Arms Labs’ Toxic Waste Endangers Public, Group Says

An anti-nuclear group charged Tuesday that the government is endangering the public by mishandling highly toxic material and radioactive waste at the nation’s weapons laboratories.

“It is one of the great ironies of our age: In the name of protecting our national security and well-being, we are poisoning ourselves,” the New York-based Radioactive Waste Campaign said in a “citizen guide” to the weapons sites.

The document, relying heavily on the government’s own reports, identified problems at 16 Department of Energy-run plants, including the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory here.

The group asked Congress to order a halt to dumping of radioactive wastes and called for creation of an agency to oversee the weapons plants.

Released Report

A local group called Tri-Valley Citizens Against a Radioactive Environment released the report at a press conference here.

Marylia Kelley, a group member who lives in an apartment across from the Livermore lab, said: “The more I research, the more I worry. Every time we go through the files we find evidence of mismanagement of toxic and radioactive contaminants.”

The government has acknowledged many of the problems, though officials at the Department of Energy and the Lawrence Livermore lab said the group overstated the threat to public health.

DOE spokesman Will Callicott said Energy Secretary John Herrington “has put into place a program that is both thorough and aggressive,” and he added that the agency is cleaning up its sites in a program that will cost tens of billions of dollars and last into the next century.

The Environmental Protection Agency lists Livermore as qualifying for Superfund money for cleanup.

At Livermore, Fredric Hoffman said his environmental restoration division plans to spend up to $60 million to clean up toxics that leaked into ground water beginning in 1942 when the site was a naval air station.

The lab deals with a number of hazardous chemicals, including tritium and plutonium used in weapons development, and cancer-causing agents used in biomedical research.

Tiny amounts of radioactive material have been discharged--both accidentally and intentionally--into the air and sewer system, prompting concern among local officials and residents. Hoffman and others at the lab maintain the emissions pose no hazard and are below DOE safety standards.