Explosives test range Site 300 questioned over cleanup plan

Reresentatives of the U.S. Department of Energy and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory say they've made substantial progress in 25 years of cleanup efforts at Site 300, but lab critics said the overall cleanup plan does not go far enough.

"I'm surprised you would consider a cleanup plan without considering the pollution from further activities at the site," said local businessman Bob Sarvey, one of about a dozen speakers Wednesday as the DOE and the lab collected public comments for its cleanup plan.

"As part of your cleanup, you must stop polluting the site," Sarvey said.

Leslie Ferry, of the lab's environmental restoration division, said most of the contamination addressed in the plan is the result of past practices at the high explosives test range, including disposal of radioactive uranium and tritium into unlined landfills.

"The experiments at the site are now designed with a much better understanding of environmental protection," she said.

By next year, the lab and DOE expect to have a "record of decision" on the site-wide cleanup plan, which will define where the rest of pollution is and what it will take to clean it up.

Ferry outlined cleanup efforts that started in 1982 when the lab started to remove toxins from soil and groundwater around the 7,000-acre high explosives test range southwest of Tracy.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency declared the site a top national priority in 1990, which accelerated efforts to remove solvents and radioactive contaminants from soil and water. Ferry said the lab and DOE have treated about 250 million gallons of groundwater and removed about 12,000 pounds of contaminants.

She also described how a mile-long plume of groundwater contaminated with trichloroethelyne along Corral Hollow Creek has been removed, and how groundwater pollution from radioactive tritium has been curtailed at one explosives firing table in the northwest corner of the site.

The lab plans to cap trenches filled with uranium and tritium-tainted material and install drains around them, but does not plan to excavate the radioactive debris. While the lab has no plan to remove tritium from groundwater, it does expect that its radioactive half-live of 12_ years will cause the radioactivity to deteriorate before the groundwater migrates off-site.

Kathy Setian, Site 300 project manager for the EPA, said one particular landfill at the northwest corner of the site, another source of radioactive tritium and uranium pollution, appears to be contained now that the landfill has been capped.

"If this remedy works, there will be no further releases of tritium from Pit 7 into the groundwater," Setian said.

But critics of the lab, such as Livermore-based Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment, pointed out that the lab and DOE have performed no analysis of how continued explosions at the site will contaminate soil and groundwater.

"It's surreal for me to listen to this presentation about how this cleanup is foolproof," said Loulena Miles, staff attorney for the group. She was one of many to point out that continued tests using depleted uranium are proposed for the site.

At the same time, the University of California hopes to put a biological research site, specializing in animal diseases, on the site.

"A robust cleanup is important for a number of reasons," she added. "Cleanup must take into account a wide variety of future uses," she said.

Contact reporter Bob Brownne at brownne@tracypress.com.

Reader Feedback

sharonbrock wrote on Jun 24, 2007 12:47 PM:

" http://tracypress.com/content/view/9774/2/ There are information that would answer many questions you may have. Thanks. "

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Clay wrote on Jun 24, 2007 11:06 AM:

" See News 10 article about Livermore Lab cleanup at http://www.news10.net/display_story.aspx?storyid=29392 "

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sharonbrock wrote on Jun 23, 2007 8:45 AM:

" "The San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution-7:30 p.m., July 19 at the Tracy Council Chambers, 333 Civic Center Plaza. The district will discuss Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory�s plan to increase the amount of explosives used at Site 300 in the hills southwest of town." "Those explosions would include the use of depleted uranium, which is already responsible for soil and groundwater pollution at the site. The air district will study the potential effects of uranium dust from the explosions, as much as 450 pounds every year, and whether winds from the west would carry that dust toward Tracy." "

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Rodin wrote on Jun 22, 2007 8:50 PM:

" The destruction of Tracy will stop when residents come forward with Bob Sarvey and others. It's their right to a future. DU is a WMD that violates Federal Code, the Geneva Convention, and all standards of decency. DU cannot totally be cleaned up by any method. DU has now contaminated Hawaii too, once the most beautiful islands on earth, because California was not enough to sacrifice to stupidity. When will it all stop? Who will stop it? "

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sharonbrock wrote on Jun 21, 2007 12:09 PM:

" Watch the events unfold in Tracy, Tracy was one of the site under consideration to build 5 super Wal-Mart sized National Livermore Biolab and Agrolab. Now if this site is chosen, it will affect your health and investment. There are glaring evidence among the and babies born to women who were exposed to "Tank Busters" (shells are still radioactive and laying on the grounds, further contaminating the ground) are showing horrors of deformity. Think of your unborn children and their children. Help yourself by saying, "We don't want it nearby!" "

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Clay wrote on Jun 21, 2007 11:17 AM:

" Please see comments at similar article in the Tracy Press regarding yesterday's meeting at http://tracypress.com/content/view/9836/ "

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Clay wrote on Jun 21, 2007 11:04 AM:

" It is obvious to me that the engineering design of the waste pits were inadequately built to protect groundwater especially since the groundwater table comes into contact with the waste. This is deplorable engineering practice. Lining of pits or waste piles with groundwater monitoring is the only acceptable engineering practice for holding nuclear waste. As the incompetence of Livermore scientists/engineers to protect the environment becomes ever more obvious, nuclear testing, designing, and processing activities at the lab should NOT be taking place. "

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Clay wrote on Jun 21, 2007 10:57 AM:

" It is obvious that the pits should be excavated of all radioactive material waste and relocated to an appropriate hazardous waste facility at Nellis Air Force base in Nevada or the Envirocare facility in Utah. If an appropriate hazardous waste facility resides closer in California, it should be shipped there. "

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