Why Take Chances? : A judge, concerned for river, orders that radioactive dump be reconsidered

Would the Colorado River be contaminated by a low-level radioactive waste dump proposed for Ward Valley, a site in the Mojave Desert near the river? California’s Department of Health Services says no. A study by three geologists with the U.S. Geological Survey says yes. Last Wednesday Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Robert O’Brien wisely said maybe and properly directed the department to reconsider its decision to approve the dump. The Colorado River provides a substantial percentage of Southern California’s drinking water. Why take chances?

Geologists Howard Wilshire (whose name has now been given to the report), David Miller and Keith Howard identified five pathways by which radioactivity could migrate from the dump to the river in an initially little noticed 1993 study.

The Interior Department (of which the Geological Survey is part) actively dissociated itself from their opinion and discouraged them from discussing it, especially with the press. But their courage, backed by the timely and forceful intervention of Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and meticulous report-reading on the part of the Committee to Bridge the Gap--which spotted a passing allusion to the study and took the time to inquire about it--have now clearly served California public safety well.

“Is (the Colorado) threatened to be contaminated? Is it possible it will be contaminated?” Judge O’Brien asked. Answering his own question, he said, “It does not appear that the (USGS) analysis . . . has been placed in a proper perspective, so that an objective person can properly evaluate it. . . . “

As for what is now required: “Due to the extraordinary importance of what is at stake here, e.g., radioactive waste and drinking water . . . the analysis of the Wilshire Report should be placed side by side, in its complete form, with the counter-analysis before any approval.”

Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt has already directed the National Academy of Sciences to review the Wilshire Report and publish its own findings by the end of 1994. Because assessment of the threat to the river involves an accurate characterization of the waste “stream” (the material going to the dump) as well as of pathways from the dump to the river, this review and the one the Department of Health Services is now on notice to conduct may begin to bring into the open matters of public concern that have by no means had the formal public airing they deserve.

Radioactive waste disposal is a clear need in California, but safe water is an even clearer one, not just for nuclear power, the biotech industry and radioactive medicine--the key categories of waste producers--but for the entire economy and the entire population.

As Judge O’Brien rightly said in his opinion, “Any doubt must be resolved in the form of caution.”