Yucca Lawsuits

Yucca Lawsuits

Jul 21 - Richmond Times - Dispatch

Already with a budget in the red, the U.S. government now faces challenges regarding its never-ending quest to store spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain. Last Monday a trial began in D.C. as the parent company of three reactors - Maine Yankee, Connecticut Yankee, and Yankee Rowe of Massachusetts - began presenting its case against the Department of Energy. Yankee Atomic Electric Co. seeks $548 million for the three reactors, for maintenance and security of nuclear waste that should have been shipped to Yucca six years ago. After all 65 claims course their way through adjudication, the U.S. could lose billions of dollars.

And the utilities with nuclear reactors have a point. The DOE has breached its contract with them, a contract stipulating that a nuclear-waste repository would be open for deposits in 1998. A recent setback regarding Yucca could delay its opening indefinitely.

Despite the trials and a warning by Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham that the department will be liable for "some portion" of the costs to utilities ($500 million or more each year after 2010) if Yucca Mountain does not begin taking spent fuel in six years, some politicians continue to drag their feet. The Democratic Party is considering a plank in this year's party platform urging a prohibition on Yucca from accepting nuclear waste.

The foot-dragging is nothing new. For two decades Presidents and Congressmen have shirked their duty to take charge of spent rods from nuclear plants. They have refused to create temporary repositories in New Mexico and Idaho.

Now the utilities have come knocking. Estimates of $56 billion in possible damages ought to spur the pols and the bureaucrats into action.

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