Keep the pressure on tailings

Congress may choke on the nearly $400 million price tag to move radioactive mill tailings away from the Colorado River near Moab. But it would be better to swallow that bitter pill than the billions of dollars the tailings could generate in health problems and lawsuits if they weren't moved.

The government already seems skittish about acknowledging its role in the diseases and deaths caused by nuclear tests a generation ago. It ought to have learned its lesson.

Fortunately, the new secretary of energy, Sam Bodman, ruled this week that the tailings should be moved to a spot near the I-70 and U.S. 191 interchange, safely away from the water. The other alternative was to cap the tailings in place, which scientists said would poison the river and threaten the health of 25 million water drinkers downstream in Arizona, Nevada and California. People like to hear glowing reports about their water supply, but not when the reports are literally about the water glowing.

But, as good as the news from the Department of Energy was, Congress still has the final word. In an age where lawmakers are constantly on the lookout for ways to cut money in politically unimportant states, they may be tempted to tinker with this one. They shouldn't.

Bodman's decision was a victory for the intense lobbying efforts of many elected officials in Utah, along with other advocates. Without these efforts, Washington probably would not have looked closely at the tailings pile, which was generated from uranium mill operations conducted between 1956 and 1984 to aid in the nation's Cold War efforts. But that lobbying should not stop until the money is in place and the contaminated dirt is being loaded onto rail cars.

Scientists and others have cast a wary eye on the tailings for years. Most recently, heavy flooding in Southern Utah demonstrated how catastrophic nature could be in terms of sending the tailings downstream. University of Utah researchers used carbon dating to determine that twice in the last 1,000 years, floods ripped through the land that now holds the tailings. Capping the tailings in place would not serve to protect anyone.

If the tailings entered the water supply in such a large flood, they would introduce ammonia, uranium, radium, lead and other toxins . Already, some contaminants have leached into the river.

This is a huge public health issue. Bodman is to be commended for understanding that. Now it's Congress' turn to do the right thing.