International Response:  Negotiations Stall on Anti-Terrorism Treaties

By Jim Wurst
Global Security Newswire

UNITED NATIONS — A week-long negotiating session on two incomplete treaties on terrorism ended Friday as it began Monday: unable to find a way to distinguish a terrorist from a freedom fighter and unable to agree on excluding state forces from anti-terrorism provisions.

An ad hoc committee of the General Assembly's Legal Committee picked up where it left off in October with a draft comprehensive convention on terrorism.  The 12 existing so-called “sectoral” treaties that outlaw specific acts (hijacking airplanes, laundering money) have been able to avoid defining terrorism since in these treaties terrorism is defined by the act, but since this text is meant to cover all aspects of the problem, the burden of a definition has fallen on these negotiators.

The current draft article on definitions consists of a list of offenses that if committed by “any person” or “a group of persons acting with a common purpose” would constitute a terrorist act.  Such offenses include “death or serious bodily injury,” “serious damage to public or private property,” and actions taken “with the aim of furthering criminal activity.”

The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which has 58 member states, wants to include the provision that “peoples’ struggle including armed struggle against foreign occupation … shall not be considered a terrorist crime.”  This apparent reference to the Palestinians’ struggle against Israel is opposed by the Western states.  No headway was made on this contentious point.

The other controversy left unsolved is how far the use of force by the armed forces of states can be excluded from the definition of terrorism.  This question of scope is also closely tied to the conflict in the Middle East, but the OIC insists its proposals are relevant outside of that region.

The current wording says “the activities of armed forces during an armed conflict ... are not governed by this convention” and that “activities undertaken by the military forces of a state in the exercise of their official duties, inasmuch as they are governed by other rules of international law, are not governed by this convention.”  The OIC wants to change the first phrase to read, “the activities of the parties during an armed conflict, including in situations of foreign occupation … are not governed by this convention.”  The Islamic states would replace the phrase “governed by” international law with “in conformity with international law” and drop the phrase “other rules.”

A delegate from an OIC state said replacing “armed forces” with “parties” and “governed by” with “in conformity with” would be “a strong statement of law.”  In an interview, the delegate also said the phrase “governed by other rules” needed to be dropped because it could be used by states to claim national law supercedes international law.  While these two points make sense on a practical level, a Western delegate said, the political issues involved made any agreement difficult.

Committee Chairman Rohan Perera of Sri Lanka, said this issue of scope “is indeed the crux” of the problem and called on delegates “to be creative” in finding a way out of the impasse.  Richard Rowe, an Australian diplomat who was coordinator of the talks, wrote in his report that the understanding of governments’ positions had been “enhanced” and that “the issues for which we need to find broadly acceptable solutions have been more sharply clarified.”

The issue of scope is also being scrutinized on human rights grounds. Two leading human rights groups, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, issued a joint letter on Monday saying,  “the draft convention could undercut the laws of war by criminalizing acts committed in an internal armed conflict that are not prohibited by humanitarian law.  The draft text also has a loophole that could allow military forces during peacetime to commit acts of ‘terrorism’ that would neither be covered by the convention nor by humanitarian law.”  Some states, including European Union members, have attempted to address this issue by proposing new language to the preamble specifically on the “protection of human rights.”

Scope is also the stumbling block to the second draft terrorism treaty before the committee. A draft on the suppression of nuclear terrorism, originally proposed by Russia, would make it illegal for any “person” to use a “nuclear explosive device” or release radioactive material in any other manner, such as damaging a nuclear power plant. Definition is not an issue in this case since, unlike the comprehensive treaty, the act defines the terrorist. The rule governing the armed forces of states is the problem.

The current draft says, “the activities of armed forces during an armed conflict, as those terms are understood under international humanitarian law, which are governed by that law are not governed by this Convention.”  This wording leaves open the question of whether the use of nuclear weapons by a state would be legal since such use is not explicitly banned by international humanitarian law. States that want to prohibit the use of nuclear weapons do not like this ambiguity.

Mexico has proposed adding this sentence: “The Convention does not address, nor can it be interpreted as addressing, in any way the issue of the legality of the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons by states.”  A Mexican delegate said this addition would “expressly clarify” that the nuclear weapon states could not use the text as permitting nuclear weapon use.  Mexico, one of the most vocal proponents of nuclear disarmament, believes the legality issue should be addressed in disarmament forums, the delegate said.  The OIC delegate called the proposal “good but irrelevant” since it would leave in place the “exceptional” status of the nuclear weapon states.

The committee is not scheduled to reconvene until October.

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U.S. Response I:  Members of Congress Criticize Bush’s “Axis of Evil”

On their return yesterday from a security conference in Munich, U.S. legislators from both parties criticized U.S. President George W. Bush’s harsh rhetoric toward North Korea, Iraq and Iran in his State of the Union speech last week (see GSN, Jan. 30).

“I’d just as soon not have seen that in the speech,” said Senator Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.).  He said the United States should follow Theodore Roosevelt’s advice to “speak softly and carry a big stick.”

“It was reckless rhetoric to lump all three countries together,” said Representative James Moran (D-Va.).

Bush created confusion by including North Korea in his “axis of evil,” since the main problem with North Korea is proliferation, not terrorism, said Representative Tom Allen (D-Maine).  “It’s not connected to al-Qaeda,” Allen said.

In addition, Brent Scowcroft, national security adviser during the first Bush administration said, “I really don’t know what it was designed to do.”

“It stood out from the rest of the address,” he said (Thomas Ricks, Washington Post, Feb. 4).

European Response

European delegates at the Munich conference added their concerns about the hostile tone of Bush’s recent remarks, according to reports (see GSN, Feb. 1).

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said he found no evidence that Iran, Iraq or North Korea sponsors terrorism and cautioned that any action against the three countries must conform to international law.

The West defines terrorism with a double standard, Ivanov said, and he questioned why Chechnyan rebels were not also considered terrorists.  Ivanov said Russia has its own list of “rogue states” that support terrorism. 

“Well, we don’t like some of your allies, like Saudi Arabia or Gulf States who give finance to terrorism organizations,” Ivanov said (Daniel Rubin, Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 4).

Ivanov said Russia shares U.S. concerns about the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, but such concerns should not be limited to Iran, Iraq and North Korea alone.

“As far as nonproliferation issues are concerned there is a serious problem and threat, but that should not be limited to these three countries,” Ivanov said (Reuters/New York Times, Feb. 2).

Some European officials said they were concerned the United States has grown so technologically and militarily advanced that it no longer needs to listen to European allies.

“There is a danger that the Europeans and the Americans in pursuing terrorism may diverge in their points of view,” said Karl Lamers, foreign policy spokesman for Germany’s opposition Christian Democratic Party.  “We want to participate, which is why I would ask our American friends to bring us along in the formation of strategy, instead of you doing it and asking us to trot along behind.”

“We are losing our punch and our political influence,” said Christian Democrat leader Angela Merkel (Thomas Ricks, Washington Post, Feb. 3). 

The United States needs to “do much more” to help the military forces of its European allies by sharing more technology, NATO Secretary General Lord Robertson said yesterday.  He said that without increased U.S. technology transfers and industrial cooperation, it would become impossible for NATO forces to operate effectively alongside U.S. troops.

“For Washington, the choice could become:  act alone or not at all, and that is no choice at all,” Robertson said (Agence France-Presse/Times of India, Feb. 3).

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U.S. Response II:  Ridge Supports Private Nuclear Plant Guards

Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge said Sunday that he opposes federalizing nuclear power plant security guards (see GSN, Dec. 7, 2001).

The federal government’s role in nuclear power plant security should be setting plant security standards, Ridge said on NBC’s Meet the Press.

“There is a role here for the federal government,” Ridge said,  “[but] those who own the nuclear power plants have to provide [security].”

Legislation has been introduced in the U.S Senate that would federalize all nuclear power plant security forces.  The nuclear energy industry and U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Richard Meserve have opposed the bill (see GSN, Jan. 18).  Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev.), one of the sponsors of the legislation, said Friday that he plans to continue to push for its passage (Associated Press/New York Times, Feb. 3).

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North Korea:  U.S. Seeks Talks with North Korea, Despite Bush Statement

The United States is still willing to conduct talks with North Korea, despite U.S. President George W. Bush’s statement last week that North Korea is part of an “axis of evil,” U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell told South Korean Foreign Affairs Minister Han Song-su Friday (see GSN, Jan. 30).

South Korean officials had expressed concern Bush’s statement would make dialogue with North Korea more difficult (see GSN, Jan. 31).  Powell did not, however, try to smooth over Bush’s claim that North Korea poses a threat to international security, a State Department spokesman said.

Bush’s statement signaled a new bump in a frequently rough road of North Korean-U.S. relations, according to some experts.

“I’m coming to believe that the administration is not open to negotiation, which raises the question, what does one do about these problems if you don’t even explore the diplomatic option,” Robert Gallucci, who negotiated the 1994 Agreed Framework nuclear pact with North Korea, said.

Bush’s statement on North Korea, however, could “galvanize people to say, ‘This is important.’  We’ll meet anytime, anyplace, without preconditions, but they’ve refused so far,” a State Department official said.

The Clinton administration had attempted to negotiate with North Korea, but the Bush administration suspended the talks when it came into office, according to the Washington Post.  The United States attempted to restart talks on nuclear proliferation and other weapons programs in June, but North Korea balked, according to the Post.  Meanwhile, North Korea has purchased materials for ballistic missile production facilities and “continued its attempts to procure technology worldwide that could have applications to its nuclear program,” according to an unclassified CIA report (see GSN, Jan. 31).

U.S. diplomats met with South Korean and Japanese officials days before Bush’s State of the Union speech to discuss policy regarding North Korea, and on the day of Bush’s speech, administration officials hinted that talks with North Korea were about to resume, the Post reported (Peter Slevin, Washington Post, Feb. 2).

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Pakistan:  Four Scenarios Considered for Nuclear Weapons Use

Pakistan might consider using nuclear weapons against India, even if Pakistan didn’t face an extreme military crisis with India, according to a report by Italian nuclear physicists who visited Pakistan in early December (see GSN, Dec. 6, 2001).  The report described four scenarios under which Pakistan could use nuclear weapons, including territorial, military, economic or political possibilities.  The two physicists visited Pakistan before the Dec. 13 attack on the Indian Parliament that has increased tensions on the subcontinent.

Pakistan could attack with nuclear weapons if India conquered a large amount of Pakistani territory, if India destroyed a large part of Pakistan’s military, if India attempted to strangle Pakistan economically or if India pushed Pakistan into “political destabilization or creates a large scale internal subversion (there),” the report said, citing Pakistani Lt.-Gen. Khalid Kidwai of the Strategic Plan Division, which controls Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.

All of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are directed against India, Kidwai said.  Pakistan does not have a no-first-use policy (see GSN, Jan. 24). 

Kidwai said the risk of nuclear conflict would be low or nonexistent if both countries made rational decisions and “if they stay clear of the nuclear threshold and restrain from aggressive behavior that could trigger a nuclear reaction.”

The report, by Paolo Cotta-Ramusino and Maurizio Martellini of the Landau Network, an Italian arms control institution, said certain aspects of Pakistan’s nuclear posture are “not reassuring.”  Pakistan views its nuclear arsenal “as an instrument to countervail a manifest conventional inferiority vis-?-vis the Indian military force,” the physicists said. 

“It seems that the combination of the diversity and broadness of the motivations that may justify the use of nuclear weapons, on one side, and the use of the nuclear threat to enforce a rational decision making, i.e. a not-too-aggressive behavior, by the opponent, on the other side, is suggesting a vision of … Pakistani nuclear weapons, that is not reassuring,” the report said.

“Presumably Pakistan feels or will feel compelled to enlarge and diversify its nuclear arsenal so to increase the nuclear options and make the threat of nuclear retaliation more credible,” the report added.

Permissive Action Links

Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are disassembled, with the fission core stored separately from the ignition components, but Pakistan could quickly assemble the bombs, Kidwai said.  Some Pakistani experts said Pakistan does not need permissive action links to prevent unauthorized use of the nuclear weapons, because the weapons are disassembled, the report said (see GSN, Nov. 5, 2001).  If Pakistan used such links, it could indicate the country was shortening its nuclear response time, the report said.

Pakistan would likely accept offers from other countries to improve the security of its nuclear arsenal as long as the basic secrecy of the nuclear program was maintained, the report said (see GSN, Nov. 29, 2001).

Pakistan’s Nuclear Capability

Pakistan has “ground and air capability for the delivery of nuclear weapons,” Kidwai said, and the Italian physicists assumed that meant, “that bombs/warheads can be delivered by airplanes and/or missiles.” 

Pakistan is likely to look for more nuclear options, and “if this diversification will move Pakistan away from a doomsday-machine vision, it will also increase the likelihood of the use of nuclear weapons in a situation of crisis.  Thus the Indian subcontinent may follow on a reduced scale (but not necessarily on a reduced risk) the pattern of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. … nuclear race during the Cold War,” the report said.

Kidwai told the researchers that nuclear artillery is not part of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal at this time, the report said.

Arms control negotiations between India and Pakistan combined with international pressure on the two countries could reduce the risk of nuclear conflict in the region (see GSN, Jan. 25), the report said (Nadeem Iqbal, Inter Press Service/Yahoo.com, Feb. 4).

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U.S. Response:  Bush Requests Large Biodefense Budget Increase

U.S. President George W. Bush is requesting $5.9 billion for bioterrorism defense in his proposed fiscal 2003 budget (see GSN, Jan. 22), according to the New York Times.  The funding would be several times more than previous spending to counter a biological attack.  Bush has requested $11 billion over two years, including the fiscal 2003 proposal, the $1.4 billion Congress approved last year and an already approved $3.7 billion supplemental request for bioterrorism defense (see GSN, Jan. 14).

The proposed 2003 funds would include:

*         $1.75 billion for the National Institutes of Health;

*         $600 million for the Defense Department, including $420 million for efforts to improve detection systems; Bush proposes to spend the rest on research, such as antidotes (see GSN, Jan. 24);

*         $10 million to create a team of U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention scientists to work with foreign scientists and to improve methods for sharing information about outbreaks and new drugs;

*         $650 million for the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile, including more “push-packs,” packages of drugs and medical supplies that authorities can rush to a site anywhere in the country to respond to an attack or epidemic (see GSN, Jan. 29);

*         $20 million for the CDC’s Epidemiological Intelligence Service, an early-warning system against biological warfare; and

*         $1.6 billion for state and local health systems (see GSN, Feb. 1).

National Institutes of Health

“The $1.75 billion request for the National Institutes of Health alone is the biggest single-year request for any discipline or institute in the history of the NIH,” said Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at NIH.  “This is the first time that an extraordinary amount of money is being increased expressly for bioterrorism rather than for the general enhancement of capabilities.” 

Fauci said he would spend $441 million on basic research, $592 million on drug and vaccine research, $194 million on testing new drugs and $522 million on new research laboratories.

Proposal Reflects New Threat Assessments and Homeland Defense Priorities

Bush’s proposed increase in biological defense funding reflects a reevaluation of security threats since Sept. 11 and the anthrax attacks (see related GSN story, today), according to the Times. 

“The anthrax letters showed us that even a relatively unsophisticated, small-scale attack can cause enormous disruption since our toolbox for countering such strikes is fairly bare,” said a senior Bush administration official.  “Compared to the full destructive potential of biological warfare, the anthrax letters were a slingshot” (Judith Miller, New York Times, Feb. 4).

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Anthrax:  Spores Found at Washington-Area Site

Officials discovered trace amounts of anthrax spores Thursday at a Federal Communications Commission off-site mail facility outside of Washington, the Washington Post reported (see GSN, Feb. 1).

Not enough spores were found at the commission’s mail processing center in Prince George’s County, Md., to cause infections, said FCC spokesman David Fiske.  He added that the eight contract workers at the facility had been offered anthrax antibiotics, but he did not know if any had chosen to take the medication.

“It’s still a trace, so we have to take every precaution,” Fiske said.

The facility will be cleaned to eliminate all possible anthrax remnants and will be tested periodically, Fiske said.  Final U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention test results on the facility are expected today (Jamie Stockwell, Washington Post, Feb. 2).

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Russia:  Work Remains to Get U.S. Disarmament Funds

Russian chemical disarmament official Sergei Kiriyenko said his country has “a lot of work” to do to meet requirements for $50 million aid that the United States has offered this year, Nezavisimaya Gazeta reported Saturday (see GSN, Feb. 1).

“Russia has done everything to meet” requirements that the United States called for to resume its chemical disarmament aid program, said Kiriyenko, Russian chairman of the State Commission on Chemical Disarmament, but work remains before Russia will see the funds.

U.S. experts from various agencies will visit Russia Feb. 26 to consult with Russian officials, Kiriyenko said.

“Americans’ main doubt is whether Russia has declared all of its chemical weapons supplies,” he said in an interview with the Gazeta. “We have suggested rational logic — understatement of supplies would imply a smaller sum of assistance.  Thus, I’d rather overstate supplies of chemical arsenals in this case.”

Russia will apply in 2003 to unfreeze the $600 million that the United States has pledged in the past, Kiriyenko said.  As for the $80 million that has been conditionally approved over the last two years, not all of it has yet been spent, but it may be soon, he said.

“Pentagon experts and the American company Parsons that performs destruction operations in Russia do not rule out that this money may be spent in 2002 already,” he said.  Parsons would receive most of the funds, which it would use through its subsidiaries in Russia, he said.

Kiriyenko also emphasized that monetary assistance is not the only form of U.S.-Russian cooperation.

“It’s essential that our cooperation should not be reduced to Americans’ giving money to us,” he said.  Joint voting in the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and exchanging safe technologies could be other areas of cooperation, he said.

“Americans have long been sure that their technology of destruction of chemical weapons by means of burning them is better than Russia’s.  But now it isn’t ruled out that the U.S. will use a technology resembling the Russian one,” Kiriyenko said (Marina Kalashnikova, Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Feb. 2 in Agency WPS, Feb. 4).

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Japan:  Largest Rocket Successfully Tested

Japan today successfully completed a second and final test launch of the H-2A rocket, its biggest rocket to-date, CNN.com reported.

Today’s successful test has cleared the way for a series of 11 operational flights over the next three years, according to CNN.com.  The test took place at Japan’s space center on Tanegashima, a small island more than 980 miles southwest of Tokyo. 

The new H-2A is more advanced than the previous H-2, which was launched last August (CNN.com, Feb. 4).  The H-2A is powered by six rockets — compared to the H-2’s four — and can carry greater payloads (Sumiko Oshima, Aviation Week & Space Technology, Feb. 4).

The H-2A was expected to fly over the Pacific Ocean and release one probe south of the equator.  The DASH probe will orbit the Earth for three days and test re-entry technology before crashing into the Sahara Desert.

The rocket was also expected to deploy a second probeto orbit the Earth for about a year to test how commercial items such as microchips and batteries perform in outer space, CNN.com reported.

The successful launch of the H-2A comes after Japan scrapped the earlier H-2 series of rockets when one failed to deploy its payload in orbit and another had to be destroyed via remote control so it did not veer off course.  After those failures, the U.S. firm Hughes Space and Communications International cancelled an order for 10 satellite launches, CNN.com reported (CNN.com, Feb. 4).

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Pakistan:  China Did Not Aid Missile Development, Official Says

Pakistan Saturday denied allegations made in a recently released CIA report that China had extensively assisted its ballistic missile development program (see GSN, Jan. 31).

“Our program is totally indigenous and there is no truth in the reports that China had supplied missile or missile technology to Pakistan,” said Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Aziz Ahmad Khan (Associated Press/New York Times, Feb. 2).

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Nuclear Waste:  Yucca Mountain Shipments Similar to Today’s, Experts Say

By Mike Nartker
Global Security Newswire

Critics of the U.S. plan to store high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada have begun to question how spent fuel from more than 100 U.S. nuclear power plants will be transported to the site (see GSN, Jan. 28).  U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham recently announced his intention to formally select Yucca Mountain as the site of the permanent repository (see GSN, Jan. 11).

While no formal transport system has yet been established, Yucca Mountain transports are expected to be similar to nuclear waste shipments conducted at present, sources told Global Security Newswire last week.

“Spent fuel is the most protected of hazardous materials and will continue to be so in the future,” said Eileen Supko a nuclear engineer with Energy Resources International.  The U.S Energy Department, though, has just begun planning for the repository’s opening, currently scheduled for 2010, and the transportation details have not yet been “nailed down,” she said.

Yucca Mountain is expected to be the storage site for 70,000 metric tons of nuclear waste, which would arrive at the site in about 56,000 truckloads.  This works out to about six trucks per day over the next 30 years, according to an article in the January/February 2002 issue of Technology Review (see GSN, Jan. 17)

Nuclear power plant operators are eager to begin shipping nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain when the repository is operational, said Mitch Singer, media relations director of the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry organization.  The waste is currently kept on site at nuclear power plants in spent fuel pools, which was never meant to be a permanent solution, he added.  Singer estimated that waste shipments would begin within months of the repository’s opening.

About 75 to 80 percent of the waste shipments to Yucca Mountain would travel via rail, Supko said.  A train could carry about five times more heavy shipping casks — which weigh close to 120 tons when fully loaded — than a trailer truck.

Engineers first prepare spent fuel for transport by placing it in stainless steel baskets within a shipping container, which is the current method for shipping safe fuel, according to a report from NEI.  Two steel cylinders surround each basket, forming a cavity into which lead is poured to block radiation.  A thick outer layer of shielding material around the container further blocks the release of radiation, and the layers of containers are sealed with steel lids.

A train transporting nuclear waste is required to have a buffer car placed between spent fuel cars and other cars.  Rail waste shipments to Yucca Mountain will likely be sent via a dedicated train, Singer said.

All nuclear waste shipments must first have their security plans approved by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Supko said.  The shipping routes are inspected ahead of time and “safe havens” are set up along the route. 

The shipments are also tracked through Global Positioning Satellite systems and escorted, Supko said.  They get armed escorts when they pass through urban areas.  She added that the armed guards are only provided through major population centers because of the higher population density and greater level of risk in the event of an incident. 

A contracted spent fuel transporter will notify the governors of the states along a route seven days in advance of any shipments and will let them know precisely when the shipment enters and leaves each state, Supko said.  The public will also be given some notification, though it will be limited due to security concerns.

Shipping Containers are Main Safety Measure

Shipping containers themselves are the primary security measure for nuclear waste transports, Supko said.  She cited the extensive testing the canisters undergo to demonstrate their ability to withstand a transportation accident or a terrorist attack.

The canisters are put through several tests to evaluate their durability, according to the NEI report.

For example, containers were loaded onto a truck and crashed into a 700-ton concrete wall at speeds up to 80 miles per hour.  Another test involved dropping containers 30 feet onto a steel-reinforced concrete slab, which is comparable to hitting a concrete slab at 120 miles per hour.  Containers were also totally submersed in water and in a pool of aviation fuel burning at over 2,000 degrees for 90 minutes.

In all tests, the canisters did not rupture nor was there damage to the spent fuel inside, according to the NEI report.

“Although dented and charred, the containers remained totally intact to protect the used fuel they would carry,” the report said.

Shipping Containers’ “Achilles’ Heel”

Other experts disagree, however, that the nuclear energy industry’s reliance on the durability of the containers is sufficient.

Nuclear waste shipping regulations have not been upgraded since the 1960s, said Edwin Lyman, scientific director of the Nuclear Control Institute, a nonproliferation organization.  He added that any new regulations would have to be designed to cover a wide range of tests.

Container safety requirements are not strict enough, and real-life examples have often exceeded testing situations, Lyman said.

For instance, fossil fuels often burn at higher temperatures than those used to test the containers, Lyman said.  That could be a factor if a train or truck carrying spent fuel shipping containers were involved in an accident with a petroleum tanker, he said.

A potential design flaw in the containers is the rubber seal used under the steel lid, Lyman said.  The seal is the cask’s “Achilles heel,” he said.

The rubber seal eventually fails if exposed to temperatures between 300-350 degrees Fahrenheit for about an hour, according to Lyman.  If the seal would fail, radiation from residue on the outside of the spent fuel, known as “crud,” could vent into the air.  If the temperature of the spent fuel itself increases to 700 degrees Fahrenheit, a self-sustaining fire could break out inside the shipping container.  That fire could then lead to fuel rod failure, which could release large amounts of radiation.

Although a steel seal would be more resilient, Lyman said, the nuclear power industry chose to use the rubber seals for cost reasons.

“That’s the way it was done and they weren’t forced to do [anything differently],” he said.

Little That States Can Do

Already some state and local officials have begun to voice opposition to waste shipments coming through their areas en route to Yucca Mountain.  Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman recently said he would arrest anyone who attempts to transport nuclear waste through Las Vegas.

State and local officials, however, have little legal recourse to block a shipment routed through their areas, Supko said.  Federal interstate commerce laws prevent states from arbitrarily enacting legislation to block commerce. 

Instead, states will be encouraged to work with the Energy Department during the routing process, Supko said.  Waste shipment routes preferred by the Energy Department already circumvent major cities and population areas, she said. 

States can place some restrictions on transports, such as limiting the hours or weather conditions the shipments can travel, and can recommend alternate routes.  Since most of the shipments will be delivered by rail, which has set routes, it would be nearly impossible for a state to use these restrictions and alternate routes to completely block a shipment, Supko said.

Public interest in waste shipments will be high when a permanent waste storage site is first approved, and it is up to the nuclear industry and the Energy Department to provide accurate information to reassure residents along a waste shipment route, Supko said.  She added, however, that over time the shipments will become a mundane, everyday occurrence and the public will lose interest.

“It’s like when you see a gas tanker on the road next to you,” Supko said.  “You don’t think anything about it.”

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