Number: 1985-19
WHEREAS, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (NWPA), enacted January 7, 1983, confirmed the responsibility of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) for management of high level radioactive waste and directed DOE to provide safe facilities for isolation of high level radioactive waste from the environment in Federally owned and Federally licensed repositories; and
WHEREAS, a technical program is being developed to meet all relevant radiological protection criteria and other requirements established by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and all other provisions of the NWPA; and
WHEREAS, by March 1987 NWPA requires DOE to recommend to the President a single site, chosen from at least five nominated sites, for construction of the first repository; and
WHEREAS, NWPA also requires DOE to select at least three candidate sites, chosen from at least five nominated sites to be recommended to the President by July, 1989, as possible locations for the second repository; and
WHEREAS, serious concern has been expressed about the siting of a high level nuclear waste repository in, or adjacent to, the New York State Adirondack Park, Canyonlands National Park, the Great Lakes Watershed and other such areas; and
WHEREAS, it contradicts the public trust to locate high level nuclear waste repositories in areas where they might significantly impair state, regional, or national recreation areas, significant wildlife habitat, or other natural resources; and
WHEREAS, final guidelines do not fully assure the protection of state and Federal protected lands in that, among other things, the final guidelines:
(1) would protect state parks only where it was found that such parks were “comparably significant” to Federal parks and where the proposed repository would “conflict irreconcilably” with the park,
(2) do not apply to parks, wildlife refuges and other sensitive areas created after January 7, 1983, and
(3) do not unequivocably ban repositories located immediately adjacent to protected areas such as National Parks;
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the National Wildlife Federation in annual meeting assembled March 14-17, 1985 in Arlington, Virginia, expresses its concern that the issue of nuclear waste disposal is an urgent national problem; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the National Wildlife Federation calls upon the U.S. Department of Energy to revise its final siting guidelines to provide for the disqualification of any potential waste disposal site which might significantly impair state, regional, or national recreation areas, significant wildlife habitat, or other natural resources.