International nuke group to tour Yucca Mountain

Friday, Jan. 9, 1998 | 10:34 a.m.

Shirley Ann Jackson, chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, will visit Las Vegas Monday during a meeting of international nuclear regulators.

International Nuclear Regulators Association members plan to tour Yucca Mountain Monday. Jackson is also INRA chairman.

Yucca Mountain is the site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas where the U.S. Department of Energy is studying the volcanic rock for a national high-level nuclear waste dump. If the dump opens after 2010, nuclear utilities would ship irradiated fuel rods to the site.

The NRC is the licensing agency for the dump and monitors DOE's studies at Yucca Mountain.

Before the Yucca Mountain tour, the association will met at the NRC's Region IV field office in Walnut Creek, Calif., and tour the DOE's Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in northern California.

The five-day international meeting is focusing on national trends in electric generation and their effects on nuclear safety.

The meeting will also examine how national regulatory approaches impact nuclear safety and key elements of nuclear safety regulation worldwide.

The INRA was created in May 1997. It began discussions of nuclear issues at that time in Paris.

Agencies belonging to the association include Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Spain, Sweden, Britain and the United States.