Biodefense laboratory ready to open in Livermore

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Oct 5, 2006 | by Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER

Scientists are preparing to open a new biodefense lab inside Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons laboratory as a federal appeals court weighs legal challenges to the new facility.

A Livermore watchdog group filed an emergency request late Tuesday night that asked a federal judge to halt the start of work in Lawrence Livermore's new biosafety level 3 lab. The group, Tri- Valley CAREs, argues that earthquakes, accidents or a terrorist attack could release the lethal germs being studied inside.

"This move is very dangerous because they're proposing to do operations without what we consider the proper level of (environmental) review," said Marylia Kelley, the group's president.

Livermore Lab officials say the new lab -- a portable research facility delivered by truck last spring -- has been through four safety reviews by the University of California and the National Nuclear Security Administration and should be ready for operations by mid-November.

"We believe that there's a critical need for the facility, and we're doing our best to get it going," said lab spokesman Steve Wampler.

Livermore researchers have been among the most prolific U.S. teams in developing genetic probes for detecting biowarfare germs that cause anthrax, plague and other diseases. Those probes or assays are used in the network of biodetectors that sniff for potential bioterror agents in more than 30 major U.S. cities.

Caroline Purdy, a chief scientist at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said in court papers last February that the new lab at Livermore is important for upgrading the BioWatch network. "It is my professional opinion that LLNL's BSL-3 facility will significantly improve our nation's ability to detect and respond to the threat of terrorism using biological agents and that delaying commencement of operations at LLNL's BSL-3 facility would directly and adversely impact the national security of the United States," she said in an affidavit.

Federal and lab officials have made the same argument since 2002.

In 2003, Kelley's group and Nuclear Watch of New Mexico sued the National Nuclear Security Administration, the nuclear weapons arm of the U.S. Energy Department, alleging that the agency wrongly neglected to perform a full environmental impact analysis and underestimated the risks from earthquakes, terrorists and accidents.

The two nuclear-disarmament groups also say placing the new lab inside a top-secret nuclear weapons facility would invite foreign nations to place offensive biological programs inside secret defense labs and deny inspectors access to them.

U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong rejected those arguments, and Tri-Valley CAREs asked for review by the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals while at the same time seeking an injunction against operations of the new lab.

The appeals court referred the injunction request to the lower court, which never ruled because the National Nuclear Security Administration announced that it had no intention of starting operations until November 2006.

Research in the new lab hasn't begun, according to lab officials, largely because a series of internal and federal reviews suggested the new lab and its staff were not ready.

The most recent review, conducted by the National Nuclear Security Administration's Livermore Site Office, found deficiencies ranging from the need for a first aid kit in an emergency evacuation area to additional training for some staff to recalibration of some lab equipment.

Given four years of delays, Kelley said the government easily could have done the fuller environmental study.

"Why there's a hurry up right now I don't know," she said. "But for them to propose beginning operations before the

9th Circuit rules is jumping the gun and in our view outrageous. It's an attempt to moot our request for additional environmental review by beginning operation without doing that review."

In December, Lawrence Livermore and the University of California decided also to pursue a more ambitious biodefense research facility, roughly double the size of a Wal-Mart superstore, at the lab's remote explosives testing range known as Site 300. The UC team is one of 13 nationwide competing to host the new National Bio and Agrodefense Facility, focusing on diseases that can infect animals and humans.

Contact Ian Hoffman at ihoffman@angnewspapers.com.