New Mexico Levies $54M Against Energy Dept. For Violations At Nuclear Repository

mdsolar notes that New Mexico has asked the US Department of Energy to pay over $54 million in fines stemming from violations that led to the indefinite closure of the nation's only underground nuclear waste repository. The state Environment Department delivered a pair of compliance orders to Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, marking the state's largest penalty ever imposed on the agency. Together, the orders outline more than 30 state permit violations at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in southeastern New Mexico and at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The orders and the civil penalties that come with them are just the beginning of possible financial sanctions the Energy Department could face in New Mexico. The state says it's continuing to investigate and more fines are possible. The focus has been on a canister of waste from Los Alamos that ruptured in one of WIPP's storage rooms in February. More than 20 workers were contaminated and the facility was forced to close, putting in jeopardy efforts around the country to clean up tons of Cold War-era waste."

Re:

[jbengt]

Really?
Why would they need to give Mexico back to South Americans?

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

The end is an absolute idiot? What?

Re: new mexico

[WindBourne]

Why? It was never theirs. Any land ends up belonging to those with the greatest number of ppl. The area claimed by mexico was never theirs. It was owned by native Americans or indian tribes that had 5-10x as many ppl as Mexicans had here. Sadly, the genocide that the Mexicans started in America was continued by the other Europeans that had moved to america.

But to claim that any of this belonged to new Spain or mexico is a joke.

Mostly Smallpox

[Futurepower(R)]

Way off topic, but European diseases such as Smallpox killed Incas [pbs.org]. Quoting: "Even before the arrival of Pizarro, smallpox had already devastated the Inca Empire..." And: "... the viruses tore through the continent, killing an estimated 90% of Native Americans."

Re: Mostly Smallpox

[WindBourne]

Any reason why you quoted something that was NOT in that link? In POF, the link kindof refutes what you said by stating that it killed UP TO 95%, while you unequivocally state that they were killed. In addition, that was in 1400, 3-400 years before mexico would form and then start trying to attack north american Indians.

There were no more Incas.

[Futurepower(R)]

That's one of the problems with Slashdot commenters writing comments that are so off-topic. One person said, "Let's give New mexico back to Mexico." The response was "Right after Mexico gives Mexico back to the Incas."

I intended to say that there were no more Incas, because the Incas contracted European diseases.

Re: The real problem of nuclear is close ties to g

[Rostin]

WIPP was designed, owned, and run by the government, or at least by contractors who may as well be government employees. The problematic waste was packed by employees of Los Alamos National Labs, a government facility. I don't know exactly where you intended to go with this, but I very much doubt anyone involved felt that they were somehow beyond government accountability.

how can New Mexico regulate a federal site?

[Trepidity]

Next maybe they'll fine the military over activities at White Sands Missile Range?

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[ColdWetDog]

You can fine or sue the Federal government all you want. As to whether they care, it's up to them [wikipedia.org].

So much for ...

[CaptainDork]

... Yucky Mountain.

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[Mr D from 63]

Cold war era waste is in all kinds of difficult to manage forms. A system of tight regulation & oversight, including fines for violations, is the best way to deal with it. If there are no fines or violations occurring, then either oversight or regulation is too lax, or both.

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[ultranova]

A system of tight regulation & oversight, including fines for violations, is the best way to deal with it.

But if you let the market take care of it, you'll surely boost sales for bottled water, Fallout 3 style!

Re:

[ColdWetDog]

It's all a bit of political posturing. The Feds can decide if they will allow Nevada to sue them (Federal Tort Claims Act). Thus, the Feds can essentially dictate whether or not they want to give Nevada some money. Everybody knows this. It's just a game.

Re: neo-cons stealing from the feds.

[WindBourne]

He obviously meant NM.

Re: neo-cons stealing from the feds.

[WindBourne]

Name calling? It is no more name calling than referring to Obama as a dem, liberal, or even left-winger.

In addition, nm went from 1 of the top 5 ran states to 2nd to last worst ran state. [247wallst.com]
The level of incomprtence shown by neo-cons like Martinez is nothing less than staggering. She and her cronies took a state in a great position, and destroyed it.

Nuclear disaster area in the United States

[Futurepower(R)]

There is a nuclear disaster area in the United States, the Hanford nuclear site [wikipedia.org]. I've heard about the some of the problems over many years from a manager of one of the departments of the U.S. Department of Energy, and the Wikipedia article mentions some of the problems. Here is one quote:

"Citing the 2014 Hanford Lifecycle Scope Schedule and Cost report, the 2014 estimated cost of the remaining Hanford clean up is $113.6 billion..." [my emphasis] Retrieved Dec. 3, 2014.

Here is another quote from the Hanford Wikipedia article: "From 1944 to 1971, pump systems drew cooling water from the river and, after treating this water for use by the reactors, returned it to the river. Before being released back into the river, the used water was held in large tanks known as retention basin for up to six hours. Longer-lived isotopes were not affected by this retention, and several terabecquerels entered the river every day. These releases were kept secret by the federal government."

What is called cleaning Hanford has now taken more than 50 years. The Wikipedia article is not, at present, completely clear about that fact, apparently because, as the quote above says, the U.S. government managed the information so that it did not get into the news, although much of the information was not actually a secret, but was known to people living in the area.

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[Firethorn]

The only thing I want to point out about Hanford is that it was a nuclear weapons facility, not a nuclear power one.

Sadly, this shows that when it comes to weapons, the USA wasn't that much better than the USSR in keeping it's activities clean.

Re:

[zippthorne]

Yes, thank you for your post, Coal industry.

What is the sources.list entry?

[Optali]

And more importantly, does it work in vanilla Ubuntu or is it Debian Unstable only?