Energy Department previews new cleanup costs and plans

Reports encourage public participation

Six reports addressing a range of issue--from total life-cycle cost of the environmental management program to evaluation of risks to public health and safety, are scheduled to be released by the U.S. Department of Energy. The first of these reports, Estimating the Cold War Mortgage: the 1995 Baseline Environmental Management Report, was released April 3. It is the first annual report of the activities and potential costs required to address the waste contamination and surplus nuclear materials facilities for which DOE's environmental management program is responsible. The National Defense Authorization Act of 1994, which mandated the creation of the report, requires it to include the costs, completion schedules, and proposed remediation strategies for the environmental management program's projects and activities.

"What does the nation want to buy? That is the question posed by this analysis," Thomas P. Grumbly, DOE's assistant secretary for environmental management, said at the presentation of the document. "The course we are on is estimated to cost approximately $230 billion over a 75-year period. What we found was that the future use of the land and facilities will largely determine if the cost is higher or lower. This estimate is a reasonable projection given current technologies to stabilize--not completely scrub sites to "green fields" status, which is not technically feasible in many cases.

"We have changed the way we do business, particularly by opening the department to public view and asking the American people to participate in our difficult decision-making," Grumbly continued. "The American people, using technical expertise from this department and these tools for guidance, can help us make these choices."

Grumbly previewed the five other documents (listed below) that affect work at DOE sites. The reports and other DOE initiatives are designed to encourage public participation in decisions governing the cleanup of the nation's nuclear weapons complex and to enable the department and Congress to make major decisions on the direction of work during the rest of this decade.

• DOE's Proposed Site Treatment Plans, required by the Federal Facilities Compliance Act, were submitted to affected states the first week in April. The plans propose specific treatment for mixed radioactive and hazardous waste currently stored at the 40 sites around the country. The plans are subject to a 90-day public comment period.

• DOE's draft Environmental Impact Statement for managing spent nuclear fuel from foreign research reactors, released in early April, includes a 60-day public comment period.

• The draft Programmatic Waste Management Environmental Impact Statement propose a national strategy for treating, storing, and disposing of waste both from DOE's inactive weapons sites and facilities and waste from cleanup operations. It was scheduled for distribution for public comment in May.

• The DOE Risk Report, mandated by Congress and due in June, will evaluate the risks posed to the public, workers, and the environment by conditions at DOE facilities.

• The final Spent Nuclear Fuel Environmental Impact Statement includes extensive public input on DOE's plans for managing DOE and Navy spent nuclear fuel for up to 40 years.

To obtain copies of these reports, call the Department of Energy's Center for Environmental Management Information (800) 7EM-DATA (736-3282).