CCNS Update

It was announced at the June 5 th Los Alamos County Board of Public Utilities meeting that there are two proposals to bring approximately 50 or more megawatts of solar electricity to the County and Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), a federal Department of Energy (DOE) facility. One of the County’s goals is to develop and strengthen partnerships with Jemez Pueblo and Pueblo de San Ildefonso in...

The Austin newspaper, the Texas Observer, chose Searchlight reporter Alicia Inez Guzmán, to receive its 2024 MOLLY Prize on May 30 th . Guzmán holds a Ph. D. in Visual and Cultural Studies from the University of Rochester in New York. Her article, “Buried Secrets, Poisoned Bodies,” is exemplary investigative journalism. The prize, awarded to only one journalist a year, honors Molly Ivins, the Obse...

Just as there were problems encountered with air monitoring during the February 14, 2014 explosion and release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), a nuclear bomb waste dump, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board continues to raise questions about that issue.

On March 12 th , the Department of Energy (DOE) submitted its Planned Change Request to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to use new Panels 11 and 12 in the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) underground nuclear waste facility. The Planned Change Request also outlines the plans for seven additional panels for waste from expanded plutonium pit production at Los Alamos National Laboratory (L...

Beginning on Monday, May 13 th , at an in-person and virtual public hearing in Santa Fe, the New Mexico Environment Department will present its proposal to vastly expand the reuse of produced water from the production of oil and gas to the New Mexico Water Quality Control Commission.

Did you know the federal Departments of Defense and Energy, NASA and the private industry sector currently operate more than 60 open burn pits across the U.S. and its territories – causing the uncontrolled release of PFAS and other toxic chemicals to the environment?

This week, CCNS highlights portions of a recent press release by Nuclear Watch New Mexico, Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment (Tri-Valley CARES), and the Savannah River Site Watch about the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). Their piece suggests NNSA does not have its priorities straight in neither producing up-to-date information on the way plutonium appears to...

Recent monthly reports by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board relate disturbing stories about near-miss operational incidents in the fifth shaft, under construction, at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP). The underground federal radioactive waste disposal site is located 2,150 feet below ground surface in a salt formation almost 30 miles east of Carlsbad, New Mexico. The Board has repo...

The Coalition invites you to join the Saturday, April 6 th Caravan in your vehicle at the Camel Rock geologic formation on the Camel Rock Frontage Road in Tesuque at 9:30 am.

Did you know that the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) was supposed to complete its 25-year waste disposal mission and begin closing on Tuesday, March 26 th ? You may know about it because WIPP officials had a party.

Did you know that on Friday, March 26, 1999, the first shipment of plutonium- contaminated nuclear weapons waste from Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) reached the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP)?

Thursday, March 28 th marks the 45 th anniversary of the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant accident in Pennsylvania. A new documentary, “RADIOACTIVE: The Women of Three Mile Island,” tells the harrowing story of the 1979 accident involving the release of radioactive and toxic materials into the air, soils, water and into bodies young and old.

For twenty years, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has struggled to contain the cancer-causing hexavalent chromium plume in the regional drinking water aquifer below the nuclear weapons site. The horizontal and vertical reach of the deep plume covers an area of unknown size and the depth of the contamination is unknown.

Members of Indigenous communities provided testimony to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights at a historic hearing in Washington, DC this week about the impacts of uranium exploitation on their human rights.

This week, at the same time as the National Nuclear Security Administrative was requesting public comments about its need for 173 megawatts (MW) of electricity, the County of Los Alamos Board of Public Utilities was considering a proposal for 170 megawatts from the proposed Foxtail Flats Solar and Battery Energy Storage System in San Juan County, New Mexico.

CCNS has prepared talking points and a sample public comment letter you can use to craft your oral and written comments about the proposed 14-mile long, 115-kilovolt electrical line across the Caja del Rio before it would cross the Rio Grande to Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL).

Please mark your calendar to attend one or more of these meetings or submit public comments before the deadlines. Links and more information are available under Did You Know? at nuclearactive.org

As promised, a second public meeting on the proposed Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) upgrade project to expand electrical power capacity will begin at 4 pm on Thursday, February 15 th at the Santa Fe Community College. The first virtual and in-person public meeting was held at the same location on January 11 th .

Twenty years ago, the hexavalent chromium plume was discovered in the regional aquifer 1,000 feet below ground surface at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). Since then the debate about how to remove the dangerous hexavalent chromium from the regional drinking water aquifer has been ongoing between LANL, the New Mexico Environment Department, and the public.

In July 2022, the Department of Energy (DOE) awarded the Tularosa Basin Range Services, a Bechtel affiliate, a 10-year, $3 billion dollar management and operating contract for the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) to continue the disposal of Cold War radioactive and hazardous wastes from the fabrication of plutonium-based nuclear weapons.

Monday, January 22 marks the third anniversary of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. This year’s focus is the lie of deterrence. For decades policy makers have declared nuclear weapons necessary to deter enemy attacks, all the while ignoring the humanitarian costs of the nuclear arms race and the global devastation promised by the nuclear weapons should deterrence fail.

In an utterly confusing move, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) released an environmental assessment for public review and comment that claims it contains the final remedy for the cleanup of the hexavalent chromium plume in the regional drinking water aquifer.

On December 19 th , Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) released a draft environmental assessment that would allow the installation and operation of a 14-mile, 115 kiloVolt overhead electrical line basically in parallel to the two electrical lines that already cross the Caja del Rio Plateau and the Rio Grande to the Pajarito Plateau, where LANL is located. It is named the Electrical Power Capaci...

Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) has a habit of releasing environmental documents requiring public comment during the winter holiday season. That habit continued this winter with not one, but two draft environmental assessments (EA). One involves the hexavalent chromium plume in Mortandad Canyon. The second, and the topic of this Update, is the proposed Electrical Power Capacity Upgrade Proje...

An on-going David versus Goliath fight occurred last week during a public hearing before the Albuquerque Bernalillo County Air Quality Control Board, a board charged to prevent or abate air pollution.