Yucca Mountain Quality Assurance documents may havae been falsified

[JohnWxy]

Contractor conducting review of data foiund that certain QA documents may have been falsified.

(NOte I inadvertantly posted this twice. I requested this one be deleted.__JW Same post is here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x47280)

http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Jul-21-Thu-2005/news/26917259.html

Meanwhile Wednesday in Congress, a House committee chairman followed through on a threat to subpoena Yucca Mountain documents held by the Energy Department.

Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., signed subpoena documents that were issued to Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman.

The subpoenas order DOE to deliver by Friday 10 categories of documents including personnel and research records of scientists tied to e-mail messages that suggest quality assurance documentation may have been falsified.
~~

Davis is chairman of the House Government Reform Committee. A federal worker subcommittee headed by Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev., is conducting an investigation of the e-mails.

Porter said the subpoenaed documents "are just one more piece, an integral part of getting information. Unfortunately we're having to force (DOE) to hand them over."

The Energy Department was reviewing the subpoena, spokesman Craig Stevens said. DOE officials say they have resisted because of the likelihood Porter would publicize documents that could threaten repository licensing.

YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Another official to leave project

Subpoenas in e-mail issue signed, sent to Energy Department

By STEVE TETREAULT
STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU


WASHINGTON -- The Energy Department's licensing director for Yucca Mountain has resigned, the second senior manager to leave the nuclear waste project in the past month, DOE officials confirmed Wednesday.

Joseph Ziegler submitted his resignation last week citing personal reasons, DOE spokesman Allen Benson said. His last day is July 26, employees were told in an e-mail.

Yucca license preparations have been marked by delays, however, that have postponed an anticipated application date from last December until this December and possibly later.

At an hearing before NRC administrative judges on Tuesday, an attorney for DOE said the department may need even more time, perhaps up to six months, to reformat sets of electronic documents to a required standard for a licensing database.

In a follow-up Wednesday, however, DOE attorney Donald Irwin said the department is still working out a schedule and he could not pinpoint possible delays.

Ziegler's departure from Yucca Mountain comes two weeks after the announced transfer of John Mitchell, the president of the project's operating company Bechtel SAIC. Bechtel said it routinely transfers managers after two or three years.

Benson maintained the turnover among senior managers does not signal Yucca Mountain is in turmoil.

"People at that level move and there's nothing unusual about that," Benson said. "Joe Ziegler was here about five years or so and after five years of a rather intense amount of work, that is not unusual."

Bob Loux, a Yucca Mountain critic and executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, shrugged at Ziegler's departure.

"My sense of things is that they are so far away from having an actual license application that it doesn't even matter," Loux said. "They will probably just have someone else take his place."

Meanwhile Wednesday in Congress, a House committee chairman followed through on a threat to subpoena Yucca Mountain documents held by the Energy Department.

Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., signed subpoena documents that were issued to Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman.

The subpoenas order DOE to deliver by Friday 10 categories of documents including personnel and research records of scientists tied to e-mail messages that suggest quality assurance documentation may have been falsified.

Also subpoenaed were communications between DOE and its contractor, and a copy of a draft repository license application.

Davis is chairman of the House Government Reform Committee. A federal worker subcommittee headed by Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev., is conducting an investigation of the e-mails.

Porter said the subpoenaed documents "are just one more piece, an integral part of getting information. Unfortunately we're having to force (DOE) to hand them over."

The Energy Department was reviewing the subpoena, spokesman Craig Stevens said. DOE officials say they have resisted because of the likelihood Porter would publicize documents that could threaten repository licensing.

http://www.energy.gov/news/1601.htm

March 16, 2005

Statement From Secretary of Energy, Samuel Bodman
WASHINGTON, DC -- The Department of Energy has learned that certain employees of the US Geological Survey (USGS) at the Department of the Interior working on the Yucca Mountain project may have falsified documentation of their work. This documentation is required as part of the Department of Energy and Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s quality assurance programs that verify the accuracy and credibility of work that has been completed. This documentation in question relates to computer modeling involving water infiltration and climate.

“During the document review process associated with the Licensing Support Network preparation for the Yucca Mountain project, DOE contractors discovered multiple emails written between May 1998 and March 2000, in which a USGS employee indicated that he had fabricated documentation of his work.

http://www.agiweb.org/gap/legis109/yucca_hearings.html#june27

On Friday, July 1, 2005, the House Government Reform Subcommittee on the Federal Workforce and Agency Organization held a hearing on the "Yucca Mountain Project: Digging for the Truth." Although this particular subcommittee does not have supervision over the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear repository, the subcommittee has been investigating allegations that federal employees have falsified data related to the site evaluation of Yucca Mountain. A previous hearing held on April 6th included testimony from several government representatives related to the ongoing investigation that stemmed from a series of e-mails written from 1998 to 2000 that suggested data falsification may have occurred.

[acmavm]

1. Falsifying data having to do with the suitability and safety of a

nuclear repository is really as degenerate and low as starting a war over a lie. You get the same result, thousands and thousands of deaths of innocent people when the situation goes belly up.

Some people should be facing serious incarceration time.

[NNadir]

2. The Bush adminstration may have falsified reality about global climate

change.

Your point is what? That the documents will kill someone?

In every case, the opposition to nuclear technology is dependent on words like "could," "may," "might."

Global climate change on the other hand IS happening.

If you know of one person in the United States who has died from the storage of commercial spent nuclear fuel, now would be the time to produce that person.

[JohnWxy]

3. You obviously don't comprehend the concept of time, let me explain

something to you. Since nuclear waste will have to be stored without leakage for 14,000 years or more, the likelihood of leakage is not yet known for this long time span.

PRoduce someone who has died - from commercial storage of spent nuclear fuel? I guess we won't count those who have or will get cancer from living near Three Mile island or Hanford (oh, that doesn't count not commercial storage, right?) And of course the DOE and NRC will say there is no proof they got cancer from exposure to Three Mile Island or Hanford. Cancer often takes decades to show up and to be diagnosed, so the verdict is still out on many people. Cancer, is that a physiological process you don't understand?

Your remark re "What's your point, documents will kill someone?" reveals your adolescent, cavalier and unrealistic attitude re the risks of nuclear waste storage. The importance of the reliability of the tests on Yucca cannot be over-emphasized. When you enthuse about the benefits of nuclear out-weighing the risks YOu sound like a geek at a fucking Star Trek convention explaining the profundity of Star Trek to a non-believer (replete with spandex pants, zip-up boots and pajama top shirt) . I don't have to produce a dead body to demonstrate the risks of nuclear waste storage over 14,000 or more years. And by the way, if you are wrong re storage of nuclear waste Capt. Kirk won't come to clean up your mess. Shit, man, grow up.

What you don't understand about time is even a small likelihood of leakage or small error on calculations of the inviolability of a given storage site can expand to significant proportions when extrapolated over 14,000 years. Time and nature have a way of confounding man's formulae and simulations.

i read the articles on Oklo you referenced in another thread and the first two were introductory or general and didn't address migration from the site. The third (Los Alamos) was detailed. I will quote from that report (my own emphases):

" Our models are
becoming detailed enough so that we can
extrapolate from the short time scales of
laboratory experiments to the long time
scales required for storage of nuclear waste.
In general, our studies of the geochemistry
of the Yucca Mountain site, although far
from complete, so far indicate that the
geochemical properties and setting of the site
will strongly inhibit the movement of radioisotopes
by flowing groundwater to the accessible
environment."


Since people are falsifying data coming form YUCCA maybe they are concerned the models are still not complete enough (some twenty years after teht Los alomos report).


I also direct your attention to the last line in the article I referenced/linked-to at the top of this thread:

"The Energy Department was reviewing the subpoena, spokesman Craig Stevens said. DOE officials say they have resisted because of the likelihood Porter would publicize documents that could threaten repository licensing."


And don't preach to me about Global Warming. I know it exists and I know that nuclear is not the only source of energy available to us. I think that people are going to demand a full commitment to renewable energy and conservation (including more efficient design of infrastructure and power driven equipment). I think we will be able to do this without nuclear power (HOwever, when and IF nuclear storage can be demonstrated to be feasible and practical I will be all for it. But so far, I don't think it's been demonstrated - I will continue to study this, however, ever hopeful for progress.).

... Now, we eventually we will cope with Global Warming. It won't be easy, but it will be done. It's impossible to forecast very far into the future beyond even 50 years, so no one knows for sure how long it will take. But it will take a long time to get the climate back to what we consider normal. But if it takes a couple hundred years (or even four hundred years) to get things back to mid 20th century climate status, if you expand nuclear you will have nuclear waste to deal with for another 14,000 or more years (what we have already, 80,000 tons(?) plus whatever you add to it, if you go all out with nuclear from here on). Another 14,000 years. Now that is a long time for future generations to cope with a potential extremely costly (in terms of valuable resources) mess to deal with. I think we better be damn sure we are right before we start adding to this toxic inventory.

I think it would be a good idea to explore every other possiblity first and only use nuclear as a last resort. And we have not begun to explore all the available alternatives yet.

[megatherium]

4. Nuclear waste can be reprocessed to remove the hot stuff and create more

fuel. But global warming might not be reversible because when positive feedback loops kick in, which it appears they're doing, it will be impossible to go back. They're now saying 4.5 C is the best case scenario for warming in this century. It might be three times that.

I have my own concerns about nuclear power. It is being run by corporations, and corporations have been known to cut corners and cause enormous disasters (Bhopal and Exxon Valdez come immediately to mind, as well as Three Mile Island). And building a couple dozen nukes in the next 15 years isn't enough if that is our chosen route away from fossil fuels; if that's all we do, it's isn't worth the trouble.

The attractions of nuclear are perhaps a bit theoretical: With the proper fuel cycle and use of breeder reactors, it has the capability of producing all the electricity we use for the indefinite future (tens of thousands of years). Of course, breeder reactor programs have had serious problems, and they're very expensive. And nobody is seriously talking about ramping up nuclear to the level required.

But I'm in favor of a relentless, full-court press to stop use of fossil fuels, especially coal. (We have plenty of coal, and you can be certain the default for the US and other countries will be to expand use of this fuel.) Conservation (beginning with 40 mpg CAFE standards now), renewables (subsidies for solar and wind) -- and if done properly, nuclear. If not nuclear, wind. (Count me as a non-nimby on wind. I think it would be cool if my horizon had lots of wind turbines on it.) But everything we do we must do big time, now. Global warming is worse than you think, and may be irreversible.

[JohnWxy]

5. My faith that we will cope with GLobal Warming is just that, a statement

of faith that we will. (I don't like to think of the consequences of not addressing the problem). Yes, it could be irreversible, I just am convinced we will wake up and do the right things. But yes, we need to ACT NOW. (of course I've been saying that for 30 years (sigh)!
REgarding breeder reactors you should see what the National Academy of Sciences has to say about reprocessing - not good. I couldn't locate the link right now, but will find it for you. They say it will actually increase the amount of nuclear waste!

My main point about nuclear is why conduct an experiment in nuclear survivability on the human race as long as there are alternative energy sources available to us. We have barely started to develop renewables.

The Nuclear industry sees global warming as another chance to get their (mutated) foot in the door again, before we really try other (renewable) sources of energy available to us.

ON wind power see www.awea.org. A Government study done in the early to mid 90's determined that the potential for wind power in the U.S. is equal to THREE TIMES the total electrical demand of the country. Power storage technologies (vandium redox flow batteries for one) will enable use of wind power beyond the 20% of total limit without power storage. Wind power should be developed all-out right now. Last year wind power growth was 38%. We should support expansion of Wind Turbine manufacturer's capacity so as to keep up or exceed this growth rate years into the future. At that growth rate we would meet the nations electrical energy requirements in abaout 18 yrs. We would be able to eliminate th euse of coal in about 11 yrs (don't have calculator readily available but I think that's about right).

Wind power is now the cheapest source of power available (4 - 6 cents per KiloWatt Hr) and if Wind FArms were financead along the lines of Coal and Gas plants the cost would go down by 40%. All this without the concerns of radioaactive waste for 14,000 yrs. Any and all renewables should be aggresively developed before we even talk about conducting the nuclear experiment.

Use of wind power in less developed nations (e.g. China) is also more feasible than nuclear (hell almost anything is more feasible than nuclear. The cost in future resources to contain and perhaps deal with unforeseen consequences (i.e. leaks, could be enormous - not just cleaning up theenvironment to make suitable for living things but also how about the health issues after exposure. These resources will be needed to cope with global warming.)

Commercialization of Fuel Cell cars running on hydrocarbons (gasoline or ethanol(preferred) could begin in 10 years (Google: "ethanol fuel cells Acta"). This beat free hydrogen fuel cells by about 10 years. Until then I know most people would love to be able to use ethanol in the ICEs and reduce imported oil:patriot:.

Interesting post. I enjoy hearing the ideas of thinking (and emotionally mature) people. I do agree though, we can blow it on global warming. I just have to believe we will act and act in time.

[JohnWxy]

6. CORRECTION, RATE OF GROWTH WAS 43% in 2005 for Wind Power

[JohnWxy]

7. Union of Concerned Scientists on Reprocessing - with link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=46584&mesg_id=46686


"After reprocessing, the remaining material will be in several different waste forms, and the total volume of nuclear waste will have been increased by a factor of twenty or more, including low-level waste and plutonium-contaminated waste."

[NNadir]

8. Oh please...

You cannot produce one death from Three Mile Island. You are assuming that someone got cancer, but in fact you cannot prove it. No one can, because it seems no such readily identifiable person exists.

Hanford is not a commercial site; it is a weapons site. It's most egregious problems result from 50 year old technology that is no longer used. In any case, the area around Hanford has not become a major site of disease: It has not been necessary to evacuate the cities of Yakima nor Richland even in this egregious case.

You are a very confused kid. In order to determine what will happen in a given period of time with a fission product, you would have to know some chemistry and some physics. You don't know either.

And don't claim that you know anything about global warming either. You don't. If you did have any sense of the scale of the matter you wouldn't be spouting 40 year old stuff about ethanol and conservation as if there is some kind of magic bullet there. There isn't.

Your references to "Star Trek" pretty well define your level by the way. This is why the world has rejected the anti-nuclear argument. It pretty much comes in these kinds of terms.