Miller: $30 billion overrun should disqualify Yucca

Wednesday, May 6, 1998 | 9:53 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- Gov. Bob Miller says a projected cost overrun of $30 billion plus growing safety concerns should disqualify Yucca Mountain from being considered a site for a national nuclear dump.

Miller released a $200,000 study Tuesday that says the final cost of the repository would be $53.9 billion over the life of the project, compared to an estimate of $33 billion projected by the U.S. Department of Energy in 1995.

"Only 11 percent of the total cost of this folly has been paid," Miller said about the project located 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

The predicted cost overrun is half of the cost of the Persian Gulf War and it could finance some federal agencies for years.

The state Office of Nuclear Waste Projects contracted with Planning Information Corp., Thompson Professional Group and Decision Research Institute to predict the cost of developing Yucca Mountain.

The cost overrun, Miller said, would mean taxpayers would have to pick up a $26 billion tab. Nuclear energy users now pay a tax -- a tenth of a penny per kilowatt hour -- that is used to fund the DOE's assessment of Yucca Mountain.

"The time is now to cut the losses and seek a viable alternative to the Yucca Mountain project," Miller said.

Bob Loux, director of the nuclear waste office, will appear today before the Legislative Interim Finance Committee to discuss problems facing the state concerning Yucca Mountain following notification from the DOE that it is freezing $691,000 of the $800,000 left in the state's budget.

There's been no written documents presented to the state, only a verbal warning that the funds will not be available. Loux, who said he has enough for his office to make it through July 1, plans to ask the Interim Finance Committee in June for $1.7 million to carry the state program through the next fiscal year.

Since 1982, the state office has received $75 million in federal funds. The state has contributed only a small fraction to Loux' office.

Miller said there's no chance of a reversal on the freezing of the federal funds.

An audit by the state General Accounting Office in March 1996 questioned spending by the state office for advertisements and other expenses. The DOE then hired the KPMG Peak Marwick consulting firm to review the audit and give its assessment. KPMG agreed with the state's findings.

Meanwhile Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa said her office reviewed the 1996 GAO audit and found there was nothing improper about Loux' office's spending practices.

She said court cases have held the state is entitled to the "broadest possible rights" in deciding how the money it receives from Congress should be spent.

"The GAO report appears to be contrived in an attempt to embarrass Nevada's Nuclear Waste Projects Office for its vigorous opposition to the Yucca Mountain project," Del Papa said.

A spokesman for Del Papa refused however to say whether her office would sue to protect the $691,000 that is being withheld by the DOE.

The money being questioned, the governor said, was spent to counter an $8 million advertising campaign launched by the nuclear waste industry.

He said the audit held the state should not have used the money to respond to the nuclear industry campaign. At first Loux and Miller said the auditors took exception to the spending of materials going to other states. But Miller said Tuesday that part of the money was spent inside Nevada on advertising citing as an example a video was developed to show to state school children.

Miller said the state has been successful so far in its fight against the nuclear dump but that it must continue holding its firm resolve. He termed the advertising program of the industry a "dismal failure."

The DOE is going to spend $56 billion and won't give the state funds to evaluate the program, Miller said.

"This is patently unfair," he said.