Yucca Mountain faces challenges says former Energy Dept. official

Washington (Platts)--3Mar2006

The repository project at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, faces institutional,
political, and legal challenges that have been driven in part by "historical 
regional equity and fairness concerns," said a former Energy Department 
official. 

     Lake Barrett, a former acting director of the Yucca Mountain project,
told officials at a nuclear waste conference in Tucson, Arizona, this week
that he believed that "if political solutions can be found to these
fundamental  Nevada concerns, ... that other technical, regulatory, management
and budget issues can be adequately addressed." 

     Waste legislation expected to be introduced in Congress this year could
provide a vehicle to "address these policy issues," said Barrett, who heads L.
Barrett Consulting. In an apparent reference to the department's new
fuel-cycle initiative, the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, Barrett said he
believed "that the current global situation and advanced nuclear technologies
can be integrated to play an important role in revising current policy in an
acceptable way for everyone." 

     He cautioned, however, the country must proceed with a repository, adding
that advanced fuel-cycle technologies "are decades away from meaningful
implementation and are not in themselves a waste disposal solution."

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