Proposed Tritium Venting by Los Alamos National Lab Postponed Indefinitely after Community Pressure
THANK YOU to the over 2,500 of you who signed our Petition to Deny LANL’s Request to Release Radioactive Tritium into the Air!
A massive thank you as well to our fellow campaigners we worked alongside on this issue, Tewa Women United and Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety, and of course thank you as well to NMED Secretary Kenney for listening to our community.
From Tewa Women United:
Beloved Community, we have some really good news!
Our Environmental Justice team has finally received the response from the New Mexico Environmental Department regarding the LANL/DOE/NNSA request for temporary authorization to begin venting tritium this summer. The short story: **Secretary Kenney (NMED) says that NMED will not act on the temporary authorization request** until the following criteria is met:
1. independent technical review
2. public meeting
3. tribal consultation (in addition to NMED tribal consultation)
4. compliance audit
These criteria must be met and LANL/DOE/NNSA must submit an updated request before NMED will revisit and make a decision.
This means that **tritium venting will not happen this summer!**
We sincerely thank the thousands of you who signed and shared the petition, our partners @nukewatchnm and Concerned Citizens for Nuclear Safety (CCNS), and Secretary Kenney for this decision.
Here is a powerful excerpt from NMED’s letter to LANL:
“In closing, the historical gross mismanagement of these waste streams by DOE and NNSA have placed NMED in an untenable situation. Now, the risk of inaction poses a far greater threat than a technical solution, but no technical solution is free from risk. Your disregard of state laws and rules governing these wastes for almost 20 years greatly exacerbated this situation and put New Mexicans, tribal communities, and our environment at risk. Given your failure to comply with New Mexico Hazardous Waste Act and its regulations codified at 20.4.1 of the New Mexico Administrative Code, you are hereby notified that NMED is separately commencing a civil enforcement action pursuant to this matter.”
Thanks to everyone who signed the petition to stop the tritium venting in Los Alamos and surrounding communities!