Yucca E-mails

Monday, April 4, 2005 | 10:48 a.m.

Excerpts of some of the government e-mails about scientific testing at Yucca Mountain. The names and positions of the people involved have not been released, but the e-mails come from the U.S. Geological Survey and the Energy Department.

"Still don't know quite how to handle the air temp glitch. I'm continuing to keep mum about this, but, from a scientific integrity standpoint, it is tempting to let the end users know exactly what was provided to them in terms of effectively cooler future climate simulations. Problem is, I don't know how to do this without looking bad." E-mail May 11, 1998

"Like you've said all along, YMP (Yucca Mountain Project) has now reached a point where they need to have certain items work no matter what, and the infiltration maps are on that list. If USGS (U.S. Geological Survey) can't find a way to make it work, (redacted) will (but for now they are definately (sic) counting on us to do the job.) E-mail Dec. 17, 1998

"Science by peer pressure is dangerous but sometime (sic) it is necessary." E-mail April 2, 1999

"Some nights I have a hard time going to sleep because I realize the importance of trying to get the right answer, and I now how many serious unknowns are still out there and how many quick fixes are still holding things together... I'm looking forward to putting the YMP nonsense far behind me." E-mail April 4, 1999

"Don't look at the last 4 lines. Those lines are a mystery that I believe somehow relate to the work (redacted) was doing in entering the 1994 data. These lines are not used by (redacted) (we stop at 9/30/84). I've deleted the lines from the "official" QA version of the files (which do have headers). In the end I keep track of 2 sets of files, the one that will keep QA happy and the ones that were actually used." E-mail Nov. 15, 1999

"Please do not tell anyone how this was done because then we will need to get this whole thing through software QA!" E-mail Feb. 17, 2000

"I can fudge the attachment for (redacted) for now but eventually someone may want to run (redacted) to see what numbers come out and at that point there will be problems, although it is my belief for now that an impact analysis would reveal that the differences are not critical to the end result." E-mail March 6, 2000

"The programs, of course, are all already installed otherwise the (redacted) would not exist. I don't have a clue when these programs were installed. So I've made up the dates and names (see red edits below). This is as good as its (sic) going to get. If they need more proof, I will be happy to make up more stuff, as long as its (sic) not a video recording of the software being installed." E-mail March 30, 2000