RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT - SUMMARY OF LEGISLATIVE ACTION 2001
Background
Radioactive waste remains deadly for hundreds of thousands of years. The debate about
what to do with the waste in Texas has raged on for not quite as many years, but has
driven citizen participation in the issue for at least 20 years. During that time, the
Sierra Club and other citizen groups have again and again forced the nuclear industry and
state officials away from cheap and easy solutions such as dumping the waste in
underground trenches in the backyards of low income, Mexican American communities. The 77th
legislative session was filled with more drama and controversy, but in the end no
radioactive waste legislation was passed and no nuclear waste disposal facility will be
built in the next 2 years. Citizens walked away with another victory under their belts and
momentum to build support for safe and reasonable radioactive waste solutions during the
interim.
The showdown over radioactive waste began before the session started, with dueling
House and Senate interim studies and dueling waste disposal companies. The House
Environmental Regulations Committee study proposed that the state own the license for
waste disposal and that assured isolation (above ground management) become an option for
dealing with waste that Texas could accept under the its compact with Vermont and Maine.
(The Texas Compact, ratified by Congress in 1998, provides that if Texas builds a
radioactive waste disposal facility it will accept waste from Vermont and Maine.) On the
other hand, the Senate Natural Resources Committee interim study proposed that a private
company be allowed to obtain a radioactive waste management license and permitted to
dispose of nuclear weapons waste from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). While compact
waste from Texas, Maine, and Vermont is expected to be approximately 2.7 million cubic
feet over the 35-year lifespan of the compact, estimates on the volume for DOE waste reach
into the hundreds of millions of cubic feet over the next ten years.
Similarly, two radioactive waste disposal companies were vying for business in Texas.
Envirocare, with land for a possible site in Ward County, was lobbying for a state-owned
license and the use of assured isolation. Waste Control Specialists, with a radioactive
waste processing facility already located Andrews County, was lobbying for privatization
and below-ground dumping. But just weeks before the legislative session began Envirocare
agreed to abandon operations in Texas pursuant to a lawsuit settlement with Waste Control
Specialists. Additional pressure was focused on Texas by a court order that DOE clean up
50 years of cold war radioactive mess at over 70 sites throughout the country, as well as
the Bush administration’s newly announced energy policy, which calls for the creation
of a new generation of nuclear power plants IF a cheap disposal option for existing waste
and dismantled plants is found.
Tension was high when the session began in January. The Lone Star Chapter and the West
Texas-based Texas Radioactive Waste Defense Coalition agreed on nine principles for
radioactive waste management which were turned into legislation and filed by Rep. Lon
Burnam (see list of bills at the end of this section). The Sierra Club and others prepared
to fight the mammoth lobby team of Waste Control Specialists (which had contributed over
$600,000 to state officials since 1997), as well as Texas’ nuclear utility giants.
Since Waste Control Specialists opened its Andrews County site in 1995 the company has
lost $77 million. By passing a bill that would allow it to break into the DOE waste
clean-up market, Waste Control hoped to turn its losses into billions in profit.
Senate Committee Action
Senator Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock) introduced SB 1541 only hours before the filing
deadline in March. The 100-page bill was kept a secret from all but a few key legislators
and industry lobbyists until it was filed. The bill allowed private companies to be
licensed to import and dispose of massive amounts of radioactive waste at up to three
separate disposal facilities, while transferring ownership of and liability for the waste
to the state taxpayers. Senator Duncan invited the Sierra Club, along with several
industry groups, to testify at the first Senate Natural Resources Committee hearing on the
bill. After many meetings with Senator Duncan, grassroots pressure, and media publicity,
Senator Duncan re-wrote the bill and removed many of the worst provisions. The new version
attempted to limit the amount of waste imported to Texas and bar the importation of DOE
waste. The number of disposal facilities was reduced from three to one.
The next significant action on the bill came when, in the words of a Waste Control
lobbyist, Senator Teel Bivins (R-Amarillo) "hijacked" Duncan’s bill by
getting enough votes in a Senate Natural Resources Committee meeting to add a 16-page
amendment restoring many of the provisions Senator Duncan had deleted. With four members
of the committee present, Senators Brown, Duncan, and Lucio voted for the amendment while
Senator Duncan voted against it. The Bivins amendment called for the creation of two
private dumps—one for compact waste and one for virtually unlimited amounts of DOE
waste, including a new category called "mixed waste": radioactive waste mixed
with hazardous chemicals. The amendment was tailor-made for (if not written by) Waste
Control Specialists.
Senate Floor Action
The Lone Star Chapter and other organizations and individuals from across the state
worked hard to convince 10 Senators to block the bill when it came to the Senate floor.
Because Senator Bivins and Waste Control Specialists had convinced more than a majority of
the Senate to vote for the bill, the Sierra Club and others attempted to take advantage of
Senate rules that require a two-thirds majority of the Senate to bring any bill to the
floor. This rule creates a situation in which 10 Senators can block a bill.
All of those who endeavored to find 10 votes to block consideration were bitterly
disappointed when the bill was set for debate on the May 2 Senate calendar and only nine
senators voted to block the bill (Record vote #?). Senator Eliot Shapleigh (D-El
Paso) offered an amendment to strip the provisions added by Bivins in committee, with
Senators Duncan and Truan joining him to object to Bivins’ amendment. Unfortunately,
Senator Shapleigh’s attempt to exclude DOE waste failed in a 16 to 13 vote (record
vote #), and the bill was passed by the Senate on a 19 to 10 (record vote #).
Editorial opposition to the bill poured forth after the Senate vote, with the Austin
American Statesman, Waco Tribune-Herald, Dallas Morning News, Alpine
Observer and the El Paso Times all strongly denouncing the bill. The Houston
Chronicle ran a guest editorial against the bill by a Houston-area Sierra Club member.
House Committee Action
On April 3, the House Environmental regulations Committee held a hearing on all
radioactive waste bills filed in the House. A list of those bills and how they fared can
be found at the end of this section. Many citizens from West Texas and Austin testified
that afternoon against HB 3240, the House companion to SB 1541, and in favor of a slate of
bills proposed by the Texas Radioactive Waste Defense Coalition and carried by Rep. Lon
Burnam.
The Environmental Regulations Committee did not vote on any bills that day. Instead,
Chairman Warren Chisum (R-Pampa) waited until SB 1541 was approved by the Senate and sent
to the House. He then re-wrote the bill, changing several small but significant
provisions, including a requirement that a private company be licensed to build a facility
for Texas Compact waste. This was significant because Bivins’ amendment included no
requirement that a licensed private operator that establishes a highly profitable disposal
site for DOE waste also establish a site to handle much smaller and less profitable
amounts of Compact waste. Advocates of the legislation habitually justified it as
necessary to fulfill Texas’ "obligations" under the Compact. (It should be
noted that the Compact does not obligate Texas to build a radioactive waste
disposal site).
On May 15th the Environmental Regulations Committee met to vote on SB 1541.
Despite considerable grassroots pressure on committee members to strip the Bivins amendment
from the bill, it was approved with the DOE waste provision intact.
House Calendars Committee
SB 1541 was sent to the House Calendars Committee on May 19, only one day before the
last House Calendar could be set according to House rules. The Lone Star Chapter, Public
Citizen, League of Conservation Voters and numerous citizens from across the state worked
to generate calls, letters and visits to Calendars Committee members. On Sunday, May 20th
at 7:00 PM—only 5 hours before the deadline to set the very last House
Calendar—the Committee voted 5 to 3 against placing the bill on the calendar, thereby
killing the bill. Rep. Debra Danburg (D-Houston) led the charge against the bill, with
Representatives Harold Dutton (D-Houston), Brian McCall (R-Plano), Jim Solis
(D-Harlingen), and Senfronia Thompson (D-Houston) also voting against it. Representatives
Kim Brimer (R-Fort Worth), Gary Walker (R-Plains) and Chairman Barry Telford (D-De Kalb)
voted to set the bill on the House calendar.
House Floor Action
One last-ditch attempt was made to pass the bill by attaching a crucial element of SB
1541 to another bill as an amendment on the House floor. At 11:30 on May 22, half an hour
before the deadline for passing all bills, Rep. Ron Wilson (D-Houston) offered an
amendment to a minor bill relating to the definition of hazardous waste. Wilson’s
amendment to privatize radioactive waste disposal would have opened the floodgates to
federal weapons waste. The amendment was withdrawn after Rep. Burnam raised a point of
order against it, but it was quickly re-written and offered again. This time, several
Representatives gathered at the microphone to "chub" (essentially a filibuster)
the bill until the midnight deadline.
Other Legislation Related to Radioactive Material
HB 1099 by Rep. Warren Chisum (R-Pampa) - Effective 9-1-01
This bill, as originally filed, would have weakened the financial assurance
requirements for uranium mining companies. At least 2 uranium mining companies in Texas
have recently threatened bankruptcy in order to raid their clean-up trust funds to pay
executive salaries and the opening of new mines. Sierra Club and others alerted Rep.
Chisum of the need for greater, not lesser, financial scrutiny of the uranium mining
companies. Rep. Chisum agreed, and re-wrote the bill. The new version of the bill deals
mainly with fees and penalties for those who are licensed to use radioactive materials,
and with the inspection of mammography machines.
HB 8 by Rep. Gary Walker (R-Plains) - Died in House Environmental Regulation Committee
Would have allowed private companies to obtain state licenses for radioactive
waste disposal and accept radioactive waste from the U.S. Department of Energy for
disposal in Texas.
HB 85 by Rep. Pete Gallego (D-Alpine) – Died in Senate
Passed out of House and Senate committees but never taken up by the full Senate, this
bill would have deleted a cartographic "box" around Sierra Blanca in Hudspeth
County, Texas that exists in current law. The law currently stipulates that a radioactive
waste disposal facility run by the state must be located within this box.
HB 2370 by Rep. Lon Burnam (D-Fort Worth) - Died in House Environmental Regulation
Would have prohibited below ground disposal of radioactive waste.
HB 2371 by Burnam - Died in House Environmental Regulation
Attempted to close a gaping loophole in the Texas-Maine-Vermont radioactive waste
compact that allows governor-appointed compact commissioners to vote to import unlimited
amounts of nuclear power plant waste from other states to be dumped at a Texas disposal
facility. This bill required the compact commissioners to take an oath to vote against
accepting waste from any state besides Maine or Vermont.
HB 2905 by Burnam - Died in House Environmental Regulation
Would have created a Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management Authority to hold the
license for long-term radioactive waste management. The authority could then contract with
one or more private companies to operate one or more disposal facilities.
HB 3086 by Burnam - Died in House Environmental Regulation
Would have required the host county of a radioactive waste disposal facility and all
adjacent counties to hold a voter referendum on the siting of the facility.
HB 3283 by Chisum - Died in House Committee on Environmental
Regulation
A 50-page bill that defined assured isolation, required the state to hold the license
for radioactive waste disposal of assured isolation, removed the box around Hudspeth
County, prohibited waste disposal within 100 km of the border, attempted to close the
compact loophole, mandated that the disposal or assured isolation facility be built in
West Texas, among other things.
HB 3420 by Chisum - Left Pending in House Environmental Regulation
The House companion to SB 1541.
