Major Nuclear Dump Has Leaked, But Does US Gov't Have a Plan B?

[xchrom]

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2014/02/28-3


A shipment of radioactive waste makes its way to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in southeastern New Mexico (Photo: Los Alamos National Laboratory / Flickr Creative Commons)

A radioactive leak from a New Mexico underground nuclear dump that was championed as a safe long-term repository calls into question the federal government's overall approach to disposing of dangerous waste from nuclear weapons production, experts warn.

"This leak just proved that out of sight is not out of mind," said Arnie Gundersen, Chief Engineer and nuclear safety advocate at Fairewinds Associates and former nuclear industry executive turned whistleblower, in an interview with Common Dreams. "You can have a problem when you get this stuff underground, and then what do you do?"

The federally-owned Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in southeastern New Mexico, which stores nuclear waste deep beneath the earth's surface in salt formations, is the only underground repository for materials above the lowest level of radiation. It is the bedrock of the U.S. government's current approach to dispose of military-generated plutonium-contaminated transuranic waste from decades of nuclear bomb production and testing. Since it became operational in 1999, WIPP has collected this waste from across the United States, including Los Alamos National Laboratory in northern New Mexico.

The Department of Energy declares on their website that "WIPP has set the standard for safe, permanent disposal of long-lived radioactive defense wastes."

[agent46]

1. Plan B

> Do everything possible to minimize the spread of this news.
> Stop or prevent all environmental impact studies.
> Ensure there are no statistics being kept for increased radiation or possible vectors of radiation in the region and beyond.
>When related incidences of illness, cancer and death begin to show up in the population, ensure there are no statistical links to the radiation leak.
>Frame any discussion as a matter of opinion what actually happened, or whether or not it was dangerous.
>Keep the debate going until all the effected die off and the general population becomes used to the new normal.

Worked for the Gulf disaster. Worked for Fukushima. Works for Fracking. It's a model, a formula, and it works like a dream.

[newfie11]

2. +infinity!!!!!!

God knows what else is out there that we don't need to know about!

[madokie]

3. Pretty much got it down no doubt

[GreenPartyVoter]

4. Yep.

[WhiteTara]

5. Within the next decade we'll need a hotspot map to help

avoid those terrible places of contamination.