Nevada dodges a nuclear bullet

Benjamin Grove

Thursday, March 23, 2000 | 11:40 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Although there are future bills lurking in Congress that would ship the nation's nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain, Nevada appears to have dodged a current effort to create a high-level radioactive dump in the state.

President Clinton in a few days will receive a bill now passed by both the Senate and House that would ship the waste to Nevada by 2007.

Because Clinton has said he would veto it, Nevada's four members in Congress hope nuclear waste legislation is dead for now.

"I would hope that the Republican leadership will not waste another day on a legislative issue that is not going to fly," Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said.

The House on Wednesday passed the latest version of a nuclear waste bill, 253-167. The opposition would need only 145 votes to sustain the veto.

Many of the negative votes, however, do not reflect opposition to the waste dump in Nevada. Some House members support another bill that would ship the waste even earlier to Yucca Mountain.

The Senate on Feb. 10 also passed the bill with a narrow veto-sustaining margin, 64-34.

"The vote was a victory for Nevada because we (in the House) achieved for the first time a sufficient vote to sustain the president's veto, and that works hand in hand with what the Senate has done on this issue," Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said.

"The numbers were very good. We're very pleased," Berkley said.

The bill designates Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, as the nation's nuclear waste burial ground. Waste now stored at nuclear power plants nationwide would be shipped by truck and train across 43 states to Nevada by 2007.

In all, 199 Republicans, 53 Democrats and 1 Independent voted for the bill Wednesday; 148 Democrats, 18 Republicans and 1 Independent voted against it, with 15 not voting.

Nevada's members said they did not expect House leaders to push another pending nuclear waste bill that Nevada officials consider even worse for the state.

That bill would ship nuclear waste to Nevada by 2003, effectively establishing temporary waste storage at the Yucca site.

Rep. John Dingell, R-Mich., a longtime proponent of the Yucca Mountain dump, was one those opposed to the current legislation.

"The simple fact of the matter is this is a bad bill," said. "Let us put a decent bill on the floor."

Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, a strident Yucca plan supporter, also pleaded with fellow members to hold out for a "better" bill. He said power plants needed more immediate relief.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said he is sure the Senate would sustain a certain veto on the current bill, expected soon.

Reid blasted House Republican leaders for passing a "partisan" bill despite the veto threat.

"This is a Republican effort to satisfy the big money of the utilities and they failed," Reid said.

Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev., praised Berkley, Gibbons and Clinton and made an election-year plea.

"I want to stress that every Nevadan should give very careful consideration to the candidate that they would choose for president," Bryan said. "It is the president's veto threat, supported by Vice President Gore, that has made all the difference in the world."

It was not immediately clear if Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush would have signed the bill if he were president. Bush has told supporters Gov. Kenny Guinn and Gibbons that he would make a decision based on science, but he has not taken a definitive stand on the issue.

Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., led the charge on the floor to pass the bill. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., who has 11 nuclear power plants in his state, asked him to manage the bill.

Upton argued in debate that "in the middle of the Nevada desert, far away from a populated ecosystem, sits Yucca Mountain, which by scientific accounts is a good place to start" burying waste.

Upton was not disappointed the vote fell short of a count that could override a veto, a spokesman said.

"For it to pass by such a wide margin is indicative of the bipartisan support it has in Congress," spokesman Mike Waldron said. "This is not a party line issue."

Upton had said a nuclear power plant's waste in his state is stored a "baseball throw away" from Lake Michigan.

The Nuclear Energy Institute, the Washington-based chief lobby group for nuclear power plants, called on Clinton to make a stand. The bill "offers the president a historic opportunity to steer our nation onto the path of safe geological disposal of used nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste," NEI vice president John Kane said in a written statement.

Activist Wenonah Hauter said the vote was an example of the nuclear industry trying to buy legislation.

"The nuclear industry supported this bill because it does not want to take responsibility for the mess it has made and continues to make each day," said Hauter, director of the Washington-based Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project.

Sun reporter Cy Ryan contributed to this story.