Three Tentative Sites Selected for Low-Level Nuclear Waste Dump

Three potential sites for California’s low-level nuclear waste dump were named Wednesday by the company developing the dump for the state. Two of the sites are in San Bernardino County and the third is in Inyo County.

All three are on federal land in remote desert locations. They were chosen from a list of 16 locations, according to Ron Gaynor, vice president of U.S. Ecology, the development firm.

The three sites will be studied in detail before U.S. Ecology applies to the state for a license to build on one of them, Gaynor said. He said the firm hopes to file that application in 1988 in order to build and open the dump by 1990.

U.S. Ecology, a Kentucky-based firm with offices in Newport Beach, was selected in 1985 by the state Department of Health Services to purchase, develop and operate the dump site for the state.

The dump eventually is to receive all of California’s low-level nuclear waste--radioactive material such as clothing, plastic gloves, tools and medical supplies from nuclear industries, laboratories and hospitals. Currently, such material, which must be buried for as long as 100 years while the contamination dissipates, is sent to a dump in Washington state.

The two San Bernardino sites named Wednesday are in Ward Valley, about 25 miles west of Needles, and Silurian, about 15 miles north of Baker. The Inyo County site is in Panamint Valley, about 30 miles north of Trona.

Gaynor said the firm selected the locations after all 16 sites were reviewed by a citizen advisory board that included members from San Bernardino, Inyo and Riverside counties, the League of Women Voters, Indian tribes, the Sierra Club, and the nuclear industry.

The two San Bernardino locations were heavily favored by the advisory board, Gaynor said. The Inyo County site was chosen for review because of vocal support for the site from within the county’s business and political community, he said.

Jim Dodson, the Sierra Club’s vice president for Southern California, said the Panamint site was a poor choice from an environmental standpoint and was chosen only “as a concession to political interests there.”

But Gaynor said all three sites meet the state’s minimum standards for environmental safeguards. He said if further study eliminates any of the three locations from consideration, one of two alternate sites in San Bernardino County will be added to the list.

In a related development Wednesday, Assemblyman Steve Peace (D-Chula Vista) announced that Arizona Gov. Evan Mecham had agreed to Peace’s plan for a compact between the two states on disposal of the low-level waste.

The compact, required under federal law if California is to avoid being ordered to accept waste from another state, has been the subject of years of debate within the Legislature and with Gov. George Deukmejian. Peace’s plan would place the dump site for both states in California for 30 years, after which Arizona would host a facility to handle the waste.