Global Resource Action Center For The Environment (GRACE)

December 5, 2025

• The percentage of Brookhaven’s budget spent in the region around the lab has steadily decreased over the last ten years, falling from 66% of the lab’s budget in 1992 to 55% of the budget in 2002.
• Of the $32 million in the 1997 Brookhaven budget for cleanup activities such as environmental restoration and waste management, only about 18% or $5 million will actually be spent at Brookhaven. Almost all of that amount will go to research and administration with very little devoted to actually cleaning up pollution problems at Brookhaven.
• In addition, virtually nothing will be spent to remediate any of the pollution problems at or around Brookhaven over the next five years.
• Defense-related spending at Brookhaven has doubled since 1995--increasing from $13 million to $27 million.
• The Peconic-Gardiners Bay System and its estuary-related activities create about 50% more jobs in the region than Brookhaven, and the river/estuary’s total economic impact of $823 million is one-third more than the lab’s.
• There is no evidence that current efforts to redirect the lab can coexist with classified research programs of any significant size. Secrecy inhibits good research and is detrimental to achieving the levels of openness and efficiency necessary to make Brookhaven a responsible member of the regional community.

The analysis in this paper is based on a recently updated US Bureau of Economic Analysis RIMS II model built specifically for the Nassau-Suffolk county region around Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Brookhaven National Laboratory occupies a 2265 acre site 75 miles from New York City and in close proximity to New York's Hampton communities on the eastern end of Long Island. As opposed to most Department of Energy (DOE) labs, only a small percentage of Brookhaven’s $472 million budget for FY1997 is directly related to defense projects. However, Brookhaven claims that "there has been an increase in the number of programs funded by the Department of Defense" and the amount of defense-related spending has doubled since 1995 (increasing from $13 million to $27 million.) Of the rest of the lab’s budget, about $300 million is related to various kinds of nuclear research. Nuclear research, which involves the use of two research reactors, is the primary cause of radioactive pollution of the ground water and aquifers at Brookhaven.

The Economic Impact of Brookhaven

Appendix 1 shows Brookhaven’s economic impact on Nassau and Suffolk counties. Of the lab’s total budget of $472 million in 1997, about $285 million was actually spent in the region around Brookhaven. This spending creates a total economic impact of about $550 million in the two county area. And with about 3300 people employed at the lab and another 3300 employed in the region as a result of the lab’s presence, the total regional employment impact of Brookhaven is about 6600 jobs.

While Brookhaven clearly has a significant economic impact, this impact is not as large as that derived from the marine, tourism and recreation activities associated with the Peconic River, the Peconic-Gardiners Bay System and their resulting estuary. Appendix II shows that river/estuary-related activities create about 50% more jobs than Brookhaven in the region around the lab (a total of 10,350 jobs) and that the river/estuary’s total economic impact of $823 million is one-third more than the lab’s. Further, these figures do not include the effect of the river and the estuary on the lifestyle and character of the area--an effect that has significant consequences for every sector of eastern Long Island’s economy.

These figures frame the dilemma facing Long Island residents. Brookhaven is a major economic force in the area, but it also threatens a larger economic force--the income derived from river and estuary activities. Further, the character of the work performed at Brookhaven seems to be changing in an unfavorable way for the economy of the region. Historically, about two-thirds of the Brookhaven budget was actually spent in the region around the lab. The rest of the budget was spent for equipment and other purchases from outside the region, and some of it was also removed from the region by the large proportion of transient scientists who visit the lab to conduct research work. Starting in 1996, the proportion of the Brookhaven budget spent in the local region began to fall and along with it, the impact of the lab on the local economy has decreased. According to the employment figures in the Brookhaven institutional plan for FY1997-FY2002, regional spending by Brookhaven will decrease from 66 percent of the lab’s budget to 55 percent of the lab’s budget by 2002.

This decrease in the proportion of the lab’s budget spent in the local area adds further urgency to measures taken by Brookhaven to stop/clean up the groundwater contamination coming from the lab before it destroys the important economic activities associated with the Peconic-Gardiners Bay System and their resulting estuary. The recent Tiger Team report on Brookhaven found that

Given these problems, and given the additional problems with management and image identified in the recent GAO report, one would assume Brookhaven would be aggressively trying to correct the pollution problems arising from its site. However, the budget and manpower figures for BNL paint a very different picture of the lab’s cleanup efforts.

Figure 1

Proposed Environmental Remediation and Waste Management

Spending Trends at Brookhaven--FY94, 95, 96 and 97 Budgets

Cleanup Activities at Brookhaven

Figure 1 shows that the amounts scheduled to be spent by Brookhaven for cleanup-related activities continue to decline with each succeeding year’s estimates. Part of this decline is a result of cuts in DOE cleanup budgets nationwide. However, the problem of reduced cleanup funds is complicated at Brookhaven by the manner in which those funds that are available were spent, and in this respect, Brookhaven is somewhat unique among DOE sites.

The first table in Appendix III shows the expected employment that would result if Brookhaven actually used its cleanup money in the same manner that other DOE sites use theirs. Cleanup activities of the type employed by other, polluted sites would generate the expected employment levels shown in Figure 2 where expected employment levels for Environmental Restoration/Waste Management (ER/WM) activities vary between 210 and 280 workers. These employment levels are "expected" because they match the employment and cleanup activity one would find at other contaminated DOE sites with similar ER/WM budgets where cleanup is actually being undertaken. However, cleanup employment figures released by Brookhaven--and shown both in the second table of Appendix III and in Figure 2--are at the much lower level of approximately 70 workers.

Figure 2

Comparison of Expected and Actual Employment Devoted

to Pollution Remediation and Waste Management at Brookhaven

There are three likely reasons for the difference between Brookhaven and other contaminated DOE sites. First, as both the GAO and the Tiger Team reports note, Brookhaven has done very little to clean up its mess over the last ten years. As a result, it has used very little labor in clean up efforts. Second, it is generally acknowledged that the type of pollution present at Brookhaven--ground water/aquifer pollution--is extremely difficult to clean up, particularly if it involves radioactive contamination. Some ground water/aquifer work has been done at a few sites like Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory where water has been pumped out of the ground, petroleum-based contaminants have been stripped from it, and then the water has been re-injected back into another well. However, such techniques are not suitable for radioactive contamination.

Third, in spite of numerous reports in the press--none of which have been contradicted or corrected by Brookhaven--that have placed the Brookhaven cleanup budget at about $30 million per year, it is clear that very little of Brookhaven’s cleanup budget is actually spent on the lab itself. Pages 91 to 95 of the Brookhaven Institutional Plan for FY1997-2002 describe five different cleanup/waste management programs at Brookhaven, all of which are obviously aimed at problems at other sites. No mention is made of spending at Brookhaven itself, and if the ER/WM employment figures cited by Brookhaven are used in a regional model of the lab’s activities, the results, shown in Table 3 of Appendix 2, are that only 18% of the funds Brookhaven receives for ER/WM--approximately $5 million in 1997--are spent in the local region. To make matters worse, these funds appear to have been spent on scientific and engineering studies, not on actual, physical cleanup of the polluted sites at Brookhaven, and virtually nothing will be spent to remediate any of the pollution problems at or around Brookhaven over the next five years.

The third table in Appendix III also shows the economic impact of the limited cleanup activities at Brookhaven. It is clear that neither the employment nor the economic impact from cleanup are significant enough to make any noticeable impact on the Brookhaven region. It is also clear that if Brookhaven continues to pollute its site with nuclear operations, or if it cannot control the pollutants presently located over the aquifer, the results for the economy and the health of the region could be disastrous. For this reason, it is important to consider what could be done to help Brookhaven National Laboratory transition to a less pollution-prone method of operation so it can become a better neighbor to the other residents of the eastern end of Long Island.

Lab Management

The recent GAO and the Tiger Team reports on Brookhaven have confirmed that Department of Energy and Associated Universities Incorporated have both created fundamental problems the lab must confront before the problems at Brookhaven can be solved. Further, there is no evidence that a successful program to redirect the lab can coexist with classified research programs of any significant size. Secrecy inhibits good research and is detrimental to achieving the levels of openness and efficiency necessary to make Brookhaven a responsible member of the regional community.

As a first step, Brookhaven must begin to take responsibility for its actions. Contrast this requirement with the approach Associate Universities has taken in the recent debacle at Brookhaven:

This response, from an organization that was fired after operating the lab for almost 50 years, indicates the depth of the problems at Brookhaven.

For either cleanup or conversion to address both the needs of the lab and the residents of the region, local citizens must be involved in the process so the costs and benefits of the lab’s operations are balanced in an acceptable way. Fostering this involvement is partially a responsibility of lab management, but it is also a direct outcome of citizen sensitivity to the impact of the lab on the region around it. It is highly unlikely that any DOE organization can accomplish this goal. The GAO found the failure to deal with the tritium leak at Brookhaven in a timely manner was due, in part, to systemic management problems at DOE. And Congressman Brown, a member of the House Committee on Science that received the GAO report on Brookhaven, said

At issue is whether the organizations now in the running for Brookhaven’s new managers can do any better. For example, choosing another university system virtually guarantees the same kind of management exercised by AUI--a level of quiet, Victorian incompetence that marks the administrations of most institutions of higher education in this country. Adding other DOE contractors to this mix is also unlikely to improve the performance of the lab since no contractor has shown the ability to handle the kinds of pollution or management problems Brookhaven now faces.

In the end, the key factor that may keep history from repeating itself at Brookhaven is the establishment of active citizen involvement and monitoring. A group to perform this function is now forming at Brookhaven. How well it succeeds will depend on whether the group is allowed to perform good, independent oversight of the lab, or whether the new management at Brookhaven, in conjunction with DOE, will seek to co-opt the citizens group. If this occurs, the odds are very good that Brookhaven will never recover from its current problems and will be entirely shut down in the near future. If, on the other hand, independent oversight is allowed at the lab, cleanup and conversion may be possible and Brookhaven may survive into the 21st century. Those who view Brookhaven’s survival as imperative because of its contribution to advanced research across the United States would do well to help insure that the current transition at the lab proceeds in a manner that will allow the lab to survive.

Appendix 1

Regional Employment and Economic Impact of

Brookhaven National Laboratory

Appendix II

Regional Employment and Economic Impacts

from the Peconic Estuary

Appendix III

Regional Employment and Economic Impacts

from Cleanup At Brookhaven National Laboratory