LAS VEGAS - Mar 5

 

Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman says his department will not begin moving nuclear waste away from power plants around the country until the proposed repository at Yucca Mountain is licensed.

At a meeting with reporters in Washington, D.C Friday, Bodman sought to dispel speculation that the Bush administration was considering establishing temporary nuclear waste storage sites while the Nevada disposal site remains on the drawing board.

"All our efforts will be going into the procurement of an operating license" for Yucca Mountain, Bodman said. "At that point in time we will make a decision whether we will take advantage of interim storage opportunities or not."

DOE missed a Jan. 31, 1998, deadline to begin moving waste off reactor sites, triggering dozens of lawsuits from utilities and continuing pressure to move fuel to Yucca Mountain or elsewhere.

Under the scenario Bodman discussed, nuclear waste could remain at plant sites for at least five years.

By the time Yucca Mountain is licensed, new research on nuclear waste reprocessing would inform decisions on whether the spent nuclear fuel should be deposited at the site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas or sent elsewhere in interim storage to await recycling, Bodman said.

The energy secretary's comments signal the administration's evolving strategy for handling nuclear waste.

In recent days, administration officials have outlined a plan that features continued emphasis on a Yucca repository but also a big push to explore reprocessing technologies that might wring more use out of spent fuel while making the ultimate end products less toxic for burial in Nevada.

A nuclear waste bill is expected to be sent to Congress in the coming days. Bodman said it will not contain interim storage provisions. A second DOE official confirmed that later Friday.

There had been broad speculation within the nuclear industry and on Capitol Hill that the administration might seek to establish temporary storage on federal land in Washington, South Carolina, Idaho or at the Nevada Test Site.

A spokeswoman for Officials at the Nuclear Energy Institute, the nuclear industry's main trade association, had no immediate comment on Bodman's remarks.

NEI has been lobbying the government to move faster to remove spent fuel from plants in 39 states where it has been accumulating in pools and in "dry cask" storage containers.

The Energy Department is in the midst of a repository redesign and is awaiting radiation health standards for the site. The Environmental Protection Agency has said those will not be finalized until near the end of the year.

At whatever point DOE applies for a repository license, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has four years to evaluate it, a schedule that a number of experts say is optimistic.

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Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal, http://www.lvrj.com