Editorial: Horrifying disclosure

Friday, March 18, 2005 | 9:26 a.m.

The latest revelation that Yucca Mountain is a disaster in waiting came after Wednesday's disclosure -- by the Energy Department, no less -- of evidence suggesting that documents in support of the project's primary safety study may have been falsified. The evidence is borne out by e-mails among government scientists. The existence of the e-mails and the critical nature of their content were confirmed by Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman.

The e-mails, written between May 1998 and March 2000, focused on the most important study of Yucca Mountain's capacity to safely act as the burial site for the nation's high-level nuclear waste. This was the study by the U.S. Geological Survey, a branch of the Interior Department, that concluded water would move extremely slowly underneath the mountain over thousands of years. It would move so slowly, the study concluded, that there would be no danger of corrosion to the metal casks containing the waste.

This study was critical, because earlier studies by the Energy Department itself suggested that water beneath the mountain would flow in sufficient quantity to corrode the casks in a relatively short period of time, say, a hundred years. In that event, radiation would escape into the environment, creating an ever-widening and permanent threat to human life. Of course, if those studies had been considered conclusive, the Yucca Mountain project would have been forced to shut down. Therefore, the Energy Department seized on the U.S. Geological Survey finding, and used it to guarantee the safety of Yucca Mountain.

The e-mails, however, contain evidence that documentation supporting the U.S. Geological Survey study might have been falsified. If that indeed happened, the whole basis for claims that Yucca Mountain can safely contain nuclear waste is shattered. This is a horrifying turn of events. At stake are the lives and health of thousands of people, and no less than the future of Nevada as a place to live. The Energy Department spoke only generally about the e-mails, but we believe it should release their contents, verbatim, immediately. It's about time the public had an insight into the inner workings of the people responsible for pushing this mad project.

Investigations are under way by the inspector generals of both the Energy Department and the U.S. Geological Survey. In our view, this is an insufficient response, as both of these departments are responsible for generating the data in question and both have a vested interest in the ultimate opening of Yucca Mountain. At a minimum, the Government Accountability Office should be involved. What's really needed, given the magnitude of this disclosure, is an exhaustive probe by a special prosecutor, who would be independent of the government.