Environmental Review of Nuclear Dump is Flawed

by Marsha Shaiman

Reprinted from On Indian Land, Fall 1996. Published quarterly by Support for Native Sovereignty, P.O. Box 2104, Seattle, WA 98111. Annual subscription: $12 individual, $20 institution.

"These traditional lands have extreme religious, cultural and archaeological non-renewable sources and resources that relate and tie [us] spiritually and physically to these areas," states a resolution by the Lower Colorado River Indian Tribes in opposition to a proposed nuclear dump site at Ward Valley, California. Area residents and environmental organizations join the Fort Mojave, Colorado River, Chemeheuvi, Fort Yuma-Quechan, and Cocopah Indian Tribes to halt construction of the low-level nuclear dump site.

"We can't take the slightest chance of contamination of the ground water of the Colorado River which is the basis of our presence and existence," state these Tribes about the proposed site to be located 18 miles from the Colorado River over an aquifer experts believe connects to the River. According to Bradley Angel, Greenpeace Toxics Campaigner, the uproar created by dump site opponents, concerning safety and other issues, has forced the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to prepare a supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) on the project.

Local organizers against the dump site, however, insist that the mandated new round of hearings, meetings, and studies are a sham. They cite statements from Deputy Secretary of the Interior John Garamendi that the SEIS will only determine the conditions for transferring the federal land at Wary Valley to the State for the dump, not determine if the dump should be built. They also cite their own previous negative experience with the environmental review process.

Dump site opponents' characterization of the process is supported by the manner in which recent meetings on the SEIS were conducted. Instead of holding traditional public hearings at which oral testimony is given and is recorded by a court reporter, the BLM held three "informal scoping workshops" in June, 1996. They set up tables in hotel conference rooms with staff to listen to the public. Bradley Angel, told them, "We think your workshop was designed to exclude public testimony."

U.S. Ecology, the company that proposes to store nuclear waste in unlined trenches dug in the Movaje Desert at Ward Valley, has a bad track record for safety. Their dump in Beatty, Nevada leaked radioactive materials into the ground and also contaminated the town of Beatty. Nevada shut them down in 1992. U.S. Ecology is reportedly on the brink of bankruptcy.

Despite U.S Ecology's history and the danger of contamination to the aquifer and the Colorado River, which downstream supplies drinking water to 15 million people in California, Nevada and Arizona, California Governor Pete Wilson insists on the importance of a nuclear dump site at Ward Valley. He has even had legislation introduced into Congress, HR 3083 in the House and S 1596 in the Senate, which would transfer the federal land at Ward Valley to the state4 of California, for a nuclear dump site, waiving any and all environmental oversight.

The supplemental Environmental Impact Statement is expected to be released towards the end of 1996, after which more public hearings will be held. There should also be a written comment period open to the public at this time.

To protect the land, an ongoing vigil at Ward Valley has been maintained this summer by groups opposing the dump site and protests are being held throughout California about this issue.

To help, contact the following people. Tell them you oppose the unconditional transfer of Ward Valley land to California:

Patricia Madueno or Steve Lopez
Fort Mojave Tribe
500 Merriman Street
Needles, CA 92363