Where is Yucca Mountain? Yucca Mountain is the only site being Yucca Mountain is located in Nevada, about an considered by the Department of Energy hour northwest of Las Vegas. It is in the desert, (DOE) as a “permanent disposal” site for the and the land it occupies includes public land, United States’ highly radioactive nuclear Nevada Test Site land, and Nellis Air Force Base waste. This spent nuclear fuel and high-level land. However, all of this land is part of the waste is currently located at 77 sites across the For more information, contact: Western Shoshone traditional homelands. If a country and would have to be transported by dump is built at Yucca Mountain, the Shoshone truck or rail to Yucca Mountain if that site is will lose access to this sacred place. approved as a geologic repository. Public Citizen’s Critical Mass Energy Under current law, 70,000 metric tons and Environment Program of waste would be allowed to be stored at 215 Pennsylvania Avenue, SE Yucca Mountain, with 63,000 tons of that Washington, DC 20003 being commercial waste and the rest being www.citizen.org/cmep DOE waste. However, that still would not 202-546-4996 OREGON IDAHOIDAHO accommodate all the waste projected to be 202-547-7392 (fax) Get the Facts about Washoe produced in the U.S. (an estimated 107,500 County Humboldt metric tons of both commercial and DOE County YUCCA Elko County waste). OR Scientific study at Yucca Mountain has MOUNTAIN, Pershing revealed a host of potential problems at the Reno County Lander Nuclear Information County Eureka site. Besides being sacred land, Yucca Moun- CALIFORNIA CALIFORNIA

NEVADA County UTAH UTAH Resource Service Churchill County White Pine tain has many characteristics that make it an Lyon County unsuitable place to store highly irradiated 1424 16th Street, NW County Washington, DC 20036 and nuclear waste. Mineral Nye County For instance, the people who live near www.nirs.org County 202-328-0002 Nuclear Waste! Storey Yucca Mountain, in the Amargosa Valley, County Esmeralda depend on the aquifer beneath the mountain 202-468-2183 (fax) Douglas County Lincoln County CALIFORNIACALIFORNIA YUCCA County for their drinking and irrigation water. This MOUN- TAIN water is sure to be contaminated if nuclear Clark County waste is stored inside the mountain. Further, Las Yucca Mountain is located in an extremely Vegas active earthquake zone. Read on for more ARIZONA details! A Threat to Groundwater The Danger of Earthquakes significant rise in groundwater levels could occur What Can I Do? The Department of Energy (DOE) as the result of an earthquake, possibly flooding Should an earthquake hit the Yucca N Write to your Members of Congress talks about “disposing of” nuclear waste. But the repository. This type of event would surely Mountain area while nuclear waste is stored and tell them it’s a bad idea to store nuclear waste cannot be disposed of; it only compromise the integrity of the nuclear waste there, disastrous consequences could result. The nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain. You can can be stored, and the DOE has indicated that containers and contaminate the groundwater groundwater table could rise, coming into contact beneath Yucca Mountain. Despite the evidence to use the sample postcard text below, or if radioactive waste is stored in Yucca Moun- with the stored waste and contaminating it. Or the write one in your own words. Send your tain, it will leak into the groundwater someday. the contrary, the DOE has said it considers it storage canisters themselves could break open. unlikely that an earthquake would strike the note on a postcard depicting a local scene The DOE is finding more and more Also, portions of the mountain could collapse, in your community to drive home the point problems with the “natural barrier” system at region. permitting no access to the broken canisters that you’re a voter in their next election. Yucca Mountain, and the agency appears to inside. be scrambling to piece together an engineered N Host a letter-writing party and have barrier system that delay but not prevent your friends and family write letters or leakage into the groundwater. postcards, too. The Department of Energy’s own N Also, if you belong to a group yourself, studies show that if the groundwater is con- put an article in the newsletter, make taminated, people will be harmed by drinking an announcement at a meeting, or arrange this water, eating produce and meat grown to have a speaker address your group on with the contaminated water, and drinking milk this issue. from cows that have been exposed to the contamination through their feed and drink. N Contact us (see back of flyer) for more If radioactive waste leaks and con- flyers or other materials or to arrange a taminates the groundwater beneath Yucca presentation to your group. Mountain, it would not only jeopardize the health of nearby residents, who depend on that Nevada ranks third in the nation for aquifer as their sole source of potable water, current seismic activity. Since 1976, there have Dear Rep./Senator ______but also it would jeopardize the health of the been more than 600 seismic events of a magni- tude greater than 2.5 within a 50-mile radius of I think storing high-level nuclear many people who drink milk produced on Nevada Earthquakes: 79,794 events located by the University waste at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, is dairy farms in the region, including families and Yucca Mountain. The Western Shoshone call of Nevada, Reno Seismological Laboratory; the United States a bad idea! Science has shown that Representative X earthquakes pose a definite threat to Yucca Mountain “Serpent Swimming Westward” Geological Survey; and the California Institute of Technology House of Representatives children in the Los Angeles area.Thirty-five safety, and that the aquifer beneath Washington, DC 20515 thousand gallons of milk per day from the and speak of its constant movement. In 1992, an Yucca Mountain will be contaminated with radiation. Amargosa Valley in Nevada are sold in Los earthquake with a magnitude of 5.6 originating More information on these and other OR Angeles, California. just 10 miles from Yucca Mountain caused Please OPPOSE all legislation that significant damage to the DOE field office build- technical problems with Yucca Mountain can would send nuclear waste to Nevada. Senator Y ing at the site. be found at: Sincerely, U.S. Senate Further, some scientists believe that a http://www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/ Your Complete Name and Address Washington, DC 20510