
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, July 22, 1990                   TAG: 9007220152
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

HALT OF WASTE BURNING AT PLANT ANNOUNCED

The Department of Energy has agreed not to burn waste containing plutonium and hazardous chemicals at the last two operable incinerators at its Rocky Flats weapons plant near Denver, unless it can win permission from the Colorado Department of Health or the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

The agreement came Thursday in the settlement of a lawsuit brought by the Sierra Club, an environmental group. At least three uncontrolled fires broke out in one of the incinerators in testing in 1987, said Adam Babich, the lawyer for the Sierra Club.

David P. Simonson, deputy manager of the Energy Department's Rocky Flats office, said the "unintentional" fires had been confined to the interior of the incinerator.

The Department of Energy had said it had the right to use the incinerators while it sought a permit to do so under a 1976 federal anti-pollution law.

- The New York Times

by CNB