Action Alert: Oppose License Applications

ALERT:
Oppose License Applications to IMPORT MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF NUCLEAR POWER WASTE from EUROPE to BURN, MELT, TRANSPORT and DUMP in the US!

EnergySolutions (often called EnergyPollutions) runs 2 commercial nuclear waste dumps in the US (in South Carolina and Utah) and incinerators, a metal melter and other “processing” facilities in Memphis and Oak
Ridge, Tennessee.

EnergySolutions is applying for a federal license to import 20,000 tons, one million cubic feet and over 600,000,000,000,000 becquerels (radioactive emissions per second) of radioactive waste (mainly from Italian nuclear power and related industries) into the US for processing including incineration, “recycling” (into unspecified waste streams and destinations), transport and disposal.

The “Low” and Intermediate Level Nuclear Waste from ITALY would

~Enter the US via Ports of Charleston and New Orleans (possibly others)

~Travel to and throughout Tennessee --

~Be Burned, Smelted, Chopped, and otherwise “Processed,” in Memphis and Oak Ridge giving off routine radioactive emissions and creating more waste.

Some could be “cleared” and Dumped in Solid Waste Dumps in TN or “Released” and “Recycled” for use as if not radioactive.

Some would be transported to Utah to be buried.

This opens the doors (or the borders) to foreign radioactive waste coming in from around the world.

This would give a huge financial boost directly to EnergySolutions (and indirectly to other “processors”) that routinely release radioactivity and use Tennessee (Dept of Envt and Conservation-TDEC) state licenses to release the waste from regulatory controls normally required for nuclear power waste. It facilitates dispersing nuclear waste in this country via Tennessee.

This would fill up existing (already-controversial) disposal capacity for the massive amounts of nuclear waste already generated by nuclear power and weapons in the US.

ACTION NEEDED:

Comment to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission to say NO to License Applications Nos. IW023 and XW013 (Federal Register Volume 73, Number 28, 2/11/08)

Send copies of your comments to your Congressmembers and Senators and to your State legislators especially if you are in TN, UT, LA, SC and states between and downwind.

Comment to NRC (secy@nrc.gov) by March 12, 2008; Contact NIRS (dianed@nirs.org) to join requests for hearing(s) and to intervene.

From NIRS website: http://www.nirs.org/radwaste/llw/llwhome.htm

In the US “low-level” radioactive waste includes all the commercial nuclear waste except irradiated fuel from nuclear reactors, the liquid and sludge from reprocessing and the solid into which that is converted. In most of Europe this same range of waste is considered “low” and “intermediate” level. Regardless, it includes the same long-lasting, deadly radionuclides as in high level radioactive waste and sometimes in even greater concentrations.

Despite no place or technology to isolate the waste as long as it is radioactively
hazardous, the nuclear industry creates more and more.

UPDATE February 2008. A major US nuclear waste company, EnergySolutions, with a
near monopoly on commercial nuclear waste treatment and disposal in the US, proposes
large scale importation nuclear waste from Italy for processing and disposal in the US.

This import license application is open for public comment until March 12, 2008. On
February 28, 2008. over 50 national, state and local groups and individuals requested an extension of 90 days for public comment and requests to intervene and hold hearings.

Congressmembers including (Rep. Gordon and Rep.Matheson ), state legislators, a governor and newspapers have expressed concern and opposition.

A million cubic feet, 20,000 tons, and large amounts of radioactivity from the Italian nuclear industry facilities - what appears to be most of Italy’s “low” and intermediate level radioactive waste - could be brought around the globe to the US through the ports of Charleston, South Carolina and New Orleans, Louisiana. It would then go to Memphis and Oak Ridge Tennessee for “processing” and the remains transported to Utah for burial.

Comments submitted so far and the docket can be viewed on the NRC website
www.nrc.gov and searching in the electronic library ADAMS under the docket # 11005711.

Comment to NRC (secy@nrc.gov) re: Application No. IW023 by March 12, 2008;
Contact NIRS (dianed@nirs.org) to join requests for hearing(s) and to
intervene.