San Onofre Now Required to Give Public Warnings Before Radioactive Discharges

Guest Blog by Roger Johnson
[ An update from Roger Johnson is at the end of this article]

There is an important new development at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS).  Southern California Edison (SCE) is now required to provide advance public warnings of their regular radioactive discharges into the Pacific Ocean off of San Onofre State Beach.   A 48 hour warning notice is quietly posted on their website:   https://www.songscommunity.com/stewardship/environmental-monitoring-around-san-onofre/liquid-batch-releases   There have been 6 such releases between late May and late July. The warning notices are not well publicized and unfortunately few people see them.  When they are discovered, concerned residents have gone down to the beach to post warnings for swimmers and surfers.

Unfortunately, SCE only announces liquid batch releases into the ocean but does not disclose their atmospheric releases blasted from air ejectors into the prevailing winds.

All nuclear power plants during routine operation regularly pump radioactive effluents into waterways and blast out atmospheric releases through air ejectors. In the case of SONGS, liquid releases are diluted with seawater and pumped through giant 18 ft. diameter pipes into the ocean off one of the most popular state beaches in California.  The practice relies on the theory that the solution to pollution is dilution.  About 2.5 million swimmers, surfers, campers, and hikers visit San Onofre State Beach each year.  Until now, few had any idea that nuclear waste was being dumped into the ocean nearby. 

 

While the San Onofre releases are a concern for ocean lovers, the seafood industry, and those who value marine ecology, the atmospheric releases are worrisome for all the densely populated cities and towns down wind.  For more than a half century, these discharges have been conducted in secret.  The exact dates, times, and contents of the are never disclosed.  In the past, some discharges have gone on continuously for over 24 hours.  Annual reports are made which are buried in the NRC website the following year. These reports are only quarterly averages which conceal data on individual releases.  There is no way to know if very large discharges were averaged with much smaller discharges to produce an innocent sounding disclosure about the levels of radioactivity dumped into the environment.

The health effects of regular discharges of low-level radiation into the environment are unknown.  While each release may sound harmless, the health effects of ionizing radiation are cumulative over years and decades.  This is especially true for women and children who are more vulnerable to radiation. (Radiation safety standards are based on the average young adult male.)  The NRC labels the releases as “allowable” but is careful not to claim that they are harmless.  The local operators are more reckless and often say that they are safe even though there is no evidence to support that claim. Excess radiation is a major concern for everyone now that cancer is the number one killer in California and much of the nation.

The only major American study of cancer clusters around nuclear power plants was done in 1990 by the National Cancer Institute.  It failed to find cancer clusters but the study was heavily flawed and the results are now considered invalid. It never proved there is no increased cancer near nuclear power plants as the nuclear industry sometimes claims.  It merely failed to find a cancer effect, probably because the research was poorly designed.  It studied only where people died, not where they lived or worked.  It went by political boundaries rather than by distance from the discharges.  It measured only deaths, not incidence.  

More recently, the National Academy of Sciences spent 5 years and millions of dollars on two reports which examined how to study the problem should actual research ever be carried out.  The final report, titled Analysis of Cancer Effect in Populations Near Nuclear Facilities proposed a pilot study which would look for cancer clusters in the 50 km radius around these 7 nuclear facilities:

·  Dresden Nuclear Power Station, Morris, Illinois

·  Millstone Power Station, Waterford, Connecticut

·  Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station, Forked River, New Jersey

·  Haddam Neck Plant, Haddam Neck, Connecticut

·  Big Rock Point Nuclear Plant, Charlevoix, Michigan

·  San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, San Clemente, California; and

·  Nuclear Fuel Services, Erwin, Tennessee.

Unfortunately, the NRC terminated the funding so no actual research was ever conducted.  While there has been little research in the United States, better and more recent studies in Europe have reported cancer effects.  In early 2020, a petition by the Samuel Lawrence Foundation asked for congressional funding of new research regarding cancer clusters near nuclear power plants.  “Near” is defined as living within 50 km of a nuclear power plant.  Millions live “near” the San Onofre and Diablo Canyon nuclear power plants. Over 1,100 signed the petition.   

SONGS appears to be the only nuclear power plant in the world where discharges are announced in advance. This all came about when Southern California Edison went to the California State Lands Commission for a permit to dismantle their cooling intake system.  The Surfrider Foundation in San Clemente objected to Edison’s environmental impact statement and requested that SCE provide advance public warnings of liquid discharges.  The State Lands Commission agreed and required that advance public warnings of discharges would be a condition for the permit.

It remains to be seen if others elsewhere wish to bring pressure on their own nuclear power plant operators to do the same.  If the nuclear industry claims that these discharges are harmless, why do they fiercely resist making public disclosures in advance?   Could it be that they do not want the public to know about these routine regular radioactive discharges into the local environment?  If they are harmless, then why do they conduct discharges in secret with no advance warning?

Update from Roger Johnson –
Many have asked how those living near San Onofre got Southern California Edison to agree to provide a 48 hour advance warning before they conduct a liquid radioactive batch release.  (They did not agree to provide an advance warning for atmospheric releases.) Below is a link to an article which discusses what happened should others want their NPP to do the same.  It turns out they are doing releases almost weekly with 6 discharges in the last 2 months.  The next one is tomorrow July 31!  It appears that few people realized that they have been doing both liquid and atmospheric releases in secret for over a half-century.  It also appears that San Onofre is the only NPP in the world where the public is given advance notice.  These notices have brought new public attention to what goes on at a NPP.  The locals are up in arms about these discharges off our beaches.

Now that the cat is out of the bag, maybe activists all over the country should pressure their own NPP to demand the same. If they claim it is safe, then why do they insist on doing it in secret?  Could this be one of the reasons why cancer is now the number one killer in the country?  Our petition to demand funding to restart the National Academy of Sciences study of cancer clusters near NPP now has over 1100 signatures.  We will soon present it to the four members of Congress representing the 50 km area around San Onofre and Diablo Canyon.  These releases illustrate how nuclear power plants are the most environmentally damaging form of energy production.  Lets work toward radiation-free energy! 

May we encourage others across the country (a) pressure your local NPP to provide advance notice of radioactive releases, and (b) contact your representatives in Congress and ask them to support the NAS cancer research project.

Here is a link to our petition:   https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfiIy9OhlIE7jixTEAKkKIEBb4rQd6nwkOj3NAazyiJh-H_eA/viewform

---

Roger Johnson, PhD is a retired Professor Emeritus, Fulbright Scholar and Guggenheim Fellow, formerly living near the Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant near Manhattan and now living in San Clemente near the San Onofre nuclear power plant. As a child, he lived in Japan and visited Hiroshima and Nagasaki in ruins shortly after World War II. 

 

By Mary Beth Brangan and James Heddle – EON

“We’ll hold our noses and vote.”
Despite passionate public comments from community groups and individuals – and even concerned comments from some Commissioners themselves – presenting a long list of the legitimate public safety and environmental risks posed by the San Onfre dry storage facility for 3.6 tons of intensely radioactive fuel rods being created by Southern California Edison, the California Coastal Commission voted unanimously on July 16, 2020 to give the project the go-ahead.  There were, however, two “yes, boo” votes.

[ As of July 24, 2020, Attorney Mike Aguirre writes: “If people want to challenge the Coastal Commission decision on the grounds that (1) the hearing was unfair it should have been an evidentiary hearing and it was marred be cause the commission had already made up its mind before the hearing started; (2) the findings don’t support the decision and  (3) the evidence does not support the finding we must act within 30 days from the decision or sooner.” ]

Community Pleas for a Hot Cell Facility
In a remarkable show of community agreement, the bulk of the public comments from individuals and organizations advocated for the preservation of existing cooling pools plus the construction of a sealed ‘hot’ or ‘dry cell’ building.  This would allow damaged canisters or those containing damaged fuel to be robotically repaired or repackaged into sturdier thick casks that can be monitored and repaired as needed and meet transportation safety requirements. 

All current thin welded-shut Holtec canisters at San Onofre are gouged along their entire 18 ft. length as they are lowered into the vaults, initiating stress corrosion and galvanic corrosion that’s increased in the salty ocean climate.  The chance is high that these damaged canisters will need to be repackaged.  Also called for was the creation of a building where the casks would be protected from the elements and terrorists.  Many cited the model of the Swiss Zwilag facility that includes all these common sense precautions. 

Southern California Edison Plan
None of these provisions are included in the Southern California Edison plan for decommissioning, which calls for:

• Transferring the remaining highly radioactive fuel assemblies out of the cooling pool and into thin stainless steal canisters to be lowered into concrete silos in an Independent spent fuel storage installation (ISFSI) just above a popular surfing beach;
• Demolishing the pools;
• Rubblization of the remaining radioactive reactor domes and other structures to be shipped for ‘disposal’ – possibly in ordinary landfill sites as currently proposed by the NRC – in California or other states;
  
• Returning the site to so-called ‘Green Field’ status to be used for public recreation or,
• Reusing the cleared site to relocate the dry cask ISFSI to higher ground further from the rising surf, if no off-site alternative has been found.

Citizen Concerns
Citizen opponents to the plan question the durability and safety of the thin Holtec stainless steel canisters being used by Edison to store the radioactive fuel rods. They point out that these types of canisters are known to be susceptible to through-wall cracking caused by the stress of the corrosive salt sea air. They warn that through-wall cracks can occur in as little as 17 years even without being gouged first, as is the case at San Onofre.
Remember, each of these 72 canisters contains more radioactivity than was released from the Chernobyl disaster. [ A 73rd canister contains greater than Class C waste. ]

The California Coastal Commission requires that the canisters be preserved well enough to
be able to be moved by the year 2035.  However, there is no proven way to check the condition of the fuel inside the welded canisters without opening them and inspecting the enclosed fuel rods.  This would only be possible with a hot cell facility that allows robots in an inert gas filled environment to handle the intense radioactivity safely without exposure to oxygen or people. 

Too Hot to Move Until the Year 2100
Additionally, the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board’s 2019 report, Preparing for Nuclear Waste Transport  clearly states that huge canisters like those at San Onofre that contain 37 fuel assemblies each of extra thermally hot and more radioactive high burnup fuel must be repackaged into smaller casks.  If not repackaged, the extra heat and radioactivity will prevent them from being transported until the year 2100.  This is the case even though the designs of the canisters have been licensed by the NRC. (pg. 76)

So even if by some miracle, the 5/8 inch thin canisters that are already gouged significantly survive to the year 2035, they will be too hot to transport.  However, predictions are that within only 20 years sea level rise and increased storm surge from climate change will affect the San Onofre dumpsite 108 ft from the shore.  Again, repackaging is only possible in a hot cell facility and that was blocked by Southern California Edison and the NRC representative who said it wouldn’t be needed.

From the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board’s 2019 report pg. 77:  “DOE has examined the trend in SNF dry storage at nuclear power plant sites (Williams 2013). On average, during 2004–2013, the nuclear utilities discharged SNF that has higher burnups (approximately 45 GWd/MTU) than previously discharged SNF and, therefore, is thermally hotter and more radioactive. In addition, the nuclear utilities are loading SNF into larger dry-storage casks and canisters to improve operational efficiency and reduce cost. The largest of these canisters now holds as many as 37 PWR assemblies or 89 BWR assemblies. As a result, these larger casks and canisters are hotter than earlier dry-storage casks and canisters; therefore, they will take longer to cool sufficiently to meet transportation requirements.DOE estimated that if SNF was repackaged from large casks and canisters into smaller standardized canisters (and using standard assumptions about the operating lifetime of the U.S. fleet of nuclear reactors), DOE could remove SNF from all nuclear power plant sites by approximately 2070. However, if no repackaging occurs, some of the largest SNF canisters storing the hottest SNF would not be cool enough to meet the transportation requirements until approximately 2100 (Williams 2013).“

Flooding Dangers
The location of the waste storage facility yards from the surf, inches above the water table  in an earthquake and tsunami zone is given added significance by a report by Public Watch Dogs.  Consulting expert Paul Blanch revealed that Edison’s own data show that  the current site and its immediate surroundings are vulnerable to severe flooding damage in the event of an earthquake and tsunami.  Blanch’s report suggests that, in such an event, all 74 of the site’s waste storage silos could be catastrophically damaged.

---

Here are video clips from the meeting excerpted as a public service by EON, the Ecological Options Network – EON3.org and links to recent news coverage.

[The full meeting video is here.]

Video Excerpts

SanOnofreSafety.org

Public Comments by San Onofre Safety founder Donna Gilmore

SanClementeGreen.org

Public Comments by San Clemente Green co-founder Gary Headrick, U.S. Representative Mike Levin (D-CA), Adm. Len Hering.

PublicWatchdogs.org

Public Comments by Public Watchdogs spokespeople Charles Langley, Paul Blanch, Nina Babiarz.

SanDiegoSierraClub.org

Public Comments by San Diego Sierra Club spokesperson Cody Petterson.

Coalition for Nuclear Safety
Public Comments by Coalition for Nuclear Safety spokespeople Dave Rice, Bart Ziegler, Cathy Iwane.

Alice McNally – Coalition for Nuclear Safety
Public comments by Alice McNally of the Coalition for Nuclear Safety  

Michael Aguirre – Aguirre & Stevenson
Comments by Michael Aguirre of Aguirre & Severson LLP.

Surfrider Foundation – Surfrider.org

Public Comments by Surfrider Foundation spokeswomen Rose Acheson. Katie Day, Mandy Sackett

Commissioner Wilson Questions CCC Staff & SCE

Commissioner Mike Wilson questions Coastal Commission staff members Alison Dettmer and John Webber and Edison spokesperson Tom Palmisano.

Commission Comments and Final Vote

Commissioners Dayna Bochco, Roberto Uranga, Sara Amenzader and Chair Stephen Padilla comment and vote in the July 16, 2020 California Coastal Commission meeting on radioactive waste storage at the shuttered San Onofre nuclear plant.

---

News Links

Orange County Register

By Teri Sforza

Inspection plan for San Onofre’s nuclear waste gets green light from Coastal Commission
‘It’s never easy to really approve of this kind of a situation,’ one commissioner said, ‘but it’s the only recourse at the moment’

About a dozen of the 73 nuclear waste canisters at San Onofre are slated for robotic inspection over the next 15 years, to the dismay of some critics who lobbied for more, according to the maintenance plan for its dry storage system approved by the California Coastal Commission.

“I have a little bit of a gnawing feeling,” Commissioner Mark Gold said at the end of the 4 1/2-hour online meeting Thursday, July 16. “I know this is based on extensive data and what has occurred in the industry, but, when you look at 1 in 10, it’s hard to guarantee that’s representative of the whole.”

Two commissioners actually prefaced their “yes” votes with a “boo.”

“From the perspective of the commission and Southern California Edison, we all need to advocate for getting this (waste storage system) in a different location than it currently is,” said booer Mike Wilson.

Read more

---

Times of San Diego

Coastal Panel Votes 10-0 to Allow Storage of Spent Nuclear Fuel at San Onofre
Posted by Chris Jennewein

The California Coastal Commission voted 10-0 in a special meeting Thursday to approve an inspection and maintenance program allowing Southern California Edison to store spent nuclear fuel in a storage site at the decommissioned San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.

The program outlines actions SCE will take to inspect the canisters that contain spent nuclear fuel, as well as how potential issues with the canisters will be remedied. Read more

---

Donna Gilmore of SanOnofreSafety.org comments on the above article:

The Commission staff report was severely flawed. The Coastal Commissioners asked great questions, but were given lies or misleading answers from SCE, LPI, NRC, and Coastal Commission management. New leadership is needed at the Coastal Commission and the NRC. They are not protecting the public or the environment.

All these parties know or have evidence these thin-wall canisters cannot be inspected for cracks nor adequately repaired. They know cracks are likely already growing through these thin-wall canisters that are only 5/8″ thick. Some canisters are already 17 years old.

SCE has no real plan to prevent or stop cracks, leaks or hydrogen gas explosions in these canisters. Instead of a plan, they hope nothing goes wrong until they can dump this mess onto some other community or at least turn over title to the federal government (at the existing site).

With each canister holding roughly a Chernobyl nuclear disaster full of radionuclides (as admitted to by SCE), none of us will be safe until these thin-wall canisters are replaced with thick-wall casks (10″ to 19.75″ thick), the standard in most of the world.

The coronavirus pandemic continues to reveal just how disfunctional our country is compared to our European and other friends around the world. It’s time to learn lessons from them. This includes nuclear storage lessons.

I urge everyone to look at the Swiss Solution for storing highly radioactive nuclear fuel waste.

https://sanonofresafety.org/swiss/

If we don’t learn these lesson now, the resulting “nuclear pandemic” will make the coronavirus pandemic look like the good old days.

A recent Sandia National Lab report for the Dept. of Energy (Dec 2019 Technology Gap Report) states risks of short-term through wall cracks in these thin-wall canisters is a priority #1 problem that needs solving. They also said a dry fuel handling system [e.g., hot cell facility] is needed for replacing canisters. And they also said they need to study what the consequences will be from through-wall cracks. Why did the Coastal Commission managers not tell the Coastal Commissioners this? Why did they defer to the LPI consultants (who were paid by SCE)?

Why when one of the Coastal Commissioners asked LPI (after looking at the safety checklist comparing thin canisters to thick casks) if there were better systems than what SCE is using, LPI responded “it’s political”?

https://sanonofresafety.files.wordpress.com/2018/05/10reasonstousethicknuclearwastestoragecasks.jpg?w=1024

---

PublicWatchDogs.org Press Release – “Fear and loathing…”

California Coastal Commission sings sad “SONGS” about Southern California Edison’s Inspection and Maintenance Program (IMP) for nuclear waste

Unanimous vote gets “boos” from two Commissioners!
In a vote tinged with boos, and what one Commissioner described as “fear and loathing” the California Coastal Commission voted “yes” today to a Southern California Edison plan for the beachfront nuclear waste dump at San Onofre State Beach Park. the site of the failed San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). Read more

---

New York Times

A Big California Quake Just Got ‘a Little Likelier’
A new analysis puts the likelihood of an earthquake slightly higher than earlier forecasts, but researchers said there’s no reason to panic.

By Henry Fountain

An analysis of recent changes along earthquake faults in Southern California suggests there is an increased possibility of a major quake on the San Andreas Fault, researchers said Monday.

The changes in fault stresses, resulting from a pair of strong earthquakes last July, increase the likelihood of a quake on a stretch of the San Andreas in the next 12 months to about 1 percent, or three to five times the probability of earlier forecasts, the researchers said.

A major quake on that section of the fault, called the Mojave, could devastate Los Angeles and its surrounding communities, which are home to 18 million people.

“We are still saying this is unlikely,” said one of the researchers, Ross S. Stein, a former United States Geological Survey geophysicist who now runs a consulting company. “It’s just a little likelier.”

The findings were published in the Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America.

Read more

---

Los Angeles Times

770-ton load from San Onofre nuclear plant arrives at Utah disposal site

By Rob Nikolewski

The seven-week journey of an old but vital piece of the San Onofre nuclear power plant, a shipment weighing in at 770 tons, has been completed.

The reactor pressure vessel that helped generate electricity at Unit 1 of the plant arrived last week at a licensed disposal site about 75 miles west of Salt Lake City after being shipped by rail and then over highways in Nevada and Utah.

The removal of the vessel “is an important milestone” in the larger efforts to decommission the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, or SONGS, said Doug Bauder, vice president at Southern California Edison and chief nuclear officer at the facility.

Read more

Decommissioned nuclear reactor to hit Nevada roads

By Mick Akers Las Vegas Review-Journal – June 26, 2020

The largest object to travel on Nevada roads will set out on its over week-long journey next week.

The 1.5 million-pound, 16.5-foot-diameter decommissioned reactor pressure vessel from Southern California Edison’s San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station will hit the road early Monday morning from Apex in North Las Vegas, the Nevada Department of Transportation announced Friday.

To keep the load off Interstates 15 and 80, the vessel will mainly travel on U.S. Highway 93 and State Route 318 before crossing the Utah border on its way to Clive. Read more – Included video

SONGS’ radioactive 770-ton pressure vessel takes a train to Utah

Debris from demolished nuke plants is coming to Utah, where EnergySolutions is proposing a new landfill

Beyond Nuclear warns, “The transportation of radioactive waste already occurs, but will become frequent on our rails, roads and waterways, should irradiated reactor fuel be moved to interim or permanent dump sites.”

---

Levin Report Issued

Congressman looks to use report to accelerate efforts to get nuclear waste off the beach

A task force put together by Rep. Mike Levin, D-San Juan Capistrano, released a report Wednesday making 30 policy recommendations for storing and eventually finding a place to send used-up nuclear fuel — in particular, from the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, which is home to 3.55 million pounds of waste.

The first-term congressman said he will pursue legislation on Capitol Hill based on some of the report’s proposals. Among them: Creating a Nuclear Waste Administration and giving states a say in the environmental reviews of handling, storing and moving spent fuel. Read more…

PDF of the Levin Report is here.

Editors’ Comment –

Levin’s Task Force, Co-Chaired by Adm. Len Hering and Former NRC Head Gregory Jaczko, has issued its Report.

The 60-page document contains some good recommendations, but also comes down in favor of Consolidated Interim Storage (CIS).  No surprise, since Levin has introduced a bill that would prioritize making San Onofre’s radioactive waste first in line for shipment, once a CIS has been established, and that’s his over all agenda.

Leven Report’s Major Problems:

• It does not recommend an on-site hot cell, which is necessary for repairing canisters and repackaging fuel.
• It advocates for Centralized Interim Storage in New Mexico and Texas – instead of moving San Onofre’s radioactive waste  to a safer location as close as possible to San Onofre
  
• It seconds President Obama’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future ‘s Report’s advocacy for creation of a ‘new Nuclear Waste Administration.’   
The new agency would, ‘establish a new facility siting process and a new framework to achieve consent for future storage and disposal sites, including mandates for accountability and enforcement. ‘ The problem with this scenario is that plans for the new Administration point to staffing it with…you guessed it…people with ‘industry experience.’  Another captive agency would be born that would do the industry’s lowest cost, never-mind safety, bidding.

---

SanOnofreSafety.org‘s Donna Gilmore comments:

Focusing on location will no more solve our nuclear waste storage problem than rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic would have stopped it from sinking. 

The problem is the uninspectable, unmaintainable thin-wall canisters only 5/8″ thick. 

Mike Levin should be proposing legislation to require the NRC enforce existing regulations and current Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA) requirement for monitored retrievable fuel storage. These thin-wall canisters do not even meet minimum ASME N3 Nuclear Pressure Vessel requirements for storage and transport. The NRC gives numerous exemptions to these and other safety requirements.

The Swiss already meet these US requirements. We don’t need more “studies” or a new government agency as this Levin report proposes.

The Swiss use thick-wall transportable storage casks up to 19.75″ thick that can be maintained and monitored to PREVENT major radioactive releases and explosions. They have an on-site hot cell facility (Dry Transfer System) for inspection, maintenance and repackaging of fuel assemblies, as needed. Thick-wall casks don’t have the short-term cracking problems that the thin-wall canisters have.

Learn more about the Switzerland solution here: 
https://sanonofresafety.org/swiss/

Some San Onofre canisters are already 17 years old. We’re on borrowed time with these degrading canisters. Read more

---

SONGS Task Force Announces Findings and Recommendations for Spent Fuel Storage

By Lillian Boyd and Shawn Raymundo / San Clemente Times

In January 2019, Rep. Mike Levin (D-CA) assembled a task force with the goal of driving solutions to move and safely store sensitive waste located at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). Read more

What Next for San Onofre Generating Station?

SONGS Task Force publishes recommendations on dealing with 3.5 million pounds of spent nuclear fuel sitting on our beach

By Jake Howard / San Clemente Times

With everything that’s going on in our crazy world at the moment, it’s important not to lose sight of some of the more looming issues facing our local waters. Read more

Ooops! – A Dry Run for Disaster?

Truck carrying empty nuclear waste casks overturns

---

The Problem with Transporting Radioactive Waste

Nuclear Energy Information Service NEIS

NEVADA VIEWS: Nuclear tests and the Shoshone people Ian Zabarte Special to the Review-Journal, June 27, 2020

https://www.reviewjournal.com/opinion/nevada-views-nuclear-tests-and-the-shoshone-people-2063105/

REGARDING Gary Martin’s June 15 Review-Journal article, “Nuke test rumors spur Nevada lawmakers”: As a Shoshone, we always had horses. My grandfather always told me, “Stop kicking up dust.” Now I understand that it was because of the radioactive fallout.

To hide the impacts from nuclear weapons testing, Congress defined Shoshone Indian ponies as “wild horses.” There is no such thing as a wild horse. They are feral horses, but the Wild Horse and Burrow Acts of 1971 gave the Bureau of Land Management the affirmative act to take Shoshone livestock while blaming the Shoshone ranchers for destruction of the range caused by nuclear weapons testing. My livelihood was taken and the Shoshone economy destroyed by the BLM. On the land, radioactive fallout destroyed the delicate high desert flora and fauna, creating huge vulnerabilities where noxious and invasive plant species took hold. Read more

Ian Zabarte had this to say in a recent Congressional Hearing

“I just want to emphasize that Yucca Mountain is Shoshone property recognized under the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley and it’s not going to happen. It’s not workable. It’s not doable because of that. And that is the likely reason why the application was withdrawn in the first place. But that wasn’t argued in the case that came up. Yucca Mountain would be an ongoing research and development project, not a solution. It’s in the biosphere. It’s above the water table and the original intent of deep geologic disposal with sub-seabed below the water table and what we’re looking at Yucca Mountain, it’s just a matter of time before that radiation comes out and my people expect to be around another 10,000 years with your help.

“We see our food there, we see our resources there and we need the pure water, pristine water, something that is very rare now on this planet. Pristine water’s what we need for our survival, it’s our religion. We practice these living life ways in relation to the land. It’s our identity and we expect to be there so Yucca Mountain is not going to be a solution, period.“