Organizing for America | Dianne Valentin's Blog: The National Nuclear Security Administration's Draft SPEIS for Complex Transformation

The National Nuclear Security Administration's Draft SPEIS for Complex Transformation

By Dianne - Feb 23rd, 2008 at 2:13 am EST

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The National Nuclear Security Administration and the U. S. Department of Energy are in the process of engaging in public hearings on the Draft Supplemental Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (SPEIS) for what is being calling "Complex Transformation". Complex Transformation is the governments project to build new nuclear weapons. They are taking public comments on this issue and they can be submitted by postal mail, by regular mail, and by fax.

Please go to www.complextransformationspeis.com to see the documents and information presented by the NNSA at the public hearing held on Thursday

1. Written comments can be mailed to:

Mr. Ted Wyka, NNSA

Office of Transformation NA-10.1

1000 Independence Ave., S.W.

Washington, D.C. 20585

2. Written comments can be e-mailed to:

complextransformation@nnsa.doe.gov

3. Written comments can be faxed using the number:

1.703.931.9222

On Thursday, February 21st I spoke, along with many others ranging in age from 12 years to at least 86 years of age, at the first of eighteen SPEIS public hearings that will be held across the country on this issue by the National Nuclear Security Administration and the Department of Energy.

George W. Bush and Dick Chaney are determined to build new nuclear weapons. This is not the first time that we have had to deal with this issue and it comes to us again under a different name. The last time that we had to deal with it they called it Complex 2030, this time they are calling it Complex Transformation.

When they proposed it before, they did not expect the public out cry that was raised. They received approximately 32,000 public comments on that previous Environmental Impact Statement, the NNSA told us that of those, 30,000 of the comments were in opposition to the project.

We used grassroots efforts to compel our congressional representatives to remove the billions of dollars in funding from the federal budget that the Department of Energy wanted for Complex 2030, something else that they had not expected.

One of my colleagues refers to what they are doing as "putting old wine in new bottles" thinking that we won't know that they are doing the same project if they change the name of the project and change a few of the most benign details like downsizing the square footage of the facilities. The bottom line is that they still want to make new nuclear warheads when the 10,000 that we have still work perfectly well, (6,000 of which are on hair trigger alert), using billions of dollars that we can't afford.

In addition to my oral comments, I have submitted written comments via e-mail and would like to urge you to do the same, particularly if you are an environmentalist, a fiscal conservative, someone who would rather see our dollars spent on meeting unmet human needs of those in our country, or a peace activist.

Your comments can be as long or as short as you desire. Please submit your comments using any of the three methods listed above. I am hoping that you will be opposed to the creation of new nuclear warheads although their documents give the impression that they are downsizing, they are actually reconfiguring to begin to create new and what they consider more efficient nuclear warheads. (they have a section listed as assembly/disassembly, we don't need any assembly) The nuclear weapons that we currently have are quite sufficient.

Please read my written submission below, my goal was to go on record as having asked them to include and consider certain things when they create their final SPEIS document and Record of Decision. If enough people ask for something they have to provide it.

Greetings Mr. Wyka,

I hope this message reaches you well and enjoying your day.

My name is Dianne Valentin and I am saying no to the NNSA's Complex Transformation project at any location in this country.

Nuclear weapons adversely affect each of the categories listed on you SPEIS Impact Assessment list. The creation and development of new nuclear weapons cannot be separated from the process by which they are made. Land, Air Quality, Water Resources, Waste Management, Environmental Justice, Human Health, Transportation, and Cumulative Impacts are all specifically what I wish to speak on.

I am requesting that the Environmental Impact Statement provide details on:

how uranium mining and milling needed to produce the new nuclear weapons that are being proposed will not adversely affect communities, which are primarily minority and poor, their water supplies, and their land.
how uranium mining and milling needed to produce the new nuclear weapons that are being proposed will not adversely affect the climate with its release of toxins, including but not limited to CO2, into the atmosphere, in any way, (including all emissions that take place with the use of coal fired plants).
how any health study that the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), any related organizations, their contracted, or commissioned entities have done, not only use what is known as reference man or standard man to develop its health effects data, but has researched and compiled data and statistics on how nuclear weapons waste, or any other nuclear materials affect the most vulnerable of us, including children, pregnant women, the elderly, and those with compromised health. Does it not matter to you that by not using the most vulnerable when developing this data that these toxins and contaminants may be causing the rise that we see in our country in birth defects, developmental defects such as autism, and chronic childhood asthma? You know that tritium passes through the placenta and can cause defects that affect that family through more than one generation if the fetus is female, because the eggs are within that female fetus already so they are also adversely affected. Why is this project worth that?
how the NNSA intends to deal with the radioactive waste materials generated by the creation and production of these new nuclear weapons.
how the NNSA intends to deal with the radioactive waste materials already generated by the creation and production of the existing nuclear weapons
how, with a shrinking water supply in the regions targeted, the communities affected will not be compromised in any way by the amount of water used by these facilities.
how tritium releases will be monitored and by whom.
how tritium releases will be halted.
how transport of any of the materials needed in this process will be safely executed whether by road, rail, waterway, or air.
why the nuclear weapons that we already have are not sufficient for our nation's self defense.

As I said in my testimony yesterday, February 21, 2008, in South Carolina, what the Department of Energy is doing with nuclear weapons creation and development is wrong from a moral perspective, a fiscal perspective, and an environmental perspective.

Morally wrong because we don't need new and more efficient ways to indiscriminately kill millions of people at once to be secure as a nation. Morally wrong because you know that mining and mill tailings have ruined Native American lands and waters. Morally wrong because these toxins and contaminants may very well be the cause of the increases that we see in chronic childhood asthma, autism, and other physical & developmental disorders in children. Morally wrong because you know that nuclear industry workers who are not executives and engineers are still riddled with work related illnesses. Morally wrong because you know that these programs are being kept alive, (even though the people of this country have spoken out in huge numbers against them whatever name you tag on it), because some government insider wants these contracts and the lions share of the money related to these nuclear projects to go to affiliated entities. (My heart sank over and over again when I read the long list of contractor's names that were hired for a previous EIS that was done; after each name, Haliburton was listed as who he or she was affiliated with.) Will any of you there, being paid with tax payer dollars, be willing to stand up for the American people? We are who you ultimately work for. You know that we cannot afford this and you know that we do not need this. Remember what the eighteen year old who spoke yesterday said? You guys are smart.

Fiscally wrong because this country does not have the money for, nor do we need, anymore nuclear weapons. The money that is being spent on this process as well and the project that it proposes could be used for unmet human needs that we currently face in this country. Our health care systems, our education systems, our diplomatic corp, our rapid (and thorough) responses to our natural disasters, our enlisted military pay and family care, our research and development into a number of areas including alternative energy sources, and our advancements in non-war related science and engineering. Again, with the debt that we are carrying, you know that we cannot afford this.

It is environmentally wrong because the nuclear fuel cycle is dirty, extremely and irreversibly polluting. The long-term radioactive waste that is produced on both ends of the fuel cycle are so harmful to this environment we may never recover if you continue on this path. Every aspect of our environment is adversely affected.

The air, with toxic mining and milling emissions which include but are not limited to CO2.
Our water when only one third of it is returned to our waterways and what is returned is thermally affected, and water that has been affected by tritium's radioactive contamination (once that is done you cannot undo it), the fish that ingest the radioactive water and subsequently the local people who consume the fish as one of their food sources.
The earth with the radioactive materials being buried and seeping into the soil affecting vegetation, the animals that eat the vegetation and subsequently, the people who eat the vegetation and the animals.

It is no longer acceptable for our government entities to use what is commonly know as Reference Man or Standard Man when gathering, compiling, and putting out data and statistics related to this area (nuclear weapons development), when our most vulnerable are the ones who are so terribly affected. Until you can prove that these radioactive nuclear, and nuclear related materials do not have adverse affects on children, pregnant women, the elderly, and those with compromised health, the project needs to be stopped in its tracks. Regardless of how much you think that it will cost to do this, that cost pales in comparison to the damage that it does and will do to our health and environment.

You heard the young students aged 12 through 18 years of age speak on this yesterday. Their voices and their words were compelling, they moved me. They made me know that there are millions of reasons why I fight this nuclear madness. They are not just our future, they are our present. They are here now breathing this air, drinking this water, eating food produced on this earth.

The NNSA and the Department of Energy will be looked upon as committing crimes against humanity and as having perpetuated the encroaching environmental holocaust without ever dropping one bomb. These entities and the people working for them and running them are committing these acts by engaging in the activities required to build these nuclear weapons.

Use the money that would be saved by closing the facilities that you plan to close, to clean up the radioactive mess that has already been made by nuclear weapons production. As you know, we have not successfully dealt with even the very first bit of waste generated by the nuclear industry well over fifty years ago.

As I stated yesterday, the NNSA and the Department of Energy should be ashamed and embarrassed to use terms like "Centers of Excellence", "special nuclear materials", and "Complex Transformation" relative to nuclear weapons. It shows such disrespect for the people of this great country.

Peace
Dianne

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