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News :: Miscellaneous |
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The current nuclear weapons crisis |
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by Barbara Dyskant
Email: bdyskant (nospam) earthlink.net (unverified!)
Phone: 217 352-3670
Address: 709 Ashton Lane North, Champaign, IL |
21 Jun 2001
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The U.S. is currently engaged in nuclear weapons design and research, spending more now than during the Cold War. This has international repercussions, tremendous pollution, and diversion of precious resources away from needed public services. This details the situation. Author has been member of Tri-Valley Citizens Against A Radioactive Environment for over ten years. |
The U.S. nuclear weapons program is a serious threat to us all, and only we can stop it. Unknown to most of us, the U.;S. spends more now on its weapons arsenal (adjusted for 2001 dollars) than it averaged during the so-called Cold War, and it’s still increasing. This year the Department of Energy requested $5.6 billion dollars for weapons, up from $4.5 billion last year, compared to 3.6 billion averaged during the Cold War. This is true even though the U.S. is one of over 170 nations that has signed a treaty (the Non-Proliferation Treaty) committing itself to taking steps toward dismantling the nuclear weapons complex and working towards a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Research, testing and design of nuclear weapons a triple tragedy. First, it places our entire world under a threat of mass destruction, and brings a climate of fear in all our international dealings. Second, it poisons the environment, killing and threatens millions of people (it already has caused countless deaths). Third, it steals resources and funds from human services (such as medicine, food, and education) that could enhance the quality of life, and for many of us could mean survival.
Stockpile Stewardship is a federal program for maintaining the “safety and reliability” of our weapons arsenal until dismantling. Sadly, it is also for retrofitting and redesigning our weapons (such as adding burrowing capabilities or extending their lives) , researching weapons, and maintaining the capability of our scientists and equipment to build new weapons. For example, the B61-7 was modified into the B61-11 with burrowing capability. It’s as though a Chevy is brought into a garage and comes out with all Porsche parts plus a jet engine.
Perhaps the worst example is the National Ignition Facility, under construction at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in Livermore, CA. It was brought to light by a local group, Tri-Valley Citizens Against a Radioactive Environment, which got the information, publicized it, brought it to the attention of our legislators, and sued the Department of Energy, among other things. This project, already seriously over budget and full of technical problems, is now threatening to take $30 billion over its lifecycle. It is designed to use 192 lasers to “ignite” tritium (radioactive hydrogen) to recreate what happens in the sun (and in a nuclear weapon). It has been acknowledged as worthless for safety or reliability by scientists including Ray Kidder and Seymour Sack, (physicists from LLNL), Robert Peurifoy (Retired Vice President, Sandia National Laboratory) and Edward Teller (LLNL scientist and acknowledged “father of the hydrogen bomb). However, the National Ignition Facility is very usable for future bomb design, and excellent for honing the weapons design skills of scientists.
By doing this, the U.S. is undermining the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which states that the nuclear nations will work towards a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the non-nuclear states will refrain from designing such weapons, and engage in irreversible disarment. Our hypocritical stance is understandably causing questions from those countries who have agreed not to build them. If we use our expertise (gained from testing before test bans were instituted) to use computer modeling, “subcritical” nuclear reactions, the National Ignition Facility, etc., to continuing designing nuclear weapons and attempt to maintain nuclear superiority in the world, other nations have no reason to feel they shouldn’t build them too. And there is always the possibility of hijacking of the nuclear materials and technology by other players.
Our nation’s scientific talent is being pushed into the weapons complex. Recently, Isaac Trotts, a brilliant young mathematician previously from MIT, resigned from an $85,000 a year job at Livermore Laboratory after he discovered that, although he had been told his work was being used to assure the safety of our weapons arsenal, the work was being used to design new weapons. He now is traveling worldwide urging scientists to avoid using their talents to design nuclear weapons.
Many of our nuclear weapons remain on “hair-trigger alert” , meaning that their computer systems are set to to get ready to detonate a nuclear bomb on any perception of an “enemy attack”. This system has been accidentally been activated by the rising moon, a bear on the premises, a squirrel, and a Norwegian weather balloon, almost plunging us into nuclear war. Interestingly enough, ex-President George Bush, Sr. made more progress on de-alerting than ex-President Clinton.
Perhaps scariest is the prospect of “Usable Nuclear Weapons, to be examined in the latest “Nuclear Posture Review” by the federal government. Our current “posture” has been “deterrence”, with the “superpowers” having huge (170 kiloton range) nuclear weapons that are not meant to be used, as each party knows the other would retaliate in kind. A proposal, championed by Senators Warner and Allard, would change this to one of “Usable Nuclear Weapons”, so-called “mini-nukes” of under 5 kilotons (about half the size of the Hiroshima bomb), to be USED to such things as burrow underground and nuke bunkers housing “enemy” leaders or supplies, so-called biological weapons factories, etc,. They are supposed to minimize “collateral damage” (i.e., killing), etc., and essentially place nuclear weapons alongside guns as usable in “smaller” conflicts. The names Kosovo and Colombia come to mind. Other countries are concerned of course, including our traditional European allies. Currently the program was not approved for research on the weapons, but there is a study going on to consider the feasibility of the program. If it says “Yes”, (and it might), we have work to do. I was in a meeting with Senator Warner’s counsel, and they do mean to carry this out.
WASTE
There is no safe level of radioactive waste. The waste and pollution caused by the weapons complex (and the nuclear power complex as well) is unconscionable.. Department of Energy (DOE) weapons sites have enormous clean-up backlogs, including Paducah, Kentucky, which is 80 miles from southern Illinois. There is a shortfall of about $417 million to get these sites up to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standards. That is the amount of money the DOE has asked for to continue construction of the National Ignition Facility (NIF) that I mentioned earlier (the clean-up budget comes from the same source as the weapons research budget). . My son Raymi, testifying at a public hearing before the Department of Energy in Livermore, California, aptly said, “In my house, if I don’t clean up my mess before making another one, I’m in big trouble. You’re in trouble with me”. Dr. John Gofman, who started the Livermore Laboratory’s biomedical program, estimates that 60 people in the town of Livermore have already died from cancer because of contamination from the laboratory.
“In any nuclear weapons program, the first casualties are those at home”, stated Representative Dennis Kucinich (Ohio) in May, 2001, referring to the cancers, genetic damage, and other illnesses caused by radioactive contamination, from mining to research to production to testing to decommissioning. In Livermore, there was a tree transpiring tritium (radioactive hydrogen) into the air. Rain was found that could be labeled “radioactive” if bottled. In 1998, an elevated plutonium level was discovered in a Livermore playground.. In Hanford, Washington, radioactive iodine was released into the air, causing thyroid cancers many miles east. Rocky Flats (Colorado), Fernald (Ohio), and Oak Ridge (Tennessee) are some of the many other DOE sites with horrible records, which still aren’t cleaned up.
Our legacy of carelessness has ventured into doing deliberate harm. Former Secretary of State Hazel O’Leary released formerly classified documents revealing that the government conducted experiments on non-consenting humans, to observe the effects of radiation, including at the San Francisco General Hospital in the 1950s.
ACCEPTABLE RISK and “BELOW REGULATORY CONCERN
Simply stated, acceptable risk is the “probably” of sickness or death that is deemed “acceptable” by those in power. For example, if a risk of one cancer in 10,000 is deemed “acceptable”, then the maker of a product deems that it is okay to kill one in 10,000 people to do the job. I call it Human Sacrifice, which is accurate.. I have presented testimony on this many times.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is charged with the responsibility of regulating the safety of commercial nuclear facilities, as the DOE deals with the government sites. In 1991 the NRC proposed to re-classify some “low level” radioactive wastes as “Below Regulatory Concern” (BRC) and allow them to be recycled into consumer materials, placed unlabeled in landfills, etc. Their level of “Acceptable Risk” was about one in 3800. The author’s son aptly said that if we were at a baseball stadium with 12,000 people, the government felt it was okay to kill off three of them. Quite a lot of people nationwide organized around this—and, unlike some other projects, we managed to get this one stopped. However, lately the NRC is thinking of resurrecting the program, at the same time as there is a push for streamlining the licensing of nuclear power plants. I am including this because it is serious, and also because it shows our government’s “commitment” to radiation safety.
The DOE certainly is currently leasing out space previously used for weapons sites to private companies, without getting rid of the radioactive contamination. This has started in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. This is called “Reindustrialization”. The dangers should be obvious to all..
Nuclear waste transportation is another huge problem with the nuclear complex. Packing, shipping, unloading and disposing of the waste is never safe. It is estimated that with no accidents, people within about a half mile of nuclear corridors are at risk; in accidents, the conservative estimate has been 45 square miles, and people within about 50 miles are endangered. Obviously, with a huge accident, it can be a lot worse. In May, 200, the author saw a truck driving west on Interstate 74 from the Illinois state line heading towards Champaign, carrying uranium hexafluoride (an ingredient for nuclear power plants) in uncovered metal drums. On June 10, 2001, an accident in Ohio was reported, involving one of those trucks.
Disposing of waste may ultimately be the issue that may be instrumental in bringing the nuclear weapons complex to an end...There is no known safe way of disposing of it, and there has been inadequate funding for research to find the least harmful method of disposal. The proposed Yucca Mountain high level waste repository in Nevada, on Western Shoshone Indian land, is in an earthquake zone, has a poor “natural barrier” to leakage, is near a water supply for the Amargosa Valley community and for cattle and plants, and certainly cannot be guaranteed or warrantied for the 24,000 year radioactive half-life of the plutonium that would be deposited there. So-called “low level” radioactive waste is also extremely dangerous, and has been poorly handled so far. Much waste sits in pools and leaking drums at weapons sites all over the country.
MOX – A DANGEROUS WAY TO RECYCLE
One proposal for disposition of the 30 TONS of surplus plutonium from the weapons complex is to use it as MOX (Mixed Oxide Fuel) for nuclear reactors. This would be a gift to the nuclear energy industry, subsidized of course by the taxpayers, and by those whose health deteriorated due to its ill effects. MOX would cause worse effects than Chernobyl in the event of an accident. Its transportation all over the country (and internationally) is hazardous. It also could be converted back to weapons grade plutonium if our government (or anyone else) wanted to start building them. Gunboats accompany transports from France to Japan of MOX—they are security risks. The Russians are carrying out a similar program to dispose of their 30 tons of plutonium, and if we design nuclear weapons, they certainly will try to do the same.
Originally there was research being done on enclosing the plutonium in glass (vitrification) and burying it—this might have its risks, but would make it forever imnpossible to retrieve the plutonium. This was cut from the DOE budget request this year.
WE CAN DO IT
The only good news is that there are still many of us, and we can stop this. In my 10 years working with Tri-Valley Citizens Against a Radioactive Environment, I have seen a tritium building closed, a dangerous incinerator stopped, the exposure and re-examination of the National Ignition Facility including winning a lawsuit to stop having evaluators be biased, getting a dissenters’ exhibit at the laboratory, many public hearings, and the resignation of the Director of the laboratory. We need to remember also that above-ground nuclear testing was stopped primarily by mothers who were concerned about radioactive strontium in the milk supply. It is only by broad-based action, in whatever form works for each of us, that we can make a difference.
As a mother, and a concerned person for all the creatures of this earth, I urge all of you to take the step towards stopping this horrible, horrible threat to all of us.
Peace,
Barbara Dyskant
Here are some websites for more information:
www.igc.org/tvc Tri-Valley Citizens Against A Radioactive Environment. General
information about the weapons complex and action alerts;
also information specific to Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory.
www.nukewatch.org Up-to-date very pertinent info on the weapons complex, including
government stances.
www.ieer.org Science for Democratic Action and Institute for Energy and
Environmental Research, with clear scientific and technical studies
to promote the democratization of science and a healthy
environment. Emphasizes nuclear issues.
www.cdi.org Center for Defense Information. A wealth of statistics and figures
on anything you might need. .
www.nixmox.org Material related to Mixed Oxide Fuels (using plutonium)
www.nirs.org Nuclear Information Research Service—central clearinghouse for
nuclear power related information. Very active on Below
Regulatory Concern issues, among other things.
www.neis.org Nuclear Energy Information Service. Located in Evanston Illinois,
concerned and very knowledgeable about nuclear power in Illinois.
www.nrdc.org Assorted material on NIF and nuclear weapons.
www.wslf-web.org Western States Legal Foundation. Disarmament issues.
www.ananuclear.org Alliance for Nuclear Accountability. Has links to local groups
nationwide working on weapons issues.
Barbara Dyskant is a mother of three. In 1990, her husband’s job took her to the Livermore, California area, where she learned about the Below Regulatory Concern nuclear “recycling”, and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory weapons design facility. Since then, she has been passionately involved with trying to stop the horrors of nuclear war and contamination. Her husband and son are also involved with these issues. Barbara is an economist and also a composer, and has written many songs on the environment. Her family is also involved with renewable energy, and have several wind turbines, solar panels, and a solar oven.
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