Low-Level Waste Seminar/
Nevada Test Site tour

By Fay Martin

The objectives of the seminar were:

To establish communication among the various SSABs,
To learn about the low-level waste program and the present configuration of low-level waste at each of the DOE sites,
To learn about the status of DOE's efforts to determine the disposition for low-level waste,
To discuss barriers/challenges to DOE's decision-making process, and
To formulate suggestions for overcoming barriers/resolving challenges to DOE's decision process.

The meeting began with certain Assumptions, such as:

DOE intends to move forward in developing a Record of Decision (ROD) for the management and disposition of LLW under the Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement for Waste Management;
The participating SSABs understand that the LLW ROD will address LLW under the WM Program, but not LLW generated under the Environmental Restoration Program at the various DOE sites.

Evidently not all SSABs understood this second assumption, because there were several objections and the seminar seemed doomed to die an early death.

Another assumption, "DOE has sufficient, relevant technical information on which to base decisions for management and disposition of LLW," was also not very well received. However, with the help of the facilitators, and after several compromises, we finally got started.

Jay Rhoderick, the Director of Planning and Analysis for Waste Management, gave an overview of the LLW Program, and Mona Williams provided an overview of LLW transportation issues. Each of the Sites then gave a presentation on the LLW program at the respective Site, including Board concerns about the program. Bill Pardue did an excellent presentation for the Oak Ridge SSAB. He pointed out that offsite disposal was critical for Oak Ridge because of our high annual rainfall (55 inches); the high water table (0-20 feet); contamination/migration into the public domain; proximity to populations (0.5-5 miles) and major highways; complex geology/karst formation; equity issues; and high cost of storage versus disposal.

Attendees were divided into discussion groups according to five categories, namely:

Transportation considerations,
Equity, inter-state, tribal considerations and environmental justice,
System-wide considerations,
Economic considerations, ad
Environmental considerations.

I was in the group on equity, inter-state, tribal considerations and environmental justice. We spent a long time coming up with a definition for "equity" and concluded that "the definition of equity, the process for achieving it, and the medium for exchange for negotiating it have not been developed and universally accepted".

We also had discussions with our own site groups to see which suggestions we thought our Boards would support. We ended with a discussion on what steps should be taken to continue the dialogue among the Boards and how best the actions should be presented to DOE for implementation.

Tour of Nevada Test Site

This was fascinating and gratifying because I had worked on a Plutonium Data Base in the 1970's and had always had a desire to visit the Test Site.

We had an excellent guide, Ernest Williams, who had worked at the Test Site "in the old days" and knew all the intimate details of what happened then. We first stopped at the gate for badging and dosimeters and then proceeded to the town of Mercury.

We were shown some wooden benches on which the newsmen such as Walter Cronkite sat during one of the shots. We saw such familiar places as "Gravel Gertie" and Frenchman Flat. Bruce Becker told us about the Waste Disposal Facility (0.05 mR/ hr background here, compared to 0.03mR/hr n the desert). He pointed out a transuranic waste container that would be shipped to WIPP. It was on a RCRA pad, and also on the pad was mixed waste to be shipped to the TSCA incinerator. Lunch time was poetic as I sat on a rock under a desert willow and ate my sandwich, and talked with Jim Bierer, a tour official. We then drove through vast stretches of countryside with scrubby vegetation and several Joshua trees, on to Yucca Flat, which is 12 miles long and 10 miles wide. This is the lowest part of the valley and explains why all the silt has collected here. We were told that sometimes they have up to 4 inches of water, but there was none on our visit. Area 3 was interesting where an atmospheric shot was fired. Our guide pointed out the subsidence craters and explained about the gases coming to the surface.

Leroy Duran explained about the Radioactive Waste Management Site. There was some waste there from Fernald, five layers of tanks with 4 feet of soil between the layers, a crater and a special liner called "burrito wrap." Four shipments had arrived that morning from Sandia, N.M. Birds were flying around; I couldn't tell what the attraction was. A worker with a monitor checked our bus for contamination when we left this area.

The crater left by Project Sedan was most impressive. This study, on July 6, 1962, investigated the cratering effects of a high yield explosion. The cloud rose 12,000 feet above the desert floor. The crater is 635 feet deep and 1,200-1,500 feet wide, with some vegetation on the western side, but smooth sand on the eastern side. It took our guide 45 minutes to climb up the side once when he attempted it in the old days. (He kept slipping back after each step forward).

Another point of interest was Frenchman Flat to see the results of some research designed to test the effects of explosions on buildings. The wooden structures had all disappeared, we were told. The Bailey Bridge, hit by Priscilla (37 kilotons) showed some structural damage. Some dome-shaped concrete buildings showed no damage; also a rectangular concrete "hut" with an earthen berm was not damaged. The scientists were asked to test the effects on a bank vault (Las Vegas connection?); it was quite dramatic, seeing the old bent steel wire sticking out of the vault. We were told that the gold, silver and money were in good shape, but the accounting records were in bad shape. Walter Reed Hospital conducted a study on animals at that time.

There was never a dull moment; on the bus we saw a video of "Operation Cue," showing the effects of test explosions on houses, mannequins and foodstuff. The results of the test showed that some things were demolished and some survived; they even showed the effects on the expensive tie of one of the male mannequins.

Should we have done the tests? Should they have been done at the Nevada Test Site? What did we learn from the tests? How did we benefit mankind? How can we help the "downwinders"? Should we continue with testing? These are philosophical, practical and ethical questions that we discussed well into the night.

Sic transit gloria mundi.

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Low-Level Waste Seminar/ Nevada Test Site tour

Tour of Nevada Test Site

Other reports

Low-Level Waste Seminar/
Nevada Test Site tour