Congressional probe urged in waste shipments to NTS

Wednesday, Sept. 1, 1999 | 10:35 a.m.

A nuclear watchdog group has called for a congressional investigation into Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory after it was discovered the lab shipped illegal toxins mixed in radioactive waste to the Nevada Test Site.

Tri-Valley CAREs (Communities Against Radioactive Environments), based in Livermore, Calif., claimed on Tuesday that the sloppy low-level nuclear waste shipments and cost overruns at the lab deserve congressional hearings and a budget investigation.

A Department of Energy audit team spent a week checking the lab's waste-handling practices in July and noted 33 infractions that need to be corrected. After the audit, the lab stopped shipments.

As of Tuesday the Livermore shipments had not resumed, DOE Nevada spokesman Derek Scammell said. "We don't know when they will begin again," he said.

Livermore's waste was supposed to contain equipment, material and debris contaminated with low levels of radioactivity from nuclear weapons research done in Northern California.

The audit criticized the lab for not keeping complete records of its radioactive waste and failing to conduct required surveys of the waste on schedule. Livermore lab officials said they sent 26 shipments of low-level radioactive waste to the Test Site last year. The shipments included 24,083 cubic feet of radioactive material, enough to fill a room 240 feet long, 10 feet wide and 10 feet high.

Earlier inspections revealed more serious problems with Livermore's shipments to the Test Site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

In 1990 Nevada officials discovered 1,640 drums of Livermore's plutonium-contaminated waste sitting at the Test Site on a concrete slab, all unauthorized, according to the audit. When inspectors examined the containers, some barrels contained hazardous wastes as well as the plutonium. Called "mixed transuranic waste," the drums had been shipped in violation of Nevada's environmental laws that prohibit such wastes from coming to the Test Site.

In the late 1980s a DOE report cited wastes sent back to the lab under guard by the Nevada and California Highway Patrols. Livermore could not demonstrate it knew what was in the barrels.

There have been 147,603 shipments of low-level nuclear waste sent to the Test Site from Livermore since transportation began in 1970.

Tri-Valley CAREs latest concerns were directed at a $300 million cost overrun for a $1.2 billion military fusion laser.

The controversial National Ignition Facility is designed to simulate a nuclear weapons blast in the laboratory and ignite a tiny hydrogen fuel pellet to produce fusion energy, the same process that produces energy in the sun and other stars. The proposed laser has survived both scientific and legal challenges in 1997.

Livermore officials insist that the laser is on schedule, but a newly appointed laser program manager is assessing the project. Mike Campbell, Livermore's associate director of lasers, resigned Monday. A prominent military fusion expert, Campbell claimed he had a doctorate from Princeton University, but Livermore discovered he did not have the degree. Campbell has been replaced by Associate Lab Director for Security George Miller.

Some laser experts have predicted the laser will fail to reach its goals, while others claim it has little relevance to the nation's mission to keep the nuclear weapons stockpile safe.