Nukewatch Winter Quarterly 2019-2020
Environmental groups won a startling victory in federal court in Knoxville, Tenn. last September, when Chief Judge Pamela Reeves sided with them in a 104-page ruling, and halted the construction of a new nuclear weapons complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. Judge Reeves’s order requires the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) to prepare a new risk analysis that takes into consideration recent data from the US Geological Survey showing earthquake risks to old buildings at the site are far greater than earlier estimated. However, the weapons producing NNSA disregarded the court’s order forcing the plaintiffs to return to court Nov. 12. Calling the NNSA’s violation of the court’s September ruling “brazen” and an “abuse of the judicial process,” the Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance (OREPA), Nuclear Watch New Mexico, and the Natural Resources Defense Council, along with four individual plaintiffs, filed a rebuttal of the NNSA’s argument that construction of the new H-bomb parts facility should be allowed to continue “in the interim.” “It comes down to this,” said Ralph Hutchison, the coordinator of OREPA, “The law is the law. The judge found them in violation of the law and ordered them to redo a significant piece of their environmental analysis—and the law is clear that this environmental analysis has to be done before they can make an irretrievable commitment of tax dollars.” —OREPA, Nuclear Watch NM, and NRDC Press Release, Nov. 12, 2019
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