TOOELE COUNTY,
Utah (ABC 4 News) – A Federal judge recently struck down a ruling that is keeping high level nuclear waste from being stored on an Indian reservation in
Tooele County.
It’s a judicial move that could make it easier to bring the highly toxic waste into the state of
Utah where it will be stored.
Tribal leaders of the Skull Valley Goshute Indian reservation came together to decide what their next move will be in trying to get permission to store high level nuclear waste on their property. However, not every tribe member wants the dangerous waste placed on their land.
It’s vast, open, and a desolate land: eighteen thousand acres in Tooele County. It’s where a few herds of buffalo roam, and even fewer people live, but it’s where the Goshute Indians call home, and it is where some would like to turn their land into a long-term parking lot for used nuclear reactor fuel, a form of high-level nuclear waste that remains radioactive forever.
“We are in the middle of a hazardous waste industrial zone, zoned by the state of Utah. When we come in here to bring in economic development, that’s the only kind of business we can bring in,” says Rex Allen, a member of the tribe.
However, it’s the kind of business tribal leader Margene Bullcreek doesn’t want. For more than a decade, she’s fought against storing more than 40-thousand metric tons of waste in her backyard.
“They want to put it on Indian land, because they won’t have to be taxed by the state. They don’t have to be regulated by the federal government, so they have it made, and they can do it anyway they want to do it,” says Bullcreek.
The Private Fuel Storage Corporation is responsible for storing waste from 8 different nuclear power companies, and they would like to temporarily store it on the Indian reservation in Tooele County.
“If it is good for the nation, than it’s good for us,” says Leon Bear, a tribe member.
If some people get their way, then they would store the waste 3 miles away from where some tribe members live, but experts predict if anything goes wrong, then people 40 miles downwind would be affected, including those who live in Grantsville, Tooele, Dugway, and even parts of Salt Lake County.
“How are we going to transport it? How are we going to get it here?” asks Daniele Collard, a Tooele County resident.
Collard worries about the potential health risks.
“If it’s going to affect us, we should be part of the decision making. We should reap the benefits,” says Collard.
“The carrot that they waved around in our faces was like a million to a billion dollars,” claims Bullcreek.
All of the money should be going to the tribe, but Bullcreek doesn’t believe she’ll ever see a dime.
“Those of us that are opposing it, we aren’t going to benefit anything from it,” says Bullcreek.
Many fear allowing high level nuclear waste to come into the state of Utah would set a precedence to allow even more of it to come here, which has many Utahns against any waste being stored here.
Some tribe members believe all the Interior Department has to do is correct some procedural errors, and that should be enough to keep the waste off of their land.
