Statements Regarding Senate Bill to Close High Flux Beam Reactor

As described in FYI #109 , Senator Alfonse D’Amato (R-NY) has introduced a bill, S. 1140, stating: “The Secretary of Energy shall ensure that the High Flux Beam Reactor at Brookhaven National Laboratory is not reactivated.” Joining D’Amato in this effort is Rep. Michael Forbes (R-NY), in whose district Brookhaven National Laboratory is located.

The following are quotations about this action from a congressional press release, newspaper articles and an editorial. Information about the reactor and its research program is available at the following site: http://www.hfbr.bnl.gov/

Rep. Michael Forbes, September 2 press release: “After a long and thoughtful review of the environmental, health and safety problems at Brookhaven National Lab, I have come to the inescapable conclusion that the High Flux Beam Reactor (HFBR) must be permanently shut down. All of the Lab’s resources and energies must be directed toward cleaning up the many sources of radioactive and chemical contamination on-site, and not toward restarting the larger of the two nuclear reactors at the facility.”

Senator Alfonso D’Amato, September 2 press release: “Given the sorry history of this nuclear reactor, the best solution is to shut it down, and see to it that it does not restart. It must be decommissioned and we must end any threat it poses to the health of Suffolk County residents. There is no doubt that the operation of this facility has caused a very real threat to the groundwater in Suffolk County. People have to be assured that the reactor will not pose a threat in the future.”

D’Amato and Forbes letter to DOE Secretary Federico Pena, as quoted in September 3 New York Times, informing him of their intention: “to do all that is within our power to see to it that the high flux beam reactor at Brookhaven National Laboratory never operates again.”

Dr. Peter Bond, BNL Interim Director, September 3 New York Times: “It would take away a major scientific resource.... It obviously has a strong negative impact on the work that can be done.”

DOE Secretary Federico Pena, September 6 Newsday: “I want to assure the community and the members [of Congress] that no one is charging headlong into trying to reopen this facility until we get all the facts.”

Director Bond, September 6 Newsday: “The course of action he [Pena] laid out previously was a very sensible one which involved going to the science community, going to the public and gathering all the information before making the final decision.”

Senator D’Amato, September 6 Newsday: “I think it’s more than lip service. The secretary’s engaged in a comprehensive review that we believe in the fullness of time will demonstrate quite clearly why...it should not be restarted.”

Newsday editorial, September 4: “Instead of protecting a world-class research institution that pumps about $400 million a year into the regional economy, the two Republicans are giving aid and comfort to a vehement antinuclear fringe that falsely portrays BNL’s admitted environmental lapse as an imminent danger to the public health. Score another for Long Island’s ever-present NIMBYs.”