Gephardt says he’ll vote against nuke shipment bill

Robert Macy

Tuesday, March 9, 1999 | 3:01 a.m.

LAS VEGAS -- The most powerful Democrat in the U.S. House says he will vote against a bill to ship nuclear waste to a temporary storage facility in Nevada, joining growing opposition to the plan.

Rep. Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., wrote Congresswoman Shelley Berkley that he intends to vote against a House bill that would authorize the shipment of 77,000 tons of high level nuclear waste through 43 states to the Nevada Test Site.

"Given the safety issues involved, I believe we should not act without considering reasonable alternatives," Gephardt said.

The Missouri congressman said the Energy Department's safety and scientific review of the suitability of Yucca Mountain as a permanent site is not scheduled to be completed until 2001.

The bill, H.R. 45, would allow for interim storage at the test site until Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is approved. Yucca Mountain is the only site being studied as a permanent repository for 77,000 tons of radioactive waste now collecting at nuclear power plants across the country.

Gephardt said a recent administration proposal to improve existing temporary storage facilities for high level nuclear waste should be thoroughly reviewed by Congress.

"This proposal could provide a safe and cost-effective alternative that would make unnecessary the shipment of radioactive waste through countless communities in 43 states, including my home state of Missouri," Gephardt said in a letter to Berkley.

Berkley said she has worked to inform her colleagues of the dangers of shipping the waste across country to Nevada.

"I made a promise to the people of Southern Nevada to stand on the roads and rails if necessary to stop the shipment of nuclear waste across the nation and into our state," Berkley said.

Other members of Congress are also expressing concern about the plan.

"It is becoming increasingly clear to many of us that the legislative path we have been on for the last two Congresses is coming to a dead end," said Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., ranking member of the House Energy and Natural Resources committee.

"I think the time has come for some new thinking and a fresh approach to this old problem," Bingaman said in the National Journal's Congress Daily.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., who chairs the Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee, has indicated he would like to see funding of research on technology that could reduce the lifespan of radioactive waste, now some 10,000 years. The so-called transmutation could cut the time the waste needs to be stored to 300 years.