This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2009, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

The Salt Lake Tribune can disagree with EnergySolutions on policy issues without resorting to malicious personal attacks on its management and impugning the character of the decent people who work for the company.

In her column, "Rewriting the rules on hot waste," ( Tribune, May 24), Rebecca Walsh did not have the facts on her side and therefore attacked the character of Steve Creamer and other EnergySolutions' officers, hoping that her readers would not know the difference. The people of Utah are intelligent and understand that The Tribune has an anti-nuclear and anti-EnergySolutions agenda and that reporting the facts in an unbiased manner is not part of that agenda.

Here is the truth: EnergySolutions operates a low-level radioactive waste disposal facility in the west desert of Utah. The Clive facility has been in operation for more than 20 years with a solid health and safety record. The facility was located in Clive because of its remoteness, arid climate and ideal geology. The Clive facility, licensed by Utah, is highly regulated and complies with all state and federal regulations.

The facility disposes of Class A low-level radioactive waste, the lowest level of radioactivity classified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. No spent fuel. No Class B or C waste. Despite what The Tribune asserts in Walsh's column, there have been no "broken political promises," no "breaking your word," no secretly taking waste from foreign countries.

The NRC has granted a number of import licenses over the years to import material from other countries for processing in Tennessee with the residual waste from the internationally generated material disposed of at Clive. Every application for an NRC import license is made a public record by the NRC, open to public comment, just like the company's application for a license to import the Italian material.

The Tribune knows that it is not accurate to say that the company has taken foreign-generated material in the past "without really telling anybody." As a highly regulated facility, nothing the company does is in secret or hidden from the public.

The Tribune may not want a disposal facility in the west desert; it may not agree with the General Accountability Office that there is no Class A waste disposal capacity issue in the short or long term; it may not agree with the NRC that there is no difference between domestically and internationally generated material; it may not agree with the conclusions of Utah state regulators that EnergySolutions safely manages and disposes of this material; and it may not agree with government and industry leaders that EnergySolutions provides an important Class A low-level nuclear waste management service to the nuclear industry, government and medical research facilities.

The Tribune can certainly disagree on these issues without assaulting the character of EnergySolutions officers and calling EnergySolutions employees "nuclear grave diggers." The Tribune should base its opinions on facts that are accurately and honestly reported. It owes that much to its readers.

Jill Sigal is senior vice president of EnergySolutions.