Editorial: Full-steam ahead is wrong for dump

Thursday, Nov. 16, 2000 | 9:46 a.m.

Two UNLV scientists said this week that within the past 2 million years, hot water deep beneath the surface has not risen to where a proposed nuclear waste repository would be buried inside Yucca Mountain. This finding echoes the same theory already advanced by the U.S. Department of Energy in the dispute as to whether ground water or super-hot water previously has invaded the planned dumpsite. This issue's significance is that if flooding occurred by hot water during the past 10,000 years, that means a similar flood could one day result in the corrosion of nuclear waste containers, a possibility that should disqualify Yucca Mountain from further consideration.

But the public would be wrong to believe that this is the end of the debate over this issue. As the Sun's Mary Manning reported Wednesday, a scientist from Bucknell University in Pennsylvania discovered calcite deposits she believed were left by hot water. And Yuri Dublyansky of the Russian Academy of Sciences says he has evidence hot water has invaded the site of a repository in Yucca Mountain's recent geologic history.

The DOE plans on making a recommendation on the site in July, but the lack of common ground on such a critical issue makes it incumbent upon the federal government to stop this rush to judgment. It's not just the dispute over water penetration in the mountain, either. Other nagging environmental and safety concerns have shown what a disaster Yucca Mountain would be if a repository is built. The right course, then, would be for the government to call a time out in its investigation.