Dangerous debris.

• Author: Cox, Andrew
• Position: Low-level radioactive waste - Includes related articles

The pressure is off -- at least for now.

South Carolina's June 13 decision to let all states, except North Carolina, uses its Barnwell facility gave everyone a little more time to decide how to dispose of low-level radioactive waste.

The reopening (Barnwell had been closed to states outside the Southeast region) comes as an especially big relief to generators in 31 states who had been storing low-level radioactive waste on business and industrial sites since June 1994. By virtue of the Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Act (LLRWPA) of 1980, those generators had no access to a disposal facility with Barnwell closed.

But Barnwell is only a temporary solution. It will not remain open forever (10 years is about its limit), and states are still responsible for managing commercial low-level radioactive waste under the LLWRPA.

In fact, no new disposal facility has been but since passage of the LLRWPA, and the reopening of Barnwell could further delay the efforts of regional compacts and states to develop new facilities. The opening of Barnwell may encourage states and compacts without long-term solutions to move even more slowly. In the meantime, other ideas are popping up such as consolidating the compacts and reducing the number of facilities currently planned, creating a state and federal partnership, and letting business firms handle low-level waste for a fee.

THE LLRWPA OF 1980

South Carolina was one of the first states to urge Congress to pass the LLRWPA in 1980 because it did not want to be a national dumping ground. Ironically, 15 years later, Barnwell is still open to the entire country through a proviso adopted in the state's 1995 budget bill.

A lawsuit was filed Sept. 7, 1995, against Governor David Beasley, House Speaker David Wilkins and Lieutenant Governor Robert Peeler, who also is president of the Senate, that challenged the authority to reopen Barnwell through a general appropriations act.

The suit was filed by, among others, the Sierra Club, the League of Women Voters and former state Representative Harriet Keyserling.

Before 1980, three states with disposal facilities -- Nevada, South Carolina and Washington -- took in waste from the entire United States. Feeling unfairly burdened, and worried by several accidents, the governors of these states, with the support of the National Governors' Association and the National Conference of State Legislatures, urged Congress to pass the act. It encourages all states to share the responsibility of disposal. The act permits states to band together in compacts, subject to congressional approval, and develop regional disposal facilities.

The incentive for states to join compacts is that they can then exclude waste from outside the compact, whereas states that are not members of compacts must -- under interstate commerce laws -- accept waste from everyone. To date, nine compacts have been formed, with one more awaiting congressional approval. Six states -- Massachusetts, Michigan, New, Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island and South Carolina -- are unaffiliated. The District of Columbia and Puerto Rico also are unaffiliated.

PROGRESS OF COMPACTS

Despite years of effort and expenditures of millions of dollars...