COMMITTEE TO MINIMIZE TOXIC WASTE PRESS RELEASE UC BERKELEY LAB PLAN TO DEMOLISH BEVATRON: Tens of Thousands of Tons of Radioactive Debris Will be Hauled Through the Streets of Berkeley for 7 Years! The Lawrence Berkeley Lab held a scoping meeting for the public on Thursday, March 31, 2005, 6:30 p.m.-8:30 p.m., at North Berkeley Senior Center to present its plan to demolish the Bevatron (a massive particle accelerator) and Building 51. The University of California will prepare the Environmental Impact Report for this seven-year project. The dust and debris from the tens of thousands of tons of radioactive/hazardous waste produced from the smashing of the concrete shielding blocks and metals in these facilities will contain toxic materials (which may also be radioactive) such as asbestos, mercury, lead, PCBs, chlorinated VOCs, and aromatic hydrocarbons. Some of the radioactive materials include Cobalt 60, Cesium 137 and Europium 154. Radioactive energy from Cobalt 60 can be 59 times greater in intensity than that of an ordinary X-ray. These radioactive and hazardous wastes will be hauled by thousands of heavily loaded trucks down Hearst Ave. to Oxford, south on Oxford to University Ave. and down University to I-80. From there they will proceed to landfills in Altamont, CA, the Nevada Test-Site and Clive, Utah. The demolition is expected to continue through FY2012. An alternative to demolition and removal would be to allow the Bevatron and its contamination to remain onsite in relative containment. Onsite containment will allow the radioactivity to decay in place and not be hauled away to other communities. This would also preserve the historic aspects of the Bevatron, as it is eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places for the research in particle physics, which resulted in four Nobel prizes. If you don't want Radioactive Asbestos Dust in your neighborhood, stores, or at bus stops, or in a truck next to your car on the street. SEND IN YOUR COMMENTS BY April 16, 2005 To: Daniel Kevin, Environmental Planning Group Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory One Cyclotron, Road, MS 90K0198 Berkeley, California 94720………………..EXPRESS YOUR CONCERNS