PLATFORM : Ward Valley

Store California’s low-level radioactive wastes at 800 separate locations around the state? Definitely a bad idea, but not one that’s coming from medical researchers who generate radioactive waste as part of their routine laboratory operations.

Just when you might think that nothing would be allowed to interfere with research to develop cures for cancer, Alzheimer’s, AIDS and a host of other horrible maladies, hospital administrators now must set aside precious space and money for waste-storage facilities, while others have thrown up their hands in frustration.

Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles already has stopped research on a lifesaving new drug to prevent coronary veins and arteries from clogging after a heart attack. Scientists at the University of California at San Francisco have abandoned certain experiments that could lead to breakthroughs in the treatment of diabetes and endocrine disorders.

Unless California is prepared to write off medical research and other key sectors of its economy that make use of radiation, the state should not yield in its effort to open a central waste disposal facility at Ward Valley in the Mojave Desert.

If the era of state responsibility for vital services has indeed arrived in national politics, let opening the Ward Valley facility be one if its first victories. There are few cases in which a difficult problem affecting key sectors of California’s economy could be resolved with so little effort.