How Imperiled Is This Valley? : Nuclear dump question needs one more thorough review

By 2040, California’s population is expected to double to 63 million from today’s 31.5 million. Where will these people live? Who will employ them? How many schools will they need? The list of questions about the coming population explosion is long, but perhaps no question is so pressing as “What will they drink?” Arid California can survive its demographic future only by guarding every drop of water as if the state’s life depended on it. Quite simply, it does.

This is why the threat to California water posed by a low-level radioactive waste dump near the Colorado River is a matter of such grievous concern. Private lawsuits aside, nothing now blocks the dump but a hearing that Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt has asked Gov. Pete Wilson to hold. After that hearing, construction will begin if Babbitt transfers to the state the federally owned dump site, at Ward Valley near Needles.

Wilson has made crystal-clear the kind of hearing he has in mind in a detailed proposal that reads, in part: “No testimony will be admissible to support any of the following: . . . an argument that an alternative site or an alternative design would be preferable; an argument that a different licensee would be preferable; or an argument that either the state or the licensee are unprepared to meet the fiscal demands of site operation.”

On Nov. 8, Business Week published an article entitled “Has U.S. Ecology Cleaned Up Its Act?” The answer the magazine gave about the firm the Wilson Administration has licensed to run the dump was a resounding “No!” Among the supporting evidence:

“MAXEY FLATS, KY. Operated waste disposal site until leaking plutonium forced a shutdown in 1977. In 1986, the EPA put the dump on its Superfund list. Cleanup could cost up to $100 million.

“SHEFFIELD, ILL. State attorney general sued for $97 million in 1978 after finding radioactive waste leaching. In 1988, the company agreed to pay $8 million for cleanup.

“BEATTY, NEV. Closed several times . . . for numerous violations. Nevada ordered it closed permanently in January, 1993, but now allows U.S. Ecology to bury non-nuclear waste.

“U.S. Ecology acknowledges some past problems, but says it has improved operations.”

Until January, 1993, U.S. Ecology regularly pointed to its Beatty facility as proof that its earlier problems were behind it. But Gov. Bob Miller of Nevada told Business Week: “We were in constant disagreement with them about the amount of radioactive waste they were bringing in. I certainly did not have a good working relationship with them.”

U.S. Ecology may have answers to the questions raised about it, but Californians have the right to hear those answers in a hearing that grants opponents the right of discovery and cross-examination. Yet Wilson has ruled out any questions about the firm: If a dump opponent asks a question, “the presiding officer will be expected to intervene.”

This is, in a word, appalling. California cannot afford a gag order when the resource at risk is the Colorado River. The Clinton Administration, if it cares at all about its reputation as a friend of the environment and of this state, cannot afford it either.