Tons of radioactive soil from a former rocket engine test and nuclear research site in Simi Valley could be sent to Kettleman Hills -- if all regulatory agencies sign off on the plan.

The plan is part of Boeing and NASA's ongoing cleanup of soils contaminated with cesium 137 at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory. The company, working as a contractor for the federal agency, is seeking governmental permission to truck the material to Kettleman.

Radioactive materials are not usually acceptable to the hazardous waste landfill. But officials with Waste Management, which runs the landfill, say they can take the materials as long as state regulators clear them.

State health officials have so far concluded that the waste is safe and can be buried legally at Kettleman because of a 2002 executive order signed by then-Gov. Gray Davis. The order set a moratorium on the disposal of radioactive materials from cleaned-up Superfund sites at municipal landfills and has no wording prohibiting it from the kind of landfills like the Kettleman Hills Facility.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board, which has ordered Santa Susana's cleanup, and the state Department of Toxic Substances are still reviewing the issue to determine whether the Department of Public Health Radiological Health Branch's assessment was correct.

Community activists and nuclear watchdogs charge that the state health officials skirted the law by issuing a decision without a public process. They also accused Waste Management of violating the public trust by intending to receive radioactive waste while publicly stating that its permit does not allow it.

"What they said that is true is that the permit doesn't allow it. What they said that is not true is that they won't be accepting it," said Bradley Angel, executive director of San Francisco-based Greenaction.

"How is it that the landfill whose permit explicitly excludes radioactive waste might end up accepting waste that came from nuclear power plant contamination?" Angel said.

In response to concerns, Waste Management officials countered that landfill opponents like Angel are searching for a battle that isn't there.

"We only take material that is safe and has been cleared by our regulating government agencies, period," said Kit Cole, spokeswoman for Waste Management. "Our No. 1 commitment is to the safety of our employees and safety of the community."

However, Boeing's own study indicates the level of contamination found in soils at Santa Susana is still much higher than what's normally acceptable to Class I and II landfills.

The cesium contamination found in some soil samples taken at the Santa Susana facility reached as high as 0.659 picocuries per gram, according to Boeing's own study. That's more than 500 times higher than the strictest federal cleanup standard required by state law SB990, which is 0.0012 picocuries per gram, said Dan Hirsch, president of the nuclear watchdog group Committee to Bridge the Gap and a UC Santa Cruz lecturer on nuclear policy.

The average contamination level of all 44 samples reported by Boeing was lower at 0.192. Still, the number is 160 times higher than the level normally allowable to municipal landfills, such as Kettleman Hills.

Just as environmental justice groups sent a letter to California Secretary for Environmental Protection Linda Adams last week raising concerns, Waste Management sent its own letter to her office defending its position. The company stressed that it has not yet agreed to accept the waste.

Cole does confirm that the company would accept the waste if it is cleared by regulators. But she also said the opponents are making a big deal out of nothing.

"Their letter takes what is for us a daily occurrence and makes it misleading by treating it as if it's something unusual," Cole said. "Going through approvals from all these agencies is simply a day at the office for us. We have taken materials before that have been cleared. Given that it's our job to help clean up the state, we will continue to do so."

The issue may further complicate the already controversial permit process for Waste Management's proposal to expand the existing hazardous landfill and construct another, which is expected to face a county decision tonight.

That's because the environmental impact report for the projects makes it clear that the landfill is not normally able to take the kind of radioactive materials under discussion.

According to the document, all waste loads are screened for radioactive waste. Radioactive waste with short half-lives, such as medical waste, can be stored until radioactivity lessens. Otherwise, any radioactive waste is rejected, the report says.

There is no facility in California licensed to receive radioactive waste.

In a Sept. 24 letter to the L.A. regional water board, Boeing stated that if the soils meet the Class I and II landfill permit standards, it wants to dispose of them at Kettleman. If not, the material would be sent to Clive, Utah, the company said.

But disposal at municipal landfills is cheaper than disposing waste at a licensed radioactive waste landfill.

On the same day, the California Department of Public Health issued a five-sentence letter concluding that the Santa Susana soils can be sent to Kettleman, citing the criteria of the 2002 executive order.

Department of Public Health officials contacted this week did not return phone calls.

Under state law, the Department of Toxic Substances Control has control over the cleanup of Santa Susana, but the health department determines if the waste meets regulations.

"There have been allegations that the DPH decision was somehow wrong, and as a result we're seeking further clarification from DPH and wanting to ensure that provisions of our permit have not been violated. That's our role at this point," said DTSC spokeswoman Mercedes Azar.

Azar said the amount of contaminated soils proposed for disposal is estimated to be 1,500 cubic yards.

Hirsch argues the Department of Public Health made a mistake when it used the executive order as a rationale for approval.

The waste at issue is not so-called "decommissioned materials" regulated by the executive order, which imposes a moratorium on the disposal of such materials to Class III landfills -- that can only take scrap metals, demolition debris and other inert waste. But the executive order does not explicitly ban materials from Class I and II landfills, such as the Kettleman Hills hazardous waste landfills, possibly leaving a loophole.

"Boeing states the wastes are not decommissioned wastes. Therefore, that little loophole, even if it exists, is irrelevant to the waste they want to ship in, the reason being that the Santa Susana facility is yet to be cleaned up and not decommissioned," Hirsch said. "The waste they want to ship to Kettleman far exceeds the cleanup level established by law, SB990, which sets what the cleanup standards should be for the site."

The reporter can be reached at 583-2429.

(Oct. 19, 2009)