Get Prepared: A coalition of advocacy groups, including Union of Concerned Scientists, Tri-Valley CAREs, and NukeWatch New Mexico recently held a training to help participants prepare effective comments.
Watch the recording here
Password: gP=&0LYZ
Category: New Mexico
Lawsuit Compels Nationwide Public Review of Plutonium Bomb Core Production
AIKEN, S.C. — Today the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), the semi-autonomous nuclear weapons agency within the Department of Energy, published a formal Notice of Intent in the Federal Register to complete a nationwide “programmatic environmental impact statement” on the expanded production of plutonium “pit” bomb cores. Pits are the essential radioactive triggers of modern nuclear weapons. The NNSA is aggressively seeking their expanded production for new-design nuclear weapons for the new nuclear arms race.
The South Carolina Environmental Law Project (SCELP) successfully represented the Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition and Nuclear Watch New Mexico, Savannah River Site Watch and Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment in a legal challenge to NNSA’s attempt to improperly jump start dual site pit production. On September 30, 2024, United States District Court Judge Mary Geiger Lewis ruled that the NNSA had violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by failing to properly consider alternatives before proceeding with its plan to produce at least 30 pits per year at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) in New Mexico and at least 50 pits per year at the Savannah River Site (SRS) in South Carolina.
Find Out the Facts & Sign the Petition: Why NMED Should Deny LANL’s Request for Tritium Releases
Why NMED Should Deny LANL’s Request for Tritium Releases
The Los Alamos National Laboratory plans to begin large releases of radioactive tritium gas any time after June 2, 2025. The only roadblock to the Lab’s plans is that it needs a “Temporary Authorization” from the New Mexico Environment Department to do so.
Reasons why NMED should deny LANL’s request are:
- The state Environment Department has a duty to protect the New Mexican As it states, “Our mission is to protect and restore the environment and to foster a healthy and prosperous New Mexico for present and future generations.” 1
- Why the rush? LANL explicitly admits there is no urgency. According to the Lab’s publicly-released “Questions and Answers” in response to “What is the urgency for this project?”
“There is no urgency for this project beyond the broader mission goals to reduce onsite waste liabilities.” 2
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- In addition, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) admits that the end time frame for action is 2028, not 2025.3 Therefore, there is time for deliberate consideration.
- Contrary to NMED’s Resource Conservation and Recovery Act permit for LANL, the Lab has not fulfilled its duty to inform the public via NMED of possible alternatives to its planned tritium releases.4 According to Tewa Women United, “LANL has told EPA there are 53 alternatives; that list of alternatives, initially requested in 2022, has not yet been Tewa Women United has repeatedly asked LANL to provide the public with that list.” 5
Formal Comments on the Draft Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement for Continued Operation of the Los Alamos National Laboratory
The National Environmental Policy Act requires the Los Alamos National Laboratory to periodically prepare a new “Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement (SWEIS) for Continued Operations.”
Please use NukeWatch NM’s recent extensive comments on the Lab’s new draft SWEIS as a resource and citizens’ guide to Lab issues.
Did you know, for example, that:
• LANL’s nuclear weapons production budget has doubled over the last decade?
• The Lab’s so-called cleanup plan is to “cap and cover” some 200,000 cubic yards of radioactive and toxic waste, leaving them permanently buried as a perpetual threat to groundwater?
• There is a planned intentional release of up to 30,000 curies of radioactive tritium gas, all without a public hearing?
Use our lengthy formal comments as a starting point, toolkit or resource for dissecting ongoing and future issues at LANL!
We encourage you to use our comments to ask for follow-up info, either from us here at NukeWatch or from the Lab, and to demand better accountability and transparency! Use as background or briefing material for local and congressional advocacy.
For example:
- Cite or excerpt our comments in future public processes under the National Environmental Policy Act. For example, we are expecting that a nationwide programmatic environmental impact statement for plutonium “pit” bomb core production will be announced soon, the result of a lawsuit in which NukeWatch led.
- Share with those organizing around stopping expanded plutonium pit production and advocating for genuine radioactive and toxic wastes cleanup.
- Learn about LANL’s proposed electrical transmission line across the environmentally and culturally sensitive Caja del Rio and alternatives that were not considered.
- The National Environmental Policy Act itself is under assault by the Trump Administration. We expect environmental justice and climate change issues to be stripped from LANL’s final Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement. This needs to be resisted!
NukeWatch NM argued that the draft SWEIS should be withdrawn and a new one issued because:
• The NNSA has rigged the draft LANL Site-Wide EIS with three self-serving scenarios:
– Expanded nuclear weapons programs (contradictorily called the “No Action Alternative”).
– Yet more expanded nuclear weapons programs (“Modernized Operations Alternative”).
– Yet far more expanded nuclear weapons programs (“Expanded Operations Alternative”).
• A Reduced Operations Alternative must be included.
• The SWEIS’ fundamental justification for expanded nuclear weapons programs is “deterrence.” But “deterrence” has always included nuclear warfighting capabilities that could end human civilization overnight.
• The SWEIS purports to align with U.S. obligations under the 1970 NonProliferation Treaty. That is demonstrably false.
• Future plutonium pit production is NOT to maintain the safety and reliability of the existing nuclear weapons stockpile. Instead, it is for new-design nuclear weapons that could lower confidence in stockpile reliability and/or prompt a return to testing.
• The SWEIS’ No-Action Alternative violates the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).
• The legally required programmatic environmental impact statement on pit production should be completed first, followed by the LANL SWEIS.
• Plutonium pit reuse should be analyzed as a credible alternative to pit production.
• A recent proposal for a data center at LANL is not in the SWEIS. It raises huge issues of future water and electrical use, the appropriateness of commercial interests at a federal lab, and the possible fusion of artificial intelligence and nuclear weapons command and control.
• Recent Executive Orders could strip the final SWEIS of environmental justice and climate change analyses. This must have clarification.
• Planned tritium releases should be fully analyzed.
• The Electrical Power Capacity Upgrade should be analyzed will all credible alternatives.
• The proposed BioSafety Level-3 facility must have its own standalone EIS.
• All Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board concerns should be addressed and resolved.
• Genuine comprehensive cleanup should be a preferred alternative.
• A new SWEIS should follow a new overdue Probabilistic Seismic Hazard Analysis.
Brief Analysis of Today’s U.S. Supreme Court Oral Arguments on the Illegality of Licensing Radwaste Dumps in TX and NM
Today the United States Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission vs. Texas. At issue is whether the NRC exceeded its authority when it approved licenses for proposed “consolidated interim storage facilities” for high-level radioactive waste, and this includes highly irradiated “spent” fuel from nuclear power plants.
Two consolidated interim storage facilities are planned for western Texas and southeastern New Mexico. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as Amended specifically prohibits private “interim” storage of federal spent nuclear fuel, and disallows the Department of Energy from taking title to the waste unless a permanent geologic repository is licensed, built and opened. The law intended to prevent private “interim” storage of federal radioactive waste because interim storage is much less robust than permanent storage, and would double the risk of accident or attack during transport, since consolidated “interim” storage means the waste has to be moved twice, once to the CISF and again to a permanent repository.
NukeWatch Los Alamos Lab Site-Wide EIS Workshop – February 6, 2025
Full Video Recording: NukeWatch Los Alamos Lab Site-Wide EIS Workshop |
NukeWatch Presentation: Los Alamos Lab Site-Wide EIS Workshop |
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NukeWatch Los Alamos Lab Site-Wide EIS Workshop  |
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Independent Review of Chromium Groundwater Contamination Fails to Make Final Cleanup Recommendation
After 20 Years Los Alamos Lab Still Doesn’t Know Size of Plume
At Present Rate Cleanup Will Take More Than a Century
On December 30, 2024, in the middle of the holiday season, the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) posted the report Independent Review of the Chromium Interim Measures Remediation System to its largely unknown Legacy Cleanup Electronic Public Reading Room. This report attempts to address the Lab’s extensive contamination of the region’s deep groundwater aquifer by a large plume of hexavalent chromium, whose potentially serious human health effects (including cancer) was the subject of the popular movie Erin Brockovich.
LANL’s chromium contamination plume is at least one mile long, a half mile wide and 100 feet thick.[1] It is commonly regarded as the Lab’s most serious environmental threat. One drinking water supply well for Los Alamos County has been shut down because of the plume. Lab maps of the contamination depict it as abruptly stopping at the border of San Ildefonso Pueblo, which is highly unlikely.
The bottom line of the newly released chromium report is:
“…at this time the plume is not sufficiently characterized to design a final remedy… data gaps and uncertainties need to be addressed before committing to an alternative or final remedy.”
This is a full two decades after the chromium plume was first reported.
Court Rules U.S. Nuclear Weapons Production Plan Violates Federal Law
On September 30, United States District Court Judge Mary Geiger Lewis ruled that the United States Department of Energy (“DOE”) and its semi-autonomous nuclear weapons agency, the National Nuclear Security Administration (“NNSA”), violated the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”) by failing to properly consider alternatives before proceeding with their plan to produce plutonium pits, a critical component of nuclear weapons, at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (“LANL”) in New Mexico and, for the first time ever, at the Savannah River Site (“SRS”) in South Carolina.
The Court found that the plan’s purpose had fundamentally changed from NNSA’s earlier analyses which had not considered simultaneous pit production at two sites. These changes necessitated a reevaluation of alternatives, including site alternatives, which Defendants failed to undertake prior to moving forward while spending tens of billions of taxpayers’ dollars. Therefore, the Court entered judgment in favor of Plaintiffs, the nonprofit public interest groups Savannah River Site Watch, Nuclear Water New Mexico and Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (CAREs); the Gullah/Geechee Sea Island Coalition; and Tom Clements as an individual plaintiff.
As a result of this ruling, the Defendants are required to newly assess pit production at a nation-wide programmatic level which will mean undertaking a thorough analysis of the impacts of pit production at DOE sites throughout the United States, including radioactive waste generation and disposal. Under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), this will provide the opportunity for public scrutiny of and formal comment on their assessments.
RECA Advocates on Capitol Hill Renew Push for Nuclear Radiation Victim Compensation This Week
This week saw important developments surrounding the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), which provides compensation to individuals affected by U.S. nuclear testing and uranium mining and expired in June earlier this year, leaving many who were exposed to radiation without compensation. Advocates and lawmakers are intensifying efforts to push Speaker Mike Johnson to bring RECA back to the House floor for a vote.
Two Native American women, Linda Evers and Tina Cordova, have been at the forefront of this fight, advocating tirelessly to preserve and extend RECA’s provisions. Their work has resonated powerfully, especially in New Mexico, where uranium mining and nuclear tests have left entire communities facing severe health crises. These populations have been disproportionately impacted by radiation and suffered from generations of exposure to radioactive contamination, leading to chronic illnesses, cancers, and premature deaths. The situation is especially dire for Native American and rural communities, who have long borne the brunt of this toxic legacy, with little to no compensation or acknowledgment. The fight to extend RECA is not just about justice—it’s about survival for those still suffering the long-term effects of these catastrophic policies.
In a recent Washington, D.C. event, activists from New Mexico voiced their frustrations over the lack of progress, pushing lawmakers to extend the act and increase compensation limits. See more on this in the news report above from KOB 4.
Nuclear Waste ‘Interim’ Storage Updates
In June 2024, Holtec International, along with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the Department of Justice, petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review a March ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court that vacated Holtec’s license to build a nuclear waste interim storage facility in New Mexico. The Fifth Circuit’s basis to vacate the license is that the NRC lacks the authority to license private interim storage sites like Holtec’s in New Mexico and a similar facility in Texas operated by Interim Storage Partners (ISP). Holtec’s petition to the Supreme Court aims to reverse the lower court’s ruling and allow the construction of the facility in southeastern New Mexico, which would store spent nuclear fuel “temporarily” while awaiting a permanent disposal solution.
Holtec contends that their operations are safe and necessary for managing the nation’s growing stockpile of nuclear waste. These sites and any transport to these sites are not only dangerous but environmentally unjust. New Mexico’s demographic is largely Latino. There are many communities of color, especially in the southern part of the state where the sites are being proposed. These sites present clear examples of environmental racism; people of color would be disproportionately affected if the Holtec/ISP CIS site were licensed and constructed.
For more background information, see:
Keeping a (Nuke)Watchful Eye on Consolidated Interim Storage: No High-Level Waste To New Mexico
Interim Storage Partners first applied for a federal license to build the site back in 2016. The NRC approved and licenced the facility in west Texas in 2021.
Key dates include the petition being docketed on June 27, 2024, and scheduled for the Supreme Court’s conference on September 30, 2024. During this conference, the justices will decide whether the Supreme Court agrees to hear the case (grants certiorari). If it does, oral arguments may be scheduled in late 2024 or early 2025, with a decision expected afterward. The timeline for any Supreme Court ruling could vary, but such cases often take several months for a decision following the grant of certiorari.
UPDATE – OCTOBER 4, 2024: The Supreme Court has granted certiorari, meaning the justices will hear arguments and decide the case.
From Courthouse News Service: “The court is expected to take up the case in its forthcoming term, which begins Monday. Arguments likely will begin next year, with a decision possible by the summer.”
For more information, see also: exchangemonitor.com/fate-of-interim-storage-at-supreme-court-could-be-decided-by-october
High Detections of Plutonium in Los Alamos Neighborhood – As We Enter a New Nuclear Arms Race the Last One is Still Not Cleaned Up
In April Nuclear Watch New Mexico released a map of plutonium contamination based on Lab data. Today, Dr. Michael Ketterer, Professor Emeritus of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Northern Arizona University, is releasing alarmingly high results from samples taken from a popular walking trail in the Los Alamos Town Site, including detections of some of the earliest plutonium produced by humankind.
On July 2 and 17 Dr. Ketterer, with the assistance of Nuclear Watch New Mexico, collected water, soil and plant samples from Acid Canyon in the Los Alamos Town Site and soil and plant samples in Los Alamos Canyon at the Totavi gas station downstream from the Lab. The samples were prepared and analyzed by mass spectrometry at Northern Arizona University to measure concentrations of plutonium, and to ascertain its sources in the environment.
Keeping a (Nuke)Watchful Eye on Consolidated Interim Storage: No High-Level Waste To New Mexico
If you follow news on nuclear waste, you know that the federal government is required by law to have a permanent disposal plan for our nation’s nuclear waste before engaging in temporary storage, or “consolidated interim storage” for commercial spent nuclear fuel. There are currently about 86,000 metric tons of this fuel in the U.S., stored on-site at operating or shutdown nuclear power plants in 33 states, an amount that continues to grow by about 2,000 metric tons a year (GAO). This is waste generated by nuclear power plants called ‘high-level radioactive waste’ (HLW), also known as ‘spent’ or ‘irradiated’ fuel. This waste contains plutonium, uranium, strontium, and cesium; it is most toxic and dangerous type of radioactive waste created by the nuclear industry and will be radioactive for millions of years.
Two private companies “Holtec” and “Interim Storage Partners” are proposing to build and operate facilities for HLW called “Consolidated Interim Storage Facilities (CISF)” in New Mexico and Texas. While federal law requires the government to have a permanent disposal solution, it does not explicitly prevent private entities from offering interim storage solutions. Enter money-gobbling Holtec and ISP.
Nuclear Weapons Issues & The Accelerating Arms Race: February 2024
FEDERAL BUDGET NEWS
Release of federal FY 2025 budget expected March 11 (it will initially be just topline numbers).
Meanwhile on the FY 2024 budget: House and Senate Armed Services Committee authorized funding exceeding Biden’s request, including money for the Sea-Launched Cruise Missile and nuclear warhead (reminder: that the President doesn’t want), plus adding $$ for plutonium pit production at the Savannah River Site. But appropriations bills are still not happening because of ever increasing congressional dysfunction. This is now best exemplified by Republicans rejecting an immigration bill they initially drafted but that Trump denounced because he wanted immigration to remain a hot issue during the presidential election campaign.
The current second “laddered” Continuing Resolution that is keeping the government running expires March 1 and 8.
As New Mexicans Struggle, Sen. Heinrich is Proud of Nuclear Weapons Money
Sen. Heinrich is so proud of all of the nuclear weapons money in New Mexico. He is one of the chief congressional architects of expanded production of plutonium “pit” bomb cores and sits on the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee from where he can direct $$billions to the Sandia and Los Alamos Labs.
But during the Department of Energy’s long presence in the Land of Enchantment, according to Census Bureau data New Mexico has slid in per capita income from 32nd in 1959 to 47th in 2022. New Mexico has the most children living in poverty (30%) and is rated dead last in well-being of children and quality of public education. Finally, in a report that the Los Alamos Lab tried to suppress, six county governments surrounding Los Alamos County suffer a net economic loss from LANL.
In fiscal year 2024 DOE will spend $10 billion in New Mexico, 75% for core nuclear weapons research and production programs and 5% for dumping related radioactive wastes in our state. DOE’s budget is 6% greater than the entire operating budget of the State of New Mexico ($9.4 billion).
Senator Heinrich, please explain what good all that nuclear weapons money does for average New Mexicans, and not just for the privileged nuclear weapons enclaves.
For much more, please see nukewatch.org/new-mexico-americas-nuclear-colony
Nuclear Weapons Issues & The Accelerating Arms Race: January 2024
FEDERAL BUDGET NEWS
Half of the federal budget (including Energy and Water appropriations which funds DOE) shuts down January 19 and the other half February 2 if a Continuing Resolution (CR) is not reached. House Speaker Johnson agreed to a previous funding agreement with the Biden Administration but the so-called Freedom Caucus is now in revolt.
Update: On January 18, Congress passes third stopgap funding bill instead of full FY24 budget, keeping the government funded until March.
Sen. Martin Heinrich aids and abets the new, more dangerous nuclear arms race. He is outspokenly proud of all of the nuclear weapons money in New Mexico, and he is one of the chief congressional architects of expanded production of plutonium “pit” bomb cores. In congress, Heinrich sits on the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee from where he can direct $$billions to the Sandia and Los Alamos Labs.
But during the Department of Energy’s long presence in the Land of Enchantment, according to Census Bureau data New Mexico has slid in per capita income from 32nd in 1959 to 47th in 2022. New Mexico has the most children living in poverty (30%) and is rated dead last in well-being of children and quality of public education. Finally, in a report that the Los Alamos Lab tried to suppress, six county governments surrounding Los Alamos County suffer a net economic loss from LANL.
In fiscal year 2024 DOE will spend $10 billion in New Mexico, 75% for core nuclear weapons research and production programs and 5% for dumping related radioactive wastes in our state. DOE’s budget is 6% greater than the entire operating budget of the State of New Mexico ($9.4 billion).
Senator Heinrich, please explain what good all that nuclear weapons money does for average New Mexicans, and not just for the privileged nuclear weapons enclaves.
For much more, please see https://nukewatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/New-Mexico-Americas-Nuclear-Colony.pdf
ACCELERATING NUCLEAR ARMS RACE
North Korea Issues Ominous Warning About Nuclear Strike This Year
North Korea has issued an ominous warning about “the highest risk of clashes this year” between the totalitarian state and its neighbor to the south, which could end in “a nuclear strike,” according to South Korean media. Yonhap News Agency, a major media outlet in Seoul, reported on Thursday that North Korea media condemned recent Army artillery exercises and naval firing drills and exercises. The Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), the state news agency of North Korea, said the exercises are “self destructive” and called South Koreans “warmongers,” according to Yonhap.
Los Alamos Lab’s Future at a Crossroads: Cleanup or More Nuclear Weapons? NukeWatch Applauds NM State Rejection of Fake Cleanup
Santa Fe, NM – In an important win for genuine cleanup at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) has rejected the Lab’s plans for so-called cleanup through “cap and cover.” LANL’s plan would leave existing radioactive and toxic wastes uncharacterized and forever buried in unlined pits and trenches as a permanent threat to groundwater. At issue is remediation of the Lab’s “Material Disposal Area C” waste dump that has 7 pits and 108 shafts of radioactive and toxic wastes. Area C is located in the heart of nuclear weapons production at LANL, contiguous to the Lab’s main plutonium facility which is expanding production of plutonium “pit” bomb cores.
In a September 7, 2023 “Public Notice of Statement of Basis,” the Environment Department ruled:
“For maximum protection of human health and the environment and to ensure that the drinking water resource can be conservatively protected, NMED has determined that the selected [cleanup] remedy for MDA C must consist of waste excavation, characterization, and appropriate disposal of the buried waste… Excavation will ensure that the source of contamination at MDA C is removed…”
Breakthrough Study Bolsters RECA Claims for New Mexicans Exposed to Trinity Test Site Radiation
Plutonium Detections From Trinity Test Discovered 78 years After Test – Confirm RECA Must Be Expanded
Located in the Tularosa Basin in southern New Mexico, the Trinity Test Site marks the location of the first detonation of a nuclear weapon. Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer” would have you believe this area is desolate, inhospitable and uninhabited. Contrary to this narrative and popular opinion, The area where the Trinity test occurred was not uninhabited. There were more than 13,000 New Mexicans living within a 50-mile radius. Many of those children, women and men were not warned before or after the test. The event marking the dawn of the nuclear age in July 1945 ushered in decades of health issues for residents living downwind due to exposure to radioactive fallout. The long-lasting impact of radiation exposure is a painful legacy that the New Mexican communities have had to bear.
New preliminary information strongly supports Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) status for New Mexicans downwind of the Trinity Test Site. In the past weeks, Michael E. Ketterer, (Professor Emeritus, Chemistry and Biochemistry, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ) has completed a short “proof of principle” study that directly investigates where plutonium in soils originates by analyzing isotopic ratios, in a known portion of the Trinity Test plume.
Dr. Ketterer sampled soils along highways NM 42, US 54, NM 55, US 60, and US 380. The isotopes show that there is definitely plutonium from the Trinity Test in the northeast plume, and distinguishes it from global (stratospheric) background and New Mexico regional background from Nevada Test Site fallout. Soils along all five of these highways contain plutonium that reflects mixtures of Trinity Test debris and global/Nevada regional background fallout; in some cases, nearly 100% of the Pu originates from the Trinity Test.
Does New Mexico Deserve Downwinder Status: Definitely Yes, as Evident Via Plutonium Isotopes in 2023 Soil Samples
Michael E. Ketterer, Professor Emeritus, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry
Northern Arizona University , Flagstaff AZ
Introduction/objective: to investigate whether plutonium from the July 16, 1945 Trinity Test can be identified in contemporary soils and dusts near the Trinity Site. A proof-of concept study was conducted via a small-scale July 2023 collection of soil samples along five public highways transecting the areas reported to be most affected (refer to 239+240Pu deposition inventory map from Beck et al., 2020). More-distant soil samples were obtained from the Carson National Forest near Truchas, New Mexico.
New Mexico: America’s Nuclear Colony
Money doesn’t talk, it swears. (Bob Dylan)
Quick Facts
Nuclear New Mexico
• DOE FY 2024 budget in NM is $10 billion (double next state).
– 75% core nuclear weapons research and production programs
– 28% life extended and new-design nuclear warheads ($2.65B)
– 20% expanded nuclear weapons production ($2 billion)
– $1.75B expanded plutonium “pit” bomb core production
– 5% for dumping radioactive bomb wastes (WIPP $484 million)
• Expanding nuclear weapons programs sold as jobs, jobs, jobs
• Los Alamos County (LAC) 70.6% non-Hispanic Caucasian
• LAC is 11th richest county in USA, most millionaires per capita
• Los Alamos County median household income $123,677
• Los Alamos County per capita income $64,521
• Los Alamos County persons in poverty 3.7%
• Los Alamos County has least children living in poverty in USA
• Los Alamos County rated best county to live in in USA
• Historically LAC schools subsidized added $8 million/yr from DOE
• LAC receives >$50 million in annual state gross receipts taxes
• Dept of Energy renewable spending in NM is 0.5% of $10B budget
• Indigenous and Hispanic lands unjustly seized for LANL
• World’s first atomic bomb detonated at Trinity Test
• 75 years still no govt tally of sick Navajo/Laguna uranium miners
• At least 8,280 sick Los Alamos and Sandia Labs workers
• Major hexavalent chromium groundwater contamination at LANL
• LANL plans to “cap and cover” and leave >200,000 yd3 of waste
• USA’s largest repository of warheads 2 miles south of ABQ airport
• Nation’s only plutonium “pit” bomb core production site at LANL
• Nation’s only dump for bomb wastes at Waste Isolation Pilot Plant
• NM targeted for all of nation’s lethal radioactive high-level wastes
New Mexico
• NM’s entire FY24 state operating budget is 6% less ($9.4 billion).
– 54% public education K-12 and higher
– 34% public health and safety
• NM per capita income falls from 32nd (1959) to 47th (2022)
• New Mexico 50% Hispanic, 11.2% Native American
• New Mexico 4th poorest state
• Median household income $54,020
• Average per capita income $29,624
• New Mexicans in poverty 18.4% (3rd highest in USA)
• 30% of New Mexican children live in poverty (highest rate in USA).
• New Mexico rated worst in well-being of children
• New Mexico is dead last in quality of public education
• Six surrounding county govts suffer net economic loss from LANL
• New Mexico has very abundant renewable energy resources
• DOE transfers excess land to white, wealthy Los Alamos County
• Generational cancers, Downwinders never compensated
• Chronically delayed remediation of 260 uranium mines and 7 mills
• NM facing decreasing water resources and increasing wildfires
• Lab commonly hires away senior NM Environment Dept officials
• >$5B for plutonium facilities, more than all NM schools & hospitals
• DOE threatens to sue NM over new WIPP state permit conditions
• Federal Nuclear Reg. Comm. grants license despite state opposition
New Mexico: America’s Nuclear Colony
New Mexico is the birthplace place of nuclear weapons. The “Land of Enchantment” has always been the single most important state within the U.S. nuclear weapons complex. The Department of Energy (DOE) will spend $10 billion in NM in FY 2024, 6% more than the operating budget of the entire state government.
Great news: New Mexico Bill SB-53 has passed! Thanks especially to Senator Jeff Steinborn and state Rep. Matthew McQueen for co-sponsoring and introducing SB53.
THE FUTURE OF WIPP: PLUTONIUM BOMB WASTE
NNSA’s mission is plutonium pit production…for the next 30 years and beyond.
NNSA HAS STATED CLEARLY: “WIPP IS ESSENTIAL FOR PIT PRODUCTION UNTIL 2080.”
As you can see clearly in the National Nuclear Security Administration’s chart above, NNSA is getting ready to dump radioactive wastes from plutonium pit production at WIPP for the next 30 years.
Waste from expanded pit production will soon far outweigh cleanup wastes.
Despite being located in New Mexico, out-of-state sites have been given priority over radioactive wastes from Los Alamos Lab.
ALL FUTURE PIT PRODUCTION is for speculative new designs that can’t be tested because of the international testing moratorium, thereby perhaps eroding confifidence in the stockpile. Or, alternatively, these new designs could push the U.S. into resuming testing, which would have severe proliferation consequences.
Pit production will add an estimated 57,550 cubic meters of radioactive plutonium wastes over 50 years, more than half of WIPP’s projected future capacity. The National Academy of Sciences has already concluded that WIPP doesn’t have sufficient capacity for all of DOE’s planned radioactive wastes.
State Environment Department Begins to Rein in Work On LANL’s Chromium Plume Given Major Differences With DOE
At a February 9, 2023 public community forum hosted by the Department of Energy’s Environmental Management Los Alamos Office, there were strong indications that the New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) is convinced that DOE’s plans to remediate the chromium groundwater contamination plume under Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is not working. Kimberly Lebak, program manager for N3B, the LANL cleanup contractor, described how it is finalizing the 2023 milestones under the Consent Order that governs cleanup, despite the fact that the NMED Groundwater Bureau has requested that DOE stop injecting treated water by April 1, 2023. DOE and NMED are not seeing eye-to-eye concerning the “Interim Measure” that N3B is using to contain the chromium plume.
The two agencies disagree on the Interim Measure, originally designed to prevent chromium from migrating across the San Ildefonso Pueblo border while DOE tries to figure out a final remedy.