORABLE MICHAEL LEAVITT, Governor, State of Utah 4
HONORABLE LEON BEAR, Chairman, Skull Valley 5
Goshutes 6
JOHN PAUL KENNEDY, Skull Valley Goshutes 7
CHIP WARD, West Desert Heal 8
MARGENE BULLCREEK, Skull Valley Goshutes 9
FERRIS GROLL, Utah 10 MietTIN HOEPNET., Coalition 21 11 DONALD COBB, Utah 12 LISA BULLCREEK, Skull Valley Goshutes 13 WAYNE BALL, Utah 14 R.J. HOFFMAN, Health Physics Society 15 LEE ALLISON, Utah 16 RALPH BECKER, Utah State Representative 17 SUZANNE WINTERS, Utah i
18 BRIAN MEACHAM, Utah Peace Test 19 KATHLEEN CLARK, Utah 20 CYNTHIA OF THE DESERT, Utah 4
21 CHRIS CERNICH, Utah 22 STEVEN BARROWS, SSWUS 23 DIANE NELSON, Utah 24 STEPHANIE KESSLER, Wyoming Outdoor Council 25' DAVID TERRY, Utah
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PARTICIPANTS:
[ Continued) 2 NINA DOUGHERTY, Utah Sierra Club 3
BOB JAMES, Air Force 4
JERRY SCHMIDT, Utah 5
STEVE HOFFMAN, Hawk Watch International i
6 BONNIE ROBINSON, Utah 7
DR. GREGORY THAYN, BLM Utah l-8 CHRISTOPHER ROBINSON, Utah 9
VIRGIL JOHNSON, Goshute 10 CALVIN ANDREWS, Analogics Marketing & Consulting 11 ROSEMARY HOLT,' Women Concerned Utahans United 12 JONATHAN HURD, Salt Lake Food Not Bombs 13 14
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PROCEEDINGS
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[6:30 p.m.]
3 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Let's go on the record.
4 Welcome.
My name is Charlie Haughney.
I'm the 5
deputy director of the NRC's Spent Fuel Project Office.
And 6
as such, I'm one of the NRC persons who's responsible for 7
the review of the proposed license for the private fuel 8
storage facility.
And more specifically tonight, for 9
consideration of the scope of the environmental impact 10 statement that the NRC must prepare in conjunction with its 11 licensing process.
12 There's a number of NRC staff members with me.
On 13 my left is Eric Leeds, who's our licensing section chief.
14 To my immediate right is Mark Delligatti, who's the project f) 15 manager or the focal point for this particular project.
A_/
16 We also have representatives from our general 17 counsel's office, one of whom, Mr. Sherwin Turk, is on my 18 far right.
Dr. Edward Shum is manning the front table.
19 He's a senior environmental scientist.
Sue Gagner is here 20 from our office of public affairs for any immediate media 21 contacts.
22 And we have representatives from our two main 23 contractors who are doing the safety and environmental 24 reviews.
First, the Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory 25 Analysis, which is San Antonio, Texas, and the Oak Ridge I
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National Laboratory.
That is the contractor doing the
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2 environmental impact statement.
And they're of course from 3
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Some administrative items first.
I'm going to 5
conduct this meeting almost non-stop.
I will defer to our 6
single court reporter when he needs a break.
But for the 7
rest of us, including myself, if you need a break, feel free 8
to take part of it.
And I do that because we have a number 9
of presentations, and about 20 speakers signed up and 10 climbing at this point.
11 The speakers are asked to sign up in the back of 12 the room so we will control you in the order of the sign-up.
13
'And it's interesting to note that prior to the meeting we 14 had four people sign up for this meeting.
I think the
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15 number we're getting is about typical for one of these.
16 This meeting is being transcribed.
And staff will 17 review the transcription as a part of its consideration of 18 the scoping comments.
We also ask that you consider sending 19 written comments to the staff.
And I'll post the address on 20 the Viewgraph machine et this time, and we'll post it from 21 time-to-time throughout the evening.
It's also listed in 22 the Federal Register announcement that advertised, at least 23 initially, this meeting.
24 These written comments can be extremely important.
25 I don't want to dismiss the importance of the transcript or ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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anything we hear this evening, but the written comments also e~s 2
are considered by the staff in deciding really exactly what U
3 to consider in the environmental impact statement that we're 4
about to write.
5 One last thing, and I've got a few other remarks.
6 But I think this -- you need to view this meeting as very 7
unique.
The government frequently spends all kinds of 8
energy working on a particular issue and then presenting a 9
decision, or a near decision, to the public.
10 At this stage, you're beginning to give us 11 literally some advice on how we should handle the 12 environmental impact statement for this facility.
We're in 13 the early stages of conducting that review and te have not 14 yet formed any opinions, and we won't form any opinions
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15 instantly tonight.
16 I'm not going to react to your comments or, in any 17 particular way, but I do want to listen and understand them.
18 So I may ask some clarifying questions after you're finished 19 if you're one of the speakers.
But this advice is crucial, 20 and I think leverages our decision-making process because of 21 its timing.
It occurs early in the process.
22 I've noticed that the Honorable Merrill Cook from 23 the Second District here in Utah has arrived.
24 And, Mr. Cook, I could do one of either two l
l 25 things.
Either continue for a few minutes with our l
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presentations or allow you to speak at this time.
Your rS 2
preference, sir?
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CONGRESSMAN COOK:
Why don't you continue.
I, 4
.because of another commit' ment, would have to leave in 5
another 20 or so minutes.
So if I could just -- any time l
6 within that, if I could get four or five minutes would be --
7 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Fine.
Then we'll continue for 8
about another 15 minutes or so.
9 CONGRESSMAN COOK:
Great.
10 MR. HAUGHNEY:
And if you can signal me, I'll stop 11 the process.
Thank you, sir.
Appreciate that.
12 What is the purpose of this meeting?
And I'm 13 going to read to you from the script a bit and then I'll 14 talk about it some more.
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15
~It's to give members of the public an opportunity t
w, 16 to provide comments to the NRC staff on information that you 17 believe should be considered during the development of the 18 environmental impact statement for Private Fuel Storage.
l
- 19 And they are applying to construct and operate an-20 independent spent fuel storage installation on the 21 reservation of the Skull Valley Band of the Goshute Indians.
22 So as I said, we're very interested in hearing what you have 23 to say about this particular matter.
24 Now prior to this, Private Fuel Services submitted i
'25 an environmental report as a part of its license 1
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application.
This is in, at the present time, it's in one
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2 three-ring binder.
And a copy's available here in town at LJ 3
the University of Utah's Marriott Library.
Of course we 4
have copies in Washington.
And so they're available for yea 5
to examine directly.
6 We will be contracting principally with the Oak 7
Ridge National Laboratory to review that document, to 8
conduct the scoping process with us, and to produce a 9
document that is called a draft environmental impact 10 statement.
And if you could remind me of when we expect 11 that will be due.
12 MR. DELLIGATTI:
I'd have to check with Dr. Shum, 13 MR. HAUGENEY:
All right.
I'll get you a date on 14 that in just a moment.
It's months away, in any event.
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15 The draft environmental impact statement is then v
16 published.
You'll all be able to see it and read it, and 17 comment on it officially.
So there's a second round of
-18 comments that we will attempt to gather to better focus the 19 appropriate description of the environmental impacts of this 20 proposed licensing' action.
21 Now we are going to make three brief presentations 22 this evening.
And one of these, Mark Delligatti of my staff 23 will talk about another major part of our review, which 24 involves safety.
25 Principally, the application consists of two parts f3 ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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and then some other ancillary items, the two parts being the 2
environmental report and the safety analysis report.
And 3
there's other things like emergency plan and quality 4
assurance plan.
And I don't mean to dismiss those, but they 5
aren't as large in content or extent as these two major 6
documents.
7 So organizationally, the staff tends to divide 8
'ourselves on a major case like this into a safety review 9'
group and a environmental review group, and we have done 10 that.
So Mark will explain the safety review.
11 He'll be followed by Murray Wade from the Oak
-12 Ridge National Laboratory that will talk about what's 13 contained in the environmental impact statement.
And we 14 hope that this will allow you to focus your comments for
()
15 this particular meeting.
And you're free to say whatever 16 you like, but if you can focus them on the environmental 17 impact statement, it'll make this entire complicated 18 process, I think much more reasonable.
19 There's one other major player from the NRC side 20 in this.
And there are many major players outside the NRC, i
21 but there's another major player in part of the NRC, and L
22' that's the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board.
-23 The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board is an 24' independent panel of administrative law judges that are 25 considering whether or not to allow my staff to eventually I
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issue this license, when we're finally done with all the 2
safety and environmental reviews.
And that proceeding has 3
just really gotten underway.
It's been through ruling on 4
standing of parties that are now admitted to the proceeding.
5 And I believe we have about six parties in the proceeding.
6 We can clarify that in a moment, but the State of Utah State 7
Attorney General's office is one of the parties.
8 And we have also a ruling on contentions.
Now 9
these are the matters that will be argued in this legal 10 proceeding before the three judge panel.
And there's quite 11 a set of those, and they include both safety and 12 environmental issues.
The -- that particular process has to 13 finish and the board must issue a decision before the NRC 14 staff can issue the license, and that will be some time s
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15 away.
16 At this point, I will -- let me mention one other.
2 17
-- two other things.
The scoping process itself will allow 18 us to issue a separate report called a scoping report.
So 19 the first major piece of paper you'll see out of the NRC in 20 this environmental process will be the scoping report.
L 21 Any of you that are signing up this evening to 22 speak or showing interest will get a copy of that report in 23 the mail when we produce it. 'And this thing will be out 24 several months before the draft environmental impact 25 sta'2 ment.
And I also commit to mail you a copy of the l
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draft environmental impact statement for taking the time and 2
interest to speak this evening.
And all those documents 3
will be publicly available as well.
4 The last thing I ask, and I'm going to do this 5
again, is to consider the fact that this matter is 6
oftentimes contentious, oftentimes emotional.
And let me 7
ask that as an individual speaks, no matter who they are, 8
where they're from, that you listen courteously and reflect 9
upon their views and opinions.
And if you are interested in 10 speaking, we have a sign-up procedure and you'll be able to 11 do that.
12 At this time, if, Mr. Cook, if you still have 13 time, I'll switch to another presenter, if you'd like to 14 speak at this time.
I'm done.
()
15 CONGRESSMAN COOK:
Yeah.
As long as I'm out of 16 here by 7:00, that's just fine.
17 MR. HAUGHNEY:
All right-Mr. Delligatti.
18 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Okay.
19 MR. HAUGENEY:
Can we do that?
I think we can 20 perhaps get two of them done.
Thank you.
21 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
I'm Mark Delligatti.
22 And as Charlie indicated, I'm the senior project manager 23 responsible for the review of the application submitted by 24 Private Fuel Storage.
25 What I'd like to talk to you about tonight is O
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really what is not the subject of this meeting.
It's the
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safety report, which is different from the environmental
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report.
And I'd like to tell you about the kind of 4
information that goes into the safety report.
And if you j
5 have any questions on that or you have any comments on that, 6
you can forward them to me; you can call me; I can provide 7
you with the appropriate information later in this meeting.
8 Could I have the next slide please.
l 9
If you look in our regulations at 10 C.F.R. Part 10 72, you'll see that the following kinds of information must 11 be presented if you want to apply for a license to store 12 spent nuclear fuel.
This includes general and financial 13 information, technical information, technical 14 specifications, the applicant's technical qualifications,
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15' financial assurance information, recordkeeping for ls-s 16 decommissioning, information on emergency planning, and an I
L 17 environmental report.
That's what the regulations say when 18 you want to send your application in to NRC, make sure l
19 you've covered all that.
Next slide.
t l
20 And this is how it's usually organized when we i
21 receive it.
This is how it was organized by Private Fuel 22' Storage.
We get five volumes.
One is the license L
23 application, one is the safety analysis report; that's the l'
24 technical report, the information of which we -- we're 25 focused on primarily in the safety review.
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Then there is the emergency plan.
We review that 2
very carefully to make sure that any applicant's emergency 3
plan meets our requirements in Part 72 for emergency 1
4 planning for a facility of this type.
Then there is a 5
security plan, that is generally not released to the public 6
for obvious reasons, and there is the environmental report.
7 Those five volumes were all submitted to us.
The 8
license application, the safety analysis report, the 9
emergency plan and the environmental report are all 10 available at the Marriott Library at the University of Utah.
11 And the folks there have been great.
12 They have been designated as a local public 13 document room by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
They 14 have hard copies of the license application and they have 15 all other docketed information, usually available within a 16 few weeks of our receipt of it on microfiche.
And if you go 17 there and speak to Ms. Jill Moriarity, she is head of the 18 document section on the lower level of the library.
She can 19 help you with anything like that.
20 Now what's the information, the actual kinds of 21 information that we get on a site?
Well, there is a great 22 deal of technical information.
In considering a site, it's j
23 heavily in the area of geography, earth sciences.
So we 24 request that the applicant submit geography, demography, L
25 earth sciences.
You can see the list up here.
All of this p
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information must be submitted to us.
2 Our technical staff, and in this case, with the f-w) i
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3 assistance of our contractors from the Center for Nuclear 4
Waste Regulatory Analyses, review the information that is 5
presented by the applicant.
And we go through that process.
6 And if we believe that additional information is needed, we 7
prepare what we call a request for additional information.
8 And we send that to the applicant and the applicant must 9
respond to that.
10 In this particular application, we have already 11 sent one request for additional information to Private Fuel I
12 Storage and they have responded to us on that.
Next slide 13 please.
14 Now there's a second part to a safety review for a
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15 facility of this type, and that is the review of the LJ 16 information associated with the storage cask that will be 17 used at that facility.
Now Private Fuel Storage has 18 referenced in their application two cask vendors, Holtech 19 (phonetic) and Sierra.
And our staff at NRC is currently 20 reviewing those two applications.
21 Now they contain a whole different set of 22 technical information which the staff must review.
The 23 topics there, as you can see, are on this screen:
24 structural thermals, shielding criticality, confinement, et 25 cetera.
Until the staff has completed its technical of the (a
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site, its technical review of at least one of the casks and s
2 gone through the appropriate regulatory procedures there, 3
and the final environmental impact statement has been 4
completed, that's when the licensing process ends.
5 So there are a lot of reviews going on here by the 6
NRC staff.
We take them very seriously and we take yc ur 7
interest and your concern very seriously.
And I would 8
welcome any comments or concerns that you might have on 9
either the staff or the site -- on either the cask or the 10 site review.
Please feel free to contact me.
11 If you could put that first slide up again with Ed 12 Shum's address.
My address is exactly the same.
You can 13 just mail any comments to the Spent Fuel Project office at 14 the USNRC, at Mail Stop 06G22, Washington, D.C.,
20555, and
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15 we will be happy to receive your input.
Thank you very 16 much.
17 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Okay.
At this time, let me ask I
18 Mr. Murray Wade of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
19 Mr. Wade will talk about the environmental impact statement 20 process.
21 MR. WADE:
Thank you, Charlie.
~ 22 As the first slide talks about, we're in the NEPA 23
. process for this project.
This proposal is a license l
24 application under 10 C.F.R. Part 72.
NRC has determined 25 that the proposed action is a major federal action.
Oak
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' Ridge' National Laboratory is the subcontractor to NRC to 2
-prepare the EIS.
And I, Murray Wade, am the project manager 3-from Oak Ridge.
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4 As far as NEPA background, just a real general s
5 background.
The National-Environmental Policy Act of 1969 6
is where NEPA started.
And CEQ, the Counsel on
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Environmental Quality,.put together their implementing 8
regulations.
And.as far as NRC's actions are concerned,.NRC 9
10 C.F.R. 51-implements NEPA and CEQ.
10 The scoping process, as Charlie has mentioned, is 11 to inform the public of the proposed action; to identify 12 public and agency concerns; to focus the impact assessment 13 on important issues; to collect comments and suggestions on 14 the scope of the DEIS, or the draft environmental impact 15
' statement.
16
.The schedule, the notice.of intent for this action 17 was sent out on May 1st,
'98.
We're in the middle of the I scoping process, which includes this meeting.
And that 1
19 process will end on June 19th,.where.all oral and written 20 comments will be accepted.
There'll be a scoping report i
1 21 that should be out in approximately September.
And this i
22-report, as was mentioned, will summarize the comments and 23 will be distributed to.each speaker..And then the tentative 24 schedules'for the draft and the final EIS are 1999 and 2000.
3 25
'As noted, they're-tentative schedules at this point.
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And just very briefly on the DEIS outline, Section
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2 1 will talk about the proposed -- the purpose and the need.
O 3
Section 2 will talk about the proposed action and 4
alternatives.
Section 3 will describe the affected l
5 environment, the natural resources and things that are part 6
of the site that's in question.
7 Section 4, or Section 3 continue, will cover, you 8
know, all the various issues we've got listed, including 9
environmental justice, cultural resources, and all the other 10 issues.
And Section 4 is really where the impacts to all 11 these resources are assessed.
And there's -- they're 12 assessed.
The assessment is done for all the alternatives.
l 13 And then Section 5 includes a cost benefit 14 analysis, and Section 6 documents the federal and state
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15
' environmental requirements, all the laws and regulations and sm/
16 permitting regulations to go along with the proposal.
17 And up to this point, the important topics that 18 have been identified.
This is an alphabetical order:
air 19 quality; cost and ben 0 fits; cultural resources; 20 environmental justice; geology and hydrology; human health 21 and safety; plant and wildlife ecology; socioeconomic, 22 including land use, aesthetics, traffic ficw, noise; 23 transportation risk; decommissioning; and environmental 24 monitoring.
25-MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Wade.
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Congressman Cook, this is probably a good time for 2
you to take the podium.
3 Please welcome Congressman Merrill Cook.
4 CONGRESSMAN COOK:
Thank you.
My name is Merrill 5
Cook and I represent the Second District of Utah in the 6
Congress of the United States.
I certainly appreciate this l
7 opportunity to present testimony on the scope of the I
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8 environmental impact statement for the proposed high-level 9
nuclear waste site on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation 10 in Tooele County.
11 I would also request that I be allowed to submit a 12 longer written statement.
And my assistant, Debra Reed, 13 from our office, will leave copies of that on the seat here.
14 And I apologize for having to leave at about 7:00 because of I) 15 some prior commitments.
%j 16 I have had grave concerns about this proposal 17 since it was first unveiled by the Skull Valley Goshutes and 18 the consortium of nuclear utilities known as Private Fuel l
19 Storage, or PFS.
In fact, the very first bill that I 20 introduced as a member of congress, HR 2083, would block the 21 storage of high-level nuclear waste at the Skull Valley I
22 site.
HR 2083 would accomplish this by imposing l
23 prohibitively high fees on the transportation of waste to 24 the site.
25 My two primary concerns are, first, that PFS has i
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refused to provide the State of Utah and its citizens with l
2 sufficient information on this proposal; and second, that
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3 the site, which is designed only for interim storage, may 4
turn into a de facto permanent site without any of the 5
necessary safeguards in place to protect the environment or 6
the people of Utah.
1 7
It's my hope that the EIS review will be broad 8
enough to adequately address these issues.
It's critical 9
that the federal government carefully and responsibly 10 analyze potential environmental impacts of this high-level 11 nuclear waste site.
Artificially curtailing or constraining 12 this review would be an abdication of the federal 13 government's most important responsibility, and that 14 responsibility is protection of public health and safety.
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I hope that the EIS review will address the many 16 unanswered questions about this proposal.
For example, will the utilities have the money to pay for the costs of cleanup 17 18 in the event of an accident?
Have the utilities set aside 19 any money for maintaining the site?
Will the utilities be 20 prepared to address the problems or accidents that could 21 occur during the transportation of the waste?
Will the 22 utilities be prepared to handle terrorist attacks or 23 sabotage?
Have the utilities addressed the threat of foreGt 24 fires or range fires?
And what is the legal responsibility 25 between PFS limited liability members and their parent
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utility companies?
2 The PFS utilities fail to provide adequate answers 3
to these questions or to describe the arrangements between 4
PFS and the tribe.
PFS argues that the arrangement with the tribe involved proprietary information covered in the lease 5
6 with the Skull Valley Goshutes.
7 One PFS spokesman even claimed that, quote, "It's 8
like if you were to lease property in your backyard for 9
parking or whatever.
It's a private matter between the 10 parties," end of quote.
11 With all due respect, siting high-level nuclear 12 waste is not like leasing property for a parking lot.
It's 13 not even like establishing a hazardous waste disposal 14 facility.
15 As to the safety questions, PFS has responded to 16 those questions by insisting these casks will not leak, citing experts from the very industry that stands to profit 17 18 from the transportation and storage of this waste.
The 19 current nuclear scandal in Germany underscores the 20 inadequacy of those assurances.
21 German newspapers have reported, and the German 22 nuclear industry has confirmed that deadly waste, identical 23 to that waste that's proposed for the Skull Valley, has 24 leaked from similar casks, casks both the German government 25 and the nuclear industry insisted would not leak.
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Now high-level nuclear waste is one of the most
/N 2
toxic, dangerous substances known to man.
I've worked in O
3 the explosives industry for over 25 years.
We never take 4
safety issues lightly.
The PFS and the federal government 5
should not take them lightly here.
6 It's imperative that the EIS analyze the 7
implications of storing waste on the Skull Valley site 8
beyond the 40 year allowable license term.
I and others 9
have repeatedly warned that futu.Te economic and political 10 pressures, which we cannot even imagine now, could strand 11 the waste on the Skull Valley site.
Licenses and leases can 12 be renewed.
There's nothing that guarantees that the waste 13 will be removed at the end of the initial license term, or 14 even after the one-time only renewal option.
_()
15 Because of this very real risk of permanent 16 storage at the Skull Valley site, the scope of the EIS 17 should examine long-term storage issues.
These should 18 include but not be limited to long-term seismic risks, 19 long-term cask performance and cask degradation, and 20 long-term institutional controls.
These long-term issues 21 parallel. potential problems that the Nuclear Waste Technical 22 Review Board recommended for study at the Yucca Mountain 23-site.
24 I hope the EIS will address many concerns Utah and 25 its citizens have expressed about this proposal, concerns
()T ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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that simply haven't been addressed yet.
Please thoroughly
[
2 examine the implications of long-term storage at the Skull 3
Valley site.
Please include in the EIS the same issues 4
mandated for review by law at a federal interim storage 5
site.
Now I have listed some of these issues in my written 6
testimony.
7 And again, I want to thank you for allowing me to 8
testify this evening.
Thank you very much.
9 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you, Congressman Cook.
I 10 found your comments very helpful.
Appreciate it.
11 And in response to your first request, your longer 12 statement will be included in the record.
Thank you.
13 We've got one more presentation to set the stage 14 and then we'll get into the other speakers.
Mr. John
()
15 Donnell of Private Fuel Storage is going to talk about some 16 changes and alterations that are intended for the environmental report that was originally submitted as part 17 18 of the application.
19 Mr. Donnell.
20 MR. DONNELL:
Good evening.
My name is John 21 Donnell.
I'm the project director of the technical and licensing activities for the Private Fuel Storage project.
22 23 This project will provide temporary, centralized 24 storage for some of the nation's spent nuclear fuel.
This 25 storage facility utilizes a start-clean stay-clean approach ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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I l-23 1
to provide a safe, cost-effective, interim solution to a
)! /~%
2 problem of national concern and importance.
'\\}
o 3
The Private Fuel Storage project was begun in 1994 L
4 by a group of electrical utilities who recognized that the i
.5 federal government would not honor its obligation to begin l
6 taking spent nuclear fuel by January 31, 1998.
By 1995, an 7
agreement had been reached between the utilities to move 8
forward with a formal project.
9-A number of prospective sites, including the Skull 10 Valley Band of Goshute Indian Reservation, were offered to l
11 the project in early 1996 for consideration as potential 12 siting areas.
Through the use of a screening process, the 13 site offered by the Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians was l
14
-selected as the primary siting location.
~ \\
[Y 15 A business agreement was reached with the tribe in c
16 late 1996, and the Private Fuel Storage project began the 17
-task of completing the necessary studies and preliminary 18 engineering.
These initial activities provided the 19 necessary information to prepare an application for 20 submission to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a L
21 storage facility license.
1 22 The facility is located on the reservation in 23 Tooele County.
The purpose of the facility is to store l
24 spent nuclear fuel that has been discharged from U.S.
25 commercial nuclear generating plants.
The maximum capacity i
('"'\\
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of the facility is 40,000 metric tons, and it will be sited 2
on approximately 100 acres of land within the reservation.
3 The spent fuel will be transported to Utah by rail 4
using certified shipping casks.
Two transportation 5
alternatives have been identified for moving the fuel 6
between the main line railroad and the facility on the-7 reservation.
The shipping casks will either be off-loaded 8
at an intermodal transfer point at the main line and loaded 9
onto a heavy-haul tractor-trailer for transport to the 10 facility, or the casks will be transported using a new 11 railroad spur connecting the facility directly to the main 12 line.
13 The canisters will be stored at the facility, 14 inside concrete storage casks, which will be located on 15-concrete pads within a secured area of the facility.
16 Multi-purpose canisters containing the spent nuclear fuel 17 will.be utilized for both the shipping casks and the storage 18 casks.
~19 The initial license for the facility has a 20 year 20 life, and can be extended'for an additional 20 year term.
21 No handling of bare fuel will occur at the facility since 22; the operations will be limited to the handling of sealed 1
23 canisters.
The facility will operate under a contamination-free, start-clean stay-clean philosophy, which 25 will. utilize and minimize the possibility of transporting to l
' ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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25 1
the facility any externally contaminated canisters.
(,f3 2
Tonight's meeting fccuses on the environmental l's) l\\
3 aspects of the project, which are documented in the project i
4 environmental report.
This report is beina reviewed by the 5
NRC staff and will provide a basis for the preparation of l
6 their environmental impact statement,
)
7 ZWs project environmental report specifically 1
1 8
covers the local region and the specific site offered by the 9
band to the project for the storage facility.
Field studies 10 and surveys have been performed to characterize the existing 11 environment.
The impacts associated with the construction i
12 and operation of the facility are provided in this document.
13 The environmental report also evaluated the 14 transportation corridor from the main line railroad to the
/(s 15 facility on the reservation using the existing Skull Valley i
l 16 Road corridor.
This corridor was evaluated for heavy-haul 17 using the existing road.
In addition, the corridor could 18 provide rail service with the addition of a new rail spur 19 adjacent to and parallel to the road.
20 As noted in the project environmental report and 21 mentioned in prior NRC meetings, the project has continued l
22 to develop and evaluate alternate transportation options l
23
-from the main line railroad to the facility location.
A 24 transportation study was begun in late 1997 and completed in 25 early 1998.
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26 l
1 This study developed several potential alternate f
l 2
transportation corridors for both heavy-haul and rail, and 3
also determined additional intermodal transfer point 4
locations near the main line railroad.
The study concluded 5
that an alternate corridor should be evaluated in more 6
detail along the western side of Skull Valley, as well as an 7
alternate intermodal transfer point location.
8 Now that the weather has improved, detailed field 9
surveys were begun recently and are in progress on the l
10 proposed corridor and alternate intermodal transfer point.
11 It is anticipated that this work will be completed soon.
If 12 ultimately the pursuit of the proposed corridor or the I
13 alternate intermodal transfer point is authorized by the 14 Private Fuel Storage LLC, a revision to the license
()
15 application will be submitted to the NRC staff to include 16 this new information.
17 The Private Fuel Storage project is looking 18 forward to working with the NRC, other regulatory agencies, 19 and other interested parties in pursuing and licensing a l
20 facility which addresses a concern of national interest.
l l
21 Thank you.
l 22 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you, Mr. Donnell.
l 23 Okay.
At this point, that's the conclusion of our i
24 presentations.
We have two other elected officials that are 25 listed to speak.
And the first, the Honorable Michael f]
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Leavitt, our governor, can't be with us this evening, but he 2
was kind enough to send a tape of his remarks, and I'd like 3.
to show them at this time.
And then after the tape, we'll 4
have the Honorable Leon Bear, chairman of the Skull Valley 5
Band of the Goshute Tribes.
6 MR. LEAVITT:
(Via Videotape) I want to thank the 7-United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission for providing 8
this opportunity for public comment regarding this proposal.
9 Private Fuel Storage, or PFS, a limited liability 10 corporation, proposes to store high-level nuclear fuel rods 11 on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation.
They would 12 store up to 40,000 metric tons of spent fuel 40 miles from 13 Salt Lake City.
This is the largest temporary storage 14 facility ever proposed.
It represents 25 percent more spent
()
15 fuel rods than have been generated in the past by the entire 16 nuclear industry.
17 We've been told by PFS that the proposed 18 high-level nuclear storage is safe.
They say it's safe 19 because it is stored now at nuclear power plants in the east 20 and midwest and California.
If it is so safe, it can stay 21 right where it is.
I-22 The impacts of the proposed facility reach far 23 beyond the borders of this, of the reservation.
Therefore, 24 the scope of the environmental impact statement, of the EIS, 25 which the NRC proposes under the -- under NEPA, has to be l
r~s ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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extended beyond the impacts of the reservation as well.
The 2
EIS must consider the cumulative impact of the proposed 3
storage site and the numerous other facilities and 4
activities that take place in the West Desert.
5 This is an area that already is the storage site 6
for 43 percent of the United States' stockpile of chemical 7
weapons, weapons that are being destroyed to reduce public 8
risk.
The malfunction and the crash of a cruise missile in 9
an' adjacent Dugway Prc7ing Grounds, as well as the crashes 10 of F-16's on maneuvers over the adjacent Utah Test and 11 Training Range, are well documented, and good examples of 12 the problem.
These existing operations and previous 13 accidents have to be considered in the EIS.
14 Now you have a responsibility under NEPA to know
()
15 and to evaluate and to mitigate the cumulative impacts of j
16 those activities, or to disapprove the proposed storage 17 facility.
Utah and the Skull Valley Reservation are not 1
18 safe places to store lethal radioactive waste that come in d
19 the form of fuel rods.
20 Transportation impacts have to be evaluated as 21 well during this process and review.
Major transportation 22 corridors in the west are critical, not only to the states 23 and communities they connect, but to the economic viability 24 of local, national and international businesses and 25 governments.
Interstate 80 and the Union Pacific Railroad I
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-through Salt Lake City and Tooele counties are critical 2
east-west transportation corridors.
-s
\\s#
3 This is a corridor that PFS has to use, whether it 4
transports the nuclear fuel rods by truck or by rail.
Any 5
accident resulting from the release of radioactive material 6
would be devastating to public safety.
But even an accident 7
that blocks the east-west transportation for hours or days 8
would have the equivalent impact on commerce, on business,
~9 and on the public.
There is no nearby equivalent 10 transportation corridor.
11 When the Great Salt Lake, for example, was i
12 threatened to be flooded, this -- the State of Utah spent 13 more than $50 million developing pumps that would allow the j
14 Great Salt Lake to be -- have its level protected so we can
- /~N 15 protect this very same corridor.
We expect no less i
{k s 16 commitment from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and from 17 PFS.
18 Furthermore, this transportation corridor has been 19 proposed for another high-level nuclear waste shipments.
l And none of the..feguards or assistance that's provided by 20 l
21 the U.S. Department of Energy shipments are required or 22 provided by the NRC and PFS.
Existing NRC regulations, as 23' well as provisions in the PFS license application, are well l
24 short in mitigating the impacts of accidents in this L
25 transportation corridor.
I p'
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The so-called temporary designation of the 2
facility is also within the purview of the IR -- of the EIS.
,-s 3
This facility is being proposed and evaluated as a temporary 4
storage facility.
However, there is no way to insure that 5
the spent fuel rods will ever be removed after they're 6
shipped here.
There's no permanent facility.
And Yucca 7
Mountain remains under study.
8 Furthermore, the license application clearly 9
states that one of the objectives for constructing this 10 temporary facility is to enable fuel rods to be shipped to 11 off-site nuclear power plants so that they can be 12 decommissioned.
Now once again, when this is done, the fuel 13 rods could not be restored to the power -- returned to the 14 power plant.
/)
15 The NEPA process requires an evaluation of the V
16 facility for a proposed operation.
A temporary facility.
l 17 It requires that it be a temporary facility, and this one 18 clearly will not be temporary.
If the facility cannot be 19 demonstrated as temporary, then the facility would operate 20 beyond the scope of the license and beyond the scope of the 21 EIS.
Both the EIS and the license would be flayed.
22
-Tonight I've identified a few of many issues and 1
23 concerns and questions that have been addressed in the EIS.
24 More extensive written comment will be submitted before the 25 scoping process and the public comment deadline has been l
{
l ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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1 arrived.
As PFS provides additional information in response 2
to deficiencies and omissions in their license application, 3
I.would expect that there would be additional issues that we l
4 will raise as well.
5-
.Therefore, I'd request that the public be allowed l
6 to submit additional scoping issues for evaluation as the 7
license process proceeds.
The public will need to have l
8 notice and access to those additional submissions.
Time to 9
evaluate them vi.tl be necessary so that we can -- that the l
10 NEPA process can be conducted in the way it was intended.
11 We need to have -- be noticed of opportunity to submit 12 additional comments.
13 The administrative license procedure and the 14 activities of the licensing board and admitted parties are l
15 separate from the NEPA process and cannot constitute or 16 supplant the NEPA process and public review.
As an 17 alternative, the NEPA process could be postponed until the 18 license is complete and all information necessary for the 19 NEPA analysis to be available to the public.
20 If there are any questions or clarifications 21 regarding my comments, I'll be happy to respond in writing.
22 Again, I'd like to thank you for the opportunity to present 1
23 these. comments as part of the scoping process.
As you know, 24 this is a matter of grave importance to our state.
So 25 important, in fact, that our state legislature acted almost
(]
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unanimously to oppose to put into place safeguards, to
( L(~T 2
oppose the actual placing of this and to put in safeguards l V 3
for any kind of waste.
l 4
We expect the same kind of care on the part'of the 1
5 federal government, and we look forward to working with you 6
to be sure that that occurs, 7
MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Governor Leavitt.
8 For your information, we're going to be 9
transcribing that tape.
It'll be part of the transcript of 10 this meeting.
In addition, we'll get some copies made and L
11 have them in the docket file, the tape.
So it'll be l
12 available as part of the environmental impact statement 13 record.
l 14 And at this time, let me welcome the Honorable
()
15 Leon Bear, Cilairman of the Skull Valley Band of the Goshute l
16 Tribe, for your remarks.
1 17 MR. BEAR:
Thank you.
My name's Leon Bear.
I'm 18 the Chairman of the Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians.
I l.
19 I guess one of~the things I'd like to say today is l
i l
20 that the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes has been around this 21.
country for a long time, over 10,000 years.
We were an l
l 22 environmentalist at the beginning and we're -- we continue i
i l
j.
23 to be environmentalists today.
i I
24 The traditions of the band are put into place 25 through our governmental regulations which we are applying
- -[
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33 1
to this process.
And the band also recognizes the fact that
/"N.
2 the scoping is being done and the EIS' are being done, which U
3 the Stato of Utah has made mention and wants required.
4 These issues are -- these -- all the issues are being 5
answered through this EIS.
6 The thing about the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes 7
is that the Skull Valley Band has a treaty since 1863.
He 8
have executive orders that were put into place in 1917 and
.9 1918 reserving the property that de now own, which we have 10 sovereignty over, which we regui,.te and have our laws and 11 orders on.
12 So the fact that the Skull Valley Band is into 13 this issue and has come together with PFS to license or to i
i 14 put a lease together for the land is appropriate.
We feel
(( )
15 that the economic development is appropriate for us because 16 of the facilities already surrounding us.
So everything is 17
-- will be in place and we hope that we will also be 18 involved in the EIS' as out on the reservation.
19 So the only other thing that I have, and my 20 concern, which is mentioned before, was this agent's fuel, j
21 spent fuel coming through Utah.
You know, the fact remains 22 is that the DOE is going to transport this stuff through 23 Utah and we should have the same scoping EIS involved before 24 they do this through Utah to make sure the safety factors 25 are in place.
And that's about all.
Thank you.
("T ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Chairman Bear.
r"]
2 Appreciate your remarks.
\\
/
3 At this point, we're ready to start the public 4
comment portion of the scoping meeting.
Just a couple of 5
administrative items.
6 We're going to use the microphone in the center 7
aisle.
That will broadcast over the speakers in the room 8
and also will be fed into the court reporter for 9
transcription.
So please use that particular microphone.
10 We've got, at this stage, about 30 people signed 11 up for speaking.
And I expect that'll continue to grow a 12 bit more as the evening goes on.
We're less than an hour 13 into the meeting and some people may continue to come in, as 14 they're welcome-to.
And I'm going to ask that you do the
(
i 15 following:
L. I 16
.I'm going to ask that you limit your oral comments 17 to about five minutes.
If you have more to give, please 18 supplement-them in writing, which we can receive this 19 evening or on the address on the -- that will be shown on 20 the screen and turn upside -- turned right-side up at this 21 time.
22 And we are trying to receive all the comments by 23 15 June so we can keep the schedule going on the scoping 24 process.
I'll tell you that if we get them by 15 June, 25 they're certain to be considered in the scoping process.
If
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you send them later, we'll do our best, but I won't q
2 guarantee that anything we get, you know, 20 June or 15 July
'3 will be incorporated, but we'll do our best to consider them 4
throughout this EIS process.
5 And I think at that point, just a reminder again, 6
please allow courtesy to each speaker so that their voice 7
can be heard in this open American unique style of exchange.
8 And we'll get started.
9 Mr. Delligatti, if you would announce the first 10 speaker.
11 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Yes.
The first speaker on our 12 list is Mr.. John Paul Kennedy of the Confederated Tribes of 13 the Goshute Reservation.
14 MR. HAUGHNEY:
And you just walked past the 15 microphone.
16 MR. KENNEDY:
I'd like to use yours, if I could.
17 MR. HAUGHNEY:
You may.
And as you do it, would 18 you state your name and location.
Thank you.
19 MR. KENNEDY:
Thank you very much.
I am John 20 Kennedy.
I am the general counsel for the Confederated l
21 Tribes of the Goshute Reservation, which is a federally 22 recognized Indian tribe sometimes confused with the Skull 23 Valley Band of Goshutes.
Indeed, the tribe which I 24 represent are sort of first cousins, the older cousins and 25 larg2r cousins of the Skull Valley Band.
l p
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The Goshute Tribe has a reservation which 2
straddles the Utah and Nevada border.
It's approximately 65 3
miles west of the Skull Valley area.
While the Skull Valley 4
Band has only about 120 members, approximately 30 of whom 5
actually reside on the reservation, the Goshute Tribe has 6
approximately 450 members.
Approximately half, 250 or so.
7 little more than half, reside on the Goshute Reservation..
8 A substantial group of members of the Goshute 9
Tribe at Ibapah, which is my client, actually lives in 10 Wendover, in Tooele County.
These two tribes have, as I 11 mentioned, established a federally recognized status.
The 12 Goshute Tribe from Ibapah has been in existence since 1914 13 as a federally recognized group.
The Skull Valley Band, on 14 the other hand, has only been recognized in relatively I i 15 recent years.
U 16 Members of the two groups are literally first 17 cousins.
They have common grandparents; they have common 18 ancestors going back, of course, for generations; and they 19 share the same aboriginal area.
The Goshute aboriginal area 20 extends roughly from the Okert Mouncains on the east to the 21 Ruby Mountains on the west, from the Great Salt Lake on the 22 north to approximately Delta on the south.
It's an area 23 consisting of approximately 5 or 6 million acres, depending l
24 on which study you rely upon.
25 The -- as Chairman Bear indicated, the Goshute f
l p
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37 1
people, as a people, have historically been very concerned 2
about environmental issues.
And as a result, my client has 3
looked at this matter very carefully; and disagreeing with 4
their cousins at Skull Valley, have taken a position in 5
opposition to this development.
6 We recognize the sovereign status of the Skull 7
Valley Band.
We recognize that they have authority with 8
respect to their tribal lands, just as any Indian tribe 9
would have.
But at the same time, we emphasize that all 10 Indian tribes, in exercising their sovereign rights, also 11 need to be careful about their sovereign responsibilities.
12 And we feel that in this instance, that has not been the 13 case.
14 And we are particularly concerned about the lack 15 of information.
And I think it's been alluded to here in 16 the governor's comments, and also I'm sure you'll hear it 17 alluded to by many others.
Congressman Cook of course 18 alluded to the same thing.
19 There are really two substantial governmental 20 actions that are taking place here.
One is the approval of 21 this license application.
But secondly, there is another 22 governmental action that's being taken, and that is the 23 approval of the lease between the Skull Valley Band and PFS.
24 It is my understanding that the normal process for 25 approving n Indian tribal lease would be to go through the
\\
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Bureau of Indian Affairs, which would ordinarily conduct or
/\\
2 have conducted for it an environmental impact statement.
In lb L
3 this case, however, the BIA, as I understand it, has 4
deferred to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its 5
preparation of the environmental impact statement for the 6
license.
7 The problem is, we submit, that there are two 8
different sets of standards involved.
And the standards 1
9 involved for the Bureau of Indian Affairs necessarily 10 involve a consideration of the trust responsibility that the 11 United States government has for the tribal beneficiaries, 12 not just a tribal government, but all of the tribal 13 beneficiaries.
14 Consequently, we feel that the interests of not (j
15 only the tribal government as a government needs to be 16 considered, but the individual interests of all of the 17 members to whom this trust responsibility extends needs to 18 be taken into account.
Likewise, because of our continuing 19 interest in the aboriginal area, we feel that that trust i
20 responsibility extends to the Confederated Tribes of the 21 Goshute Reservation at Ibapah.
22 One of the problems that I would like to focus on, 23 and I will also submit a written statement for the record, 24 deals with the difference in standards that the NRC follows 25 versus the standards thht the BIA should follow.
And let me (O_,/
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try to illustrate that with respect to the issue of
("%
2 financial responsibility.
3 In the initial presentation, it was indicated by 4
the gentleman from Oak Ridge that the financial information i
5 is a part of the safety report.
We submit that the 6
financial information is also an integral part of the 7
environmental 1 _ ort itself.
And the two are tied together B-
,in the process of decommissioning the site and also in 9
maintaining the site.
10 Consequently, if the lessee, in this case PFS, is 11 incapable financially of handling the decommissioning of the 12 site, the tribe would be left, and all of the people who are 13 members of the tribe, would be left with a situation where 14 they would be responsible for 40,000 tons of high-level
.(,U) 15 nuclear waste, waste that is lethal for generations, as many 16 as 400 generations, thousands of years.
17:
MR. HAUGENEY:
Excuse me, Mr. Kennedy.
18 MR. KENNEDY:
Am I running over my time?
19_
MR. HAUGHNEY:
Yes, you're a little --
20 MR. KENNEDY:
All right.
21-MR. HAUGHNEY:
-- bit over.
And if --
22 MR. KENNEDY:
Thank you.
Let me just summarize in 23 30 seconds, if I can.
24 MR. RAUGENEY:
That would be wonderful, 25 MR. KENNEDY:
Thank you.
I apologize.
/~
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The point is that at this juncture, there is no
(g 2
alternative site to remove these materials.
IO 3
Secondly, even the plans for an alternative site, 4
which have not been approved, even if they were approved, it 5
is impossible physically for the new site to be created and 6
up and running and able to handle the acceptance of the 7
transfer of this material within the 20 year period of the 8
lease.
So consequently, this lease cannot be performed.
We 9
know that as we stand here today.
It's impossible to be 10 performed in 20 years because this site cannot be 11 decommissioned within that period of time.
12 Secondly, because we don't know where the site 13 where the material will be transferred, we don't know how 14 much it will cost.
And because we don't know how much it
()
15 will cost, we cannot possibly say at this time that PFS is 16 capable to handle those costs.
17 For these'and many other reasons, my client, the 18 Confederated Tribes of the Goshute Reservation, opposes this 19 project and urges the government, as a part of the 20 environmental scoping process, to take into account these 21 kinds of issues and to find another alternative.
Thank you 22 very much.
23 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Kennedy.
Next.
24 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Next, Chip Ward.
25 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Ward.
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MR. WARD:
My name is Chip Ward and I'm here as a 2
spokesperson for West Desert HEAL.
I'm also a member of the 3
Citizens Against Chlorine Contamination and the Chemical 4
Weapons Working Group.
All three groups are engaged in 5
environmental issues near the proposed PFS facility.
I 6
I hope that the range of issues and concerns I 7
describe will convey to you that those of us who live on the 8
West Desert already suffer poor health and endure to many 9
cumulative risks and adverse impacts from what's out there 10 already.
These risks and impacts must be included within 11 the scope of the EIS on this project if that EIS is to be 12 meaningful and meet the requirements of the National 13 Environmental Policy Act.
14 West Desert Healthy Environmental Alliance, a
()
15 local grassroots community group concerned with the impact 16 of environmental degradation on health, conducted a survey 17 in 1966, which I'll submit to you, of Grantsville, the 18 nearest largest community to the proposed PFS facility.
We 19 believe that survey revealed high rates for cancer and birth 20 defects, an MS cluster, widespread respiratory ailments and 21 other chronic illnesses.
22 We believe ill health is already too common in our 23 community and may be attributable to the cumulative impacts 24 of downwind exposure to radiation testing during the 50's, 25 downwind exposure to open air nerve agent tests at Dugway
(]
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Proving Grounds just west of Skull Valley, decades of d('s episodic exposure to chlorine gas and other toxic pollution 2
3 from MagCorp magnesium refinery just north of Skull Valley, 4
as well as occupational exposures from solvents and 5
pesticides.
6 In Tooele County, we have learned the hard way 7
that health risks and impacts are cumulative.
The EIS must 8
account for the health of Tooele County citizenr and 9
consider current health conditions and existing risks and 10 impacts when calculating further risks and impacts.
11 I'm also a member of the Chemical Weapons Working 12 Group, a national umbrella organization for numerous local 13 community groups that are challenging the wisdom of burning
)
1 14 chemical weapons in our backyard.
The lion's share of the
()
15 chemical weapons arsenal is bunkered just east of Skull 16 Valley.
The stockpile is being destroyed using a i
17 controversial method in a program that is already 14 years 18 behind schedule and 900 percent over budget.
A meaningful 19 EIS must consider what it means to add a nuclear waste 20 depository next to a chemical weapons arsenal that is being 21 burned.
22 I'm also active in the Citizens Against Chlorine 23 Contamination, now a working committee of the Utah chapter 24 of the Sierra Club.
The CACC has been working for almost 25 two years to challenge the Magnesium Corporation of America i
p)
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Proving Grounds just west of Skull Valley, decades of r
2 episodic exposure to chlorine gas and other toxic pollution l
3 from MagCorp magnesium refinery just north of Skull Valley, 1
l as well as occupational exposures from solvents and 4
5 pesticides.
l 6
In Tooele County, we have learned the hard way 7
that health risks and impacts are cumulative.
The EIS must 8
account for the health of Tooele County citizens and 9
consider current health conditions and existing risks and 10 impacts when calculating further risks and impacts.
11 I'm also a member of the Chemical Weapons Working 12 Group, a national umbrella organization for numerous local 13 community groups that are challenging the wisdom of burning 14 chemical weapons in our backyard.
The lion's share of the (n) 15 chemical weapons arsenal is bunkered just east of Skull s_-
16 Valley.
The stockpile is being destroyed using a 17 controversial method in a program that is already 14 years 18 behind schedule and 900 percent over budget.
A meaningful 19 EIS must consider what it means to add a nuclear waste 20 depository next to a chemical weapons arsenal that is being 21 burned.
22 I'm also active in the Citizens Against Chlorine 23 Contamination, now a working committee of the Utah chapter 24 of the Sierra Club.
The CACC has been working for almost 25 two years to challenge the Magnesium Corporation of America r"N ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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to clean up what is arguably the dirtiest industrial 2
operation in America.
Each year, MagCorp's magnesium j-3 refinery just north of the -- of Skull Valley emits 85 4
percent of the point source chlorine gas emitted in the 5
nation, as well as thousands of tons of other toxic 6
pollution.
Because of MagCorp, more than 33 pounds of toxic 7
pollution per capita is emitted each year in Utah, compared 8
to a national average of just under 6 pounds per capita per 9
year.
10 The CACC recently convinced state regulators to 11 start a thorough program of testing MagCorp for dioxin 12 emissions.
We are particularly concerned about the impact 13 of dioxin exposure to millions of migrating birds that pass 14 through the Great Salt Lake ecosystem.
The EIS must
)
15 consider the toxic burden we already bear from MagCorp and 16 must consider the consequences of adding more adverse 17 impacts to those that are already suffered by Great Salt 18 Lake wildlife.
19 Transporting radioactive waste through a narrow 20 transportation corridor bounded by a lake and mountains 21 could have an obvious and powerful negative impact on our 22 local economy should an accident happen, but transporting 23 that waste along the shores and wetlands of the Great Salt 24 Lake could also lead to a wildlife holocaust.
25 In addition to the risks and impacts I have just f- ~
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described, an inventory of West Desert risks and impacts 2
would also have to include two commercial hazardous waste
.3 incinerators, the massive hazardous waste landfill, the 4
radioactive waste landfill, and'the open burning and 5
. detonation of conventional munitions.
And then there is the 6
-- then there are the F-16's from Hill Air Force Base that crash into the West Desert and Salt Lake on a fairly regular 7
8 basis.
And then there is the occasional missile that comes 9
our way.
10 Finally, the EIS should assess the economic 11 consequences to our communities if we in Tooele County are 12 perceived as an environmental pariah.
Because if the PFS 13 facility is added to what we already endure in the West 14 Desert, that is surely how we will be perceived.
Thank you.
O 15 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you very much, Mr. Ward.
U 16 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Margene Bullcreek.
17 Either one.
Up to you.
18 MS. BULLCREEK:
Thank you.
Gives me great
{
19 pleasure to be standing here before you to be able to tell 20 you who we are.
We are -- we belong to an organization 21 opposing the nuclear waste storage on our reservation, and 22 we are called the Ohngo Gaugadeh Deva Awareness.
And it's a 23 traditional name for a timber setting community that had 24 been named by our forefathers.
1 l
25 And it's important to stand here before you and to l
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let you know as a traditionalist, as a Native American, that 2
this nuclear waste that's proposed for our reservation is a 3
mockery to Native Americans.
It's a mockery to who we are 4
as Goshutes.
5 Because of the fact that we had belonged to a 6
large group of Shoshone Indians Nation and we had broken i
7 off.
We didn't want to travel with them during their 8
seasonal travels.
We decided to stay in Grantsville.
We 9
had lived in Grantsville for a while, until there was a 10 treaty developed, a reservation where our grandfathers had 11 decided to stay.
We could have went to another place like 12 with the Ute tribe or with the Ibapah, which Mr. Kennedy had 13 stated, we are very close.
Our grandmothers are from there.
14 And it's the only piece of land that we have.
As
(
15 Native Americans and as a traditionalist, I want to be able 16 to say that we ought to protect where we're from and not to 17 destroy it.
Because we need to strengthen our reservation; 18 we need to strengthen our government to be strong, to be 19 able to have a government to govern ourselves.
I say this 20 because right now we do not have a strong government.
We do 21 not have traditionalist on our council.
If we did, they 22 would oppose this.
23 And another thing that I want to say is that we 24 don't have any law, we don't have any tribal code.
The only 25 tribal code we have is a criminal code.
The criminal code f
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that we had signed a contract with the state, with the 2
sheriff's department, the county sheriff's department, to O
l 3
detain and arrest people on our reservation.
We do not have 4
any remedy, we don't have any courts.
And so looking at 5
this, this is -- there's something wrong with our 6
reservation.
7 We need to have our own tribal courts; we need to 8
have our own resource developments.
We -- our reservation 9
improvements that we spend money on every year, we don't 10 have that.
Our houses needs a lot of fixing.
We need to 11 standardize our homes; we need to have jobs on our 12 reservations.
We don't have any -- if there are jobs, we're 13 not -- they don't notify us of this openings.
Only certain 14 family are the only ones that fills these positions.
()
15 And that certain family are the ones that wants 16 the nuclear waste on our reservation.
They are in that 17 political council.
They have that position to represent all 18 of the members of the Goshute on the reservation, Skull 19 Valley Reservation.
There are 124 members.
There are 69 20 voting members and the rest are minors.
And the people that 21 are supporting our council are all one family.
22 And there are those of us, a third of us that are 23 opposing this.
We do not want this nuclear waste on our 24 reservation.
We live there.
We're going to be waking up 25 every morning wondering when this thing is going to be p
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contaminating the -- our land.
We need to protect our water l
g3 2
and our air; we need t_
protect our mother earth.
And I say d
3 this as a traditionalist.
We don't want to be able to go j
4 and buy water, maybe in the future.
We don't want to go out 5
and buy water because our water is contaminated.
6 They say.this is all guaranteed.
I mean this is 7
all safe, but it's not guaranteed.
Look what happened to 8
the Las Vegas fallouts.
My aunt was one of the people that 9
was compensated when she had died of cancer.
Now her son 10 also'has cancer.
11 Indian land has always been targeted for nuclear 12 testing, for uranium mining, for other -- for Hanford 13 (phonetic) Testing Facility, Yakima Reservation, Arizona
.14 Navajos, three -- there's only three surviving miners out of j
(' }
15 that, the Navajos that had mined in that area.
And we have 16 cancers down in Arizona where they had comc in for uranium 17 mining there also.
18 There had been people -- they had been promised 19 the same thing as the NSB had promised us, that there would 20 be plenty of money for everybody, but now some of them do 21 have cancer.
22 And we cannot argue against -- our organization, i
23 OGDA, cannot argue against the Bureau of Indian Affairs, 24 Secretary of Interior, and NSB, who has all the money.
It 25 is not OGDA's fault, our members that are against the g
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nuclear facility's fault, because the tribal council had 2
never ever come up with an economic resources in the past.
3 They had never come up with programs or go for grants.
4 It's not the State's fault that the State isn't 5
helping us.
It's the BIA's fault for keeping us at arm's 6
length.
And we do -- we did have money.
We had a lot of 7
money, and the BIA had, as wards of our government, had 8
stated that we have the opportunity to govern ourselves.
9 But all this money went to waste.
We've went through a lot 10 of business ventures and we lost out a lot of money.
11 So why should we be -- I'm sorry.
But why should 12
-- so why should we be able to deal with the nuclear waste 13 that's going to interfere?
It's going to make -- interfere 14 into our lives of native -- as Native Americans.
We drink
)
15 the water, we eat the wild plant life that are -- this is 16 all within the five mile scope of the EIS.
And we eat the 17 wild animals, we eat the deers that comes -- that's in our 18 mountains.
We have religious sites; we use the sagebrushes 19 as part of our sacred religious ceremonies.
These are all 20 sacred to us.
We need to. protect this.
21 And also, I want to be able to say that we need to 22 hold onto our traditions, because if this thing should ever 23
-- if the nuclear waste should control our lives, then we're 24 not going to be able to be who we are.
Who are we going to 25 be?
Are we going to be -- is finally the government's going Q
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to make us -- drive us into the melting pot that they have
.gs 2
intended to do years ago?
~'
3-We don't want this.
OGDA doesn't want this.
We 4
want to be able to live on the reservation without fear.
And if our council is telling themselves that they're doing 5
6 everybody a big favor by making millionaires out of us, then 7
why are they sacrificing our lives and our future lives for 8
their own greed?
9 And the'NR -- and I've been to Washington, D.C.
in 10 February to lobby.
And I've talked to a couple of senators 11 there.
And I mentioned to them what is DOE's intention as 12 far as the transportation of this nuclear waste from 13 Minnesota?
Well, they said we -- it's not -- we can't get 14 involved with that.
That's a different matter.
That's NRC.
15 And I thought well, so who -- and since they said 16 that to us, to me, then I'm standing here before the NRC.
17
.And I am not requesting.
I am telling them to please i
18 recognize us as an organization, as a traditionalist, to be
{
-19 able to protect our future,.and to be able to save our 20 environment.
21 We do not want to give all this up for money, 22 because money won't last long.
Money's not going to last 23 into the generation.
If there's going to be any mishaps, i
24 it's not going to be in this generation, it's going to be in i
25 their generation.
And then we're going to be coming before 1
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DOE and ask for cleanup funds.
r' 2
MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thanks.
N,%
3 MS. BULLCREEK:
And just one last thing that I i
4.
want to be able to say is that the Secretary of the Interior 5
and the BIA have not filed their EIS reports.
They are 6
going to determine that on whatever the NRC come up with, 7
but the NRC doesn't know us like Native Americans, like the 8
BIA knows us.
We've been wards of the government for so 9
many years, and they're not protecting us now.
10 But I want the NRC to know that we do have an 11 archaeological site on the reservation that needs to be 12 protected.
We have our religious, sacred ceremonies that 13 needs protected, be protected.
We have eagles.
We had sage 14 hens and pheasants at one time, but they had closed that
(
)
15 water up.
But that could be reopened.
There is peace 16-there.
It's not barren.
There's peace there.
17 And that's all I want to say, is the organization 18 is here to protect the future generation and to be Native 19' Americans.
Thank you.
20.
MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
21 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Ferris Groll.
I hope I 22 pronounced that correctly.
23 MR. GROLL:
Yes.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I'll 24 try not to be redundant in things that have already been
':25 discussed.
l 1
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My nams is Ferris Groll.
I'm a deputy i
2 commissioner with the Department of Public Safety, State of f
3-Utah.
4 Much of the material that we received so far, and 5
that's been not too much, has not dealt with at least one 6.
issue that I'd like to bring to your attention.
Other 7-issues will be brought up by other staff of state i
8 government.
And that is the threat of terroristic or 9
domestic terrorist attacks upon shipments, not only in 10 transit, which is not just in the scate of Utah, but which 11 will cover a great many highways and thousands of miles 12 getting the material here.
And then again, once it is 13 stored at site.
We've not seen a definite plan on how to 14
-deal with that potential and the risks involved.
i l
15 As you well know, there are many capabilities, not 16 only from within our own country but from foreign groups, 17 that could use this opportunity to make a point or to 18 actually create damage with the facility and with the 19 material.
We know that there's some -- been some previous 20 studies done on attacks by ---Department of Energy had 21-looked at certain casks that have been used.
22 I-We believe that those studies are not adequate at 23 this time with new generation.
I was glad to hear that you l
24' are now evaluating some new. casks to transport that material l
25 and would like to see the results of that new testing.
So I yg ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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was glad to hear that.
(~}
2 You really need a realistic approach to those V
3 terroristic need risks.
A new comprehensive study needs to 4
be done, I believe, in looking at those based on recent 5
terroristic activities, domestic and foreign, on different 6
facilAties within the United States and within foreign 7
countries that have been more prevalent in the last few 8
years than when your initial studies were done.
9 I would like to just refer in closing, and I will 10 be brief because I think you have the message about 11 terroristic activities and you have done some studies there.
12 I appreciate the information that has been given, but I would ask that you look at that with your new technology 14 that's available, with new availability of attack weapons I) 15
.and those kind of things that would be available now versus V
16 70's and 80's.
And I don't know if you've done studies l
17 since then, but the most recent I found is studies in the l
l 18 80's.
19 But there was also a January 1998 publication 20 done.
There was a survey done by University of Maryland, I 21 believe, and they asked some questions about transportation j
22 of nuclear waste.
The problem that you face and that we 23 face in many things is only about a third of the people were 24 aware that there's been some congressional legislation that 25 allows that transportation once this process is done.
~
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But the other interesting things in that study,
/~
2 b}
perception becomes reality.
About 70 percent of those 3
people asked in that study said that they believe that 4
transportation of nuclear waste would be a target for 5
terroristic activity.
6 And the other interesting part is about half, or a 7
little ove* half of those people, believed that there would 8
be an ecoromic impact to their properties, to their value of 9
their quality of life, if they lived within a corridor of 10 the transportation routes, and especially in the area of the 11 facility that it may be stored at.
12 It's quite a lengthy study.
That's a couple of 13 areas.
I don't know if you're aware of that one.
If you'd 14 like it, I could give you that.
But thank you for your
()
15' attention and hope you'll address at least those concerned, 16 and some of the others of my colleagues.
i 17 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Yeah.
Thank you, sir.
You're 1
18 certainly free to supplement your remarks with nay documents 19 that you feel relevant.
20 Mr. Hoepner, from Coalition 21.
I 21 MR. HOEPNER:
I'm Martin Hoepner.
I'm from Idaho I
22 ~
Falls, Idaho.
Consider myself a life-long environmentalist.
23 I represent Coalition 21, which I'll tell you l
24 about in a minute.
I also am a member of the board of i
i 25 directors of Idaho -- of the Idaho Academy of Science, l
O ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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probably belong to some 20 or 30 outdoor conservation,
/~T 2
recreation, environmental groups.
LJ 3
But I'm representing tonight Coalition 21.
We're 4
a group of Idaho-based public citizens with an interest in 5
the subject issue.
And if anybody wants to question me why, 6
I'll tell you later.
7 The coalition is an all volunteer group from a 8
great variety of backgrounds.
Its primary mission is to 9
help insure that the technologies needed to sustain an 10 appropriate quality of life in America, including a clean 11 environment and sufficient quantities of environmentally i
12 benign and affordable energy, are available to the citizens 13 of the U.S. in the next century.
Our motto is " Supporting 14 tomorrow's technology with facts, not fears."
[O
\\
15 The coalition is unequivocally and wholly in 16 support of nuclear power and the electrical utilities which 17 employ this technology to supply nearly one-quarter of this 18 nation's electrical energy.
We therefore support any 19 efforts to insure that nuclear utilities are not hampered in 20-storage of irradiated fuel.
21 Note that we do not use this -- refer to this 22 viable material as " spent fuel."
That misnamed term is not 23 used in other nuclear power countries, who rationally 24 recycle or reprocess their-irradiated fuel.
" Spent" is an 25 erroneous designation perpetuated by purely political, not l
l.
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I 55 1
technical reasons, and we hope that's a short-term 2
' situation.
3 The coalition notes that compared' t o the 4
demonstrated environmental insults caused by hydro-electric 5
power dams and burning carbonaceous fuels, nuclear power is 6
' clearly the most environmentally benign of the large-scale, 7
reliable, safe practical sources of electrical energy that L
8 are available to modern society.
9 We truly support research and development and 10
. implementation of improving combustion efficiencies, and 11 likewise, emphasis on employing alternative energies 12
. wherever such sources are feasible.
However, it's clear to 13 us that these technologies will be insufficient to meet the 14 energy requirements of the United States in the next 15 century.
Only nuclear energy can help deliver this world 16 and this country from the appalling disasters that have 17 already commenced attributable to global warming, as well=as 18D helping to meet the clean air standards for which the 19 citizens of our countries have a right to have.
.20 Of great concern to us is that neither the 21
. utilities, the government or academia appear to be at all 22-
- concerned that the 100 plus nuclear plants that now provide 23 nearly.23 percent of this nation's electricity are at the 24
' midpoint of the service life.
And there's no plans to 25'
- replace them, not even with floating fossil plants or
/^%
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I 56 1
environment ravaging. power dams.
2 This country is truly in danger from an impending 3
energy _ shortage.
Those who oppose nuclear power for alleged 4
environmental concerns have not objectively studied the 5
' facts.
And being uniformed, they may be the unwilling 6
disciplines of the anti-nuclear propagandas.
7 It's a mystery to those of us in the coalition, 8
some of us have been environmental volunteer activists on 9
natural resource issues for many years, how any real 10 environmentalist can oppose nuclear power.on environmental 11 grounds.
To us, it doesn't make sense.
12 The next part of my commentary I'm referring to an 13 article by Commissioner Diaz that was in the Nuclear News.
14 And we didn't put it in here to be obsequious, mind you.
We
()
15 like what he said.
16 He addresses three issues, and I'll just mention l
17 them to you.
He talked about closing the nuclear fuel 18 cycle, he' talked about public information.
He's got this I
i 19 quote.
He said "On public information," Mr. Dian says, and t
20 Mr. Diaz is an NRC commissioner, "the NRC should stand up 21 for the truth and object firmly and categorically wherever-
)
22 misinformation on nuclear issues is placed in circulation.
23 This is not a matter of being pro-nuclear or anti-nuclear, 24 it's a matter of being pro-public and pro-truth."
25 Coalition feels, 21 feels NRC should firmly adhere Q
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57 to this approach in addressing the EIS and do something 1
about the vast. amount of misinformation that has already 2
3 surfaced on this project, and'I heard some tonight.
4 Remember, our motto is " Facts, not fears."
5 How am I doing on time?
6 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Not so good.
Could you --
'7 MR. HOEPNER:
Okay.
Well --
8 MR. HAUGHNEY:
You're not alone, but 9
MR. HOEPNER:
Okay.
Well --
10 MR. HAUGHNEY:
If you could pick it out and 11 summarize, we'd be glad to --
12 MR. HOEPNER:
Okay.
I've got two more things to 13 say here.
14 MR. HAUGENEY:
Okay.
{}
15 MR. HOEPNER:
We would remind NRC that they have 16 an EIS review underway for a new dry proposed above-ground 17
' irradiated fuel storage facility at the IMEL. 'And maybe you 18 can look at that and you won't have'to reinvent the wheel.
l 19 summing up, whether it be the interim nuclear
'20 irradiated fuel storage facility championed by Senator Larry
-21 Craig, which if the government passes that, and they should, I
22 you guys don't have any problem here.
l l
23 The courageous and timely overture to the midwest 24 nuclear facilities by the Skull Valley Band of the Goshute, L
25 or other such. worthwhile ventures, the citizens of this i
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58 1
country and its nuclear utilities must not be thwarted by f'~}
2 those seeking to delay such needed ventures.
(>
3 Ignore those who stridently screech about risk 4
where there are no risks of any consequence, and prophesy 5
calamities where scientific evidence and empirical 6
experience prove there isn't any significant hazard.
7 Dismiss those who talk of environmental concerns when the l
8 real concern is the most -- is that the most environmentally 9
benign power source is not being encouraged, but thwarted by I
(
10 the ignorant, the deceitful, and the misinformation brokers, f
11 and the bias of journalists who insist on calling to --
12 referring to engineered nuclear storage facilities with the 13 pejorative word " dump."
14 We believe that the NRC --
(qv) 15 MR. HAUGHNEY:
That's me.
16 MR. HOEPNER:
-- will make tne right assessments, 1
17 stand up and be forthright in ignoring political emphasis, 18 and make the timely and right choices for this country's 19 citizens, based on information received at today's hearing.
20 The coalition will provide some more input on this issue.
21 Thank you very much.
22 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Hoepner.
23 MR. HOEPNER:
I don't expect applause.
24 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Don Cobb.
25 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Don Cobb.
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MR. COBB:
Thank you.
My name is Donald Cobb.
2 I'm a bureau chief with the Division of Comprehensive 3
Emergency Management, which is part of the Utah Department 4
of Public Safety.
My area is Natural and Technological 5
Hazards.
I have a prepared statement and a whole bunch of 6
materials that are going to be coming at you in a few days, 7
but I think I'll foreswear that latter part for the interest 8
of tisne here.
9 The Division of Comprehensive Emergency Management 10
-- we'll call that CEM for the sake of it -- shares a similar mission with the United States Nuclear Regulatory 11 12 Commission.
We serve to save lives, reduce injuries, and 13 protect property and the environment from the effects of 14 natural and man-caused disasters.
This is achieved through
()
15 a statutory comprehensive effort to prepare for, respond to, 16 recover from, and mitigate the effects of disasters and 17 emergencies created by a wide variety of hazards.
18 CEM also shares a common priority with the NRC.
19 We care for people.
The best way to mitigate against a 20 hazard is to reduce the risks associated with it to as low a 21 level as possible.
Here in Utah, for example, we obviously 22 cannot remove the many earthquake faults that lie under our 23 populated areas.
However, we can establish and enforce 24 appropriate building codes, increase public awareness and 25 understanding of the earthquake threat, and take many O
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related proactive mitigation measures as individuals, families, and communities to plan and prepare for a major
- g -
2 l-l1 3
quake that is known.to be overdue here.
l-4 Also in Utah, for example, we can continue efforts 5'
such as the intensive cooperative process among local, 6
state, and federal agencies to eliminate the huge stockpile 7
of chemical weapons currently being destroyed at the Tooele 8
disposal facility at.Deserat (phonetic) Chemical Depot.
9 We've already heard from Chip about some other views 10 regarding that.
11 When these~ weapons are gone forever from our i
12 state, so will be the risks associated with them.
The 13
' Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program, call that 14 CSEPP, coordinated by.CEM in Utah, represents a great effort 15 on the part'of many different levels of government to
~
16 protect _ the public during the destruction process.
Our 17:
Utah's CSEPP successes have been well documented and have 18 come about only through many years of concentrated work by 19 dedicated professionals who recognize that effective 20 communication and coordination are essential to protect the 21 residents of our state.
In fact, Utah's CSEPP has 22 established _a standard of care that directly or indirectly 23
- applies to the emergency management of other technological 24
. hazards and perhaps many natural hazards as well.
25 On the other hand, CEM's-experience with the l
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Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation ISFSI --
2 somebody said that was isfizzy (phonetic).
Is that -- how 3
do you say that; ISFSI?
l 4
MR. DELLIGATTI:
Isfizzy -- people say it 5
differently.
6 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Yeah, I -- the short pronunciation 7
of the acronym is bothersome to me personally.
8 MR. COBB:
Okay.
9 MR. HAUGENEY:
I'm in'the minority among my staff 10 on that.
11 MR. COBB:
We'll go the long route then.
The 12 ISFSI proposed by private fuel storage on the Skull Valley 13 Band of Goshute Indians Reservation has proven to be quite a 14 departure from the Utah CSEPP standard of cara.
Never once
[/)
15 has PFS nor any other representative of this effort 16 contacted CEM-regarding its plan to store high-level nuclear 17 waste in Utah.
Never once has any reply been offered to the 18 many CEM comments and observations about the gross i
19 deficiencies in PFS's emergency plan as outlined in the l
20 State of Utah 2.206' petition on June 27th of last year and 21 the more recent State of Utah contentions basis for 22 contesting licensing of nuclear waste storage facility.
23 PFS's failure to communicate and coordinate with a 1
24 state agency whose statutory responsibility for emergency 25 management has been well established for many years, is
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1
'particularly remarkable since the intent of the consortium l
l 2
- bs to introduce an arguably significant hazard into our Utah I
i 3
environment.
Simply put, PFS's purpose is quite the 4
opposite of hazard mitigation.
For Utah, it is hazard l
5.
promulgation.
l l
l 6
We are aware that PFS has contacted Tooele 7
(phonetic) County Emergency Management.
It's one of the 8
Utah CSEPP partners.
And we know too that Tooele County 9
Emergency Management has replied to PFS with a list of 10 concerns they share with CEM.
However, ISFSI is not a 11 uniquely Goshute Indian business opportunity nor an internal 12 Tooele County problem that can be solved within the confines 13 of the Tooele County line.
This is a vexing Utah issue that 14 will affect hundreds of thousands of our state residents
()
15 along the expected transportation corridors to the proposed
'. 6 waste site.
It is an issue for which appropriate 17 comprehensive emergency planning, such as in CSEPP, must 18-take place.
19 The PFS has yet to contact our office.
Some 20 months ago in mid~ July '97, the Utah Division of l
21 Comprehensive Emergency Management did receive a tasking l
R22 from the Utah Department of Environmental Quality to conduct 23 a careful review and analysis of the PFS license application
~24 and related materials including an emergency plan for the 25 PFS facility as submitted to the NRC last June.
/
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provided copies of *.he materials for this effort.
2 Specific to emergency management-related issues, 3
the review and analysis was completed in August '97 by three 4
senior CEM senior staff.
More than 90 critical observations 5
and questions regarding the PSF (sic) Emergency Plan alone 6
were compiled at that time.
These issues appear to remain 7
largely unresolved to this day.
8 For example, regarding the PFS Emergency Plan, 9
page 1-6CM commented -- going to quote from that here.
10
" Transportation plan in here is confined to the 11 site itself and the area surrounding it in Tooele County.
12 The plan does not consider intrastate transportation and 13 interstate transportation planning requirements.
This is 14 not satisfactory considering the heavily-populated regional
()
15 transportation corridors along which these dangerous cargos 16 may move.
For example, Salt Lake County is likely to be 17 affected but does not receive any planning consideration.
18 "Other serious questions follow on these 19 observations.
What exactly are the identified 20 transportation routes from the nuclear reactors to the ISFSI 21 site?
What specific Utah communities will be affected?
Can 22 they deal with a nuclear waste-related emergency and what 23 remedial or enhancement emergency management measures will 24 be required?
What unique security-related circumstances 25 along the identified routes must be considered?
What O
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factors could make these shipments vulnerable to sabotage or f-
- 2 accident?
What is the overall hazard vulnerability of the
!\\
3 transfer site at the route's end?"
4 Which transfer site, for that matter, from what we 5
learned tonight?
6 These and many other concerns must receive 7
appropriate emergency planning consideration.
8 Utah has learned.through the precedent of many 9
years successful participation in the Chemical Stockpile 10 Emergency Preparedness Program that forthright 11 communication, coordination, and effective planning by all 12 jurisdictions and entities are essential to the attainment 13 of public safety.
Further, CEM believes that Utah residents 14 and those who serve them have a right to accept or reject I
15 being subjected to unwarranted, unwanted risks over which L.
16 they may exercise some control.
17 In the absence of the communication, coordination, 18 and effective planning elements that characterize a l
19 successful emergency management effort, the ISFSI proposed 20 for Skull Valley is viewed as especially unwelcome by Utah 21 CEM.
Therefore, in the interest of public safety, CEM 22 requests that the NRC reject the PFS proposal.
Thank you, 23 and --
i 24 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Cobb.
l 25' MR. DELLIGATTI:
Lisa Bullcreek.
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MS. BULLCREEK:
Hello.
My name's Lisa Bullcreek.
2 I'm a member of the Skull Valley Goshute.
I live out in 3
Skull Valley.
I'm 28; I've lived out in Skull Valley for 21 4
years and -- I'm nervous -- first time I've talked in front 5
of so many people.
But I don't know.
I don't have any 6
information about what's going on with this facility.
I 7
live right next door to Mr. Leon Bear, and he's the 8
chairman.
I would think that they would tell me, you know, 9
what's going on because that's where I grew up at, that's my 10 home.
And they're bringing this facility there and they're 11 disrupting my life.
I mean, the facility isn't even there 12 but it has caused a big problem within my family, within the 13 tribe.
I mean, there's -- what did they, 120 member of the 14 Goshute Tribe.
There's only five homes out there.
There's 15 probably like 14 members that live out there that's lived 16 out there for just about as long as I have.
I'm'the third 17 generation living out in Skull Valley.
My grandmother who 18 was also from Ivanpaw (phonetic), and she lived out there.
19 And my mother was raised out there and her brothers and her 20 sisters.
And they all lived out there.
Her -- my mother i
21 and her brother still live out there.
At one time, their l
l 22 other brother and another brother lived out there.
So this
)
23 is -- you know, this is our home.
This is my family's home.
l 24 And the -- you know, I'd like to know if -- is it l
25 really going to be safe.
I mean, I was brought up -- I mean j
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-- well, what's been really bothering me is, since the attorney -- or the tribe's attorney, Mr. Quintana 3
(phonetic), had referred to Skull Valley being barren, I'm 4
not barren.
I'm alive and I'm living out there, and I have 5
for years and years and years, and so has my family.
And if 6
it looks barren to them it's because they don't know how to 7
live with it.
I mean, they see weeds; they see sage 8
brushes; they see willows.
Well, to these things, that's my 9
life, you know.
They all -- that's who I am with my 10 religious belief like sage in or religious ceremonies, 11 willows for our cradles for the kids to grow up in.
It's 12 what we all grew up in.
My grandmother would go out there 13 to the willows and cut them and fix them.
These things are 14 part of me, a part of my life and my family's life too.
] )
15 And I don't know if people don't know that, you 16 know, maybe some people that are going for it.
- Well, 17 they've never lived out in Skull Valley.
The names that --
18 the people that want the facility out there, they've never 19 lived out there.
It's a hard place to live at because it's 20 way out there, you know, way out there in, you know, the 21 desert, you know, sage brush, not barren but sage brushes.
22 And, you know, we've -- I don't know.
This thing is -- it's 23 just really hard.
This whole thing really is.
24 And I haven't got any papers on how safe this j
25 facility is.
This man says that, you know, these are the
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1 facts.
Well, I wish somebody would show me some papers with N-2 some facts or tell me something about how big this 3
facility's supposed to be, you know.
What are the, you 4
know, what are the dangers that we're facing?
Well, I know 5
because the jets that fly by -- everybody's made some good 6
points, and I know what they're talking about because, like 7
I said, I stay out there.
I've lived out there for years.
8 The jets fly by really low.
That's really scary to think 9
that maybe one of these days the jets are going to hit right 10 into it and then that's going to be the end of everybody, 11 not only, you know, just the people living on the 12 reservation.
And also, I would hate to be part of that 13 responsibility to cause so many lives lost if something was
-14 to happen.
15 I mean, you know, to me it's embarrassing now 16-because people ask me where I'm from and I say Skull Valley, 17 and they says, "Well, you're the people putting the facility I
18 out there.
Why are you doing that for?"
I says, "I'm not 19 doing.it.
I'm trying to go against it.
I don't believe in d
20 it."
21 But I just wanted to, you know, say these things 22 because I read these newspapers about the. chairman, Leon 23 Bear, saying he speaks for the tribe.
Well, he doesn't 24 speak for me.
He's in council and he can say that he speaks 25 for the tribe.
Well, I live out in Skull Valley and I'm r~x.;
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here to speak for myself.
And it's just -- there were so 1i j'*g 2
many things I wanted to say, but a lot of people covered all LJ t
3 them bases, and I could, you know, comment and maybe put 4
some more in there to that, but I just wanted to say that, I
5 you know, where I live at now, we have waters coming down 6
from the mountain, and our water right now is dirty.
Our 7
pipes break all the time.
8 What I'm saying is that, even though there's only l
)
9 a few houses out there, you know, and our council wants to 10 put a big facility out there, you know, they can't even take 11 care of the safety of the people living on the tribe and 12 making sure that we're getting clean water coming down 13 because our pipes are busting every summer.
And right now, 14 my water's -- the water's dirty that's coming down, and they (o) 15 don't bother to fix that.
Well, I know because we are going x_/
16 against the facility so we're kind of like pushed to the 17 side.
It is true that there are members in the tribe who 18 have been getting a little bit more money because they 19 support the facility.
And I think I'm getting -- me and my 20 family are getting the raw end of this.
You know, it's my 21 home.
I don't care what people say; it's supposed to bring 22 us money everything, but they're coming onto my home now 23 where I've always known it to be my home.
And it's easy for 24 them to say, "Go ahead; put the facility out there,"
25 because, you know, that's not their home.
It's way out
/'
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there in the mountains somewhere.
You know, what does it ty 2
matter to them?
O 3
With the money wise, you know what, I don't even 4
want the money.
You know, people say that -- well, the 5
tribe says that it's going to give the tribe, you know, jobs 6
and everything once it gets built out there.
Heck, I'd 7
rather drive over here like I've been doing for years and 8
years, an hours away, and going back to work.
The people 9
that live outside the reservation all live in the city who 10
'have access to jobs, you know, so I don't understand that.
11 You know, I'm the one that has to drive the longer way than 12 everybody else.
But here it's supposed to give them jobs.
13 But these are just, you know, some of the things 14 that -- well, I want to say more, but since we're on a
[ )\\
15
.little time schedule, I'm getting kind of nervous here too.
u 16 I'm forgetting half the things I was going to say.
- But, 17 yeah, that's basically what I wanted to say is that.
18 MR. HAUGHNEY:
May I say that for someone who has 19 openly admitted your nervousness, and I appreciate that 20 honesty, you've spoken very eloquently.
21 MS. BULLCREEK:
Okay.
Thank you.
22 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Wayne Ball.
23
.MR. BALL:
This will be short.
Hello.
My name is 24 Wayne Ball.
I'm a toxicologist with the Utah Department of 25
. Health.
I manage the Environmental Epidemiology Program p)
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within the Bureau of Epidemiology.
The mission of the 2
Environmental Epidemiology Program is to address
['}
3.
environmental hazards and disease in Utah and to prevent or 4
reduce a potential for acute enchronic morbidity and 5
mortality associated with environmental and occupational 6
factors, including those -- including exposure to toxic 7
substances, reproductive hazards, unsafe work environments, 8
and agents responsible for debilitating diseases.
The 9
program conducts epidemiological investigations in problems 10 related to hazardous substance exposure and researches 11 environmental and occupational health problems.
12 The Environmental Epidemiology Program routinely 13 contends with both identified and perceived health hazards.
14 Identified health hazards are those where a definite risk or
()
15 hazard has been recognized as being from a past exposure to 36
.1 chemical pollutant.
Perceived health hazards are those 17 hazards that have not or cannot be quantified primarily 18 because the investigation starts after and adverse health 19 event has occurred, long after the environmental exposure 20 has occurred or a belief that an illness is associated with-21 a recent environmental event.
Disease clusters commonly 22 investigated by the Environmental Epidemiology Program 23 include cancer, birth defects, and multiple sclerosis.
l 24 The public health hazards and environmental 25 impacts associated the. accidental release of the high-level
/ '-
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nuclear waste from the storage containers intended to be
(
)
2 stored in Skull Valley either during transportation of the 3
waste or during storage are clear.
There's no need to 4
further elaborate on the adverse health and environmental 5
impacts of such releases.
The Utah Department of 6
Environmental Quality has clearly outlined the risks 1
7 associated with both transportation and storage of the 8
high-level nuclear waste.
The Utah Department of Health 9
concurs with their assessment.
10 In addition, there are adverse health concerns 11 associated with the perceived risk by the populous living l
12 near the transportation routes and storage site.
With 13 perceived health hazards, the exposure to an environmental 14 pollutant is generally unknown or is not measurable.
f) t
( _)
15 Perceived health hazards are the most difficult to resolve 16 since many possible environmental causes can be attributed 17 to the disease cluster under investigation and not 18 necessarily'the most recent exposure event.
19 These adverse health concerns will be present even 20-if there is no release of the high-level nuclear waste.
21 Public fears are often not well correlated with agency or 22 industry assessments.
While agencies and industry focus on 23 data gathered from hazard evaluations, monitoring and risk 24 assessments, the public takes into account many other 25 factors besides scientific data.
In studies where the risk i
{'
l
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perception among people were studied, nuclear power was 2
considered as the activity with the highest risk, greater 3
than motor vehicles, hand guns, and smoking.
4-Heightened awareness of adverse health effects 5
from the nuclear waste will increase the demand.on local and 6
state public health resources due to perceived increases in 7
various conditions and diseases that the public associates 8-with transportation and storage of high-level nuclear waste.
9 This will result in an increase in requests for 10 investigations of diseases perceived to be associated with-11 the high-level nuclear waste.
As a result, resources and 12 attention will be diverted from the actual cause of the 13 disease cluster under investigation.
People living in 14 Tooele County and along the Wasatch front are already A()
15 sensitized to the health risks associated with Tooele Army 16 Depot, Deserat Army Depot, and Dugway Proving Ground 17 operations.
Public health resources, both at the state and 18-local level, will be required to assure people living along 19 the route of transportation of the high-level nuclear waste 20 to the private fuel storage facility regarding actual levels 21_
of exposure to.the nuclear waste.
22 Although it is possible to reduce to a negligible 23 level the identified risks of nuclear waste, it is unlikely 24.
that private fuel storage or state or local health agencies 25 will be able to adequately address and eliminate those O5 ANN RILEY & ASSCCIATES, LTD.
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perceived health risks associated with the transportation
)
and storage of.the high-level waste in Utah.
2 3
In conclusion, if the PFS facility is approved, l
4 limited public health resources will be diverted from other f
5 important health programs.
These resources will be needed i
6 to address the perceived health consequences of the 1
7 transport and storage of high-level nuclear waste.
Thank 8
you.
9 MR. LEEDS:
Thank you, Mr. Ball.
j l
10 MR. DELLIGATTI:
R.J. Hoffman.
)
11 MR. HOFFMAN:
Hello and thank you for the 12 opportunity of speaking here this evening.
My name if R.J.
13 Hoffman.
I have been a radiation safety professional and a 14 member of the Health Physics Society for 23 years, and I've
()
15 been a certified health physicist for the past 17 years.
16 And, in the recent past, I have served on the Radiation 17 Control Board for the State of Utah for some six years.
18 And, for two years, I was chairman of that group that 19 addresses itself to radiation concerns for the State of 20 Utah.
I am not presently a member of the group Scientists 21
'for Secure Waste Storage, and I'd just like to make a few 22 points and observations.
23 First, the transportation and storage of spent 24 fuel does not present'any unsolvable problems that prevents 25 safeguarding of public health.
Also, the radiation in 1
t
- ( '
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radioactive material from this site can be reduced to levels l.
2 at or below those associated with other radiation and
(
3 radioactive material activities such as lb1 medicine or 4
industrial use, which society readily accepts and would be 5
the poorer for if they did not exist.
6 Next, there's absolutely no connection between 7
weapons testing fallout or past or future chemical insults 8
or other hazardous waste facilities and spent fuel storage.
9 Arguments that try to connect them are totally fallacious.
10 Lastly, I would just like to encourage the NRC to 11 look at the siting of an internal storage facility in the 12 large view of the needs of the nation as a whole and base 13 those decisions on science and not the narrow view based on 14 phobias about radiation or radioactive materials.
So I
(}
15 would encourage this group to make their decisions with 16 respect to the environmental impact statement, considering 17 those things that truly do have an impact or connection with 18 this facility, its potential hazards or lack of hazards-19 thereof, and not bring :ba extraneous matters that are really 1
20 unrelated.
Thank you.
1 21 MR. LEEDS:
Thank you, Mr. Hoffman.
22 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Lee Allison.
23 MR. ALLISON:
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
My name is 24 Lee Allison.
I'm the state geologist of Utah, director of 25 the Utah Geological Survey.
And tonight I wish to bring to rN ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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your attention some significant geologic issues identified 2
by the Utah Geological Survey that should be analyzed as
~~
3 they are critical to both the safe and responsible siting of 4
any proposed storage site.
To date, these issues have not 5
been satisfactorily addressed by private fuel storage.
6 We have determined that the storage site may be 7
subject to fault rupture at the surface during large 8
earthquakes and may be subject to stronger ground shaking 9
during an earthquake than anticipated by PFS.
The site 10 itself is underlain by the Skull Valley -- I'm sorry -- the 11 Stansbury (phonetic) Fault Zone, which is capable of a 12 magnitude 6.8 to 6.9 earthquake, which is roughly comparable 13 to those earthquakes we've seen in the past few years in 14 California at Northridge, Loma Prieta, and in Kobe, Japan.
/T 15 In additional PFS's own data revealed a broad zone of U
16 faulting of buried faults that completely underlies this 17 proposed storage site, with a number of the individual 18 faults clearly evidence at shallow depths and other faults 19 suspected from the preliminary data that they've provided.
20 We believe that a large earthquake on the nearby j
1 21 Stansbury Fault could trigger significant earthquakes on 22 these shallow buried faults directly under the site, 23 resulting in ground shaking and ground motion significantly 24 greater than those anticipated by PFS.
Also, any of those 25 shallow faults under the site may be capable on their own of i
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rupturing to the surface.
Recent scientific studies have
(~j) found that nearly two-thirds of the historical earthquakes 2
\\
3 that have ruptured the surface in the Basin and Range 4
Province -- that's between Salt Lake City and Reno --
5 occurred on faults that had no evidence of surface rupturing
.6 in the last 130,000 years.
7 So we interpret those shallow buried faults under 8
the site to be younger than'that claimed by PFS.
- And, 9
therefore, these faults should be considered capable of 10 surface rupture anywhere under the storage site.
11 And then thirdly, the fault zones themselves are 12 similar -- or the fault zone itself is similar to that 13-underlying -- or, I'm sorry.
The fault zone under the 14 storage site is similar to that existing in many other fault 15 zones around the world such as the San Andreas Fault, 16 California, and parts of the Wasatch Fault in Salt Lake 17_
Valley.
In these similar zones where there's multiple fault 18 strands, history has demonstrated that surface fault rupture 19 can occur on any one of the fault strands or it may even 20 cause a new fault branch to propagate during an earthquake 21 and break the surface in a new location.
22 So, therefore, we strongly encourage that the EIS l
23 you're undertaking consider the impacts of greater ground l
24 shaking than expected and the possibility a 25 surface-rupturing earthquake can occur anywhere in the
(
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77 i
1 proposed storage site.
Thank you.
('S 2
MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you.
Sir, are you going to
~ ' '
3 send us some supplemental information on this subject?
I f
4 MR. ALLISON:
Yes.
We have figures and diagrams 1
I 5
and maps and charts --
i 6
MR. HAUGENEY:
All that stuff.
j 7
MR. ALLISON:
-- and it's all prepared for you.
l
(
8 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
I 9
MR. DELLIGATTI:
State Representative Ralph Becko 10 (phonetic).
11 MR. BECKER:
Good evening.
I'm Representative 12 Ralph Becker in the Utah State Legislature.
I thank you for
'13 the opportunity to comment during scoping on this EIS.
As a 14 member of the Utah House of Representatives, I sponsored a f) 15 House Concurrent Resolution 6 this year which passed
\\_/
i 16 overwhelmingly and was signed into law by the governor.
I 17-This resolution opposes the siting of the high-level nuclear 4
-18
. waste facility in Skull Valley without the approval of the 29
' state.
The legislature is arm in arm with the governor in 20
' full support of his efforts.
I will provide, if you have 21' not-received a copy of that resolution.
22-While I can't claim expertise in the business of 23 high-level nuclear waste, spent a good part of my career 24
' working on NEPA actions.
This whole process in my opinion 25 may be fatally flawed from the beginning.
We are dealing
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with the storage of some of the most hazardous materials 2
known to man.
Instead of the federal government looking at 3
the most technically suitable site or sites in the nation, 4.
you're reviewing a proposal based on the most politically 5
expedient solution for the companies that are generating l
6 this waste.
As a matter of scoping, I believe the NRC 7
should carefully explore other sites and means of storage of I
8 high-level nuclear waste.
9 In the lingo of NEPA, the scope should be broad j
10 enough to give equal consideration to a full range or 11 reasonable alternatives.
Those alternatives should include 12 leaving the materials at their present locations and finding 13 other hopefully more suitable environmental sites.
14 It's the responsibility of the federal government
()
15 to look out for the health and welfare of the American 16 people.
Transporting these materials all over the country 17 multiple times -- if this site is to temporary, it certainly 18 will be multiple times -- cannot be a rational solution for 19 the safe, long-term storage of nuclear waste materials.
20 In addition to giving equal weight to the 21 reasonable alternatives, NRC should be careful to fully 22 analyze all of the technical issues raised by the State of 23 Utah, and those have been mentioned already this evening and 24 will be mentioned further, so I won't bore you with that 25 long list.
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I'm afraid that the way this proposal comes to us
s 2
(d in Utah we have a well-founded fear that NRC will simply go 3
through the motions of an environmental impact statement and 4
approve this application.
I can assure you that we will 5
fight this proposal to the end and make sure that this 6
proposal does not proceed without the full involvement and 7
acceptance of the people of the state of Utah.
8 From my perspective, it is the responsibility of
'9 the federal government to show us that you are fairly 10 considering the needs of our state.
To date, I'm not 11 convinced.
I hope you disprove my skepticism.
Thank you.
12 MR. HAUGHMEY:
Thank you, Mr. Becker.
13 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Suzanne Winters.
14 MS. WINTERS:
Thank you for this opportunity to
()
15 comment.
My name is Suzanne Winters, and I serve as the 16 state-science. advisor for the State of Utah with statutorily 17 mandated function to provide advice to the legislature and l
18 the governor on matters of science and technology.
'19 Historically my office has acted as the coordinator for many 20 of the executive agencies for transportation and related 21 issues for radioactive waste including the departments of 22
, Environmental Quality, Transportation, and Public Safety.
23 I am here to express my serious and extensive
.24
-concerns regarding this proposal and its deliberate and 25 inexcusable omission of any consideration of a comprehensive l
l I
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1 and detailed transportation and emergency response plan.
l i
r~g 2
In recognition of the multitude and seriousness of i U 3
concerns relating to transportation of high-level nuclear l
4 waste, Congress enacted the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1982 5
as amended in 1987 to provide for the safe, efficient, and 6
cost effective transportation of radioactive materials with 7
specific provisions for spent nuclear fuel, naming the 8
Department of Energy's Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste 9
Management as the agency responsible for shipments of all 10 high-level nuclear waste and commercial spent fuel to 11 federal facilities.
It is the position of the State of Utah 12 that this proposal between PFS and the Goshute -- Skull 13 Valley Band of Goshutes is an intentional and calculated 14 attempt to circumvent the provisions of that act, which
()
15 Congress passed to ensure the safety and environmental 16 protection under nuclear waste shipping campaigns.
17 In preparation for shipments of high-level
{
18 radioactive waste transportation campaigns, the DOE began 19 development of the waste isolation pilot plant in Carlsbad, 20 New Mexico, to serve as a pilot and demonstration program 21 for the handling, transportation, and storing of radioactive
'22 waste..Through the WHIP and other DOE-related campaigns, 23 the State of Utah has worked cooperatively and productively 24 to design, plan, and implement a comprehensive and detailed i
25 transportation program with critical and necessary input fos ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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1 from all stakeholder.
As a result of a successful
~
2 cooperation, DOE will begin shipping materials to the WHIP 3
facility this month with the full assurance of all of the 4
corridor states that appropriate measures are in place.
5 This effort has required many years of planning, written 6
memoranda of understanding and agreement and development of 7
a relationship of cooperation and trust.
The State of Utah 8
believes agree -- that this has been a valuable pilot 9
program and should serve as a model for PFS for the 10 planning, implementation, and operation of a high-level 11 nuclear storage facility within our borders.
12 PFS proposes to undertake the design, building, 13 transp,rtation to and operation of a facility, the order of 14 magnitude and the potential lethality of which is
/~'b) 15 unprecedented in this country.
With no experience nor 16 concern for the impacted stakeholder, PFS has demonstrated 17 arrogance and lack of respect for not only the State of 18 Utah, but for every corridor state, local community, and 19 Native American jurisdiction through which the 20 transportation of material must pass.
21-It is the position of the State of Utah that a 22 comprehensive, detailed, and cooperatively-developed 23 transportation plan be provided to all potential corridor 24' states and tribes to the proposed nuclear waste facility.
25
. Further, it is the state's position that all provisions of A
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82 1
the Nuclear Waste Policy Act be met by the proposers of this i
eT 2
facility including but not limited to financial and 3
technical assistance, training, equipment, and natually 4
agreed upon development for route selection, alternative 5
route analysis, route risk analysis, route inspection for 6
highway and rail contingency routing plans, transportation 7'
infrastructural improvements, shipment notification and 8
tracking, shipment escorting, provision of public 9
information on routing and shipments, preparation and 10 enforcement of transportation operations protocols, carrier 11 and shipper compliance reviews, assessment of state and 12 local capabilities regarding safe routine transport and 13 emergency response, enhancement and maintenance of emergency 14 response and recovery capabilities, awareness training for
(}
15 first on the scene and first responder personnel, public j
16 information training for route community liaison personnel, 17 training for hospital personnel, waste acceptance scheduling 18 etart date and annual rate, cask loading, full-scale cask 19.
testing, accident notification, safe parking designation and 20 procedures, and provision for -- of equipment for emergency 21 response inspection and first response personnel.
22 Aa separate and comprehensive transportation and 23 handling plan must be developed to address all aspects of 24 the additional rail spur required or the intermodal transfer j
l 25 of the high-level waste as Rally Junction or another i
i
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1 designated site including but not limited to the 2
infrastructure improvements, handling equipment and 3
protocols, inspection of casks, vehicles and carriers and 4
state oversight and regulation.
5 It is further the position of the State of Utah 6
that PFS will hold full responsibility for accidents and
~
7 resulting damages involving spent fuel moving to and from 8
this facility regardless of the locatfon or the title holder l
9 of the material.
I will provide additional comments in 10 writing of my opinions.
11 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
12 MS. WINTERS:
Thank you.
13 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you.
14 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Brian Meacham.
. r')
(
15 MR. MEACHAM:
Good evening.
My name is Brian 16 Meacham.
I'm here as the spokesperson for Utah Peace Test.
17 Utah Peace Test is a citizens' group which is well known for j
18 our commitment to nonviolence, our commitment to consensus 19 decision making, and our commitment to end nuclear weapons 20-development and deployment.
We have two concerns that need i
i 21 to'be addressed in the environmental impact statement.
22 The geological record of the State of Utah
' ndicates that a major earthquake occurs along one of the i
23 24 fault systems every 350 years on average.
The experts say 25 that it is not a matter of if another earthquake will happen 1
C
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84 1-but of when it will occur.
The estimates range from 30 to i
2 50 years.
The most recent data indicates that the proposed 3
project site is sitting on top of geological faults.
We 4
assert that a major quaks will happen in Utah during the 5
lifetime of the project that may affect the proposed site 6
and that this constitutes a high risk of -- to the 7
environment.
We have seen no evidence that the structural 8
supports for the casks nor the casks themselves are being 9
designed to earthquake-proof standards.
Therefore, the 10 casks could be damaged on impact due to an earthquake and 11 leak radioactive materials.
12 Our other concern is that there are no proposed 13 plans for an on-site facility to transfer the spent nuclear 14 fuel rods from an old cask to a new cask.
The proposed
(
)
15 project's lifetime is 40 years.
Because of aging effects 16 like creep, the casks will gradually deteriorate with time.
17 We assert that, at a minimum, the rods will be -- need to be 18 transferred at least once.
Logic dictates the transfer 19 should occur after 20 years.
If a safety factor of two is 20 assumed, then the rods will be -- need to be swapped to new 21 casks every 10 years.
This represents four life cycles.
22 In order to transfer rods, it will be necessary to 23 open up the containers.
There is a high risk factor for 24 contamination of the environment as a result of this process
'25 since there will be other radioactive materials generated by ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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the fuel rods inside.
Some of these materials may be l
2 gaseous, fine powders, or even liquids.
A facility to it i
3 properly handle these potential problems does not exist in 4
the proposed site plan.
5 There is the -- an additional collateral waste
..6 problem generated by the asserted cask recycling process.
l 7
The old casks will be contaminated after storing spent l
8 nucular-(sic) fuel rods and thus become nuclear waste.
We 9
assert that the amount to be four times the current estimate l
10 because of the four life cycles.
This constitutes an 11 environmental hazard because of this project.
We see no
'12 evidence for the disposition of this radioactive used waste 13 casks.
i 14 We recognize that, as an alternative -- we i
15 recognize that an alternative exists for contracting out the J
l 16 casks recycling process to an existing facility.
Under this l
17 option, the current risk factor associated with 1
18 transportation needs to be increased by a factor of eight 19 due to the additional number of trips generated.
Thank you 20 very much.
21 MR. HAUGENEY:
thank you.
22 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Kathleen Clark.
23-MS. CLARK:
Hello.
I'm Kathleen Clark.
I'm the 24.
acting director of the Utah Department of Natural Resources.
25 Our department is charged with the responsibility for the i
f fw ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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conservation and the protection of the natural resources t
2 within the state of Utah, and I appreciate the opportunity 3
to comment here tonight regaruing private fuel storage and 4
the scope of the EIS on that proposal.
5 The Department of Natural Resources strongly 6
supports the efforts of Goveimar Leavitt and the Utah 7
Legislature to opposed the PFS proposed high-level nuclear 8
waste storage facility at Skull Valley Indian Reservation 9
for -- because of the threats that it poses to natural 10 resources in northern Utah.
11 My comments tonight are going to provide simply an 12 overview of some of our department's concernt and I'd like 13
-you to know that more inclusive comments about our concerns 14 and our issues will be forthcoming.
()
15 One of our divisions is the Utah Division of --
16 it's the Geological Survey.
You've already heard from Mr.
I 17 Lee Allison today.
I had prepared a summary of his comments 18 and I will just pass those by since you had some good 19 comments from him.
20 We also have a division that manages forestry and 21 fire in our department, and they have suggested some 22 concerns about the proposed access roads and associated 23 gravel isolation zone, that they may not be adequate to 24 prevent possible wild fires from getting into the storage 25 area, possibly resulting from transportation mechanisms.
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l 87 1
There's also some concern that the operation facilities may r"T 2
increase fires throughout Skull Valley.
An increase in the 3
rate of fires would cause significant loss of natural 4
resources, private property loss and damage, and would 5
likely cause increased cost to Tooele Cour.ty and the State 6
of Utah for fire suppression.
j 7
One of our major issues is the -- it's unclear to 8
us how PFS is going to manage water to operate this 9
facility.
The department is concerned that the availability 10 of water has not been sufficiently investigated.
If the 11 tribe plans to make water available for the facility under a 12 federal -- a claim of federal reserved water rights, we 13 foresee potential challenges to the validity and the extent 14 of those rights.
If the tribe plans to make water available
()
15 for the facility under state-created water rights, we 16 foresee potential challenges under the~ change application 17 process conducted by the state engineer.
18 The tribe's water rights depend on the number of 19 practicably irrigable acres located on the reservation.
The 20 process of determining the PIA, which is the irrigable 21 acres, requires a detailed analysis of the hydrology, the 22 soils, the engineering feasibility, economic feasibility, 23 and numerous other legal issues related to the establishment 24 of the reservation itself.
This is a complex process, and 25 once the right is quantified, the type of water use must be j
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changed from irrigation, which is now approved, to F.
()
2 industrial commercial uses, which would be associated with
%J 3
fuel rod storage.
Approval of this change of use, 4
regardless of how it is undertaken, will be another time l
5 consuming process fraught with difficulty and most certainly i
6 with challenges by other water users.
7 Even if the tribe chooses to forego claims of 8
reserved rights and uses state-created rights it already 9
holds or purchases water rights held by others, it will need 10
-- excuse me, I just read that.
These will -- these require 11 more deliberations and exploration in the EIS.
12 Under the arena of water resources and floeding, 13~
we disagree with the drainage area that was used to compute 14 the probable maximum flood for the portion of the area that
([
15 cuts across the access road east of the storage facility.
16
.The applicants used a drainage area of 26 square miles.
We 17 believe the drainage area is closer to 240 square miles.
l 18 In wetter-than-average years, the large l
19 depressions south of the access road were filled, the ground 20 was saturated,.and most of Skull Valley produced 21 signification amounts of runoff.
Wetter-than-average
)
22-conditions which would occur during a probable maximum flood L
23 event would fill the depression and water running off from l
24 the south of Skull Valley and would only drain through the 25 depression near the northeast corner of the area causing
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flooding.
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("Sp 2
The department is also concerned with potential i V l
3 contamination of groundwater aquifer before the site and t
i l
4 potential for contamination of other water sources in the l
l 5
area.
6 Regarding impacts to wildlife, we recognize that 1
7 there has been some planning for the site to discuss 8
mitigation and measures that would be taken to minimize 9
those impacts.
However, we feel much greater emphasis 10 should be made to identify and address unintended impacts on 11' wildlife migration patterns, critical habitats, and the 12 potential for unavoidable impacts on wildlife and its 13 habitat, both during the construction phase of this project i
14 and also during its life.
1 l ()
15 The department is concerned with the potential 16 impacts of toxic spill or other environmental contamination 17 could have on the Great Salt Lake.
The Great Salt Lake is a 18 unique ecosystem of international importance.
It has been 19_
designated as a western hemispheric shore bird reserve i
20 because of its importance to migratory wildlife.
The lake also supports brine shrimp harvest and mineral extraction 21 l
22 industries that are important to the state's economy.
The 23 Great Salt Lake's fragile ecosystem could be devastated by a L
24 toxic spill.
-25 Two other sites located near the proposed facility l
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are also of great concern with respect to wildlife, and that 2'
is Tempe Springs and Horseshoe Springs, both of which are 3
very important locations for migratory birds and other 4
wildlife that use these isolated areas.
The department is 5
also concerned with the potential impacts to 6-federally-listed threatened and endangered wildlife such as 7
the bald eagle and the peregrine falcon.
8 We have numerous uses relating to transportation 9
but they've already been discussed, so I am going to pass by 10 those.
But it is for these and the additional issues which
'11 we believe pose some serious threats to Utah's natural i
l
'12 resources, which we will detail to you and be submitted 13 shortly that we oppcse this.
14 In summary, we think that the scope of the EIS has 1 0
' (
j 15 got to go well beyond the boundaries of the site itself, 16 take a look at potential impacts to natural resources 17 throughout northern Utah, and also that the EIS needs to 18 challenge the assumptions of safety on which this is l
19 proposed.
Thank you.
20 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you.
21 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
In this copies 22
~ version, I can't quite make out the last name.
The first l
23 name is Cynthia, and she's a colleague of Mr. Meacham with 24 Utah Peace Test.
l 25 MS. CYNTHIA OF THE DESERT:
Good evening.
My name 1
(
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is Cynthia of the Desert.
I am with Utah Peace Test but not i
2 as'a spokesperson with them tonight.
I am an 3
environmentalist, an antinuclear activist, all these 4
wonderful labels.
We all wear different uniforms here 5
tonight, and we're all concerned about the same thing.
But 6
I have to say that I am mostly here as a mother.
You know, 7
we haven't spoken about the children except the. people who 8
live on the reservation.
You know, we bandy about all these i
9 wonderful technological terms, the adverse health hazards, i
10 environmental impacts.
You know, all of this translates 11 into we are not taking care of our children.
This is not 12 our mess.
This is not the Goshutes' mess.
This is not j
13 Utah's mess.
This is PFS and other companies who generate
.14 nuclear waste.
It's their mess and it is my contention that 1
I 15 it should be left where it is and not transported all over.
D 16_
A lot'of what I had to say tonight has been covered very 17 adequately by a lot of the speakers tonight and -- sorry, 18 I'm nervous too.
19 But I have had 13 or 14 years of thoughtful 20' education.
I am not, as someone suggested earlier, a 21 propagandist.
I have thoroughly investigated as much as my.
1 22 partial physics background has. allowed me to understand the i
23 nuclear issues from a lot of different directions.
I 24 thoroughly feel that we need to do more research in 25 decontaminating it where it sits.
I know of at least a
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(.
l:
1.
couple studies right now that are ong>ing.
Maybe five or l
(
2 ten years we'll have the answer.
I really don't feel that l
\\~-
3 it belongs anywhere except where it is at the private and j
i 4
military facilities.
5 You know, the space that you're talking about 4
6 putting it,.first of all, the tribe is in contention with 7
itself.
There are people who don't want it and didn't feel 8
they were represented.
There -- in the paperwork that I was 9
able to gather after sitting through all the days of the NRC 10 hearings in January, seem to leave out glaring things.
One 11
-- it's already been spoken of tonight, the water issue.
12 There's safety.
What if there is a fire?
What if there is 13 something going on?
Who is going to be responsible for j
i 14 taking care of things like that?
PFS?
Is the State of
[)
15 Utah?
The local fire department, where are they?
Where are
%/
16 the fire engines out there?
17 The casks' safety, all by itself, is the most 18 major issue.
And it goes back to things need to sit where 19 they are.
Transportation, the tracks, the roads, storage, 20 unloading it, transferring it.
Someone referred to that it 21 has to kind of be recycled, I guess.
There are so many 22 things that have not been addressed, and I would really hope 23 that this doesn't just get railroaded and pushed into Utah 24 or anyplace else.
I certainly hope that WHIP does not go 25 through also because that's not really a safe situation
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either from the scientific evidence I'm able to understand.
2 The seismic issues have been addressed very 3
strongly here.
As I understand from reading a lot of 4
materials on the casks, they are not earthquake proof.
5 There have-been remarks about terrorism, sabotage.
What 6
about the accidental plane crashes that happen all the time,
'7 the military areas, the chemical weapons stockpiles.
All of 8
these things have been addressed by other people tonight.
9 But, you know, it's not just a simple, oh, there's an empty 10 space out there.
Let's go put it out there.
Well, that's 11 what they said about the test site.
That's -- in Nevada.
12 But it also happens to be Shoshoni land.
Here we are again 13 dumping on the tribal peoples, and I will use the word 14
" dump" because that is as accurate as I think a word there
()
15 is.
16 Someone else spoke to all the damage that has 17 happened from our experiments with nuclear weapons, the 18 testing, the mining, the waste storage.
I just would really 19 urge the NRC to insist that PFS and other companies keep 20 their waste on site and clean up their own mess and not 21 transport it anywhere, including here, whatever here is.
22 This is the Mother Earth.
Well, it's the Goshute 23 Reservation.
Well, it's Tooele County.
Well, it's Utah.
24 Well, it's the United States.
It's the Earth and we're all 25 connected.
And if there is any trouble out there, everyone ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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will be affected.
And so that's about all I have to say.
! (~'t 2
MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
L) 3 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Cynthia.
e I
4 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Chris Cernik-(phonetic).
5' DR. CERNICH:
My name is Dr. Chris Cernich.
I'm
-6 representing the Utah Department of Agriculture and Foods 7
this evening.
With the record of humans and their 8
accidents, obviously we are preparing for the worst and, 9
though it may not occur, we certainly have'to be prepared 10 for that.
Our charge is to watch over the safety and health 11 of the domestic animal population of Utah, which potentially 12 could get to a human food chain, which is a great economic 13 boon to the State of Utah due to the number of ranchers and 14 farmers involved and their families, as so aptly has been
[~'%
15 pointed out.
This would also include birds and other
%]
16 wildlife and insects such as the domestic bee hives that we 17 have that do produce numerous amounts of economic benefit to 1
18 the farmers of Utah.
19 It would also include plant crops and range lands 20 that again have been so aptly brought to point this evening, i
21 that cattle, sheep, goats also partake of, that in the i
22.
potential of an accident would potentially get into the j
23 human food chain.
Certainly farmers anc anchers and their i
24 help and families would also be potentially at risk if we 25 did have such an unfortunate event.
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1 My concern and the department's concern would be l /"h.
2 support of the governor's stand on this issue.
There would 1
ls/
3 be a significant environmental impact to the entire area 4
including all agricultural aspects and also economic impacts 5
to the state.
It's been state previously, perceptions 6
become reality.
If there had been an accident, 7
unfortunately the economic impact to all of Utah agriculture l
8 would certainly suffer.
My questien then would who would 9
take up that slack to a very fragile agricultural 10 environment that we live in today?
Who would take up the l
11 lost product that was actually contaminated?
Who would take 12 care of any product that any' agricultural person in the 13 state of Utah could not sell and, therefore, would be 14 economically impacted severely?
Thank you very much.
A)
,f 15 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
%_/
1 16 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you, sir.
Okay.
- Again, l
17 I'm having a little trouble with this -- reading this l
18 because it was Xeroxed.
Steven Baronet (phonetic), SSWUS?
19 DR. BARROWS:
That's Steven Barrows.
j.
20 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Sorry.
21 DR. BARROWS:
Scientist for Secure Waste Storage, 22 one of their local members.
I'm not nearly as well l
23 respected as many of the Nobel Prize winners on that group.
24 I'm just one of their local boys; you might say.
My Ph.D.
25 is in physics.
I do not work for the nuclear power O.
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96 i
i industry, never have, nor do I work for the governor.
And j
f 2
so that makes me free to speak on this issue without any
(
3 economical bias one.way or another.
I notice that we have a 4
great outpouring of people from the governor's employ here 5
tonight.
6 And I'd like to say, I started off with my thesis 7
in cosmic ray physics which is a very high energy type of 8
radd.ation, and I've dealt with radiation in my research off 9
and on for the last 30 years.
I'm familiar with it.
I know 10 it can be very dangerous, and it also can be handled in a 11 very safe manner.
I've had radiation sources in the 12 laboratory that.I was working in the last five or six years, i
13 taken care of in a safe manner.
We have -- it's just a 14 matter of understanding the physics of it, and it's all well
()
15 known and it can be designed.
The problems are not nearly 16 as difficult, in my opinion, as handling the nerve gases or
.17 something like that.
Those are difficult problems.
They 18 take a large team of expert chemists and engineers to solve 19-those.
20 But myself and a few people like me could probably 21 design some of these casks to be at least radiation safe.
- 22 We'd need some mechanical engineers to talk about their 23 safety so they could withstand train crashes at 80 miles an 24
-hour, which you can see some examples.
There are videos of 25 some of these tests, and they survive the tests.
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material inside the cask is still inside the cask.
There --
l s
2 it's not l
b,f"x
-- the seal is not broken, nothing is spilled.
3 When they're transported on trains or trucks, they don't go 4
70 miles an hour.
The trains I think are limited to 30 5
miles an hour or something like that.
If you have a train 6
wreck, the problem is to get all the old train cars off the 7
tracks out of the way so you can resume your operations.
8 The casks themselves are just like a big boulder, 9
and you have to deal with that like you would a big boulder.
10 It's not a hazardous thing to somebody standing there and 11 leaning on the cask.
This does not give them enough 12 radiation to cause any concern.
He can wear his radiation 13 safety badge, and he will not be told that he was exposed to 14 too much radiation for that' day.
This is because of the
['l
-15 shielding that's built into the casks.
It's -- it makes L/
16 those safe to handle and to be around for transportation.
17 When those are located on a concrete pad inside of a fence, 18 nobody needs to even go that close to those, but they could.
19 They could go in there and eat their lunch and it wouldn't 20 hurt.
21 I think it would be nice if the pigeons are not 22 allowed to roost on top of them because months of exposure 23
.could perhaps do them some damage.
I think that's a 24 possibility.
So I'd like to see the rabbits and the pigeons 25 kept away from these things if possible.
I l (> " 4)
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I don't see the other environmental damage that r~s 2
people worry about.
Some of these claims are just really V
3 mind boggling.
I don't see how these things can start fires L
4 any more than a collection of big boulders can start fires.
5 It's really the same question.
There's no water required on 6
thes! -- on this facility except drinking water and maybe 7
some water for the convenience of those that are operating 8
the facility.
9 I agree with our friend for Coalition 21, we 10 should support technology with facts not fears.
You can't 11 make the technology unless you deal with the facts, and you 12 cannot handle it properly unless you deal with the facts.
13 If you deal with fears, there's no way to satisfy people's 14 fears if they're not willing to look at the facts.
} }
15 I myself would feel comfortable living next door 16 to this facility.
I was down in Northridge in they year 17 following that earthquake.
I think it was a 6.4 or 6.5.
We 18 have relatives there.
They have a silly habit of building 19 backyard fences with cinder blocks, and you could take the 20 fence and go like this, and it was -- it would wiggle back 21 and forth.
They had some minor damage to their house and 22 two of their sons had damage to their houses, but I cannot 23 see that the damage would have any way to touch these casks 24 that can stand a 75 -- or a 70 mile an hour train crash.
I 25 just can't see that the casks itself could be damaged by x
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such an earthquake.
2 The -- as the governor mentioned about the
(~~g r' ~,
3 transportation corridors, like I say, if we have a semi 4
truck accident, it has to be cleared off the highway or a 5
train track -- train wreck has to be cleared off the rails, 6
and it wouldn't take any longer to clear a cask out of the 7
way than any other kind of load.
In fact, if you want to 8
talk hazardous loads, talk about shipping gasoline or 9
sulfuric acid or something else in these tanker trucks.
10 Those are hazardous loads.
They cause immediate and 11 threatening hazards when they have an accident, whereas a 12
-cask would bounce to a stop and then you just wait for the 13 thing to be taken care of.
There's no need to evacuate 14 anybody, et cetera.
/~'\\
15 Q
The casks are built much like a fruit jar.
The 16 bottom is one piece and the lid is on ti.e top and it's 17 sealed so that gases and liquids cannot get in and they 18 cannot get out.
If you were to have a flood there, not very 19 likely, but the water would not be able to get in; it would 20 not be able -- if there was any water inside, which there is 21 not -- these are in solid form, -- it couldn't get out 22 again.
So there's no way this contaminates the water.
It's 23 just like a bould.er.
24 MR. HAUGENEY:
Dr. Barrows?
25 DR. BARROWS:
Yes.
l p)
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MR. HAUGENEY:
I wonder, because of the lateness t
r^S 2
of the hour and the large number of people we have yet to
,U 3
go, I don't know that we're even half --
l 4
DR. BARROWS:
I'm -- yes, I'm about done and --
5 MR. HAUGHNEY:
You're stretched.
6 DR. BARROWS:
Am I stretched?
7 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Could you summarize in 30 second --
8 DR. BARROWS:
Okay.
9 MR. HAUGHNEY:
-- and submit the rest for the 10 record?
11 DR. BARROWS:
Yes.
My conclusion is that these 12 radiation hazards can be engineered in a way that is 13 responsible and safe.
I believe they have been.
I looked j
14 at the Web site that the Goshute Tribe has.
If anybody
( )
15 wants to look at, that's very extensive and I think it's 16 well done.
It's www.skullvalleygoshutes.org, all small 17 letters, and it's up and running, so there's very good 18 information on there.
Thank you.
19 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Dr. Barrows.
20 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Dr. Nielson.
Thank you for your 21 perseverance.
22 DR. NIELSON:
Thank you, Mr. Haughney, members of 23 the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
I'm Diane Nielson.
I'm 24 the executive director of the Department of Environmental 25 Quality, a proud employee of the State of Utah and the ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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governor.
/
2 (s,T Tonight I'd like to focus on a couple of comments
/
1 3
and provide the rest of the information as written comments 4
before the deadline.
First, I'd like to address 5
environmental justice, and in doing so, recognize that there 6
are individuals this evening who have spoken more eloquently 7
on'this issue than any executive order or regulation ever 8
could do.
But as regulatory agencies, we're responsible to 9
the executive orders, to the regulations, to the guidance, 10 and thank heavens it exists.
11 Environmental justice has been defined by the 12 Environmental Protection Agency as the fair treatment of 13 people of all races, incomes, and cultures with respect to 14 the development, implementation, and enforcement of
.G
(,)_
15 environmental laws, regulations, and policies.
Fair 16 treatment implies that no person or group of people should 17 shoulder a disproportionate share of negative environmental 18 impacts resulting from the execution of environmental 19 programs.
20 This facility and the environmental impact 21 statement, as you have pointed out in your opening comments, 22 is subject to the president's executive order and to full 23 and complete analysis in the evaluation of environmental 24 impacts in the context of environmental justice.
It doesn't 25 matter whether the tribe approached PFS or PFS approached l
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the tribe.
It matters that this facility is proposed on an
/
)
2 Indian reservation without the same regulations and projections that are provided under some state as well as 3
4 federal regulation and that those impacts must be evaluated, l
5 must be fully considered by the NRC as part of this process.
6 Therefore, I would urge you to ask what the i
7 impacts related to the proposed facility will be because of 8
its location on an Indian reservation, what the groups of 9
individuals will be who will be impacted in an environmental 10 justice context, what the environmental human health, 11 social, economic, and other impacts will be, and whether 12 those impacts can be mitigated under one or more of the 13 alternatives.
If environmental justice impacts the proposed 14 site cannot be mitigated, the NRC should disallow the
()
15 proposed site in their evaluation through the EIS.
16 Transportation impacts have been discussed by a 17 number of speakers tonight.
It's worth noting that this 18 transportation corridor, the I-80 Union Pacific Rail 19 Corridor, is not a corridor that is currently proposed or 20 under consideration for any other transport of high-level 21 nuclear waste.
It is a transportation corridor, just as the 22 corridors in Skull Valley will be, that is unique to this l
l 23 facility and must be considered, therefore, within the scope l
I 24 of the proposed facility in the EIS.
25 As a corollary to that, it's interesting to O
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1 consider how spent fuel rods would travel from California I
~')
'/
2 through Utah and then to a permanent storage site.
This is lU 3
not on the way to Yucca Mountain or any other preferred site 4
at this point under consideration for permanent storage.
5 It's also important to recognize that emergency 6
planning is only a fallback and a fail-safe, not a primary 7
means of assuring the safety of the public.
That primary 8
assurance and primary responsibility rests with the NRC in 9
the evaluation of the safety of transportation.
And under 10 NEPA with emergency planning is not a substitute for an 11 adequate environmental impact statement that evaluates all 12 the risks and costs posed by such a facility.
13 A careful evaluation of the no-action alternative 14 must be an absolute priority in this case where existing
()
15 nuclear reactor sites already have more than sufficient 16 capacity to continue to store spent fuel indefinitely.
17 Before the NRC even contemplates licensing the i
18 proposed PFS facility, it must thoroughly evaluate the 19 unique risks and costs posed by transporting thousands of
-20 tons of radioactive material across the country to a new 21~
centralized repository in comparison to the risks of i
22 remaining storage on a continuing basis on site at the 23 existing facilities.
24 The NRC must thoroughly evaluate the unique l
25 transportation-related risks posed by the PFS project, risks I
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that stem from factors that are uncommon to any other spent 2
fuel shipments that have been contemplated or conducted in 3
the US to date.
Recognizing the huge quantity of spent 4
fuel, 4,000 casks, over 100,000 spent fuel assemblies 5
shipped within a relatively short period of time, with the 6
focus of the shipments on one geographic area, namely Salt 7
Lake City and Tooele County, and with the unusual size and 8
weight of the transportation casks.
9 Further, NRC ought to recognize, and my 10 understanding is cognizant of the nature of existing 11 environmental studies including studies on transportation 1
12-casks, which are now over 25 years old.
I thought we might 13 go through the discussions tonight without discussions of 14 crash testing of casks.
The point is, and I know you are 15 all aware of it, but the public is not, that the films that 16 we have seen and the stories and the reports of crash 17 testing of transportation and storage casks isn't relevant 18 to this discussion because none of those casks are under 19 consideration for transportation at this point and none of 20 that testing has been conducted on the cask that is under 21 consideration.
It is not appropriate to consider those 22 evaluations part of a separate EIS.
It is absolutely 23 critical because of the size and nature of this proposal 24 that those studies be included within this EIS.
25 Finally, we all heard, or those of us who were p
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here at the beginning of the presentation, about additional 2
plans and additional studies for transportation corridors 3
within Skull Valley and possibly along the corridor, the 4
main corridor of I-80 and the Union Pacific Railroad.
This 5
is information that's new to the state and I assume to l
6 others here tonight, aside from PFS and its contractors.
7 It's information that we have no technical knowledge of nor 8
supporting information regarding, at this point.
- And, 9
therefore, we also have no capability to respond in a sense 10 to the scoping impacts.
And, therefore, as the governor 11 stated in his opening comments, I would urge you to provide 12 a procedure for either opening comment to additional scoping 13 as new proposals or revisions are added to this license 14 application or else delay the scoping process until we, in-l{}
15 fact, do have a complete and technically adequate license 16 application and then let's, in sincerity, evaluate the 17 environmental impacts.
Thank you.
18 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Stephanie Kessler.
l 19 MS. KESSLER:
My name is Stephanie Kessler.
I'm 20 here representing the Wyoming Outdoor Council, and I thank r
21 you for this opportunity.
I'm actually here as a 22
- representative of a corridor state.
I'm also here because, 23 in my county where I live, a private facility similar to l
l 24 this one is also being proposed, the Elk Creed Energy 25 Project.
I would just like to make a couple of comments l
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thct I think are not repetitive of what I've heard tonight 2
and submit some written comments later.
-s 3
But I would particularly like to ditto the 4
comments of Ms. Winter and Dr. Nielson regarding 5
transportation and safety impacts.
You must conduct a 6
safety analysis, looking at transportation along the entire 7
route.
Wyoming in particular is going to have concentrated 8
impacts f' rom the corridor.
I might also let you know that 9
the I-80 corridor in my state is known as the Snowchimin 10 (phonetic) Trail.
It is not something that many people 11 enjoy driving on in the winter, and it is quite dangerous.
12 But I believe that transportation poses the 13 greatest risk, and, to do an adequate EIS of this, you must 14 look at the no-action alternative of moving all of this f']
15 waste compared to leaving it at the reactor site,
%.J 16 particularly since the NRC has already made a finding that it can be safely stored at reactors for the next 100 years.
17 18 And the alternative of choosing that and giving ourselves 19 100 years to do this correctly versus moving it within the 20 next could to ten or whenever this project is proposed to 21 begin.
j 22 We're particularly concerned about accidents along 23 the transportation corridor and the lack of emergency i
1 24 response preparedness training, equipment, infrastructure.
l 25 You need to do an analysis of what this means if communities i
l t
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1 along the route do not have the proper emergency response
)
capability, because that is not contemplated, as far as I 2
3 know, within this proposal to fund local communities and 4
state governments to the degree that is proposed within the 5
Nuclear Waste Policy Act, mind you, for a facility that is 6
smaller than the one proposed here.
The federal government 7
interim storage facility is proposed to contain only 10,000 8
or 15,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste.
This 9
one is 40,000 tons.
So we have a larger facility which --
10 with much less financial support and, thus, safety 11 preparedness for communities.
And, in particular, you need 12 to look at the inequity issue of the federal precedent of 13 licensing a facility which contradicts what has already been 14 proposed in federal law as an adequate level of support for
()
15 local community emergency preparedness.
16 You need to analyze the financial assurance of the 17 proponents of this facility for accidents and damages along 18 the transportation corridor.
You need to analyze the 19 negative economic impacts of the stigma of this waste 20 transportation through the transportation corridors and the 21 property devaluation that can occur and put that into your 22 economic formulas.
23 Regardless of whether there is maybe reason for 24 people to fear waste transportation, fears do motivate human 25 behavior and that is a fact.
And there will be negative O-ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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1 economic impacts along the corridor of the transportation
(}
2 due to the designation of routes.
l 3
A State of Nevada report conducted recently looks i
4 at the possibility of waste coming from the reactors around 5
the country to be able to be transported by rail and has 6
found that for a scenario such as this project, which is 7~
opening much earlier than a permanent repository, 8
approximately 35 percent of shipments will need to come by 9
truck.
So you need to, in your analysis, look at the 10 probability of truck transport aside from rail transport.
I 11
. understand this is due to the fact that many reactors lack 12 access to rail service and lack appropriate cask-loading 13 facilities for rail.
And so analysis needs to consider 14 truck transportation on our highways and the impacts of that
()
15 along the route.
l l
16 Also, as an alternative, if there are going to be 17 required dedicated trains for these shipments and, if so, 1
18 the evaluation of where and how those shipments will be 19 consolidated and the impacts of that on whatever community 20 that occurs at for the consolidation of dedicated trails --
21 train shipments.
22 You also have to consider -- back to my discussion 23 about accidents -- what are the recommended accident rates 24 for the ataount of waste to be transported over the amount of 25 mileage to be transported.
This is an amount of
(]_-
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transportation never experienced on our highways or railways
(~}
2 in the past.
The magnitude if phenomenal compared to our V
3 past history.
The DOE I understand has recommended that we 4
use general accident rates for truck and rail shipments, and 5
you need to do your analysis using those to compute what we 6
can expect for accident.
7 Finally, some political issues that provide risk.
8 This facility at 40,000 metric tons, plus what I think of as 9
the Wyoming facility that could open, could essentially 10 preclude the need for the permanent repository or diminish 11 our country's will to pursue a permanent solution.
And you 12 must consider in your analysis the probability that siting 13 such, quote, temporary facilities could become de facto, 14 particularly in combination with the other proposed one, r~%
( )
15 that then there isn't any capacity need for Yucca Mountain.
]<
16 Finally, you need to evaluate the need for this 17 facility overall within the whole larger national picture.
18 Will it advance our nation's progress to finding a permanent 19
. solution or will it diminish our country's will to find a I
20 solution once we have this waste moved to these desert 21 areas?
And you need to look at whether that need is based 22 on political expediency or safety reasons.
And was can't --
J 23 you can't examine this proposal in isolation.
You must look 24 at it in the larger national picture of what's going on and 25 our history in trying to site these facilities.
Thank you.
l l
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MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
2 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Dave Terry.
3 MR. TERRY:
Thank you.
My name is David Terry 4
I'm the director of the School and institutional Trust Lands 5
Administration for the State of Utah.
We're an independent 6
agency of Utah state government.
We own -- we manage for 7
the benefit of school children in the state, end place 8
sections of land in the vicinity of the proposed site.
Our 9
concerns are that, at statehood, the United States gifted 10 that land to the State of Utah for the benefit of the school 11 children.
And along with that gift was the presumption that 12 the United States would assist the State of Utah in 13 protecting the value of those lands.
Our concern is that 14 properties will be devalued or could possibly be cavalued in i
1
()
15 the area because of the location of this site, and we
)
16 believe that the environmental impact study should consider 17 that.
Thank you.
1 18 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you, sir.
19 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
Nina Dougherty.
20 MS. DOUGHERTY:
I am Nina Dougherty.
I am chair 21 of the Utah chapter of the Sierra Club, and I'm just going 22 to give a few rather broad comments at this point just to 23 let you know that the Sierra Club is highly concerned and 24 opposed to this dangerous and unnecessary proposal for this 25 project.
We will be submitting more detailed comments in A'
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writing.
,r s, 2
I say -- there -- it's rather difficult to single V
3 out specific areas of concern because they're rather 4
entwined; safety factors, the sabotage, the terrorist 5
factor, the safety on the highways, the health factor.
I 6
think you need to certainly be looking at the growth of the 7
population and, therefore, the growth and the spreading of 8
the population that is envisioned to be occurring here with 9
the phenomenal growth that is occurring.
There's a computer 10 program that sort of just shows how people are spreading out 11 across the valleys as the area grows.
Sc you are talking 12 about a lot more exposure at that point.
l 13 I certainly say that this is an unnecessary project because of the -- you have all this multiple 14 (g'i.
handling is unnecessary multiple handling of these casks, of
~
15 16 these rods, with multiple opportunity for things to go 17 wrong.
The need must be carefully documented.
It must be l
l 18 carefully analyzed and carefully documented.
It seems 19 rather obvious from hearing whau we've heard tonight that 20 the need seems a little flaky.
21 Alternatives, specially the no-action alternative.
22 There needs to be rigorous analysis of that, of the benefits 23 and the advantages of no action, not just the presumed 24 disadvantages of that.
We certainly need to consider the
-25 human factor, the human failure factor.
I remember talking I
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i to a nuclear engineer some years ago who was on a mission t
O(~h l
2 around the country.
He had helped design the Browns Ferry l
j 3
Plant.
There was a fire.
He said there wouldn't have been 4
one if it had been designed to the specs that he had been 5
involved in and had been done.
But there were other factors 6
that were involved when it came to actually building the 7
plant, and some things were' built too close together for 8
financial reasons to save some money.
That's one human l
9 factor, but there are many human factors that are involved.
10 Humans are involved in this.
Things aren't going to go just 11 exactly right.
12 We've been hearing about the risks in the area, 13 the other dangerous activities in the area, and all the 14 intertwining and if something happens wrong at one of the
()
15
'other facilities, as the chemical warfare incineration --
16 incinerator, for instance, that that could impact on the 17 need to take care of that, could create problems with the --
18 this facility and the same with this on that.
There are 19 certainly a number of dangerous activities, and we've 20 certainly been hearing about the things falling from the sky 21 with some regularity around here actually.
j 22 Earthquake certainly is another risk.
Fire.
You l
23 go out to the Cedar Mountains, you can see the devastation i
24 caused by -- the widespread devastation caused by a very I
25 rapid fire several years ago.that actually went to the
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highway and created some problems there too.
Fire is a real 2
problem.
It happens very quickly in this particular area.
I' 3
We've been hearing certainly about the 4
transportatlan activities.
I'd like to mention -- focus on 5
another aspect of the transportation, and that is the 6
conflict with the tourism recreation that occurs.
We've 7
been hearing this area characterized as barren but not 8
barren.
I certainly am on the side of not barren.
We 9
sponsor trips to the west desert weekend -- every weekend.
10 There are certainly a number of aficionados of the west 11 desert in this area who love the west desert.
Europeans, 12 Japanese love to be able to go out to the west desert and to 13 look at this wide, wide, open area.
They don't consider it 14 barren.
It's just so spectacular.
').
15 The Desert Peak and Stansburies, there certainly J
16 would be an impact.
That's a wilderness area.
Many hikes 17 are led there.
Many people do go there.
There are also 18 historical sites.
The Pony Express trail.
This road goes 19 down to the Simpson Springs.
If one wants to take the Pony 20 Express from one certain angles and to leave, many people do 21 that.
That's an area that's down there.
Hastings Pass, 22 right there at the Cedar Mountains.
The Donner Trail is 23 right there.
The Donner Party Trail.
There are the wagon 24 tracks that are there.
There are now signs that are up in 25 that particular area.
The road -- if you take a road that i
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comes right out onto that road that goes past the Skull 2
Valley Reservation.
So this is not a barren area.
It's l
V 3
rich in history.
It's rich in beauty.
It's rich in the 4
past.
It's a quite an important area and it'll become more 5'
so as the population grows and spreads.
6 And, as I said, we will be submitting more 7
detailed comments.
Thank you.
8 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
9 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you very much.
Bob James, i
10 MR. JAMES:
I'm Bob James, and I -- I'm from Hill 11
. Air Force Base, environmental management.
And we have -- we 12 operate to help support the Utah Testing Training Range, one 13 of the viable assets for training our air crews and that, l
14 and so we would like you to consider, and we'll have written 15 comments before the deadline to further expand on this, but 16 the air space above that and any accidents or whatever there 17 would -- in route would inhibit our operation through the --
18 getting people to the range on the ground plus in the air 19 space.
Thank you very much.
20 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
Very helpful.
Thank 21 you, sir.
22 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Jerry Schmidt.
23 MR. SCHMIDT:
Good evening, a:.d thanks for the 24 opportunity to comment.
Before you fellows from Washington 25 think we're a real contentious bunch out here in Utah, I
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1 just wanted to remind you.that tomorrow night about a mile 2
from here Utah Jazz is going to start kicking some Chicago 3
butt, all right.
Am I right?
All right.
I 4
But, you know, back in about 1982 I was a member
'5 of a group called Don't Waste Utah before it became a 6
anti-litter campaign out here.
We were fighting a nuclear 7
waste dump out there between Sixshooter Peaks down in 8
.Canyonlands, and I'm real surprised that, you know, 16 years 9
later we're still fighting these ideas.
But I'm thrilled as 10 somebody who's been working on environmental issues for so 11 long, to actually agree with the legislature, Governor l
i 12 Leavitt, and a congressman on this issue.
It's tremendous.
)
13 I don't know what's wrong here.
But, you know, the thing j
14 is, you know, if this thing goes through, the Skull Valley
()
15 location's going to have an appropriate name, but 16 unfortunately, they're going to have to name -- change the l
17 name of the tribe to the Glowshutes.
And the thing is, 18 since we're focusing tonight on the EIS, you know, maybe I 19 should get to my comments on that and get on those issues.
20 The travel issues, you know, let's face it, the 21 waste is going to be traveling across the country to 22 numerous cites, in particular, multiple trips through Salt 23 Lake City.
And the rail accidents, I mean, you folks know 24-they're not unheard of.
The location, 40 miles upwind of 25 Salt Lake City.
I mean, we're not only jeopardizing the l
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permanent residents, but, I mean, we're going to be hosting l
('}
2 the 2002 Olympics here.
We're going to have thousands of V
3 visitors.
I don't know if that'll be there, you know, the 4
dump will be in operation before that time.
But, if it does 5
-- if it happens after, this supposed economic benefit we're 6
going to be receiving from having our freeways torn up for 7
four years and all these roads and all this construction and 8
all this tax money we're pouring into this, this economic 9
benefit is going to be out the window because we want to 10 help support what 60 people, 120 people, you know, whatever 11 the number is.
This is ridiculous.
12 The earthquake situation, Lee Allison, other folks 13 like that have addressed that a lot more competently than I 14 ever could.
The financial liability issue, I mean, let's
()
15 face it, if this thing, you know, goes,_who's going to be 16 holding the tab on that, and it's not going to be the 17 utilities er the Goshutes.
18 The -- Mr. Donnell spoke about concrete pads and 19 walls that is going to be holding this waste, like that's 20 supposed to reassure me.
I mean, concrete does crack, you 21 know.
I mean, I'm just thinking there should be a better 22 material than concrete to hold this stuff, you know.
23 The other thing, you know, there's no doubt in my l
24 mind, let's speak to the cultural issues on this.
I mean, 25 no. doubt in my mind the Native American in this country has 1
/']
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got a. royal screw job, if you may allow me to use that 2
phrase.
3 And I'm not here to suggest that the Native 4
American tribe should be adapting to the white man's ways.
5 I mean there's -- everybody needs their cultural identity I
6 and needs to hold on to the sovereignty, etcetera.
But it 7
seems to me that they have adapted to some white man's ways, 8-and that is the idea of prostituting themselves for the 9
benefit of themselves and not their constituents.
10 And the fact is that to solve this problem, the a
11 answer is not to endanger two million people or more with l
12 this project to help solve a problem that will help 60 to 13 120 people.
That's not the answer to this.
14 And Mr. Bear -- the Honorable Chairman Bear could IQ)1 -
15
-- can say it all he wants, but the fact of the matter is, 16 their placing radioactive. waste inside the ground will never 17 honor Mother Earth.
And that's the facts.
18 The fact of the matter is, in my view, I~think the 19 tremendous comments that were placed in testimony tonight by 1
20 Margene Bullcreek should be looked at very carefully by the l
21 NRC, and in my view, you should recognize Ms. Bullcreek as 22 the true leader of the Goshute Tribe and not t'ae people who l
23 are the counsel.
24 Thank you.
l 25 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Bill Peterson?
Mr. Schmidt, if I
L i
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you want a copy of the scoping report, you're going to have v(~N
-2 to give your address to Dr. Shum, please.
MR. SCHMIDT:
Thank you, sir.
i l
4' MR. PETERSON:
I think this is wonderful that we 5-get together and have these discussions.
We're bringing up 6
a lot of issues.
I'm busy writing the application now for l
7 the facility up at the -- up at Box Elder County.
This 8
brings for -- right now we have a -- it's been -- the 9
facilities have been discussed in this meeting.
This issue i
10 in these facilities are going to become abundant; they're 11 not going to go away.
12 But it's wonderful to bring out these issues.
I 13 can tell that you people are stirred up.
But I can also tell you people that you need to learn a little bit more 14
)
15 about it.
But we are listening to what you're saying and 16 we're -- and we have most of these issues well taken care 17 of.
18 For example, you're worried about corrosion.
I 19 just did'a write-up that we anticipate we're going to 20l
-monitor the nitrogen pressure inside these canisters.
We're 21 going to tell whether or not that there's any potential for 22 corrosion at all in -- if this -
if the -- unless the 23 nitrogen exchanges with oxygen and water, there's no way 24 there's going to be corrosion inside these canisters.
25
.I just did a write-up last week -- extensive time ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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on the scenario of an aircraft crashing into this.
This 2
. stuff does not get airborne, even in the worst case scenario 3
of an air crash going into it.
We're dealing with a solid 4
that's sealed inside concrete cass (phonetic), inside thick 5
canisters inside. fuel rods.
And these have gone through 80 6
mile crash tests.
And in a aircraft were -- could crash 7
into it in it's worst scenario, I'm sorry the aircraft comes 8
out the loser.
9 And we have worked out the technologies and 10 methods of recovering all this thing and putting it back in 11 shape.
But this stuff does not get airborne.
We don't need 12 to worry abcut being 40 miles away.
There's nothing that's 13 going to come in and float over.
14 But, anyway, this sort of thing is an opportunity
()
15 to bring this to discussion, to talk about these things and 16 to hear your concerns.
And we want to get, as one who's 17 worked in these fields all my life, we need to get this 18 information to you.
19 But you need to get beyond what we're discussing 20 here.
You need to realize that nuclear is the nobel energy
{
21 of our earth.
It is our best thing that our Lord has given 22 to us in the way of energy.
And it is what has kept us l
23 alive.
What keeps us alive.
It is our present source of --
24 what keeps us going and it's going to be around, and it's 25 going to keep us -- the only thing that keeps going in the 1
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future.
And we need to understand it.
2 g
But we've got some terrible things going on this 3
world right now in the way of misuse and there's still the 4
threat of atomic bomb.
The United States has an agreement with Russia to dispose of plutonium by turning into an 5
t 6
oxide.
And by turning into an oxide, you can combine it 7
with uranium oxide, you can put it back into fuel rods, and 8
you can burn them up.
l 9
This is what my project intends to do to look at i
10 this, because this is what the agreement is with our country i
11 and with the world, and this is what we've got to 12 demonstrate.
This is not just a local issue.
This is a l
13 world issue.~
And we are at the forefront of this thing.
We i
14 have an opportunity to do something about it.
And it's
/
15 really a wonderful thing that we're meeting here tonight and
(
16 discussing this.
17 Thank you.
i 18 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, Mr. Peterson.
[
19 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Steve Hoffman?
20 MR. HOFFMAN:
Thank you for the opportunity to 21 comment.
22 My name is Steve Hoffman.
I'm the founder and 23 science director of an organization called Hawk Watch 24 International.
International, scientific and educational 25 wildlife conservation organization, headquartered in Salt O)
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Lake City, with over 3,000 members nationwide, over 600 m
2 members in Utah.
t i
G 3
In addition, we operate the largest raptor 1
4 migration project in western North America, and have so for 5
the last 18 years in the nearby Goshute Mountains.
6 I have basically two specific issues to comment 7
on.
One is the unique and important raptor resource.
These 8
are eagles, hawks, falcons, owls, and other birds of prey, 9
living in Skull Valley that could be potentially impacted.
10 We would like the EIS process to consider this resource, 11 both in terms of wintering birds, breeding populations, as 12 well as birds that may be passing through during spring and 13 fall migration.
14 We have documented -- Hawk Watch International
(}
15 members and scientists have documented the presence of 14 16 species of raptors living in that Valley.
And I'd like to 17 specifically mention five species.
These include bald 18 eagles, where we have noted up to ten bald eagles wintering I
19 at the sight at one time in January and February, observed 20 along a 25 mile stretch of road south of I-80 along the main 21 road in Skull Valley.
22 Golden eagles, which are year-round residents.
23 And we're involved in a 20 year study of golden eagles in 24 that area.
And we would be happy to make information 25 available to your EIS team.
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MR. HAUGHNEY:
We would greatly appreciate that,
/G 2
Mr. Hoffman.
k-/
l 3
MR. HOFFMAN:
Okay.
Also we're concerned about j
4 ferruginous hawks which are also year-round residents there, 5
and that's there.
We're also working with the Bureau of 6
Land Management to study that population.
j l
7 Prairie falcons, which nest in the area in the 8
Valley and the adjacent Stansbury (phonetic) Mountains.
And i
9 Swainscn's hawks, which are summer residents and also nest i
10 there, and it's also a migration corridor for Swainson's i
11 hawks.
12 The second issue relative to this project is that 13 it has important educational and recreational values 14 particularly relative to observing raptors.
Hawk Watch I) 15 International runs field trips open to the public in the 16 Valley throughout the year.
l 17 And just to give you one example, we hosted a I
18 international scientific meeting in Snowbird, Utah, in June 19 of 1997.
And we tock two bus loads of people out to Skull 20 Valley.
Many of these folks are bird watchers from the 21 eastern part of the United States.
They were thrilled to 22 see these rare and beautiful raptor species in Skull Valley.
23 And one of the highlights for everyone was seeing 24 a flock of 150 Swainson's hawks in the north end of Skull 25 Valley feeding in the sagebrush greasewood flats (phonetic),
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123 1
which is something they couldn't possibly see in New England
(]
2 or Pennsylvania.
x' ~ ' -
3 So we run field trips out there throughout the 4
year and we stop along that highway to observe the birds 5
soaring over the fields and perched on the power poles, and 6
would hate to see you know the road usage increase to the 7
point where it would flush these birds and make them more 8
difficult to observe.
9 So basically the two issues are the impacts on the 10 raptor resource there, as well as the impacts on the 11 educational and recreational values of the site.
l l
12 Thank you very much.
13 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, sir.
14 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Bonnie Robinson?
l
[
i 15 MS. ROBINSON:
Hi, I'm Bonnie Robinson.
I V
16 represent myself.
17 Four years ago, my husband, who is a military 18 member, brought me out to Skull Valley.
I got to tell you 19 in all honesty I cried all the way out there and I cried all 20 the way home.
21 After living there for four years, I began to 22 understand a lot more about_the area and began to appreciate 23 what'I have out there.
And so I'm here to represent myself 24 and my husband and my five children.
25 You know I'm not an expert and I'm not a scientist
(]
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and, boy, my background is you know.in art and drama, so let 2
me tell you I've been doing a lot of reading.
This is just
(~s 3
a little bit of what I've got.
I've got a couple of boxes 4
at home so I'm trying real hard to learn about all the 5
things that are happening here.
And I'm trying to read both 6
sides so that I have -- I can get a fair value or an opinion 7
of what's going to happen if it does happen.
8 And one of the things -- and I can't even give you 9
a bunch of paper about what I think is going to happen to 10 you, but I can give you about a list of about a hundred 11 questions.
Will that help?
And then maybe somebody could 4
12 write back to me and let me know what the answers are, 13 because I'd appreciate that.
14 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Well, we'd be delighted to receive
[G~')
15 the questions and send you a copy of this scoping report.
16 MS. ROBINSON:
Okay.
Good.
17 MR. HAUGENEY:
May I ask though that in the 18 interest of time, we have a number of other speakers --
19 MS. ROBINSON:
Right.
20 MR. HAUGHNEY:
-- that you try to summarize the 21 issue.
22 MS. ROBINSON:
I will.
23 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you.
24 MS. ROBINSON:
One of the things that I'm really 25 most concerned about and that I've been doing some -- little l
l
'+
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bit of reading about is that I can't find any information 2
about a hot cell.
3' And a hot cell is a place where nuc- -- a reactor 4-or whatever it is -- a casket leak can be assessed.
And 5
evidentally what you've got to do is take some kind of a 6
smear.
And the only place you can take this smear to find
- 7. -
out if-anything is leaking is in a hot cell.
So from what 8
my understanding is that if you don't -- since there's not 9
going to be one of those, that if there's a leak -- somehow 10 figured out that there is one there, that when you do find 11 it, they're going to send it back by railway to wherever it
-12 came from so that they can fix'it, and then they can send it 13 back out to us.
I got to tell you.
That doesn't make a lot 14 of sense.
And as somebody that's living out there, that's
}
15 kind of frightening to me.
16 I've also been out there when we've -- I've heard 17 some people talk about the fires.
I personally have 18 witnesses (sic) those fires.
It comes from lightening.
19
. strikes.
And I got to tell you, I was from here to you when 20
'I stood up against a fire. wall that was over 30 feet. MR. HAUGHNEY:
Uh-huh.
22 MR. ROBINSON:
And that that's very frightening 23 and very real.
And I know that there can be some danger.
24-I've also been doing some reading where some of.the caskets l
i 25 and some of1the. canisters do some self-heating on occasion,
-l (N
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and that frightens me.
You know that they can self-heat.
2 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Uh-huh.
'~'
3 MR. ROBINSON:
And if they can self-heat and they 4
don't have a hot cell, what are we going to do about it if 5
it's left there?
6 And there's this and there's a lot of other things 7
that I've read about that are very frightening.
And human 8
error -- I've read about several people when they've loaded 9
things up, they haven't got the seal quite right, or that 10 somebody's dropped something and they've shoved it in to the 11 next part and that it has been dented just slightly and so 12
.it doesn't fit quite in so they don't get it all sealed.
13 Human error -- geez, look around.
There's human 14 error all of the place.
And here we could have it here and
)
'()
15 we're talking about something that can damage an area so 16 widespread that it will never recover from it.
17 And these are all concerns of mine.
And I'm only 18 one person.
But hopefully there are other people out there 19 that feel the concerns for this area.
I really do love the 20 Skull Valley area, and I didn't think I ever would.
And I 21 have real. concern'for the people there.
22 I'm only ten miles away from ground zero.
23 Something happens and it affects me.
And it effects my 24' husband.
Will he have a joD if it's contaminated?
Will the l
25 people that live out there be able to go back to their ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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homes?
I. teed some answers.
And I think the people out 2
there do, too.
3 Before you go ahead with all the things, think 4
that there are people there -- real live people -- that feel 5
and care deeply about their homes.
6 Thanks for listening.
7 MR. HAUGENEY:
You're welcome.
8 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Okay.
I'm not sure I'm going to 9
pronounce this last name right.
Gregory Thayn -- Thayr 10 (sic) -- from BLM?
11 DR. THAYN:
Yes, I'm Dr. Gregory Thayn.
I'm with 12 the Bureau of Land Management, Utah state office.
I'm the 13 national environmental policy act coordinator there.
14 I'm here on behalf of the state director for Utah 15 and for the manager of the Salt Lake field office for BLM.
16 And we'd just like to say that the -- we believe 17 that the scope of the EIS should be comprehensive and it 18-should include the analysis of the entire project, including 19 any needed access or transportation across the public lands 20 that we're in charge of.
21 The BLM is an agency with expertise and 22 responsibilities and multiple use-for multiple resources.
23 And I'm not entirely clear on this -- maybe you can help 24
.with this.
If the BLM is going to in :he future be asked to 25 provide rights of way, permits, or other authorizations for l
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the project and we may -- in fact some key decisions to make 1
jT 2
and should be included as a cooperating agency for V'
3 preparation of the EIS, particularly in regards to expertise 4
in potential impacts on the public lands and resources.
5 We're especially concerned over the questions 6'
regarding the access and the transportation of the spent 7
fuel lodge and what will be involved in the construction and i
8 operation of the transportation facilities.
9 We have specific concerns about culture restore I
10 (sic) -- resources, historic trails, threatened endangered 11 plant species, impacts on livestock grazing, impacts on wild 12 horses, wetlands, wildlife, mineral resources, and I won't 13 go into detail on-that.
We will provide a letter before the 14 end of the scoping. period that will detail our concerns and 15
.the issues.
16' And we'd just like to thank you for this 17' opportunity to participate at this point.
We hope that we 18
.can assist in a proper way in the preparation of this EIS.
19 Thank you.
.20 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you, Dr. Thayn for f
21 summarizing your agency's views.
22' MR. DELLIGATTI:
Christopher Robinson?
l' 23-MR. ROBINSON:
As was stated, I'm Christopher 24 Robinson.
I'm here on behalf of three companies:
Skull 25 Valley' Company, Castle Rock Land and Livestock (phonetic),
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and Ensine (phonetic) Ranches of Utah.
I f-~3 2
Those three companies are owned by three families,
!(
)
3 mine and two others, that operate cattle ranches and other 4
agricultural operations in Skull Valley.
We own 67,000 l
5 acres in the Valley.
We're the largest private land owner.
6 We also lease the BLM's grazing rights as the previous 7
gentleman mentioned that there were some.
We also lease the l
8 state lands that were referred to by David Terry of the 9
School and Institutional Trust Lands (phone'.ic).
10 We own the majority of the privata land, if not 11 all of it, along the corridor from Rolly Junction (phonetic) 12 to the indian reservation.
We have substantial irrigated 13 crop lands where we raise feed for both human and livestock 14 consumption.
We have 2,000 acres of such crop land.
Our
'N
'[\\_,]
15 crop lands are located within -- the closest -- one of our 16 farms what we call the Brown Ranch is located just on the 17 north border of the indian -- of the Goshute Reservation 1
within about a quarter mile or a half mile of the proposed 18 19 site for the PFS (phonetic) facility.
And so I -- we also 20 graze about 5,000 head of varying classes of livestock in 21 and around the reservation on both public and private lands.
j 22 We have a unique perspective on this in that we're i
23 probably more directly impacted than anybody.
We believe as 24 has been stated here, and I won't go into the -- you know 25 trying to recite all the areas in which I support the l
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testimony, that this be a very broad and thorough EIS that 2
includes the impacts specifical3y that haven't been 3
mentioned tonight on our livestock operations, on our real 4
property values, on our water rights, and underground and 5
surface water rights, on the transportation corridor, 6
whether it's by rail or down the Skull Valley aad, and the 7
impacts on our operations.
And also noise pollution and 8
dust both relating to the construction, how it's relating to 9
the multiple trips -- you know some three or 400 trips in a 10 short period of time of these heavy cargos.
11 We believe like some of the speakers have 12 indicated that Skull Valley is a very beautiful area.
It's 13-not a dumping ground.
We lawed the efforts by Tooele County 14 to clean up some.of the stock piles of hazardous substances j )
15 that exist in the county.
~ 16 Some of you may know that the State of Utah, led 17-by the governor and private businesses of The Coalition For 18 Utah's Future, has created this envision Utah project where 19 they're studying the population trends in the state and 20 where the growth is going.
And it's estimated by that year 21 using some computer modeling and other techniques, that 22 there will be some five million people living in this state 23.
by 2050, which is roughly the proposed duration of this 24 facility.
And that the majority of that growth -- or a lot 25 of-that growth will occur in Tooele County.
Tooele County I
I
/"'
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is one of the fastest, if not the fastest, growing county in
\\
2 the state and -- or -- and one of the most rapidly growing 3
in the nation.
4 And as was pointed out earlier I believe by 5
Representative Becker, the no action alternative is really I 6
think an important consideration here when you view that 7
this is -- this site is being chosen not because it's the 8
most technically feasible; it's not the one that's most 9
remote from large population centers; it's not the one with 10 the least you know earthquake faults; or the least potential 11 for flooding; or the shortest -- you know the most direct 12 route coming from where this is stored to perhaps Yucca 13 Mountain or something.
It's being examined because it's the 14 most politically expedient site -- that the expediency comes 15 to the benefit of a small minority and to the detriment of a 16 large majority that need to be taken into consideration in 17 this scoping process.
18 And in looking at it from.a broad perspective on 19 the whole state of Utah, we have, as you that are with the l
20
.NRC know, we have tried to make our voice heard by going 21 through the legal process of intervening or requesting 22 intervention in the licensing process and have been granted 23 intervention at great cost to ourselves.
And we're very I.
L 24 much opposed to this happening, and' hope that you will take 25 an even hand.
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We somewhat feel like once the DOE and others in 2
the federal government have a predisposition toward solving 3
an interim storage problem, and our concerns about that is 4
that it may become a de facto storage site that as some 5
other speakers.have alluded, that it will remove the 6
momentum or impetus for finding and properly investigating 7
and assessing a permanent site.
And that we then may wind 8
up with a de facto site that becomes a path of least 9
resistance.
And we wind up with all of this stuff 10 perpetually sort of on a shoestring process, although I'm 11 not denigrating this process.
But relative to what's gone 12 on with Yucca Mountain over the last 20 years and is still 13 going on, it is certainly not the scope of a -- that would 14 take place with a permanent facility.
()
15 So we're very concerned and hope that the EIS 16 addresses all of those factors.
And appreciate your time, 17 and we'll be submitting written comments.
18 Thank you.
19 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, sir, for your remarks.
20 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Steve Erickson?
I guess Mr.
21 Erickson is not here.
Virgil Johnson?
22 MR. JOHNSON:
My name is Virgil Johnson.
And I'm 23 a member of the Goshute Tribe from Ibapah.
And in Ibapah, 24 we don't glow.
25 But what I want to say to you guys is I want to O
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know where all the calvary was in 1968 -- spring of 1968
(~h 2
when the sheep were buried on the Skull Valley Tribe?
Where v'
3 was the calvary then?
Where was the study done for 4
Where was the study done for emergency 5
management?
Where was all those people then in 1968 -- in 6
the spring of 1968 when the sheep were killed by the nerve 7
gas from Dugway?
Where were the calvary then in the '50s 8
when Dugway came on board and wanted to do some nerve gas 9
testing?
10 We have some strange bedfellows when things like j
11 this come about.
I find that very interesting.
Call it --
12 call yourself environmentalists.
Call yourself 13 traditionalists.
Call yourself whatever you want.
We're 14 all human beings.
,a i,
)
15 And seems to me the calvary is doing their job 16 again.
Historically, what has calvary done to indigenous 17 people -- historically?
If you take a look at it, same 18 thing is happening now.
19 But the difference in 1998 today is we have enough 20 technology from what I've heard this evening.
As an 21 indigenous individual from the state of Utah, seems like to 22 me McCarthyism's well and alive in Utah.
23 Not only that, but from some of the other people 24 who have spoken on behalf of the Goshutes on some of the 25 information that has been given this evening on the studies (7
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that have been done, it seems to me that the -- there are 2
some safety factors that need to be further studied.
And 3
then once those studies have been made, I think there needs 4
to be a coming agether (sic) -- coming together again.
1 1
5 Utah, and what I read in the paper sometimes, we l
l 6
had a company come down to Lehi, probably gave them some 7
money, gave them some land, and now they're defunct.
No 8
jobs; no economics for the Lehi people.
No economics, no 9
tax base for the Utah people.
10 So what I'm saying as an individual, once all the 11 discussion has been made, then we need to live with whatever 12 the approval is.
That's the type of an individual that I 13 am.
Once a discussion is made, if it's made in a negative 14 way or made in a positive way, once it's made, let's go on.
n J
/
15 And seems to me these lights that are on, they 1
16 come from some power.
I was a Marine down in San Onofre 17 several years ago, went through Marine boot camp training, 18 Camp Pendleton.
San Onofre -- we went down to San Onofre 19 Beach.
There's a nuclear plant there.
I don't think the 20 fish are glowing 30 years later.
There are other places in 21-the United States where they're lighting these buildings.
22 It's interesting.
23 But I would say as a Native American, I'm kind of 24 in a precarious situation because Mr. Bear is my aunt's 25' son's boy.
Marjean -- Ms. Bullcreek was -- is my aunt's
/" -)
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daughter.
So we have some ties to the land in the Great 2
\\
b Basin area from the Goshutes in Ibapah as well as the j
\\-
3 Goshutes in Skull Valley.
The only difference being the 4'
Europeans who came here with their calvary said we need to 5
identify what group and where you're going to be.
And so 6-because of how it's set up, that's how we're set up i
7 throughout the United States in the various lands on the 8
reservations.
9 And the interesting thing about this whole matter, 10 in my perspective, is economics makes strange bedfellows for 11 everybody.
And overkill, that's quite an item.
That's why 12 I call it the calvary.
13 But the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, you need to 14 consider some of these ideologies.
And then once the
)
decisions are made, I will live with whatever decision is 15 16 made.
If it says yea, so be it; if it says nay, so be it.
17 Thank you very much.
18 MR. HAUGENEY:
Thank you very much, Mr. Johnson.
19 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Did Mr. Erickson return?
Okay.
20 Calvin Andrews?
21 MR. ANDREWS:
Calvin Andrews, president of 22 Analogics Marketing and Consulting.
We're general process 23 consultants.
We deal with a wide variety of problems and 24 issues ranging from environmental to new technology.
25 One of the ways we approach problems is we try to 7-ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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look at the issues and rank order them.
Rank ordering is a
(~wg 2
very important process.
What I see is something that's V
3 strikingly inconsistent here with the State of Utah's position in how to deal with these issues that are focusing 4
5 on the environmental aspects.
6 USPCI, for example, operates a dump site -- and 7
that's truly a dump site -- permanent repository at the 8
hundred year flood level to 200 foot -- 200 year flood level 9
on the perimeter of the Great Salt Lake.
10 We've heard of 30 -- 64 million pounds of I
11 chemicals being deposited in the region of Skull Valley at
)
I 12 the present time with no corresponding concern from the 13 raptor group, for example, as to how this might be impacting 14 on the raptors in the area, the wildlife, the flora and
[)
15 fauna.
U 16 There have been concerns expressed here about the 17 nuclear repository -- temporary, I might add.
And yet 18 there's been no corresponding comments or concerns about the 19 impact of permanent repository of munitions at the Tooele 20 facility as well as Dugway.
The area is so contaminated 21 with explosive munitions that areas are permanently marked i
i 22 no transit.
1 i
23 So what we come down to is what seems to be a 24 highly inconsistent position on the part of the state.
And 25 so not being an expert in these particular areas, but a I
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process consultant, I would ask the questions, what are the 2
relative environmental hazards?
And we've Chip Hill, for 3
example, commented on environmental holocaust.
I'm not 4
picking on him.
These phrases we've heard all evening from 5
various people who have commented, j
6 Well, how would we rank MerCorp Corporation's 7
(phonetic) continuous contamination of the area for decades?
8 Or Kennecott (phonetic)?
U.S. Steel?
Geneva's (phonetic) 9 pollution of the environment as well.
Just by way of 10 comparison, how many people will be killed by the transport, 11 if you will, of these casks as opposed to light rail, which 12 will move only 15 miles up and down the other corridor --
13 the'I-15 corridor, and cross some 28 intersections at grade.
14 And based on statistics from Southern California, will
()'
15 probably kill 25 to 30 people in the next decade.
16 Is this inconsistent?
The governor went back to 17 Washington and lobbied for that position.
And yet when it 18 comes to the state of Utah's concerns about the environment 19 and safety, we have no record of a death so far as I know 20 from a incident involving a cask.
And yet we've heard 21 repeated concerns about the safety of casks here tonight and j
22 it's potential impact on the environmer.t.
Here we have a 23 life and death situation in the Valley.
What are the 24 concerns, and are they appropriately rank ordered?
l 25 We've heard some concerns, for example, about the l
Q(_/
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fault rupture from the -- on geological terms.
Believe me,
/"N 2
I would not want to see this earthquake.
But if we have an 3
earthquake out here in the Skull Valley that can accelerate 4
these casks to' velocities of greater than 80 miles per hour 5
and impact them together, I think we can kiss the whole 6
state good-bye; in fact, the whole western United States.
7 And we've heard concerns about the approval 8
process.
Well, I want to know who is giving the approval J
9 when USPCI was set up out in the Valley.
The burn site 10 which is just across the road, all within a few miles.
11 We're talking about the aboriginal lands.
And I would like 12 to know, for example, who authorized the munitions 13 depositories or repositories at Dugway, Tooele, and so l
14 forth.
ID 15 Or let's just go back a few decades.
We're i
(s) i 16 talking about the beef operation here and environmental i
17 disasters.
Who authorized the chaining of thousands and l
18 thousands of square miles of pinon forest -- the sacred 19 pinon forest, I might add, of the Goshute, and the 20 sagebrush, in order to raise beef.
I see this as woefully 21 inconsistent.
And I would like to see this addressed in the 22 environmental impact study.
23 The brine shrimp of the Great Salt Lake.
If we're 24 talking about dumping 34 million pounds of hydrochloric acid
[
25 into the environment, doesn't that have some impact on brine ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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shrimp production?
r"g 2
How about the flora and fauna, the riparian zones?
b 3
The state hasn't brought up this kind of, if you will, 4
artillery -- calvary was the term, for the tamarisk 5
infestation, which has decimated the riparian zones of the 6
entire state.
And we have no allocation of money, no 7
special groups, if you will, out here informing the people 8
as to the damage.
This is strikingly inconsistent.
9 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Excuse me, sir, i
10 MR. ANDREWS:
Yes.
l 11 MR. HAUGENEY:
Could I ask that in the interest 12 MR. ANDREWS:
Yes.
1 13 MR. HAUGHNEY:
-- of our collective stamina --
l 14 MR. ANDREWS:
Summarize.
Yes.
(~'i 15 MR. HAUGENEY:
-- that -- thank you.
O 16 MR. ANDREWS:
Thank you.
I'll summarize.
I -- by 17 the way, I might add that I observe about 60% of the time --
18 or 70% of the time being devoted to government employees 19 tonight.
20 The last point then.
If this facility at the 21 Goshute Reservation were to be putting out between two and 22 20 pounds of radioactive material per day, and we knew that 23-without any issue or any controversy, what do you think 24-would happen?
25 Now the irony here is the state of Utah lobbied 1
(
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and there were officials here in the state of Utah as well e
2 as -- and, again, this is in -- within the aboriginal zone 3
of the Goshutes -- the IPP project, which burns millions of 4
tons of coal, which we know can contains uranium.
The ratio 5
was 100 kilograms for every 270 tons of coal burned.
This 6
is going out in the form of aerosol particulate.
It's 7
involved, if you will, it ends up in the posilant 8
(phonetic).
We have an incredibly inconsistent view.
l 9
One last comment, having to do with the -- I I
i 10 believe it's environmental justice.
1sn't it ironic that 11 only a few miles -- less than an hour away -- the Enola Gay 12 crews trained to drop the first bomb on Hiroshima.
If there 13 was ever a state that deserves to have the nuclear fuels 14 back, it would be this state -- produce the uranium and
(~'}
15 train the crew.
V 16 Thank you.
j 17 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Thank you, sir.
18 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Rosemary Holt?
19 MS. HOLT:
My name is Rosemary Holt.
I do not 20 work for the state or the government.
I'm the chairperson 21 for Women Concerned Utahans United.
l 22 We are a long-standing, citizen organization 23 concerned with nuclear testing, the Utah Downwinder issues, 24 the storage of 43% of the nation's chemical weapons, as well 25 as dealing with the biological issues at the Dugway Proving ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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Grounds.
, -'s 2
Women Concerned Utahans United is opposed to the
,(')
3 quote " temporary" site for the storage of nuclear waste on 4
property belonging to the Goshute group.
We believe this is 5
a bad neighbor idea.
The 100 and -- no, excuse me -- 820 6
acre, again in quotes, " temporary" facility is opposed not 7
only by the state of Utah, the people of Utah, grassroots 8
organizations, but also by groups of the Goshutes.
9 The use of the word temporary at this site is 10 arguable.
And the transportation of spent nuclear fuel to 11 this site is likely to be subjected to accidents or 12 sabotage.
13 The possibility of opening the door to other power 14 companies to store nuclear waste at the Goshute site is a
[~'}
15 major concern.
No one wants nuclear waste in their
\\_/
l 16 backyard, nor do we want it in our neighbor's backyard.
l 17 Let's not dump nuclear waste in anyone's backyard.
18 This waste needs to be stored near the plant that 19 produced it.
20 We need to look to the future for acceptable 21 solutions in the production of this kind of waste product l
22 and the problems it produces.
This nuclear waste scenario 23 is a perfect example of benefit to a few; at great expense 24 to many.
1 25 And if I can address -- this is an aside with a f'N ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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touch of humor.
2 The security -- I'm questioning the security of 3
the concrete casks.
Perhaps we can all relate to having our 4
driveways poured with concrete.
Shortly thereafter to our 5
demi- -- we're upset when we see a crack in the concrete.
6 We just-had this happen recently at our home.
The concrete 7
contractor -- we presented the crack to him, and he said, 8
"There's an old saying.
Haven't you heard it?
If it 9
doesn't crack, it's not concrete."
10 Old concrete contractor saying:
"If it doesn't 11 crack, it's not concrete."
12 Thank you.
13 MR. HAUGHNEY:
You're welcome.
14 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
And Jonathan Hurd?
(
')
15 MR. HURD:
Hello.
My name is Jonathan, and I'm v
16 speaking on behalf of Salt Lake Food Not Bombs.
17 I live here in Utah.
I was born here in Utah, and 18 I've lived here all my life.
My parents live here in Utah.
19 My grandparents, my great grandparents have, toc, during 20 their lives.
21 Today, I have a three-year-old niece who's growing 22-up here in the state of Utah.
We here in Utah have a 23 certain history with nuclear issues and the federal 24 government.
Some 40 years ago or so, a similar bunch of --
25 t similar board of people from the federal government came
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143 i
1 into our communities.
They showed us -- showed people C)\\
2 documentary videos.
They brought out a long list of experts l
i 3
who testified that these nuclear tests that they were going I
l 4
to be doing north of Las Vegas -- that all of this was r
i 5
perfectly safe.
6 Many years later, come to find out that they lied, 7
and that many of the Utahans paid for those lies with their I
8 lives.
My grandfather died of cancer at a very young age.
l 9
Never smoked a cigarette in his life; very healthy man; very 1
10 healthy lifestyle.
Died of cancer in his 50s.
And this isn't a unique story.
This has happened all across the l
11 1
J I
12 state.
We were lied to.
13 Now, today, they come out and they bring again a long line of experts that want to tell us that this is safe.
14
()
15 But if it's so damn safe, then why do they want to bring it 16 clear out to Utah and dump in a so-called barren desert?
If 17 it's so safe, why don't they leave it Minnesota?
Why don't 18 they leave it where it is?
This stuff isn't safe.
I don't 19 care how many suit and tie wearing, Ph.D. having, fools you i
20 want to parade in front of me, telling me that this stuff is l
21 safe.
It's not sE!e.
And I'm not going to believe it.
i l
2 2 '_
This guy over here wants us to believe that 23 nuclear energy has given us life.
Air gives us life.
Water 24 gives us life.
Mother Earth give us life.
Nuclear energy 25 does not give us life.
It contaminates all those things
s ANN RILEY & ASSOCIATES, LTD.
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that do give us life.
Nuclear energy has never brought us 2
anything but death and money.
And the money is what makes 3
it particularly dangerous and what interests so many people 4
in this room.
And I hope that when their food is all toxic 5
and poisoned, and their water and their air is all poisoned, i
6' that those same people are going to be able to figure out a 7
way to eat, drink, and breathe their money, because that's i
-8 all they're going to have left.
9 Thank you.
.10 MR. HAUGENEY:
You're welcome.
11 MR. DELLIGATTI:
Thank you.
That's it.
12 MR. HAUGHNEY:
Well, ladies and gentlemen, that i
13 concludes the discussions by people who have signed up to l
14 speak.
And I'm fully prepared to close this meeting.
But I 1
15
-- we want to just say something briefly.
16 To those that have commented, I found these 17 comments to be extremely sincere and highly useful in my own 18 opinion.
And we'll have to digest them in detail and look 19 at the written remarks that have been promised.
And please 20 keep your promises, because I think the ones that have been 21 promised would be particularly helpful.
22 And I thank you for your courtesy and your 23-diligence and perseverance through this meeting.
24 MR. KENNEDY:
Is there anyone here from the Bureau 25 of Indian Affairs?
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MR. HAUGHNEY:
There have been people from the --
2 but I'd like to close the meeting at --
3 MR. KENNEDY:
I'm just wondering if there is.
I'd 4
like the record to show that no one has been here from the 5
Bureau of Indian Affairs.
6 MR.'ALLISON:
Let the record show that the Bureau 7
of Indian Affairs is here.
8 MR. KENNEDY:
In whose form?
9 MR. ALLISON:
The superintendent of the Goshute 10 Reservation.
11 MR. KENNEDY:
Thank you.
12 MR. ALLISON:
Skull Valley Goshutes.
13 MR. KENNEDY:
Thank you.
14 MR. HAUGENEY:
The meeting is --
(
)
15 COURT REPORTER:
Repeat that, Mr. Chairman.
16 MR. HAUGHNEY:
I'll get the information.
I don't 17 think it was appropriate to the scoping meeting.
18 We'll go off the record now.
The meeting's 19 closed.
20
[Whereupon, at 10:06 p.m.,
the meeting was 21 concluded.)
22 23 24 25 (Q,/
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I L_._________-_____--__
_ - - - _ _ - _ _ = - _ _ _ _ - - _ -
l' REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the'Urited States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the matter of:
NAME OF PROCEEDING:
SCOPING MEETING'FOR l
PREPARATION OF AN EIS FOR THE PRIVATE FUEL STORAGE FACILITY l
LICENSE APPLICATION I
DOCKET NUMBER:
- PLACE OF PROCEEDING:
Salt Lake City, UT were held as herein appears, and that this is the original l
transcript thereof for the file of t:he United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission taken by me and'thereafter reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction of the court reporting company, and that the transcript is a true and 1
accurate record of the foregoing proceedings.
i L
l b (4'bl M n
\\
Herb Moran l
Official Reporter l
Ann Riley & Associates, Ltd.
o l'