Temporary nuke storage bill appears dead

Thursday, Sept. 12, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

However, a bill to create a temporary waste dump at the Nevada Test Site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas, appears to be dead for this year.

A House-Senate panel agreed to provide $382 million in 1997 to continue to study whether the mountain can safely store nuclear fuel rods for thousands of years. A report is expected by 1998.

The action by a group of House and Senate lawmakers is a mixed blessing for the state. It kept alive the long-term threat of a permanent dump at Yucca Mountain. But in doing so, some of the strongest proponents of waste storage in Nevada seemed to acknowledge that their efforts to put a temporary waste facility in the state are dead until at least next year.

Frustrated by the lengthy Department of Energy study, and under pressure to remove waste from nuclear utilities around the country, House and Senate leaders have been pushing a bill to put the waste at the test site "temporarily" -- for up to 100 years.

A House spending bill for energy programs would have withheld funding for the long-term Yucca Mountain project until Congress approved interim storage at the Test Site. The idea was intended to put pressure on Congress and the president to approve interim storage at the Test Site. But Sen. J. Bennett Johnston, D-La., said Wednesday the House strategy wouldn't work.

"We can't do (interim storage) this year," he said. "Believe me, I would be the first one fighting for it if I thought we could."

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., a Senate Appropriations Committee member, agreed.

"It appears to me that they're trying to kill not only interim storage but the ongoing characterization at Yucca Mountain," he said. "If that's what you want, go ahead and do it. I just think it's rather foolish."

House lawmakers relented, and the panel of appropriators agreed to continue funding the Yucca project. The bill is expected to pass both bodies of Congress and be signed by Clinton.

Now, House leaders are trying to decide whether to schedule a vote on the interim storage measure, which passed the Senate in July, 63-37, but which President Clinton promised to veto. Sixty-seven votes are needed to override a veto in the Senate.

At a meeting with House leaders, including Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., and Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, Nevada lawmakers made their case against the bill.

Rep. John Ensign, R-Nev., retiring Rep. Barbara Vucanovich, R-Nev., and former Assemblyman Jim Gibbons, a Republican running for Vucanovich's seat, said moving the bill would hurt Republicans in their state.

Ensign is facing a Nov. 5 re-election challenge from state Sen. Bob Coffin, D-Las Vegas, in Nevada's 1st Congressional District, which includes urban parts of Las Vegas, North Las Vegas and Henderson. Gibbons will meet former state Sen. Spike Wilson of Reno in the 2nd Congressional District, encompassing the remainder of the state and 31 percent of Clark County.

Ensign said he told the leaders, "If this thing comes to the floor, you could lose two Republican House seats." After the meeting, Ensign said he has "never been so optimistic" that the bill is dead.

Earlier this week, nuclear power executives met with the leaders to plead their case. A decision could come as early as this week. Congress is scheduled to recess late this month or early next month.

Confident that a veto would be sustained, Reid dared the House to move forward with interim storage.

"You know what I say: Go ahead and let it pass," Reid said. "If Bob Dole is not worried about Nevada, go ahead and pass it. If the two House seats mean nothing for Republicans, let them pass it. Send it to (Clinton), he'll veto it, and it will only make him more popular in the state of Nevada."