Long-Term Stewardship of DOE Legacy Waste Sites A Status Report (2003) / Chapter Skim
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Contents of Report
Contents of Report
Pages 6-34
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DOE calls its activities beyond closure of contaminated sites "~ong-term stewardship" (LTS) .2 While DOE is exploring the possibility of handing off LTS responsibilities to another agency, it currently seems likely that DOE will remain the steward at most closed sites.3 The Committee on Long-Term institutional Management of DOE Legacy Waste Sites: Phase 2 was formed by the National Research Council at DOE's request to 1"CIeanup/remediation is considered complete when deactivation or decommissioning of all facilities is complete, excluding long-term surveillance and monitoring; releases to the environment have been cleaned up in accordance with agreed-upon standards; ground water contamination has been contained, or long-term treatment or monitoring is in place; nuclear materials and spent fuel have been stabilized and/or placed in safe long-term storage; and "legacy" wastes (i.e., produced by past nuclear weapons production activities, with the exception of high-level waste)
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The report addresses the task statement by developing lessons that could be learned from the sites it visited and the documents it reviewed, focusing on high-leve~ issues related to improving planning and implementation of LTS at DOE legacy waste sites: what LTS is; what it means to management; incorporate LTS in aid phases of environmental DOE's need for a discussion of values and principles for decision making, so es to · enable DOE to pursue its unfamiliar responsibilities in UTS, instead of being limited by its current emphasis on compliance with existing regulations. That emphasis hinders DOE's ability to fulfill its UTS obligations.
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The current DOE remediation and site management program is different: Its decisions center on allocations of costs and risks, without being subordinated to another mission. The combination of current technological capabilities and funds for cleanup leave little doubt, however, that many of the contaminated sites cannot be cleaned up enough to permit unrestricted human access.
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Long-Term Stewardship of DOE Legacy Waste Sites A Status Report .
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allows for consideration of cost-risk tradeoffs for risks below ~ 0-4, but requires action above that risk level. As a consequence of the duration of the hazarcis and of the potentially significant consequences of failure, the challenge of long-term management of these and other DOE legacy waste sites is both 7DoE's guidance on institutional controls in RCRA and CERCLA response actions defines institutional controls as "any mechanisms used to restrict inappropriate uses of land, facilities, and environmental media by limiting exposure to residual contaminants left behind as part of a CERCLA or RCRA remedy....
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One way to end cleanups sooner and to reduce near-term costs is to rely more on LTS. Some people, however, are wary of DOE's promises regarding UTS, and this wariness undermines and constrains DOE's ability to speed remecliation.42 SUMMARY OF FINDINGS AND OBSERVATIONS FROM THE VISITS TO MOUND AND FERNALD To inform its deliberations, the committee visited two DOE sites in Ohio, Mound and Fernatcl, as well as the Moeb Site in Utah.
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decisions. DOE should also implement steps to anticipate and carry out those responsibilities throughout the cleanup process.43 Remediation encompasses contaminant reduction, contaminant isolation, and continuing care (NRC 2000a)
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Several groups, including this committee's predecessor and a recent R&D Roadmap team, have provided details on why LTS needs to be considered when establishing cleanup goals and approaches (NRC 2000a; INEEL 2002~. They have also provided conceptual models useful for strategic planning, descriptions of limitations in the effectiveness of various LTS measures, and ideas useful in developing implementation plans for LTS.
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Adopting this way of thinking about environmental management at legacy waste sites would entail incorporating LTS into every stage of environmental management. This means looking at issues that will be important during the long term in all phases and activities related to the remecly: site investigation, option .` 17The Long-Term Surveillance and Maintenance Program is the operating arm of DOE in carrying out LTS at closed sites, directing and overseeing contractors that physically care for all of the uranium mill tailings sites and a number of other sites for which DOE is responsible.
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The approach, of course, also applies to decisions at sites that could become legacy waste sites. That is, DOE would benefit from considering the long-term implications of current and future actions that might lead to contamination or waste generation.
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Under its agreements with state and fecleral regulators, DOE undertakes to manage the residual contamination at the legacy waste sites; compliance with those agreements is a means to that end. Yet the regulations on which the agreements rest do not engage all of the difficult issues presented by the legacy wastes.
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For each hazardous waste management unit subject to the requirements of this section, the post-closure plan must identify the activities that will be carried on after closure of each disposal unit and the frequency of these activities." 26First published use of the term and concept of rolling stewardship as related to hazardous wastes appears to have been in 1\/1. Russell's testimony before a subcommittee of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works (Russell 1995~.
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This may not be a prudent basis on which to embrace a responsibility projected to last far longer than the history of the republic so far. DOE bears an enduring responsibility and a corresponding liability for problems that arise in the future at its legacy waste sites.
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Without clearly articulated value premises, DOE lacks a basis on which to defend its decisions (Russell 2002) , except by complying with regulations that were written without regard to the long-term demancis of legacy waste sites that will require LTS.
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One of the few biotic concerns that is mentioned in current LTS documents is rare and endangered species, but these are uncommonly found at legacy waste sites, almost by definition. Aid sites, however, have locally common species, or will have them soon.
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Question: How can DOE develop and manage LTS measures in partnership with the stakeho/ders who will bear the impacts of their failure anc/ who may be willing to share with DOE responsibility for their implementation? Site remediation aims to improve the environmental circumstances of local communities.
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. At all three sites the committee visited, stakeho~ders asserted that they were willing to share some of the responsibility for implementing LTS measures with DOE, a noteworthy similarity across sites varying widely in other respects.
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Because current regulations do not capture all of DOE's responsibilities, as discussed above, the DOE's practice ignores factors important to LTS. The legacy wastes are the permanent responsibility of the U.S.
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Planning For Fallibility Unforeseen events will occur at DOE's legacy waste sites. These events might include failure of a remedy to prevent degradation of a waste cell, a concern at the Moab Site (NRC 2002a)
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in the ground water at Mound. 33See Perrow (1984)
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There is enormous variation across the legacy sites within the DOE complex, but that does not mean that each site should have its own scheme for reporting and retrieving monitoring data just the reverse is true. A shared framework for reporting monitoring data is essential to assure that the information is preserved and useful.
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Recommendation: DOE should tailor its monitoring to the specific risks and circumstances of its sites, while at the same time providing nationa~-~evel guidance for reporting formats and record-preservation protocols. Institutional ChalIenges Trust, Constancy, Learning Long-term management of the legacy wastes remaining after cleanup will be shaped by two precarious societal conditions: trust in implementing institutions, and confidence that those institutions will exercise stewardship satisfactorily over many generations.
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· Clear, institutionalized assignment of responsibility for regaining and sustaining public trust and confidence and for ensuring constancy. Sources: La Porte and MetIay (1996)
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A deficit of trust and limited assurance of institutional constancy make implementing LTS arduous under the best of circumstances, given industrial societies' practice of discarcling most materials as wastes. It is therefore important for institutions and their leaders to tackle the deficit of trust openly.
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Navy an approach to conducting its ground-water cleanup so as to improve its understancling of the hydrogeological behavior of contaminated sites. The primary innovation is to use a conceptual site model to bring together the technical and institutional unclerstanding of the site and the environment of its surrounding land and water.
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This can serve as a pilot effort for incorporating learning into aid elements of UTS. Use of an adaptive management framework, such as a conceptual site model, should be explored as a means of organizing learning at the DOE legacy sites.
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Those implications go beyond expectations of technical outcomes and include how those outcomes will be valued in an inclividual and societal context. Sharing the Burc/en: The DOE Cleanup Program is not a/one in needing LTS As noted earlier in this report, without a coherent set of guiding principles for making choices among the burdens to be borne by present and future generations in addressing enduring risks, DOE's decisions will continue to be made ad hoc and will remain difficult to justify.
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The purpose is to provide a basis for discussion and coordination on LTS issues by establishing shared principles for LTS and seeking agreement on how LTS fits into the remedy process, what UTS goals are, what is expected from LTS, who is responsible for fulfilling LTS functions, and what is needed to support them.37 This is a commenclable step toward the kind of national dialogue that the committee recommends. The legacy wastes pose an unfamiliar and clifficu~t challenge to society and to DOE.
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Future generations will need to find their own way with the legacy waste sites. What the current generation needs to do is to make its choices about cleanup and UTS in ways that will give future generations the knowledge and resources to make their choices responsibly.
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