DOE loses ad money for Yucca tours

Friday, Sept. 8, 2000 | 10:46 a.m.

The Department of Energy can no longer spend $3,000 a year to advertise tours of Yucca Mountain, the proposed high-level nuclear waste repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

The Senate Thursday night passed an appropriations bill amendment that removes the advertising money from the DOE's Yucca Mountain budget. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., introduced the amendment after he noticed a newspaper ad for a public tour of the mountain. The ads amount to federal lobbying for a project, which is unpopular with Nevadans, he said.

Reid stripped the Yucca ad funds and advocated a freeze in the DOE's total budget at $351 million, the amount of last year's allocation. The state of Nevada would also receive $2.5 million to oversee the federal project.

The overall Yucca budget and the Yucca ad money amendment are still subject to negotiations between House and Senate leaders. The final version of the bill is due by the end of the month, which marks the end of the federal fiscal year.

Nevada got its oversight money back after it was stripped in 1995 when a congressional audit said the state had used the cash to lobby against the nuclear dump.

"Turnabout is fair play," Reid said.

While it costs the DOE $3,000 for advertising the tours, the total cost amounts to an average of $8,310 per tour, a DOE spokeswoman said. There have been dozens of tours for the public, teachers, congressmen and their staffs since 1989.

The free tours of the mountain are part of the DOE's community outreach program. Each tour includes up to 150 people and advertisements had been placed twice a year.

While nuclear ratepayers contribute the bulk of funds, more than $15 billion, to support Yucca work, taxpayers have contributed more than $500 million. Reid objected to taxpayers paying for tour ads. Sun reporter

Benjamin Grove contributed to this story.