Platform may rule out Yucca dumpsite

Benjamin Grove

Tuesday, Aug. 15, 2000 | 11:15 a.m.

LOS ANGELES -- State Democratic Party members say their national platform delivers a Nevada-friendly message on the issue of nuclear waste disposal in stark contrast to prickly language in the Republicans' plank.

The Democrats today were scheduled to officially approve the platform -- a lengthy statement of philosophy -- as the Democratic National Convention continues in Los Angeles.

The platform reads, "This responsibility (to develop clean energy technologies) includes disposing of nuclear waste in a scientifically sound manner in accordance with standards designed to protect human health and the environment."

That rules out Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as a waste dumpsite, Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said.

"Implicit in that is that no nuclear waste could come to Yucca Mountain because it doesn't meet safety standards," Berkley said.

"For Nevadans who care about nuclear waste coming to Nevada, there is a world of difference between the two platforms," Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., said. "George Bush is Nevada's nuclear nightmare if he is elected."

Democrats say their plank includes the crucial, specific reference to standards that dictate the level of radiation that could safely be emitted from highly radioactive waste stored deep inside Yucca Mountain, now set by the Environmental Protection Agency. The Department of Energy's 13-year-old plan to bury up to 77,000 tons of nuclear waste in the caverns under Yucca Mountain, in theory at least, could be scrapped because the site may not meet the EPA's strict radiation standards.

By contrast, the Republicans' nuclear waste plank simply blasted President Clinton for vetoing a bill this year that would have sped up waste shipments to Nevada ahead of schedule.

"The current administration has turned its back on the two sources that provide virtually all of the nation's emission-free power: nuclear and hydro," the Republican platform said. "Meanwhile nuclear plants are choking on waste because the current administration breached its contract to remove it -- and then vetoed legislation to store it at a safe, permanent repository for which the taxpayers had already paid $7 billion," referring to Yucca Mountain.

The nuclear industry umbrella group, Washington-based Nuclear Energy Institute, "applauded" the Republican language.

But Nevada Republican Party director Ryan Erwin said Democrats are making too much of their platform.

"Here we've got two presidents who have said they want to put science above politics, and two parties who say they want to put science above politics," Erwin said. "The difference is we really are committed to science over politics, and they are trying to make it a political issue."

The sentence that refers to nuclear waste in the Democratic platform was inserted by Las Vegan Aurora Wong, a nonpracticing attorney, who was the only Nevada representative on the 186-member Democratic Party platform committee. The committee met July 5 and 6 in Toledo, Ohio, and July 28 and 29 in Cleveland.

She headed to Cleveland with two Nevada-specific goals: insert the words "Lake Tahoe" into a passage on the environment to emphasize a national commitment to the fragile lake; and insert a sentence about nuclear waste disposal. She quickly realized the Lake Tahoe language would never be approved because other delegates would clamor to include their own state's natural wonders.

But she lobbied hard for the nuclear waste reference. During a reception the evening of July 28, she chatted up as many delegates as possible around the room. Other delegates were lobbying for their own issues, she said.

"Everyone knew that we didn't have a lot of time, and we all had to go back home with something. Everyone was working other people," she said.

When it came time the next day to introduce her sentence, dubbed amendment 33, "I got up and made my pitch," Wong said.

It passed on voice vote.

"It seems to me that is an important sentence to have in place," Wong said. "It does reflect this administration's support for the use of the scientific standards. Since this is the document that Gore is running on, it kind of binds him to this policy if he becomes president."

Wong said that other members of the platform committee never would have approved language that blatantly opposed shipping nuclear waste from their states to Nevada.

"People don't want nuclear waste in their back yards," Wong said. "If this had been something that did not match Gore's position, it never would have flown."

Wong stressed that in the end, the fight of Nevadans against the Yucca Mountain proposal rests with Nevada's members in Congress and the president.

"This is not going to be what saves the day," Wong said. "It's going to be the leadership exerted on this issue."