Guinn to host nuclear summit

Monday, Feb. 15, 1999 | 11:54 a.m.

Gov. Kenny Guinn plans to meet with members of Nevada's congressional delegation in Carson City Tuesday for a nuclear waste summit.

The governor invited officials from Nevada to attend the summit so leaders can map a political, legal and scientific strategy to prevent nuclear waste from entering the state.

Guinn scheduled the summit after testifying before a House subcommittee in Washington last week against the latest effort by Congress to temporarily store highly radioactive waste in Nevada.

Congress has tried to establish a temporary nuclear waste storage site at the Nevada Test Site twice before, but legislation passed the House and failed in the Senate after the Clinton administration threatened to veto any interim storage. The Senate does not have the 67 votes to override a presidential veto.

The proposed Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1999 would ship commercial nuclear wastes to the Nevada Test Site by 2003 to be stored until a permanent nuclear repository is ready to accept waste. In addition, the proposed legislation weakens environmental and health standards that protect people from radiation.

Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is being studied as a site for a permanent high-level nuclear waste repository, but the soonest it would open is 2010. However, scientists have discovered several factors that have given opponents of the repository ammunition to fight it: The mountain's crust creeps at a rapid rate, that hot ground water may threaten a future repository and water may flow faster than anticipated.

Under current law, temporary nuclear waste storage is banned from Nevada while Yucca Mountain studies proceed.

"The proponents of this bill, who see our great state as nothing more than a dumping ground for nuclear waste, are attempting to push this bill through Congress fast," Guinn said.

"We have to have a cohesive strategy to fight them and we have to act now," the governor said.

Nevada's congressional delegation -- Sens. Harry Reid and Richard Bryan, both Democrats, and Reps. James Gibbons, a Republican, and Shelley Berkley, a Democrat -- plan to attend the summit beginning at 10 a.m. in the old Assembly Chambers at the Nevada State Capitol.

Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt, Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa, Secretary of State Dean Heller, State Controller Kathy Augustine and State Treasurer Brian Krolicki are all expected to join the congressional delegation.

Members of the Nevada Legislature who plan to attend the summit include Sen. Mark James, R-Las Vegas, Assembly Speaker Joe Dini, D-Yerington, Senate Minority Leader Dina Titus, D-Las Vegas, and Assembly Minority Leader Lynn Hettrick, R-Gardnerville.