In this long sought resolution of a five-year legal battle, the DOE, LANL, and CCNS have entered into a consent decree that requires independent, non-governmental auditing of the radioactive air emissions monitoring program at LANL. The lab has admitted that 31 of its 33 major stacks emitting radionuclides to the air were not in compliance with the law when CCNS filed its motion for summary judgment in 1994. DOE and LANL believe that full compliance with the law was achieved in June of 1996. CCNS disputes that claim. To date, there has been no independent verification of DOE and LANL's claim either by EPA or any other means, although EPA has audited a portion of the compliance program.
"The Department is pleased to reach this settlement," said Tom Todd, Los Alamos Area Office manager for DOE. "It is particularly noteworthy that the public will have the benefit of a completely independent assessment of LANL's compliance with the Clean Air Act through this settlement, as well as augmentations to the air monitoring program."
"Under the Clean Air Act, citizens groups like ours don't receive money awards," said Lee Lysne, executive director of CCNS. "We work for the benefit of the public. CCNS obtained agreement for the independent audits, as well as additions to the LANL air monitoring system, and several projects which the DOE is going to fund."
"We endorse this commitment to independent auditing, and the new outreach activities funded by DOE as ways to build public confidence in our control of radioactive emissions," said the Laboratory's Director of Environment, Safety and Health, Dennis Erickson.
The consent decree requires DOE to pay for as many as four independent audits of LANL's radioactive air emissions program, to be conducted by a team led by Dr. John Till, president of Radiological Assessments Corporation in South Carolina. Till is a national expert in dose assessments and has participated in numerous studies of nuclear weapons plants. The audits will occur in 1997, 2000, and if the independent auditor believes it desirable, again in 2002 and 2003.
Although the results of the audit are non-binding, DOE and LANL expect to take them seriously. "If the auditor finds significant problems, we expect to rectify them," said Todd. "If they don't, we'll be back in court to see that they do," said Carol Oppenheimer, partner in Simon & Oppenheimer, counsel for CCNS.
The consent decree also requires the DOE to pay for CCNS to monitor the work of the independent auditor, as an additional safeguard for the independence of the process. CCNS's scientific consultant, Institute for Environmental Research (IEER), based in Takoma Park, Md., is nationally recognized for its work assessing environmental damage and estimating compliance with air pollution regulations from the operation of nuclear weapons plants.
The consent decree will require LANL to install two additional ambient air sampling stations to supplement LANL's existing 53 station sampling network and the consent decree also requires the Lab to continue to operate five other existing sampling stations on site. The two new stations will be located between LANL and Santa Fe to better characterize LANL's diffuse emissions. According to Jay Coghlan, CCNS program director, "Diffuse emissions are radioactivity which comes from waste dumps and open air firing sites, for example, rather than from a stack. These changes to the current air monitoring system should give better and more complete data about what LANL is putting into the air."
As an additional part of the settlement, DOE will make its air emissions data available by Internet for the next five years. Under the settlement, DOE also will fund $450,000 to the University of New Mexico Masters in Public Health Program to establish a curriculum in environmental health issues related to the Clear Air Act. Further, DOE will fund radiation training for individuals to be appointed by the counties, cities and pueblos surrounding the Lab, as well as by CCNS. The Lab also will make available a repository of radiation detection equipment so that the persons who have completed the training course can borrow the equipment to evaluate government, tribe, or citizen concerns about radioactive contamination in surrounding communities. Lastly, DOE will pay $150,000 to the U.S. Treasury in compromise of CCNS's penalty claims.
Los Alamos National Laboratory, a multidisciplinary research institution engaged in strategic science on behalf of national security, is operated by Los Alamos National Security, LLC, a team composed of Bechtel National, the University of California, The Babcock & Wilcox Company, and Washington Group International for the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration.
Los Alamos enhances national security by ensuring the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear stockpile, developing technologies to reduce threats from weapons of mass destruction, and solving problems related to energy, environment, infrastructure, health, and global security concerns.