The State of California is responsible for developing a regional disposal facility for low-level radioactive waste generated by universities, medical centers, nuclear power plants, industries, and some government agencies. The California Department of Health Services has issued a license for such a facility at Ward Valley, a remote site in the arid Mojave Desert, eighteen miles from the Colorado River.
The California Radioactive Materials Management Forum is an association of professional societies and public and private institutions and corporations that use radioactive materials and generate low-level radioactive waste. For more information about how society uses radioactive materials and the many governmental findings that the proposed Ward Valley project will be safe, please see Cal Rad’s Web Page at www.calradforum.org or contact:Alan Pasternak, Cal Rad Forum
P.O. Box 1638, Lafayette, CA 94549,
510-283-5210 Fax: 510-283-5219
Groups such as Americans for a Safe Future, Committee to Bridge the Gap, and Physicians for Social Responsibility are concerned that radioactive materials from the facility will migrate through existing pathways to the Colorado River and contaminate the drinking water for Southern California. They are concerned that the proposed dump would be built in unlined trenches, that a similar site has leaked to alarming levels within just 30 years, and that health and liability risks would fall on California residents. The dump contractor claims that most of the waste consists of low level medical waste; however other sources indicate that 98% of the radioactivity would be from nuclear power plants and reactors. For more information on their concerns, see the Ward Valley Web Site: www.envirolink.org/orgs/wardvalley or contact:Derek Chernow, Americans for a Safe Future
409 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica, CA 90404
310-395-2388 Fax: 310-394-5825