Nuclear waste changes sought

[icymist]

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/172158_doe06.html

Thursday, May 6, 2004

Nuclear waste changes sought
New proposal would allow Energy Dept. to skip cleanup of the most lethal material at Hanford and other sites

By CHARLES POPE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT

WASHINGTON -- A South Carolina senator, working in concert with senior Energy Department officials, has quietly proposed changing federal law to allow lethal waste at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and other nuclear weapons plants to remain in underground tanks rather than being removed and sent to a more secure disposal site.

The proposal from Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., is included in the defense authorization bill. It was heavily shaped -- if not written -- by the Energy Department. Jill Lea Sigal, a deputy assistant energy secretary, is listed as "author" on the document Graham's office submitted with the legislative language.

The Energy Department did not return several phone calls seeking comment on the policy and Sigal's involvement. The department has actively been pursuing the change since 2002, saying that it needs the power to reclassify waste to accelerate cleanup and direct money to deal with the most dangerous waste. Each time, however, either Congress or the courts have blocked the department, including a federal court ruling last year that prohibited the Energy Department from reclassifying waste.

What the department is trying to do now through legislation amounts to the same thing, critics say.
(more)

[bobbieinok]

1. there is no end to bushco overturning every advance made in the past 50

to 100 years.