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For Immediate Release Friday, July 9, 2004
COTTER REQUEST TO ACCEPT MAYWOOD WASTE FOR DISPOSAL DENIED
Marion Galant
Community Relations Manager
Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Division
(303) 692-3304
(303) 919-5262 - Cell
For Immediate Release Friday, July 9, 2004
DENVER- The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment Friday denied the Cotter Uranium Mill’s request for state permission to accept the first allotment of radioactive-contaminated soils from a New Jersey Superfund site and to dispose of the waste at its plant two-and-a-half-miles south of Caňon City.
This allotment was to have been composed of up to 24,000 cubic yards of soils, contaminated with thorium from production of lantern components, which have been removed from properties that are part of the Maywood Chemical Superfund Site in New Jersey.
Howard Roitman, the Department of Public Health and Environment’s director of environmental programs, said, “The department has denied Cotter’s request to accept this material because the company’s procedures necessary to ensure the safe and compliant handling of the materials are not adequate. Also, it is unclear how much space is left in the company impoundment to accept all the plant’s building rubble and contaminated soils when the mill is finally decommissioned.”
Roitman continued, “The earlier volume estimate Cotter gave us is that 500,000 cubic yards of capacity might be required for decommissioning reserve. More recent scenarios have estimated that as much as five million cubic yards may be needed. If the larger number turns out to be the case, there is no room at the plant site for direct disposal of materials from off site. We need to have a much more accurate estimate.”
The Radiation Management Unit in the Department of Public Health and Environment’s Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Division had announced earlier this year that it would make the decision on Cotter’s request to accept up to 24,000 cubic yards of Maywood materials as part of the current Cotter license renewal process.
However, in connection with a lawsuit filed by Cotter in Denver District Court, a judge recently ordered the department to make its decision on the initial shipment by Friday, July 9.
Still pending is Cotter's application to renew the company’s license for the Cañon City mill for an additional five years. That application requests approval to accept an additional 400,000 cubic yards of Maywood soils for disposal at the plant site. The draft license renewal must be issued by the department’s Radiation Management Unit for public comment no later than December 15, 2004.
Cotter has proposed that the Maywood waste be used as cover for more highly radioactive uranium mill tailings already in on-site lined impoundments at the Caňon City site. The Cotter milling facility, in addition to being one of two operating uranium mills in the country, also is known as the Lincoln Park Superfund site. It was named after the neighborhood in Fremont County most directly affected by the uranium milling operation.
Cotter still is in the process of cleaning up ground water and soils contaminated with radionuclides from plant operations before 1979. Contamination was spread by blowing dust; leaks in the site’s former unlined impoundments; and flooding.
Any additional material Cotter would seek to take from the New Jersey site or other similar sites would be governed by the provisions of H.B.1358, which requires detailed evaluation of the soils and extensive opportunities for public involvement before any decision is made. The initial shipment, which had been proposed before the legislation was passed, was exempted from some of the new law’s provisions for that reason.
Under provisions of the Colorado State Administrative Procedures Act, decisions, such as the department’s denial of Cotter’s request to accept the initial shipment of Maywood waste, can be appealed by any of the affected parties to a state administrative hearing officer. The decision by the administrative hearing officer then can be appealed to a Colorado district court.
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