Savannah River Site Watch
www.srswatch.org
Media Alert
July 28, 2014
Savannah River Site Watch (SRS Watch) Interacts with Secretary of Energy Moniz at “Meet & Greet” – Question about MOX Boondoggle Posed Directly to Moniz and Opposition to German Spent Fuel Import Expressed in Letter to Him
letter to be delivered in person to Secretary Moniz: “Place MOX Construction on Cold Standby; Terminate Plans for German Spent Fuel to SRS”
Columbia, South Carolina — Savannah River Site Watch (SRS Watch), a public interest organization that monitors activities at the Savannah River Site, participated today in a “meet & greet” with Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz on his first visit to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site.
The event will took place at 4:00 p.m. on Monday, July 28 at the Aiken County Applied Research Center, 227 Gateway Drive, Aiken, South Carolina.
Unfortunately, it does not appear that DOE made an effort to invite more public interest groups involved in SRS programs. Given that a number of public interest groups recently were visible at a June 24 DOE meeting on the proposed import of German spent fuel, the groups are known and should have been invited to the meeting, according to SRS Watch. The participation of public interest groups is essential in the SRS decision-making process as they are independent from DOE and contractors and their involvement should be solicited by DOE and not ignored, according to SRS Watch.
SRS Watch director Tom Clements engaged Secretary Moniz on two key SRS issues – the mismanaged plutonium fuel (MOX) project and the ill-conceived scheme to import highly radioactive spent fuel from Germany.
“I requested of Secretary Moniz that DOE follow through with placing the mismanaged MOX construction program on cold standby,” said Clements. “My main message on MOX was to ask of Secretary of Moniz that those DOE and Shaw AREVA MOX Services managers who have allowed the MOX project to run dramatically over budget and behind schedule to be held accountable. As DOE’s credibility has been severely eroded due to the mismanagement of the MOX project, he needs to demonstrate that he will hold those responsible for the boondoggle accountable.”
“In a letter given to him, I informed Secretary Moniz that there is strong opposition to importing highly radioactive commercial spent nuclear power fuel from Germany and request that the proposal be immediately terminated,” said Clements. “There is a feeling in South Carolina and Georgia that we do not want SRS the future of to be a nuclear waste dump and that waste already at the site must be cleaned up. By not inviting more public interest groups to interact with Secretary Moniz, he will likely get a biased view from contractors wishing to profit from dumping German nuclear waste at the site but that viewpoint does not reflect the wider public. Even if he didn’t hear a balance of views about importing more nuclear waste into SRS, over time both Secretary Moniz and DOE will eventually learn that public sentiment is against turning SRS into a waste disposal site.”
See links to four editorials in local papers – Aiken, Augusta, Greenville and Spartanburg – against importing German spent fuel at www.srswatch.org.