Energy Secretary Sending ‘Tiger Teams’ to Probe Problems at Atomic Arms Plants

WASHINGTON — Energy Secretary James D. Watkins, announcing a 10-point program to put safety concerns above production goals, said Tuesday that he is dispatching aggressive “tiger teams” of investigators to assess environmental problems at all the nation’s nuclear weapons plants.

Watkins said that the teams will be similar to the 25-member investigative squad he recently sent to the Rocky Flats facility near Denver in the wake of a massive federal criminal inquiry into allegations that the Energy Department and Rockwell International Corp. had dumped hazardous waste illegally and lied to cover up violations.

To Check All Major Plants

All 35 major Energy Department weapons plants will be investigated for compliance with environmental laws within two years, Watkins said, with more than 100 “environmentally less-demanding” facilities scheduled for checkups by December, 1992.

Watkins said that he is also asking Congress for $325 million to accelerate toxic waste cleanups and $18 million to improve environmental management at the department’s weapons facilities.

He further disclosed that he is changing the department’s contracting system so that contract award fees are based much more on environmental, safety and health factors than on production.

The secretary announced that he is beginning negotiations with states that contain Energy Department nuclear facilities “to allow direct access and improve state monitoring capabilities.”

And he said that he will allow independent researchers access to the health records of 600,000 department radiation workers to determine the ill effects of testing and production.

In outlining the new program, Watkins escalated his criticism of practices at the Energy Department and declared that he is creating “a new culture of accountability.”

The retired admiral assailed “the non-uniform, haphazard, overly decentralized and self-defeating” environmental reviews of weapons facilities in the past. He pledged “full disclosure and complete assessment of potential environmental impacts” in the future.

His comments were made at a news conference scheduled at the same hour as another at which 22 environmental, scientific and church groups announced plans to sue the Energy Department to force a broad public review of its plans for modernizing the trouble-plagued nuclear weapons program.

Watkins is expected next month to disclose in detail his plans for revitalizing the weapons complexes, which have been crippled in recent years by mechanical failures, management problems and safety questions. The department is also planning to spend billions of dollars to clean up hazardous wastes that have accumulated at the weapons facilities over four decades.

Environmentalists Skeptical

Environmentalists reacted to Watkins’ new program by saying that they liked what they had heard, but they were skeptical because some of the same items had been promised by his predecessor, John S. Herrington.

“I’m encouraged but I’m skeptical,” said Dan W. Reicher, an attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, one of the groups that is suing the Energy Department. “The real test of Watkins’ commitment will come when he is facing a competition between funding for cleanup and funding of production initiatives.”

Reicher protested that Watkins “makes almost no effort to involve the public in the approach that he presented this morning. That is one of the reasons that we have filed suit.”

Glenn Commends Watkins

Sen. John Glenn (D-Ohio), chairman of the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, which has conducted hearings on Energy Department operations, commended Watkins for placing the department’s nuclear weapons program “on the right track.”

However, he criticized the failure of the Bush Administration to nominate members of an Energy Department nuclear safety watchdog panel created by Congress last year.

“Much as I applaud the excellent steps being taken by Secretary Watkins, he will some day have a successor,” Glenn said. When that occurs, he added, such a safety panel “will be vital to assure that we will not drift back into the patterns of neglect that for 38 years permitted us to build up an appallingly poor record on environmental” matters at weapons plants.