For Immediate Release
May 31, 2002

Contact
Paul Murphy- Attorney General's Office: (801)538-1892
or
Allyson Gamble - High Level Nuclear Waste Opposition Office: (801) 537-9156

Plans to put 4,000 high level nuclear waste containers in Utah will be considered at public hearings next week. State litigators say the 175-ton casks under consideration for the project have never been physically tested to see if they will withstand an earthquake.

"This is a radical and unproven plan for something that is supposed to hold material that is hazardous for 10,000 years," said Assistant Attorney General Denise Chancellor. "There is no room for error when it comes to high level nuclear waste." Chancellor will be representing Utah during the hearings.

Private Fuel Storage, a consortium of eight utilities which has formed a Limited Liability Corporation that operate nuclear power plants, has applied for a license to store the casks on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian reservation, about 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City.

The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board will hear testimony about whether the design for the facility will be able to withstand earthquakes and decide if seismic standards should be relaxed.

The entire current inventory of commercial spent nuclear fuel in the United States would be sitting in unanchored containers on shallow foundations at a site with high seismic activity.

"Utahns will suffer the ultimate consequence in the event of a design failure," said Chancellor. "Why should we be subjected again to an unproven project involving high levels of radioactivity?"

Instead of physical testing, computer models were used to see if the containers would hold up during an earthquake. PFS claims the casks are robust and will not release any radiation even if they fall or tip over from seismic activity.

The NRC has already approved a design that would allow the casks to slip on top of the storage pads and then let the pads slide on the soil to try and minimize the jolt from an earthquake.

Who: Assistant Attorneys General Denise Chancellor; Jim Soper and Connie Nakahara
What: Seismic Hearings for the proposed High Level Nuclear Waste Site in Utah
Where: Sheraton City Center, Wasatch Room, 150 West 500 South, Salt Lake City
When: 9:00 am - 5:30 P.M., Monday, June 3 through Friday, June 8, 2002

http://www.attygen.state.ut.us/PrRel/ma05312002SeismicHrgs.htm