Tri-Valley residents have a rare opportunity to stem plutonium increases locally and impact nuclear weapons policy nationally at an upcoming public hearing.
The National Nuclear Security Administration plans to produce 80 or more plutonium bomb cores, called pits, each year to place inside new nuclear warheads.
NNSA wants to turn the Los Alamos Lab in New Mexico and the Savannah River Site in South Carolina into industrial scale pit production sites.
Locally, the NNSA proposes to increase plutonium experiments and testing at Livermore Lab. This includes the Lab’s main plutonium facility and its “shake and bake” facility where plutonium bomb cores and materials undergo multiple tests.
Plutonium accidents and releases have occurred at Livermore Lab. Plutonium has been found in soils near Livermore Lab’s main plutonium facility, in soils near the Lab’s attorneys’ offices, in an offsite air monitor to the east of the Lab, and in nearby parks, including Big Trees Park to the west of the Lab. Weapons grade plutonium has a radioactive half-life of more than 24,000 years.
This is not about science, this is about new nuclear warheads and whether our air, land, water and health may be affected by future releases.
At issue, too, is the transport of plutonium in trucks between the Los Alamos Lab in New Mexico and Livermore Lab. And, there is waste. NNSA says the transuranic wastes will be trucked to Carlsbad, but the state of New Mexico disagrees.
Due to litigation brought by the nonprofit Tri-Valley CAREs and colleagues, NNSA is conducting a Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement on its pit production plans.
The Tri-Valley hearing is Tuesday, May 12. Following a half-hour open house, the hearing will be from 5:30-8 p.m. at the Garre Vineyard Winery, Santa Rosa Room, 7986 Tesla Road, Livermore.
For more information, visit www.trivalleycares.org or https://pitpeis.com/