Wny’s Most Toxic Site Defies U.s. Effort, Threatens Water

Last of a three-part seriesBy T.J. Pignataro and Dan Herbeck // News Staff ReporterSIf nature runs its slow course, West Valley’s hilltop plateau where nuclear wastes are stockpiled could erode in as soon as 150 years.Or, some fear that fueled by dramatic climatic events, the plateau could wash away in torrential downpours like the one that hit nearby Gowanda four summers ago.Either way, radioactive material would wash through several feeder streams into Cattaraugus Creek and then into Lake Erie, the Niagara River and on into Lake Ontario, fouling the drinking water for millions of people in Western New York and southern Ontario.More than 40 years after the nation’s only commercial effort to reprocess nuclear fuel was closed down, the West Valley nuclear waste site is arguably Western New York’s most toxic location.