U.S. Ecology Sues to Get OK for Radioactive-Waste Incinerator

A subsidiary of Agoura Hills-based American Ecology is suing North Carolina to overturn the state’s rejection of its bid to operate a low-level radioactive-waste incinerator.

The suit, filed in Superior Court in Wake County, N.C., challenges the constitutionality of a North Carolina law that allows state agencies to consider such licensing applications without having a uniform evaluation standard.

Disposal Sites Closed

The American Ecology unit, U.S. Ecology, which accounted for 90% of the parent company’s $57.8 million in sales last year, has disposed of dangerous materials since 1952. Over the years, it has become embroiled in environmental controversies.

U.S. Ecology’s dumps in Sheffield, Ill., and Maxey Flats, Tenn., were closed amid state allegations that the firm failed to contain waste materials properly. Dumps in Beatty, Nev., and near Richland, Wash., also have been involved in major disputes with state authorities.

The company was designated to build and operate California’s first low-level radioactive-waste dump in December, despite what a state review committee called the company’s record of “serious regulatory non-compliance” at dumps in other states.

Chuck McLendon, a spokesman for the North Carolina Department of Human Resources, said officials from that agency’s radiation protection section spent two years evaluating Louisville-based U.S. Ecology.

Commercial, Medical Waste

In announcing the March 24 decision to reject U.S. Ecology’s bid, Human Resources Department Secretary Philip Kirk said, “Based on the company’s past track record, we are not convinced U.S. Ecology has operated its other facilities with sound waste-management practices.

“Nor has it been, in our estimation, in substantial compliance with federal and state laws and regulations where it is currently operating.”

Such materials as nuclear power plant equipment, or rags, papers, filters and protective clothing used in commercial and medical processes are dumped at low-level radioactive-waste sites.

Most of the nation’s low-level radioactive waste is now disposed of at three locations: the two U.S. Ecology dumps in Nevada and Washington and a site in South Carolina operated by Chem-Nuclear Systems of Columbia, S.C.

North Carolina wants to build the nation’s first incinerator for low-level radioactive wastes.

California’s Health Services Department said it had no choice but to give a contract to U.S. Ecology in December because the company was the only bidder left after the state’s first three choices bowed out, all on the grounds that the financial and legal risks were too great.

A 1983 state law requires such jobs be offered to qualified bidders in the order of their ranking.