Plutonium Filter Problems at Livermore Lab!

[marylia@earthlink.net (marylia)]

Hello cpeo folks. This has broad implications as HEPA filters are used
government and industry-wide. Read on... Peace, Marylia

Contact:
Marylia Kelley, Executive Director, (925) 443-7148
Sally Light, Program Analyst, (925) 443-7148 or (510) 527-2057

For Release 3/11/99

Livermore Lab's Plutonium Facility -- A Ticking "Time Bomb"?

Community group calls on Energy Secretary to close plutonium facility;
conduct immediate investigation of filter problems.
Formerly secret documents form basis for group's demand.

On March 11, 1999, Tri-Valley CAREs (Communities Against a Radioactive
Environment) will send a letter to Energy Secretary Bill Richardson
demanding that he immediately shut down operations in the main plutonium
building at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) while a
thorough, open investigation of the problem-riddled facility is carried
out.  The main plutonium facility at LLNL, called Building 332, houses 880
pounds of plutonium, enough for nearly 100 modern nuclear bombs.

Tri-Valley CAREs, the Livermore-based environmental "watchdog" over the
weapons laboratory, has recently received documents from the U.S.
Department of Energy (DOE) in response to its Freedom of Information Act
(FOIA) request for information concerning LLNL's High Efficiency
Particulate Air (HEPA) filters in its plutonium facility.  The documents
were not provided until Tri-Valley CAREs, after waiting almost nine months
for a response to its April 1998 request, filed a FOIA lawsuit against DOE,
the Livermore Lab's parent agency.

These formerly secret documents, which total approximately 500 pages, can
be made available to reporters upon request at Tri-Valley CAREs' office.
They are the basis for the group's urgent letter to Secretary Richardson.
Several documents are excerpted below.

The DOE documents reveal a long history of serious problems with Bldg.
332's HEPA filters, which are supposed to protect Lab workers and the
public by preventing the release of plutonium into the air.  Plutonium, a
radioactive material derived from neutron bombardment of uranium 238, is
used in the making of nuclear weapons. Plutonium 239, the weapons grade
isotope oft used at Livermore Lab, has a "half-life" of over 24,000 years.

Among the documents are many memos from LLNL's own filter experts outlining
serious technical concerns about Bldg. 332's filter system and containing
chilling warnings about potential and actual failures.  Other documents
describe accidents that spread plutonium around Bldg. 332, which includes
many rooms and, in its entirety, covers most of four acres.

                                                Excerpt from FOIA-ed memo
of 6/6/90:  "I hope it doesn't take a release like we had in late 1979 -
early 1980 to spring the money necessary to solve the current problems." --
James S. Johnson, LLNL to Chuck Folkers, LLNL

"The records indicate that measurable plutonium releases to the outside air
occurred in 1979-80 due to HEPA filter failure," stated Sally Light,
Tri-Valley CAREs' Nuclear Program Analyst.

 "According to these documents," Light continued, "at least one type of
Bldg. 332's HEPA filters is not totally qualified for nuclear applications.
Further, the documents show that these filters, which are made by hand
from glass paper and glue, may fail when wet, hot, cold or under too much
air pressure, as well as when too old. Livermore Lab experts state in the
documents we received that HEPA filters should remain in service for only 8
years maximum. Knowing this, the Lab has continued to use some of the
filters in the plutonium facility for 20 to 30-plus years!"

                                                Excerpt from FOIA-ed memo
of 3/6/95:  "Old filters should be discarded or only used in non-critical
applications because aged filters are structurally weak." -- Werner
Bergman, LLNL to Ray Kahle.  And, on 2/16/95:  "LLNL has stored filters to
10 years prior to use and has functioning filters with 32 years of
service." -- HEPA Filter Studies, by Werner Bergman, LLNL

Light went on to say that there is a risk of major plutonium releases if a
fire -- always a possibility with plutonium -- occurs in Bldg. 332, causing
the "blow out" of plutonium-laden filters when fire sprinklers turn on.
"We are extremely concerned about this possibility, because a major
plutonium fire and HEPA 'blow out' has already actually happened at another
DOE facility, Rocky Flats, in Colorado," she said.

                                                Excerpt from FOIA-ed memo
of 3/6/95:  "As stated in all three documents, the most important issue is
the potential for HEPA filter blow out during fire conditions." -- Werner
Bergman, LLNL to Ray Kahle

According to Marylia Kelley, Executive Director of Tri-Valley CAREs, HEPA
filters work similarly to a filter in a coffee pot, which doesn't prevent
numerous small coffee particles from passing through.

"Even when the HEPA filter is working perfectly, it does not capture 100%
of the plutonium.  If the filters are allowed to get old, crusty, brittle
and failure-prone, as the ones in Bldg. 332 have, then this may show one
possible pathway by which plutonium made its way into the surrounding
community, including Big Trees Park," Kelley explained, referring to the
recent "plutonium in the park" controversy. Community concern continues to
rise as elevated levels of plutonium were discovered for a third time at
Big Trees Park, just one half mile west of the Lab and next to an
elementary school.

Kelley also stated that some of the DOE documents include Lab memos
describing the long-standing inadequacy of funding for research into both
filter problems and their remedies.  A recent memo shows a Livermore Lab
employee trying hard to juggle and stretch what little DOE funding there
was in order to even partially address existing filter problems.

                                                Excerpt from FOIA-ed memo
of 3/21/98:  "I no longer have any support for HEPA filter tasks and cannot
charge my other projects... Because of the serious accusations regarding
these filters and the potential consequences to Bldg. 332 and the Lab, I
quickly conducted a series of tests (using about 100k dollars of my DOE
monies initially intended for other filter tasks) to mitigate the most
serious questions regarding the closed filters." -- Werner Bergman, LLNL to
Tim Roberts, LLNL

"Historically, there's been very little guidance from DOE as to the filters
for the entire nuclear weapons complex.  Instead, each facility has been
left largely on its own," Kelley said.

                                                Excerpt from FOIA-ed
document of 2/16/95:  "DP [Dept. of Energy's Defense Programs] facilities
have many old HEPA filters because there is no guidance and no disposal
site" -- HEPA Filter Studies, by Werner Bergman, LLNL

"We will continue to monitor the serious HEPA  conditions at Livermore
Lab's plutonium facility, as well as the other problems there, including
the epidemic of plutonium criticality safety violations that resulted in
the months-long shut down of Bldg. 332 during 1997-98," said Sally Light.
"As a priority, we are urging the community to join us in writing the
Secretary of Energy, as well as Representative Ellen Tauscher, to demand
that Bldg. 332 be closed while an immediate, thorough and open
investigation of these serious risks to public health and the environment
is undertaken."

-30-

A copy of the letter to Secretary Richardson is available by fax on request.


++++ Please note that my email address has changed to
<marylia@earthlink.net> on 3/1/99 ++++

Marylia Kelley
Tri-Valley CAREs
(Communities Against a Radioactive Environment)
2582 Old First Street
Livermore, CA USA 94550

<http://www.igc.org/tvc/> - is our web site, please visit us there!
Our web site will remain at this location. Only my email address has
changed on 3/1/99.

(925) 443-7148 - is our phone
(925) 443-0177 - is our fax

Working for peace, justice and a healthy environment since 1983, Tri-Valley
CAREs has been a member of the nation-wide Alliance for Nuclear
Accountability in the U.S. since 1989, and is a co-founding member of the
international Abolition 2000 network for the elimination of nuclear
weapons.