[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 17]
[Senate]
[Pages 23361-23362]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                  DOD AUTHORIZATION CONFERENCE REPORT

  Mr. BUNNING. Mr. President, I rise today in support of the Department 
of Defense Authorization conference report.
  This bill funds important priorities for our troops. It gives them a 
3.5-percent pay raise. It makes last year's increases in special pay 
for combat duty and family separation permanent.
  The bill expands health care coverage for our National Guard and 
Reserve members and improves retirement and survivor benefits for those 
who have served.
  The bill also funds the safety needs of our troops for the coming 
year. It includes over $750 million for force protection gear, 
including over $430 million for body armor. More than $570 million is 
provided for additional armored humvees, and another $100 million will 
be used on more armor for existing vehicles.
  This bill gives our troops the tools they need to do their jobs, and 
the benefits they and their families deserve.
  This bill also contains important reforms to the Energy Employees 
Compensation Program.
  The Bunning-Bingaman worker compensation Amendment was added in the 
bill when it was on the Senate floor. The amendment included reform for 
the compensation program and was cosponsored by a bipartisan group 
including myself and 18 other Senators.
  I thank the Senate managers, Senators Warner and Levin, for their 
consideration and support of this important provision in the conference 
report.
  This provision will fix the problems with Subtitle D of the 
Department of Energy's Energy Employees compensation program for sick 
injured cold war workers at Energy sites throughout the country.
  Since the end of World War II, workers at Department of Energy sites 
across the country helped our Nation face threats from our enemies by 
creating and maintaining our Nation's nuclear weapons.
  Many of these workers sacrificed their health and safety and were 
exposed to harms unknown at the time in their work to preserve our 
freedoms.
  Congress passed a compensation program for the energy workers in 2000 
in an effort to help these workers.
  The Department of Energy's Subtitle D program failed miserably. 
During the past 4 years the Department received $95 million but 
processed and paid only a small number of the more than 25,000 claims 
for workers who were made ill by their work.
  DOE's miserable job with this program was especially troubling 
because of the Kentucky workers at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion plant, 
where the uranium shipped to sites throughout the country was refined.
  Under DOE's operation, more than 3,000 former Paducah workers have 
filed for compensation for their illnesses. But zero Paducah workers 
have received compensation for their illnesses.
  The provision in this bill transfers Subtitle D claims processing 
operations from the Department of Energy to the Department of Labor, 
which is currently handling thousands of similar claims under Subtitle 
B of the program.
  The Department of Labor runs one of the largest and most efficient 
claims operations in the country.
  Payments will be made directly by the Department of Labor to the 
worker or survivor. This solves the current issue of no willing payer 
for all eligible claims. Workers will get prompt medical care for their 
covered illnesses with no need to go through another system at the 
State.
  This reform effort finally fulfills the promise that Congress made to 
DOE workers in 2000.
  Many of these workers are ill and dying. Because of this reform, they 
will not have to wait for the Department of Energy to get its act 
together to process and pay the valid claims in a timely manner. DOL 
will take over these operations and process the claims much more 
efficiently and get deserving claimants the compensation Congress 
promised.
  I urge you to support this conference report to help protect those 
workers who risked their health and safety to help us win the cold war.
  Mr. JEFFORDS. Mr. President, I rise to express my concern about 
section 3116 of the fiscal year 2005 Department of Defense 
Authorization Conference Report, S. 4200, which the Senate passed by 
unanimous consent this week. Section 3116 establishes new procedures 
for the disposal of high-level radioactive waste in South Carolina and 
Idaho that resulted from the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel at 
Department of Energy, DOE, facilities.
  As my colleagues will recall, 48 members of this body voted to remove 
these provisions during Senate floor consideration of the fiscal year 
2005 Department of Defense Authorization bill. Senators were concerned 
that the provisions in the Senate-passed bill would allow the 
Department of Energy to leave millions of gallons of high-level nuclear 
waste next to drinking water supplies in South Carolina. While these 
provisions have been modified in conference and some changes have been 
made in an effort to strengthen the language, I regret to say that 
loopholes still remain that cast serious doubt about whether the 
environment near these facilities will be protected.
  I want to be certain that this language does not preempt the ability 
of States in which these facilities are located to issue permits to 
protect the surface and drinking water near these DOE facilities. The 
new conference report language in section 3116 appears to protect the 
right of states to approve closure plans or issue permits for the 
closure of nuclear waste containing tanks. The opening lines of section 
3116 specifically eliminates the ability of the Federal Government to 
regulate these tanks under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, the 
Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 or ``other laws that define classes 
of radioactive waste.'' This language is silent on state's authority, 
delegated to them by the federal government under the Clean Water

[[Page 23362]]

and Safe Drinking Water Acts, to issue permits protecting surface water 
and drinking water. The conferees did not exempt the requirements of 
the Clean Water and Safe Drinking Water Acts. These laws and the 
regulations that implement them, which do contain lists of radioactive 
pollutants, are not overridden. It is my hope that these laws will be 
implemented the way the conferees intended, and States will continue to 
be allow to protect their citizens from exposure to radioactivity 
through the water they drink and our lakes, rivers, streams and 
wetlands.
  I am also concerned that nuclear waste greater than class C, and 
generally not suitable for near surface disposal, will remain onsite 
with limited oversight. Section 3116 allows these wastes to stay onsite 
pursuant to a plan developed by the DOE in consultation with the NRC. I 
would have preferred that NRC be explicitly required to follow current 
regulation regarding disposal of greater than class C waste. Section 
3116 instead requires a new ``plan'' that has no particular 
requirements. Mr. President, radioactive waste remains environmentally 
harmful for an extremely long period of time. It had been my hope that 
we could have been more clear about the guidelines for its disposal.
  As a member of the Committee on Environment and Public Works, one of 
the Senate Committees with jurisdiction over the management of nuclear 
materials, I am deeply concerned with this provisions. It is 
unfortunate that it will soon be law. I am concerned that, in the 
future, with one small change in this legislation, several other States 
may find their water resources at risk.
  Indeed, if this waste sludge remains, the Savannah River site would 
continue to be among the most radioactively contaminated sites on the 
planet. It is my hope that the agencies responsible for implementing 
this section will do so responsibly, and I will be monitoring their 
actions.

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