Domenici drafts bill giving DOE interim nuclear storage authority

Domenici drafts bill giving DOE interim nuclear storage authority

Washington (Platts)--27Jun2006

The Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee has
drafted a fiscal-year 2007 spending bill that will put the US on a path to
consolidate commercial nuclear waste from 103 reactors at nearly 70 sites at
an undetermined number of temporary federal storage facilities, officials said
Tuesday.

The $30.7 billion energy spending bill would include $270 million for the
administration's Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. It also would fund the
Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository at $494 million, including $10 million
for development of "interim storage" facilities. That would equal FY 2006's
Yucca spending measure.

Under the provision crafted by subcommittee chairman Pete Domenici,
Republican-New Mexico, the facilities could be opened in 2011 and 2012 and be
permitted for 25 years. The facilities would have to be built on federally
owned land. It is due for a subcommittee vote Tuesday.

"This issue moves glacially," said Scott O'Malia, a subcommittee aide who
briefed reporters on the proposal. "To move spent fuel for five years or seven
years doesn't make sense, but it doesn't have to stay there for 25 years,"

For the first time, the bill would give the Energy Department authority
to open interim storage facilities, which DOE officials say they have not had.
In order to secure passage on the Senate floor, the measure would need 60
votes, since it amounts to legislating on a spending bill.

The interim storage provision would be unrelated to DOE's efforts to move
nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain. O'Malia said DOE has indicated it would
submit a license application for the repository in 2008 and that it would open
the Nevada site in 2018.

The proposal requires DOE to immediately take title of waste at eight
retired nuclear plants if the site owner requests DOE to do so. But the waste
could be left at those facilities indefinitely. For operational sites, DOE
would also have to take title of the waste if the utility requests it. DOE
would have to move the waste, but only if a place has been established where
it can be put.

It also enables DOE to fulfill its obilgation to take title of the
nation's commercial nuclear fuel under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. And it
could clear the way for new nuclear facilites, proponents say.

Money for all the interim sites would be paid for out of the Nuclear
Waste Fund. The FY 2007 money would go toward establishing an office within
DOE to handle consolidation of spent fuel and preparation of a site.

O'Malia said it would be up to Energy Secretary to put the interim
storage policy into action. It exempts Nevada and Utah from being used as
federal interim storage sites.

O'Malia said Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Democrat-Nevada, supports
the Domenici proposal.

--Daniel Whitten, daniel_whitten@platts.com

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