coming out of a smokestack they think we should shut down the factory and put 10,000 people out of work. That's what I had in mind by environmental obstructionists, but it's a term of my own invention. Mr. DELLUMS. My only comment to that is that I think that as we continue to see greater detail in our knowledge with respect to the environment, we'll find that we have been harming human beings over the years, and it seems to me that we need to be very careful about what we mean by the environment. General BURKE. Indeed. Mr. DELLUMS. There have been a number of reports that the draft environmental impact statement is an incomplete study of the Great Basin area, and that the figures reported are vague, and that by many accounts the estimates on the actual environmental impact are greatly underestimated. Would you comment, General, on that charge? And then I would like to come to some very specific questions. General BURKE. The environmental impact statement that we published in December was a product of 2 years of labor by a very large number of people, and it cost the Government $19 million. It contains 1,900 pages in the basic document, plus another 8,000 pages of supporting technical reports. You are quite right, sir, a legion of people said it was inadequate and incomplete. But that sort of raises the question of what would be adequate and complete. It is, first of all, a draft, and even though we made that investment we were not so presumptuous to think that we could have thought of everything, and I think the law, quite reasonably, provides for us to then go to all who are affected and say, "How would you make this better?" and that's the stage that we're in right now. We're going to have and we are already getting written inputs. The Governors of Utah and Nevada have teams of a hundred people who are reviewing this document and offering comments and suggestions, and we can now go out and have public hearings. Mr. DELLUMS. Mr. Chairman, I'm having difficulty hearing the gentleman. There is another conversation here. I can't hear the testimony. General BURKE. We will elicit a very large amount of comment from the public at large, all the governmental officials out there, representatives of all the groups that would be concerned with it, and all of that then will be considered and where relevant incorporated in the Final Environmental Impact Statement. Certainly it's going to be a much superior document compared to the draft. Mr. DELLUMS. Let me ask a few specific questions. To the issue of water, and I think you would agree that water is terribly important in this instance. The draft environmental impact statement, as I read it, or at least have read it with others. who have been critical of it, avoids specifically estimating how much water will be required for the construction and the operation of the MX project. How can the project continue without a more complete assessment of this critical need? General BURKE. The report does contain estimates for both of those periods, Mr. Dellums. I would be happy to extract that and send it to you. But they are in the report. A great deal of attention was paid to the water question out there. Mr. DELLUMS. Is there anyone here who can tell us, because, as you know, that draft environmental statement is volumes? General BURKE. I will pull those specific charts out and send them to you. But I will assure you that they are in there. [The following information was received for the record:] |