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capacity. Hence, the argument is that North Carolina environmentalists might be able to operate as
a market participant in a low-level site for its own waste produced by its own power plants, its own
hospitals, its own Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola bottling plants. Hence, they went through a compact
commission which was set up in the prior administration in 1980, 81, 83, ratified by Congress in
1985, went through a long elaborate procedure in which they picked one state to be host state and
that is North Carolina. That's where we are now.
Now, the situation is that the General Assembly has to accept this or not. It is not the
Governor who does it. In this state, you know, the Governor does not have a veto; the General
Assembly put us into the compact; the General Assembly can take us out of the compact. The question
is, What should they do? Which argument will be believed? The general feeling is that they will
probably stay in the compact, but we're not sure of that, it's up to them.
If they pull it out of the compact, then we will still have to site our own site. Now if we do
that, we may be liable to the wastes of the other 50 states. We will also have a surcharge on wastes
that is produced in this state that is sent to Barnwell, etc., until we have our site produced.
Governor Martin will recommend to the General Assembly that we stay in the compact with two
provisos, one proviso being that the other seven states and North Carolina amend their compact
legislation and have it approved by Congress such that no other state may withdraw from the compact
after January 1, 1995. Why? So that other states cannot use us for 19 years and then pull out at
15 years. He wants it really binding.
The second proviso is that there be adequate tariffs from this. Let me just suggest to you
that there are tariffs in effect now. The average cost of a cubic foot of low-level radioactive
waste received in Barnwell is $44 per cubic foot. A million cubic feet are received a year. That
produces a revenue of $44 million a year, and there are some benefits. They have 250 employees, a
$12 million payroll. They pay to South Carolina for the license $170,000 each year. They pay to
Barnwell County $440,000 in special license tax. They pay in taxes $65,000. Another $70,000 for
vehicle taxes, and the best of all, they pay $428 million as a surcharge to South Carolina, which is
used for education.
Governor Martin believes that if indeed we do stay in the compact, and if indeed we can set up
a --------schedule, we should use the best technology to prevent any liquids and any water soluable
products from getting into the soil and that we should have an above -ground retrievable facility so
that the radioactivity will decay over the years. By the way 90% of the decay is in 100 years, and
almost 100%, 99.something by 300 years. This is not high-level waste. High-level waste has to be
stored for up to 40,000 years. There are trace elements that have longer half-lives, but they are
in tiny amounts.
In any event, the Governor is concerned that (1) we have adequate technology that can handle
this in such a way that we don't have problems of leakage and of (not clear) into the ground water.
Secondly, he's concerned that there be sufficient revenue to compensate whoever takes this in North
Carolina. That is, for the locality and not the state. We're talking in the range of $3 to $5
million which would go into economic development. Now, that's the background. Where are we now?
I am in charged of what is called the Special Inter -Disciplinary Committee on Low -Level
Radioacive Waste, that includes representatives of various parts of the government. We have no
siting procedures; we have no legislation; we do not intend to follow the report that listed the 36
counties, including Alexander County, Iredell County, Anson, etc., as potential sites available,
because they did not have in mind the kind of technology we do, and we do not think it is fair to do
so. We have no legislation on the books. This committee is charged with writing the legislation
that will enable us to have siting procedures.
I am going to give you some of my own beliefs about siting procedure. My
own beliefs are the following:
1. You must start with education. We are going to make a videotape of what is low-level
radiation, how does one dispose of it, what are the hazards, and I could quickly say that it is not
as hazardous as some people claim when they compare it with high-level radiation. You all know that
Governor Martin opposed the high-level radioactive waste site in North Carolina because he thinks it
should be far away from population centers. He is not concerned as a scientist with having a low-
level site in North Carolina because he believes that it is possible through technology to safely
store it and with large amounts of economic benefit to whoever takes it.
2. We want input from local officials. I am writing a letter to all the chairs of all the
county commissioners that will go out on Wednesday, the day after the election, that is tomorrow, so
that it did not get confused by the partisan faces. And we will say to them where we are in our
procedures. We will also say that we inCend to have local input from the Association of County
Commissioners and the League of Municipalities. Hopefully we will be in a situation in two years
after the legislation is passed, after the issue of staying in the compact is settled, after a
variety of things is done, such that we will have one or two counties or municipalities or whatever
they are in the state volunteer for the site. I talked to one of the chairmen of a Sandhills
County, whose budget is $14 million, and I said would you be willing to consider something at the
range for $5 million for twenty years, that's a hundred million dollars right now. He knew exactly
what I was talking about. He can't say that in public. Local people have to deal with issues of
compensation, a whole series of important issues about it.
One of the interesting things is that everybody thinks that it should be in everybody else's
' backyard. Let's take one scenario. Suppose North Carolina pulls out of the compact. Suppose we
have to go it alone. The State will have to site a site without the $5 million, without the
compensation, because it is not there. The volume is not there to produce it. Now, you look at a