I. OAK RIDGE
II. PADUCAH
III. HEALTH ISSUES
IV. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY (DOE)
V. UNITED STATES ENRICHMENT CORPORATION (USEC)
VI. RUSSIA
VII. URANIUM MANAGEMENT
VIII. URANIUM MARKET
IX. SCRAP METAL

Justin Wilson, policy deputy to Tennessee’s Governor Don Sundquist, has sent a letter to the manager of DOE’s Oak Ridge Operations Office, in which he confirms approval of shipments of liquid waste from DOE facilities in Ohio and Kentucky to Oak Ridge’s Toxic Substances Control Act incinerator (TSCA). According to an article by Paul Parson, he also states in the letter that the governor’s office is considering allowing shipments to the facility from Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory (INEEL) and the Rocky Flats Plant. Frank Munger writes that the state has approved DOE’s "burn plan" for the incinerator, "including limited authority to bring toxic wastes to Oak Ridge from DOE sites in Colorado and Idaho." In February 1999, Sundquist had rejected a request from DOE to burn out-of-state waste in the incinerator, but Sundquist says that DOE has since responded to some of the state’s concerns regarding Oak Ridge. (Paul Parson, Oak Ridger, 7/6/00; Frank Munger, 7/4/00)

Donzettia and Gary Hill of Clinton, Tennessee, are seeking $7 million in compensatory damages from Lockheed Martin Energy Systems (LMES). They claim that Donzettia Hill suffers disabling illnesses and other problems because of unsafe working conditions on property managed by LMES. "LMES negligently failed to maintain the DOE Oak Ridge Reservation, K-25, Y-12 and X-10 [ORNL] premises in a reasonably safe condition." "LMES knew or should have known that toxic metals and/or chemicals, including, but not limited to, beryllium, mercury, nickel and others, the identity of which is presently unknown to Mrs. Hill, were present on the premises, and that these metals and/or chemicals presented a danger to the health and safety of Donzettia Holbrook Hill and others . . . " (Paul Parson, Oak Ridger Online, 7/11/00)

DOE’s "Oak Ridge Gaseous Plant" appeared on the list of major federal facilities that violated the Clean Water Act for at least part of the period from October 1997 through December 1998. The list was obtained from the Environmental Protection Agency by the US Public Interest Research Group through a Freedom of Information Act request. (Gannett News Service, 7/24/00)

DOE’s Office of Inspector General (IG) has released a report showing that DOE contractors at Oak Ridge did not accurately characterize the hazardous and radioactive waste that they generated and stored. For instance, they overstated the inventory of mixed waste (radioactive and hazardous waste) by including the weight of the storage containers in the weight of the waste. "The department could not rely on the (Oak Ridge) data to make informed decisions regarding the amount of mixed and low-level waste to be treated or disposed of, and avoidable costs were incurred." DOE plans to visually inspect 6500 existing containers of waste and to adopt new waste procedures that the

IG recommends. Bechtel Jacobs points out that most of the waste characterization was done before late 1997 when Bechtel Jacobs became manager of the cleanup and waste-management program. (Frank Munger, Knoxville News-Sentinel, 7/7/00)

The Tennessean obtained documents and maps showing that at the K-25 complex, water lines carrying purified drinking water were mistakenly connected for decades with lines carrying impure creek water for fighting fires and cooling machinery. The creek water was contaminated with a variety of toxic substances from nuclear fuel production. Former supervisors told The Tennessean that the contaminated water mixed with the water drunk by thousands of plant workers. The article in The Tennessean was, in part, a preview of a report by a team of three doctors who had been investigating, for DOE, health problems of workers at the K-25 plant. They released their report August 1. (Tennessean, 7/30/00)

II. PADUCAH

US District Court Judge Thomas Russell has stepped aside as judge in a lawsuit brought by 700 plant workers and former workers against past operators of the Paducah plant. In the past the judge had represented Martin Marietta, Lockheed Martin, and Union Carbide in fighting compensation claims made by workers. He maintained that this legal work did not cause a conflict of interest, but said that he stepped aside because he realized that he knew well "some of the parties" in the suit. Lawyers for the plaintiffs had demanded that the judge remove himself from the case. (James Malone, Courier Journal, 7/9/00; Associated Press, 7/1/00)

DOE has released a "Feasibility Study for the Groundwater Operable Unit at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant" (DOE/OR/07-1857 & D1). The study discusses cleanup of groundwater contamination under and around the Paducah site. The contaminants of greatest concern are the radionuclide technetium-99 and the degreaser trichloroethylene. Two hundred thousand gallons of the latter leaked into the water table. The study presents eight options for public comment. They range from doing nothing (the contaminants would degrade through natural processes in 7000 plus years) to undertaking a $917 million project that would include ozone injection, underground vaporizers, an electrical grid, and an underground dike. The costly project would destroy the chemicals in fifteen years, DOE believes; but would necessitate the drilling of hundreds of off-site monitoring and injection wells. July 18 DOE held a public meeting to discuss the options. DOE will accept public comments until November 9. (Paducah Sun, 7/15/00; James Malone, Courier-Journal, 7/19/00)

Drum Mountain

The Kentucky Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Cabinet (KNREP) issued a notice of violation of clean air standards against DOE after a state inspector saw dust coming from the conveyor belt that feeds into a bailer the drums in the Drum Mountain waste dump that have been shredded. "Reasonable precautions were not being taken to prevent particulate matter from becoming airborne," said the notice. A DOE spokesperson said that the problem was quickly remedied by improving the spraying of water onto the moving waste. DOE could be fined up to $25,000 a day for each of two violations, but as of the end of July KNREP had not been able to revisit the site and had not decided what action to take. (Gil Gideon, Courier Journal, 28/7/00; M. York, KNREP, Personal Communication)

As of July 29, only 8% of the estimated 85,000 drums in Drum Mountain had been removed. Bechtel Jacobs, which has a contract to remove the drums, has subcontracted the work to USEC, Inc. Problems with the bailer and the conveyor belt have slowed the work. As a result, USEC is considering modifying the removal process. (Bill Bartleman, Paducah Sun, 7/28/00)

USEC announced July 25 that it has completed the structural changes to the C-331 and C-335 process buildings that the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) required to make these buildings resistant to earthquakes. The changes will allow the plant to operate at higher power levels when needed, as well as provide earthquake protection. The project was part of the Compliance Plan, agreed to by USEC in 1996. Other buildings at the site needed no alterations to meet NRC requirements. (Joe Walker, Paducah Sun, 7/28/00; USEC press release, 7/25/00)

A study commissioned by British Nuclear Fuels found that workers in uranium processing plants who are exposed to radiation may be at increased risk of lung cancer. David McGeoghegan from Westlakes Scientific Consulting in Cumbria analyzed the health records of 19,500 people who worked at the Springfields Uranium fuel fabrication plant in the United Kingdom between 1946 and 1995. He found that 225 people suffered from lung cancer, and that those who had been exposed to higher levels of radiation suffered more lung cancers. The association between work and lung cancer only becomes statistically significant twenty years after exposure. (Rob Edwards, New Scientist, 8/7/00)

IV. US DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY (DOE)

The version of the Energy and Water Appropriations Bill for FY 2001 approved by the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee includes three projects for the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant: $33 million for conversion of depleted uranium; $78 million for cleanup work; and $1.75 million for an epidemiological study of workers to be conducted by the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville. (Presumably the bill provides similar funding for the Portsmouth Plant, but when we were drawing up the newsletter we could not reach anybody who could confirm this.) As of the end of July, the bill had not been voted on by the full Senate. Furthermore, the version of the bill that the House passed differs from the Senate version. (Paducah Sun, 7/14/00)

V. UNITED STATES ENRICHMENT CORPORATION (USEC)

Certain sources are regarding as over-optimistic the statement by Howard Pulley, USEC’s manager at the Paducah plant, that a substitute for the coolant freon has been field tested and could be in use in less than two years. (See July UEN.) They say that substitutes have indeed been field tested, but that they were not found to work efficiently. In a September 10, 1999 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, USEC stated that freon leaks from plant facilities at about a 6% rate. Thus leaks amount to 750,000 pounds per year. At that time USEC had a "strategic inventory" of 2.0 million pounds, which it believed "should be adequate to allow the plants to continue to utilize freon through at least calendar year 2001." The company was working on developing a substitute, the report said.

USEC announced July 11 that it has signed a ten-year electricity supply contract with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). The contract runs from September 1, 2000-May 31, 2010. Prices are fixed through May 2006, but include summer and non-summer rates. After that date, prices will change from year to year. According to the agreement, TVA will gradually become USEC’s primary source of electricity as its other electricity contracts come to an end. USEC believes that the contract with TVA will enable it to reduce the cost of a unit of enriched uranium by some twenty-five percent. According to Nuclear Fuel, TVA will receive credit for $45 million in electricity costs in FY 2001 against TVA’s future purchases of enrichment services. As security, TVA will hold a portion of USEC’s uranium hexafluoride (UF6) inventory (Paducah Sun, 7/12/00; Nuclear Fuel 7/24/00)

July 18 Congressman Ted Strickland, an Ohio Democrat, introduced legislation that would direct the government to buy back the United States Enrichment Corporation. A new, government-owned corporation called the United States Enrichment Enterprise would take over USEC’s stock and assets. USEC’s debtors and investors would be compensated. Specifically the legislation (HR 4883) directs an appointed Transition Manager, working with DOE and the Department of Treasury to draft a plan to reacquire 100% of USEC’s assets and authorizes the government to implement the plan thus created.

For the fiscal year (FY) ending June 30, 2000, USEC reported a gross profit of $233.6 million as opposed to $346.6 million for FY1999. After taking into account special charges and an inventory adjustment, USEC had a net income of $8.9 million in FY 2000 as compared to $152.4 million in FY 1999. For the fourth quarter of FY 2000, USEC reported a net loss of $62.4 million. In the fourth quarter of FY 1999, USEC had, instead of a loss, a net income of $41.0 million.

Earnings for FY 2000 reflect lower revenue due to the lower average SWU price billed to customers and also due to lower production levels and higher unit costs as a result of purchases of greater quantities of Separative Work Units (SWU) from Russia, USEC said. The average SWU price billed to customers declined 7% and revenue from the sale of SWU shrank by $87.2 million-from $1475.0 to $1387.8 million. SWU from Russia represented 41% of USEC’s supply mix in FY 2000 in contrast to 31% in FY 1999.

To bolster its income in FY 2000, USEC sold from its inventory, uranium valued at $101.6 million. Uranium valued at $56.7 million was sold in the fourth quarter of FY 2000. During all of FY 1999 USEC sold uranium valued at only $53.6 million. The average market price of uranium sank 9% during the year (in part because of USEC’s sales from its inventory), but, because of downward pressure on uranium prices at the end of the fiscal year, the market price on June 30, 2000, was actually 22% lower than that on June 30, 1999. The value of the USEC’s uranium inventory is based on the market price of uranium. Therefore, $19.5 million was charged against the company’s income for FY 2000 to reflect the decline in the value of its uranium inventory. (USEC press release, 7/26/00)

VI. RUSSIA

USEC has petitioned the US Department of Commerce for exclusive permission to import from Russia for up to two years one million separative work units (SWU) per year of commercial enriched uranium. One million SWU would equal about 15% of USEC's annual sales. The imports would be part of an arrangement with the Russian agent Techsnabexport (Tenex), according to which, from 2002 through 2013, Tenex would lower the price it charges USEC for uranium that has been down blended from nuclear weapons. Today USEC pays a fixed price of approximately $88 per SWU, although the spot price is about $80 per SWU. The current price agreement expires in 2002. Reportedly the new agreement would allow USEC to purchase blended-down uranium in the low sixties per SWU, and commercial Russian SWU at $60 per SWU. The National Security Council and the State Department support USEC's request because they think that it would strengthen the US-Russian HEU agreement. Representatives of uranium mining and conversion companies and some members of Congress strenuously oppose the arrangement. Also opposed to the agreement is Energy Secretary Richardson. DOE has refused to approve the draft agreements. (Nancy Dunne, Financial Times 5/27/00; Michael Knapik, Nuclear Fuel, 5/29/00; Nancy Dunne and Matthew Jones, Financial Times, 6/3/00; www.nuke-energy.com/data/other/usec_portsmouth.html).

May 5 Russia's minister of atomic energy informed US Energy Secretary Richardson that it would stop shipping down-blended uranium to the United States, because Russia feared that payment for the uranium would be seized as a result of litigation by the Swiss trading company Noga. Noga has filed suits in Paducah and in New York to recover a more than $64 million international arbitration award against Russia, stemming from debts unrelated to uranium. June 22 President Clinton issued an executive order declaring that the holdup of Russian uranium shipments posed an " unusual and extraordinary" proliferation threat and created a "national emergency." He declared that Russian assets directly relating to implementation of the US-Russian HEU agreement cannot be attached. The order allows Russia to resume uranium shipments. However, as Joe Walker of the Paducah Sun observes, it could lead to "a court battle between the executive and the judicial branches of the US government." (Text of Executive Order, US Newswire, 6/22/00; Associated Press, 6/22/00, printed in the Las Vegas Sun; Joe Walker, The Paducah Sun 6/24/00)

VII. URANIUM MANAGEMENT

In response to Section 3172 of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY 2000, DOE has issued an Integrated Materials Management Plan. The report addresses the integrated management of national security materials, non-national security materials, and excess materials. The plan does not discuss nuclear materials in low-level, high-level, and transuranic waste. The nuclear materials that are evaluated are grouped in the following categories: uranium materials, plutonium materials, spent nuclear fuel, and other nuclear materials such as sealed sources and special isotopes. The uranium materials covered are high-enriched uranium (HEU), low-enriched uranium, natural uranium, depleted uranium, and uranium 233. Among the plan’s purposes is providing "the first consolidated account to Congress and the public of the department’s unclassified inventory of nuclear materials and a description of how and where we manage these materials."

DOE has in the past withdrawn 174 metric tons (MT) of HEU from the weapons program and declared them to be excess. They are stored at the following sites: Idaho (23 MT), Oak Ridge (85 MT), Pantex (17 MT), Portsmouth (22 MT), Savanna River (22 MT), and Other sites (5 MT). The Y-12 plant at Oak Ridge is DOE’s primary facility for storing and processing HEU. DOE plans to build a new HEU Materials Facility at Oak Ridge to store high-quality HEU. It hopes to construct at Oak Ridge an as-yet-unauthorized Enriched Uranium Manufacturing Facility to blend, process, or recover HEU, for weapons purposes only. DOE has already transferred ownership of 62 MT of its 174 MT of surplus HEU to USEC. USEC will receive 48 MT of the 62 MT over the next six years, as specified in the USEC Privatization Act. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) will receive 30 to 40 MT of off-specification HEU for use in its reactors. Half will be down-blended at Savanna River; half at an undetermined commercial facility. DOE is in the process of deciding how to dispose of the balance of the excess HEU.

DOE has not yet decided how to dispose of its low-enriched uranium and natural uranium. The depleted uranium will be converted, as already set forth in a Record of Decision. Uranium 233 is stored at Oak Ridge and at INEEL; future management options are being evaluated.

Disposal of Converted DUF6 

The Department of Energy has released an Assessment of Preferred Depleted Uranium Disposal Forms (ORNL/TM-2000/161), prepared for the department by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The department intends to convert the depleted uranium hexafluoride now stored in cylinders at the gaseous diffusion sites to depleted uranium tetrafluoride (UF4), depleted uranium oxide (UO2 or U3O8) and/or depleted uranium metal. The report will guide the department in disposing of the converted uranium if uses cannot be found for the material. The authors found that all of the potential conversion products are suitable for near-surface disposal. They prefer the Nevada Test Site (NTS) for the disposal site, "because of its unique geohydrologic and institutional setting." Envirocare would be "questionable," due to certain restrictions on the types of materials it can accept.

Of the four potential forms, depleted UO2 would be most useful, followed by metal. Neither depleted U3O8 nor UF4 has any direct uses. However, the estimated cost for converting 700,000 MT of depleted UF6 and packaging, transporting, and disposing of the product is lowest for UF4--from $730M to 1100M. The oxides would cost $1200M-$1500M. Metal would be most expensive at $2500M. The fact that DOE’s stockpile of depleted UF6 includes UF6 generated by USEC would not give the NRC jurisdiction over disposal activities at NTS. The report, which was written by A. G. Croff et al., is available at the Web site: www.ne.doe.gov/

Starmet

Starmet Corporation in Concord, Massachusetts, has announced that it has received a Phase II Small Business Innovative Research (SIR) contract from DOE to further develop methods for making fluoride gases used for chemical vapor deposition in the manufacture of photovoltaic and semiconductor devices. The contract will assist in the full-scale commercialization of Starmet’s Fluorine Extraction Process for the production of germanium tetrafluoride and tungsten hexafluoride. The process can be used to extract the fluorine from the stockpile of depleted uranium hexafluoride now in storage at the three enrichment plants. According to Starmet, other processes for converting depleted uranium hexafluoride to uranium oxide produce only low-grade hydrofluoric acid. In contrast, Starmet can make high purity fluoride compounds. Starmet press release, 7/13/00)

In a letter to Carol Browner, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Governor Paul Caleche of Connecticut has asked that the Starmet site in West Concord be added to the National Priority List, known as the Superfund list. Starmet, formerly Nuclear Metals, made penetrators of depleted uranium for the Army for several decades. From 1958 to 1986 it dumped waste from the penetrator manufacturing process into an unlined holding basin on its property. Experts retained by a Concord citizens organization charge that, unless intervention occurs, the waste will eventually reach nearby aquifers and the Assabet River. (Tom McLain, Sun, 7/14/00)

Scientists at DOE’s Brookhaven National Laboratory have received a patent for a process that encapsulates depleted uranium oxides in thermoplastic polymers. Uranium oxide powders and non-biodegradable thermoplastic polymers are simultaneously heated and mixed to form a product that can be molded into special shapes and that forms a dense solid when cooled. The final form is said to "emit very low levels of radioactivity" and is reportedly suitable for counter weights and for shields against gamma and neutron radiation. (Environment News Service, 7/19/00)

VIII. URANIUM MARKET

Uranium 1999: Resources, Production and Demand, the latest edition of the "Red Book" published by the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Office of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reports that producers of new uranium currently supply only about 60% of world demand. The remainder is met by the drawdown of civilian and military stockpiles, uranium recovered from the reprocessing of irradiated fuel, and the re-enrichment of depleted uranium.

Energy Resources International, Inc. (ERI), based in Washington, DC, reports that it does not expect uranium prices to exceed $12/lb (in constant 2000 dollars) over the next ten years. It anticipates that the European enrichers will increase their share of the US market from 18% in 1999 to 25% in 2000 with all the increase being made by Urenco. Prices for SWU could rise somewhat in the coming years, but in 2005 prices can be expected to be between $80 and $88 per SWU depending on circumstances. (Nuclear Fuel, 7/10/00)

The US Energy Information Administration’s 1999 uranium industry report states that US utilities bought 10.0 million SWU under enrichment contracts in 1999. USEC’s two plants provided 46% of that amount; and foreign enrichment plants the balance. These figures represent a decrease for USEC, which provided 56% in 1998.

The conversion industry, like the enrichment industry, is in the doldrums. In the past two years the price that the Honeywell plant in Metropolis, Illinois, receives for converting uranium oxide to uranium hexafluoride has decreased by more than half, going from $5.50 to $2.50 for a kilogram of hexafluoride, as foreign competition gluts the market. (Associated Press, 7/24/00)

IX. SCRAP METAL

July 13 Secretary of Energy Bill Richardson suspended release of potentially contaminated scrap metals for recycling from DO sites. "I am making this decision to ensure American consumers that scrap metal released from Energy Department facilities for recycling contains no detectable contamination from departmental activities," Richardson said. "The suspension will remain in effect until our sites can confirm that they meet this new more rigorous standard." DOE is also beginning a feasibility study on the possibility of recycling steel from decommissioned facilities into items such as waste containers for use by DOE. Wenonah Hauter of Public Citizen points out that Richardson’s action is a "discretionary decision, not a regulation. It lasts only as long as Secretary Richardson or the next secretary of the Department of Energy keeps it in effect." Furthermore, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) will continue to work on setting a standard for the amount of radiation that the public can be exposed to from products containing recycled materials from government and commercial plants. (DOE press release, 7/13/00; Public Citizen press release, 7/14/00)