Texas Radiation Online

Texas to be new national nuclear waste dump for weapons factories and power plants The 2003 78th Texas Legislature gave the company WCS in Andrews Co. the big chance to open 2 huge waste dumps and import over 162 million cubic feet of nuclear waste to dispose- over 60 times more waste as estimated for the defeated Sierra Blanca dump of the 90's. Most from cleaning up facilities in the nuclear weapons complex. License for that facility was approved in 2008 More planned right next to WCS In Eunice, NM. on the lot next to WCS, int'l URENCO pushes to open a new uranium enrichment plant. The industry also calls for a second plant to prepare waste for disposal at WCS Also in Andrews Co.: Experimental Pebble Bed Modular Reactor proposed by UT System and General Atomics UT System has announced that the experimental reactor would add to the other proposed Andrews sites. Gas cooled reactors such as this also use graphite, which is used in Chernobyl-type reactors. Mishaps at Texas nuclear plants - More Reactors in planning In early 2005 at South Texas Project, reactor coolant water later found leaking at a rate of a gallon every 10 minutes. In 2003, a smaller leak in coolant at South Texas was publicized, while the discovery at Comanche Peak of 2Lbs of boron residue from cooling water was found caking up inside of the control rod mechanism went barely reported. Since 2007, Exelon is reported to seek a license for reactors they would operate, and an attempt for one or more reactors at South Texas is also on the table.

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Can we stop the nuclear industry from wasting Texas? Thanks for visiting!
---- Tristan Mendoza, Director

The WCS site in Andrews is dug into the Ogallala formation which is 30-40 feet below the surface. WCS has a history of major political influence and has even blocked nominations of federal regulatory officials who have upheld the law.

Two HUGE Nuclear Dumps To Open In Texas Since 1997, Waste Control Specialists LLC, (WCS) has operated a mixed waste processing facility on the Ogallala aquifer, including both radioactive and hazardous wastes. So far they have been storing highly radioactive wastes and dumping materials with small amounts of radioactivity into a pit which is dug right into the formation.

In May 2003, The 78th Texas Legislature gave companies permission to bid for two new enormous radioactive waste dumps- one for federal nuclear weapons facility waste, and another for commercial power plant waste from the Texas Compact. These will be the first major dumps to be built in the US in decades, and every nuclear waste dump ever built has leaked. WCS was granted it's license to dispose on a huge scale in 2008.
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Pantex To Produce Thermonuclear Weapons Again During the Cold War, Pantex was the central US assembly plant for nuclear weapons. Afterward, this role was switched to weapons disassembly and the storage of thousands of plutonium "pits" from old bombs. In the Ogallala aquifer below, chemicals from high explosives have been found in surrounding wells for several miles, tritium has also been found in recent years.

Recently, Pantex has been making small nuclear "bunker buster" B61-11 bombs, but not thermonuclear bombs. Under the Bush Administration, the US Government plans to increase the nuclear weapons stockpile in the next 20 years, which means that Pantex will once again be in full operation. >>> Click Here For More

Former target of the Soviet Union, and huge threat to global security. A chain reaction of onsite plutonium would have immeasurably disasterous consequences.

STNP is on the opposite end of the Colorado River from Andrews, at the Gulf of Mexico. In event of a meltdown, Gulf winds would blow nuclear fallout throughout the region.

Big Problems at Texas Nuclear Power Plants South Texas (Nuclear) Project is one of two Texas nuclear power plants with a long history of safety violations, worker intimidation, and shoddy construction. Like its companion Comanche Peak near Ft Worth, it forces billions of dollars in cost overruns on cities who are utility partners, thus paying larger percentages of thier utility budgets.

A widely reported leak at STNP in March '03 was seen as minor, with residue quoted as "half an aspirin tablet". Comanche Peak, had a much larger problem, which went unreported and hardly investigated by the media and the NRC. Two pounds of corrosive boric acid residue was found caking the inside the control rod mechanism. These rods keep a reactor from acheiving a meltdown state. Meanwhile, South Texas has since utilized a questionable repair procedure never tested, in which welds may be unstable. >>> Click Here For More