On behalf of Cal Rad Forum, I would like to offer congratulations on your appointment and confirmation as Secretary of Energy. Cal Rad is an association of public and private institutions and corporations that either use radioactive materials and generate low-level radioactive waste (LLRW) or otherwise have an interest in the safe disposal of LLRW.

Cal Rad's primary interest is the safe disposal of low-level radioactive wastes pursuant to the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Act (P.L. 99-240). The Department of Energy's program of technical assistance "...to those compact regions, host States, and nonmember States..." as provided by Section 7 of the Act has, until recently, served well California, the Southwestern Compact, and the organizations that use radioactive materials in the Compact region.

This letter is to make two requests. First, we request that the Department of Energy (DOE) provide interim access to its LLRW disposal facilities in the States of Washington and Nevada for commercial LLRW generated within the Southwestern Compact region. Second, we ask that the Department return to the policy enunciated by former Secretary O'Leary that DOE's technical assistance under the Act is to be provided to States and compact regions who request it, not, as in the present circumstance at Ward Valley, to the Department of Interior.

The reasons for these requests are as follows.

Cal Rad Forum supports the proposed Ward Valley, California LLRW disposal project. We therefore support the initiatives Governor Wilson announced on January 31st, particularly his decision to direct the California Department of Health Services to proceed with additional field tests at the Ward Valley site. As you may know, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) recommended certain confirmatory tests during construction and operation of the LLRW disposal facility. Regrettably, the Department of the Interior has ignored the advice of both the NAS and its own U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and demanded that the tests be made a precondition to the sale of federal land in Ward Valley to the State of California. Interior has tied this demand and a demand for a second Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement to issues at the closed Beatty, Nevada LLRW facility which the USGS has said are not germane to Ward Valley. ("...extrapolations of the results from Beatty to Ward Valley are too tenuous to have much scientific value, " Gordon Eaton, Director of the USGS, February 14, 1996.) Under these circumstances, the Governor's announcement that the State would proceed with competently conducted tests now was the right decision, and we support it.

The Department of the Interior's subsequent refusal to allow the State to proceed with the very tests it has demanded is deplorable. Interior's demand that the State apply for a new permit and cooperate with yet a third biological consultation is political and bureaucratic obfuscation and constitutes extra-procedural delay, not science. These delaying tactics undermine the federal Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Act and place at risk many societal benefits that flow from the use of radioactive materials. Interior's actions create additional hardships for universities, medical centers, biotech and pharmaceutical companies and other organizations that use radioactive materials in the Southwestern Compact region. Low-level waste continues to pile up in storage at numerous sites around the state and region.

Cal Rad Forum's Proposal

Cal Rad therefore requests that the U.S. Department of Energy open the Department's low-level waste disposal facilities at the Nevada Test Site and on the Hanford, Washington federal reservation to commercial low-level waste generated in the Southwestern Compact region until the Compact's regional disposal facility proposed for Ward Valley is operating.

We request that the DOE accept for disposal, on an interim basis, all LLRW generated in the compact region whose disposal is a state responsibility under federal law, i.e., waste classified as Class A, B, or C waste under Part 61.55 of the Code of Federal Regulations. (Greater that Class C waste is a federal responsibility under law.). This would include waste from diverse sources such as government, industry, utility, university, medical, etc. We recommend that LLRW from northern California, North Dakota, and South Dakota be accepted at DOE's Hanford facility in the State of Washington and that LLRW from southern California and Arizona be accepted at the DOE facility at the Nevada Test Site.

Cal Rad Continues to Support Ward Valley

Cal Rad continues to fully support establishment of the Ward Valley disposal facility as licensed by the Department of Health Services. We therefore request only interim access to federal (DOE) facilities until Ward Valley is in operation.

Approval of Cal Rad's request will support both the Ward Valley project and the Low-Level Waste Policy Act. This proposal affirms the federal government's responsibility to mitigate the consequences of over four years of delay it has caused.

The Role of the Department of Energy

We urge you to refocus the Department of Energy on its Congressionally mandated responsibility to assist, rather than deter, state implementation of the Low-Level Waste Policy Act. Former Secretary of Energy Hazel O'Leary resisted Interior's efforts to co-opt DOE into the administration's delay scenario. In December, 1995 and again in June, 1996, Secretary O'Leary publicly stated that Energy could only be involved at Ward Valley at the request of the State of California and that Interior had "inappropriately volunteered" DOE for a role. More recently, DOE has indicated its unwillingness to assist California except under terms dictated by the Interior Department. Specifically, we have been informed by State officials that DOE has directed that the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory may not respond to Governor Wilson's request for technical assistance but may only respond to the Interior Department with respect to any activities at the Ward Valley site. This was confirmed last month by officials of the Department of Energy. We urge you to return the Department to Secretary O'Leary's principled and legally correct position that DOE is mandated to assist the States.

With respect to our first request regarding disposal access for commercial wastes at DOE facilities in Washington and Nevada, we note if DOE is a willing party to creation of the problem, it is only fair that DOE be part of an interim solution.

The current State-federal impasse has left many organizations that use radioactive materials with no choice but to store their low-level wastes on-site in urban areas. The ongoing federal delays jeopardize continued beneficial uses of radioactive materials in California and the other states of the Southwestern Compact region and impose additional storage costs while needlessly driving up the eventual costs of disposal at Ward Valley. We respectfully request your favorable consideration of our requests.

If you or your staff have any questions, please call Cal Rad's Chairman, Bruce Wallace of Amgen, at (805) 447-3051 or me at (510) 283-5210.