The Northwest Compact was poised to forbid the importation
By Judy Fahys
The Salt Lake Tribune
Until now, it appeared chances were slim to none Utah's west desert would become the burial ground for Italy's low-level radioactive waste.
An eight-state panel called the Northwest Compact on Low-Level Radioactive Waste was expected on Thursday to assert that Salt Lake City-based EnergySolutions cannot dispose of waste from Italy's dismantled reactors. And, since Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. announced last month he would use the state's veto power to block the waste import, it looked as though EnergySolutions might have to scrap the multi-billion-dollar Italy contract.
But that might have changed on Monday, when the company filed a lawsuit that asks the U.S. District Court in Utah to declare that the regional group has no say over what happens at the company's privately owned disposal site.
Washington state attorney Michael S. Tribble said there would be no comment on the lawsuit from the compact until the member states discuss it on Thursday.
"They've received it [EnergySolutions' suit] and are preparing to discuss any ramification it might have on their regulatory authority," said Tribble.
Meanwhile, EnergySolutions continues to be on the agenda - but not to ask the compact's blessing to put about 1,600 tons of Italian waste into its mile-square disposal site in Tooele County.
"We're going up there to answer any questions the board might have," said company spokesman Mark Walker.
The company's legal team includes Michael S. Lee, who served for several years as the Utah governor's counsel. Lee played key roles on two nuclear waste issues the state was struggling with during those years: the state government's fight to prevent a storage site for spent reactor fuel from being opened at the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation and efforts to prevent the state Legislature from stripping the governor of approval authority over the EnergySolutions site.
Walker said company policy is that outside attorneys cannot comment on behalf of the company without authorization, so Lee could not speak about his roles in this case.
However, Lisa Roskelley, Huntsman's spokeswoman, said the governor was "highly disappointed" that Lee is working with the company. She added, though, that the state isn't backing down on the Italy waste.
"We are confident that our actions and the actions anticipated by the compact are under the compact's authority," she said.
Congress created the compact more than two decades ago to manage the nation's low-level radioactive waste, which does not include highly contaminated reactor fuel or transuranic waste. Now there are just three low-level disposal sites in the nation: government-owned facilities in South Carolina and Washington state, which only accept waste from certain states, and the Utah site, which now accepts about 98 percent of the nation's waste.
Nearly 20 years ago, the state regulator who oversaw the Tooele County site appeared before the Northwest Compact to ask for an exception that would allow the operation of the site, then called Envirocare of Utah, within the compact's boundaries. A scandal over the relationship between Envirocare's owner and the regulator landed the regulator in federal prison for more than a year.
Now, Huntsman and several members of Congress say that foreign waste should not be permitted in the United States. Huntsman said he would use the state's vote on the compact to block the Italy waste in the absence of a federal policy.
The company has said the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is the proper authority over foreign waste imports.
The federal agency is reviewing the company's request to take 20,000 tons of waste from Italy's dismantled reactors, recycle it in an EnergySolutions plant in Tennessee and dispose of the remaining 1,600 tons in Utah. The agency has already heard from more than 1,600 people in the U.S., Italy and France about the request.
