BLM closes public comment period on nuclear waste site

It will take weeks for the Bureau of Land Management to sort through thousands of public comments before deciding whether to grant access across public land for a nuclear waste stockpile about 50 miles southwest of Salt Lake City.

Monday was the last day the bureau was taking comment on the proposal from Private Fuel Storage, a group of nuclear-powered utilities that want to ship nuclear waste to an American Indian reservation in Utah.

The Bureau of Land Management has taken more than 4,350 mostly negative letters, e-mails, postcards and faxes on the project, including objections from Utah politicians and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

"It could take 30 to 60 days to go through them," BLM spokeswoman Christine Tincher said Monday.

The bureau will study the remarks for any "substantive" recommendations. It has no timeframe for making a decision on a right of way that would allow a rail spur or trucks to carry nuclear waste down the length of Skull Valley to the Goshute Indian Reservation.

Private Fuel Storage has a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to store up to 44,000 tons of spent fuel rods with a half-life of 10,000 years above ground at the reservation.

Yet it must clear other obstacles before the proposal can become a reality:

- Utah is asking a federal appeals court to overturn a license issued Feb. 13 by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission after eight and a half years of deliberation;

- Private Fuel Storage needs approval of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, which must decide if a lease for a nuclear-waste repository is in the Goshute's interests;

- It needs a permit from the federal Surface Transportation Board if it decides to build a rail line to the Skull Valley reservation; and,

- It needs contracts from utilities that own nuclear power plants before starting construction of the repository.

The utility consortium, which also needs a right of way from the Bureau of Land Management, filed two applications to get one.

The first is for a 32-mile rail spur that's not likely to be granted because the route would cut across a corner of the Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area. President Bush created the wilderness area on Jan. 6 in a move to block the project sought by Utah's congressional delegation.

The second application is for a 10-acre waste transfer station alongside the main Union Pacific rail line, which runs parallel to Interstate-80. Under this plan, the fuel rods would be loaded off rail cars and put on oversized trucks for shipment on state Route 196 to the reservation.

With Utah's wilderness maneuver, the transfer station appears the only practical option, but PFS spokeswoman Sue Martin said Monday that it wasn't giving up hope for a rail spur.

Martin said the comments filed with the Bureau of Land Management weren't all negative.

"We have been very pleased with the respondents who have shared their positive comments with us - people who believe that this project can be built and operated safely," she said.

Martin described the supporters as scientists, Utah residents "who are part of the silent majority" and others who believe the nation needs waste storage away from nuclear power plants - a temporary solution until the federal government can open a national repository at Nevada's Yucca Mountain.

During transit by rail or truck, the spent fuel rods would be packed in welded steel canisters and protected by additional layers of steel and radioactive shields, she said.

Martin said Private Fuel Storage looked into bending a rail spur around the wilderness area, but opponents say any other route would send tracks over ground that is often wet.

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