THE EXPLOITATION OF SOVEREIGNTY
NO NUCLEAR DUMPING ON NATIVE LAND
Since 1981, the Department of Energy (DOE) has targeted
tribally held lands to
temporarily store the nation"s highly toxic nuclear waste until
such time as a
permanent repository could be built. Such "temporary facilities"
were termed
Monitored RetrievableStorage (MRS) sites, and were conceived with
the idea that
these facilities would be monitored and the contents would be
retrievable. An
untested technology called "dry cask storage" was chosen as the
method of nuclear
waste storage.
By executive order the Nuclear Waste Negotiator was created as a
liaison between
tribal governments and the DOE to locate these MRS sites on
reservation lands.
In Minnesota, Northern States Power Company (NSP) has employed
intense lobby and
deprivational tactics, which include threats to withdraw campaign
contributions
and eliminate union jobs, and pushed through the legislature and
senate a bill
authorizing up to eight dry casks to be constructedon the Prairie
Island Nuclear
Generating Facility.
What concerns native people and others in the area is that the
existing facility
is adjacent to the Prairie Island Mdewankontan Dakota
Reservation. A recent
Minnesota Department of Health study concluded that the
reservation residents
were already subjected to up to six times the amount of
background radiation
levels determined safe by federal standards. An MRS facility
would only increase
the likelihood of nuclear leakage and higher radiation levels. In
addition, this
section of land is situated on an island and the possibility of
water
contamination is a serious consideration.
At Yucca Mountain in Nevada, the proposed opening date for the
national
repository for nuclear waste is being continually set back owing
to poor
planning. It has been discovered that the area is situated on a
fault line. In
Chilocco, Oklahoma, near the border of Kansas, the DOE is
proposing an MRS
facility on 816 acres of Tonkawa tribal land. Four out of five
tribes in this
area have voted "NO" to the construction of the facility which
would store spent
nuclear fue lfrom approximately 110 nuclear reactors. The U.S.
government has
ignored the majority rule and intends to proceed based upon the
Tonkawa Tribe's
lone vote to accept the government's proposed plans.
In Michigan, Detroit Edison Company has teamed with 33 other
utilities in
negotiating with the Mescalero Apache tribe for an MRS on
Mescalero land. Detroit
Edison is the owner/operator of the Fermi nuclear plants near
Monroe, Michigan.
Fermi 1 suffered a partial core melt in 1966, and Fermi 2 has
released
one-and-a-half million gallons of radioactive water into Lake
Erie.
WE URGE THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION AND CONGRESS TO HALT THE
TARGETING OF
RESERVATION LANDS AS SITES FOR THE STORAGE OF NUCLEAR WASTE AND
OTHER TOXIC
SUBSTANCES. WE BELIEVE THAT ALL LIFE IS SACRED AND THAT THE EARTH
IS OUR MOTHER.
WE CALL FOR A HALT TO THE CURRENT DESTRUCTIVE ENERGY POLICIES IN
FORCE AND FOR
A CONCENTRATED EFFORT TO DEVELOP PASSIVE, RENEWABLE, EARTH
FRIENDLY ENERGY
SOURCES SUCH AS WIND, SOLAR AND BIOMASS.
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