Chances dim for nuclear waste debate

Benjamin Grove

Wednesday, Oct. 13, 1999 | 11:21 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Expectations that the Senate will engage in a fiery debate on nuclear waste are fizzling.

Senate Republicans, who support a bill that would authorize nuclear waste shipments to Nevada, have been pushing for weeks for a much-anticipated debate on the legislation.

But President Clinton's threat to veto the bill, coupled with recent nuclear accidents in Asia, may have diminished the appetite of the Senate to debate the issue this year.

And time is running out. The Senate has a plate full of issues to consume before the end of October or possibly November, when it adjourns for the year. Among the issues: campaign finance reform and several spending bills that keep government running.

Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., said he will try to schedule debate this month, Senate Energy and Natural Resources spokeswoman Tina Kreisher said. "If other legislative items prevent that, it can't be helped."

Scientists are studying Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, to determine whether it is a suitable site for the nation's nuclear waste. About 36,500 tons of waste now sit at nuclear power plants and Defense Department sites in 41 states. Yucca is the only site being considered as a permanent waste repository and would be designed to hold 70,000 tons. Officials by 2001 will determine whether Yucca is suitable.

In the meantime, Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, has introduced a bill that would bring nuclear waste to Nevada as early as 2007 instead of 2010 as previously proposed.

The bill also would allow the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, not the Environmental Protection Agency, to set the radiation standards for Yucca Mountain. The EPA's standards are stricter than the NRC's standards.

Those provisions worry Nevada Sens. Richard Bryan and Harry Reid, who have long fought bills that would bring nuclear waste to the state.

Bryan referred to the latest bill as an "environmental travesty" in a recent speech on the Senate floor.

"Proponents of gutting the radiation release standard and of taking the EPA out of the process show nothing but a blatant disregard for the health and safety of the people of Nevada," Bryan said.

Reid declined to comment on whether the bill would be debated this year.

"Every day the bill does not come up for a vote is a good day for Nevadans," Reid spokesman David Cherry said.

Some congressional staffers are speculating that Clinton's threat to veto the nuclear waste bill -- made during an Oct. 1 fund-raising stop in Las Vegas -- killed its chances of being debated this year.

Kreisher disagreed.

"We know that we have enough votes to pass it," Kreisher said. "The question is: Are there enough votes to override a veto? We think we're in pretty good shape. Sen. Murkowski at this point relishes it coming to the floor."

Will Hart, spokesman for bill supporter Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, added, "Clinton has made that threat before. And we've gone ahead before."

Craig has been an outspoken supporter of shipping nuclear waste to Nevada. Defense waste sits in Idaho awaiting shipment to a permanent site. Hart said Democrats are trying to tack on amendments to the bill that would muddy the debate.

"That's the main hurdle right now," Hart said.

Others suggest that recent nuclear accidents in Japan, South Korea and India have killed any appetite in the Senate to debate the issue.

"We think it is much less likely to be debated now," said Wenonah Hauter, who follows nuclear waste issues for the Washington-based advocacy group Public Citizen. "When there is a major nuclear accident like the one in Japan, it makes it more difficult for the nuclear industry to persuade lawmakers to take action on a nuclear waste bill."

The nuclear industry has a lot at stake. The Department of Energy by law was supposed to remove waste stored at nuclear power plants beginning last year, but delays on the Yucca project have postponed that. Some power plants are storing more waste than they can handle.

One spokesman said industry leaders were "hopeful" the Senate would vote on the issue and not put it off until next year.

"There is a federal government obligation that is going unfulfilled at this point," said Steve Kerekes, spokesman for the Washington-based Nuclear Energy Institute.