Rather than making another request for an environmental impact statement (EIS) before the U.S. transports liquid highly enriched uranium (HEU) from Canada to the Savannah River Site, U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins (D-N.Y.) is asking to remove from consideration the route that would send the uranium through his district. The Energy Department anticipates overseeing up to 150 shipments beginning this summer. When all is said and done, SRS will be home to another 6,000-plus gallons of HEU, which will be reprocessed and stored on-site until the nation finds a nuclear repository.
The shipments are based on an agreement between President Barack Obama and former Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. On a larger scale, they are also part of the U.S. mission to collect weapon-grade nuclear material from around the globe to prevent its acquisition and possible use by rogue actors.
In a March 15 letter to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), Higgins said the transportation route runs through a “high risk area” in his district. The route begins at Atomic Energy of Canada’s Chalk River Laboratories in Ontario, goes over the Peace Bridge and through western New York on its way south to SRS, near Aiken, S.C. – a distance of more than 1,100 miles. Higgins has been trying to stop the transfer for years because of the “lack of current environmental or threat assessments.” The HEU is highly radioactive and has never been shipped in liquid form by truck, Higgins said.
He added that the route would take the HEU through downtown Buffalo and also bring the material close to the Great Lakes, which provide 84 percent of the continent’s surface fresh water. The Buffalo-Niagara region is also home to four international bridge crossings and the Niagara Power Project, the largest electricity producer in the state of New York, Higgins said. “In recognition of the danger associated with transporting this material through a high risk area, I respectfully request that your agency remove this route from consideration for the planned liquid waste shipments,” Higgins wrote in the letter. “Failure to reconsider would run counter to the mounting public and Congressional concern over these actions.”
The NRC said in a brief email on Monday that it will reply to Higgins “in the near future” and that the reply will include the NRC position on the issue.
