Nuclear Waste Program

MISSION: Southwest Research and Information Center is a multi-cultural organization working to promote the health of people and communities, protect natural resources, ensure citizen participation, and secure environmental and social justice now and for future generations.

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NEW (Updated March 3, 2010) in Nuclear Waste Documents: Correspondence regarding rising carbon tetrachloride levels at WIPP

Primary staff:
Don Hancock
Paul Robinson

When it looked like the federal government was about to open an underground repository for the military's radiation-contaminated garbage in the early 1980s, SRIC staff met the calls of community leaders, local emergency planners, healthcare providers, and prominent scientists to "make WIPP safe." As a result of SRIC's scientific analysis and legal actions, federal health and safety requirements were imposed on the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), delaying its opening until 1999. Today, SRIC is still watching to ensure that WIPP complies with those requirements and its mission is not expanded.

The Nuclear Waste Program provides technical assistance to community groups and information to the public and policymakers regarding nuclear weapons production facilities, including Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico and the Pantex Plant in Texas, and nuclear waste facilities, especially WIPP in New Mexico and sites that ship to WIPP. The program ensures effective citizen involvement in decisions about the future of the nuclear weapons complex relative to stopping approval of new production facilities and promoting disarmament and safer waste management and disposal at Department of Energy (DOE) sites.

In response to the Bush Administration's policies to promote new nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants, SRIC is actively involved in education regarding the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) and "Bombplex 2030," DOE's program to develop a new generation of nuclear weapons and the facilities to produce those weapons. SRIC is coordinating New Mexicans for Sustainable Energy and Effective Stewardship (NM SEES), a collaboration of citizen groups that promotes citizen involvement in the cleanup of the state's three DOE facilities. SRIC also supports the efforts to stop the Louisiana Energy Services uranium enrichment plant in Lea County because it is an unneeded facility and there is no waste disposal site for its waste.

**Program Objective and Goals for 2010:**
Program Goal: (1) Provide technical assistance to community groups and detailed, accurate information to the public regarding nuclear weapons production facilities, especially Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico and the Pantex Plant in Texas, and on WIPP; (2) ensure strong citizen involvement in decisions about the future of the nuclear weapons complex, both to prevent new production facilities and to promote safer waste management and disposal, including disposal of dismantled warheads; and (3) assist affected citizens increase their effective participation in the long-term process of disarmament and cleanup of DOE facilities. Program Objectives: Strengthen the health and safety requirements of the new WIPP operating permit and prevent high-level and commercial waste. Strengthen the health and safety and public information requirements of the new Los Alamos operating permit. Work nationally with citizen groups, states, and tribes to bring about a new nuclear waste policy to replace the defunct Yucca Mountain dump. Stop the new plutonium bomb plant at Los Alamos and support nuclear weapons reduction treaties.

Primary staff: Don Hancock, Paul Robinson.
For further information contact sricdon@earthlink.net.

COUNTDOWN TO ZERO (Nuclear Weapons) traces the history of the atomic bomb from its origins to the present state of global affairs: nine nations possessing nuclear weapons capabilities with others racing to join them, with the world held in a delicate balance that could be shattered by an act of terrorism, failed diplomacy, or a simple accident.

The film was produced by Academy Award® winner Lawrence Bender (An Inconvenient Truth) and developed, financed and executive produced by Participant Media, together with World Security Institute.

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SRIC
Southwest Research and Information Center
105 Stanford SE
PO Box 4524
Albuquerque, NM 87196
505/262-1862
fax: 505/262-1864

For further information contact Info@sric.org.