PLATFORM : Toxic Interference in Our Back Yard

People like Bennett Johnston (the Louisiana Democrat who chairs the Senate Energy and Water Development Committee) are anxious to get this dump established in California’s Ward Valley, 19 miles from the Colorado River. But how would Johnston feel about a site 19 miles from the Mississippi, with hydrological pathways from the site to the river?

The Ward Valley dump would bring waste in unstable containers and put it into unlined trenches. It would have no adequate monitoring systems or remediation plans, and its proposed operator has a shoddy record in other states.

The proponents of this dump don’t want a public hearing. If they can manage to avoid public examination of the record of the operator and all questions that experts might want to raise--experts like those who work for the U.S. Geological Survey, or consultants to the Metropolitan Water District--then they can also avoid questioning about the potential hazard to your drinking water supply.

That will be fine with Bennett Johnston. But 5 will get you 10 that if other states were lining up to dump their radioactive waste along the Mississippi River, we’d hear Johnston’s cry of NIMBY (“Not in my back yard!”) all the way from Louisiana.