Dear HCN,
Grateful thanks to Rep.
Kelly Atkinson, D-West Jordan (Utah), for his expression of concern
regarding Umetco Minerals’ plan to bury radioactive waste in
Uravan, Colo., on the San Miguel River and a short 20 miles from
the Utah-Colorado border (HCN, 11/29/93).
While
it’s true we all live downstream, I would suggest that Utah
legislators pay careful attention to the environmental threats
within their own borders. To name but two: Umetco’s recently
requested authorization from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to
receive and dispose, in its currently existing mill tailings
impoundment at White Mesa Mill in Blanding, 11e.(2) byproduct
material, i.e., radioactively contaminated soil, resins, concrete,
sludge, plumbing, etc., wastes which have been generated in Texas
and will require either railcar or truck shipments across Texas,
New Mexico and Utah.
Also, there is Envirocare of
Utah Inc., at Clive, in Utah’s West Desert – licensed to accept
radioactively contaminated wastes from cleanups of closed
facilities owned by Cintichem in New York; atomic reactor wastes
from GPU Nuclear in Pennsylvania; NORM and Mixed Wastes from
federal agencies such as the EPA’s Montclair-West Orange and Glen
Ridge radium Superfund sites in New Jersey; thorium tailings from
West Chicago, Ill.; radioactive rubble from Weldon Spring, Mo.;
radioactive wastes from Superfund sites in Denver (44 of them);
radium waste from Queens, N.Y.; and a building from West End in
Cincinnati, Ohio, which was contaminated when a radium capsule
exploded – all this, coming soon to a dump near
you.
By the way, Envirocare is currently in
negotiations with the NRC to discuss possible changes to operations
from those presented in its current license application. These
changes are to allow more operational flexibility due to customer
considerations.
Utah is just one of several
Western states being looked to with increasing frequency, interest,
and high desperation – by our government and Eastern industries,
including the commercial nuclear power industry. They have targeted
the Southwest as the nation’s dumping ground for their colossal
stockpile of wastes. If Utah officials want something to focus on,
and I hope they do, they don’t have to look very
far.
Carol
Oldershaw
Takoma Park,
Maryland
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Look also within, Utah.
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