NRC still roadblock to Yucca waste

Friday, May 5, 2000 | 11:03 a.m.

Even if Congress this year overrides President Clinton's veto of temporary nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain, it would take the Nuclear Regulatory Commission up to four years to issue a license for that project.

Time may be running out for Congress to approve temporary storage. Tuesday's Senate vote of 65-34 failed to override the veto of a temporary waste storage bill.

And any temporary licensing process would not begin until the NRC checks the Department of Energy's application to ensure there is enough information, officials said.

At the same time, NRC officials on Thursday tried to reassure about 40 people at the County Government Center in Las Vegas that it isn't working hand in hand with the DOE.

"We are not trying to cook the books so the DOE will pass," Janet Kotra of the NRC's high-level nuclear waste division said.

The NRC staff faced tough questions from state and environmental representatives on plans to license a permanent tomb for 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Yucca was singled out by Congress in 1987 as the only permanent repository site for the DOE to study.

The DOE is struggling to finish scientific studies at Yucca to submit a license application to the NRC by 2003 for a permanent repository. DOE's waste management director, Ivan Itkin, said the agency needs at least $100 million more a year to complete the studies.

The DOE's target for opening a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain is 2010 at the earliest.

The DOE has not given a thought to temporary nuclear waste storage at Yucca, DOE spokeswoman Gayle Fisher said.

"It hasn't been an issue we have realistically considered," she said.

If Congress approved temporary storage, it would take up to two years for the DOE to prepare a license application for the NRC.

Commercial reactor wastes are sitting at 72 reactor sites in 31 states. The nuclear industry is lobbying Congress to force the DOE to take the waste and store it at one place until Yucca scientific studies are complete.

The DOE does not own Yucca Mountain. It received permission from the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Air Force to conduct the last 17 years of studies. It will take another act of Congress, if Yucca is accepted as a repository by the president, to switch ownership to the DOE.

Since no high-level nuclear waste repository has been built anywhere in the world, the NRC faces an unprecedented project, NRC Waste Division Manager Bill Reamer said.

Typically, a nuclear utility can get a temporary on-site storage license from the NRC for up to 20 years with an option to renew.

The NRC doesn't have the rules in place yet for licensing a Yucca repository, although possible changes to current regulations are under review.

And there is no guarantee that the NRC will approve any license for Yucca, unless the DOE proves in great scientific detail that it can protect the health and safety of the public before, during and after the repository opens, Reamer said.

"We are not a part of the Department of Energy. We don't get money from the Department of Energy," Reamer said. "This project is somewhat unusual because typically the DOE regulates its own projects."