Nuclear industry studies role in Yucca suit

Benjamin Grove

Tuesday, Dec. 18, 2001 | 10:50 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- The nuclear industry may intervene in a lawsuit filed Monday by Nevada officials against the Energy Department.

The suit alleges the department has implemented new rules for Yucca Mountain that rely too heavily on man-made metal alloy containers to isolate nuclear waste from humans instead of relying "primarily" on the mountain's rock as originally planned. The rules took effect Friday.

That's a policy switch that came when scientists, over the years, realized that natural features of the mountain cannot adequately isolate waste, Nevada officials said. They doubt metal containers could protect waste for long, especially from water moving through Yucca tunnels, where the it would be stored.

"DOE's new siting guidelines permit DOE to rely 'primarily' not on geologic considerations, as required by law, but on engineered waste packages that could be placed virtually anywhere," Nevada Attorney General Frankie Sue Del Papa said.

The suit asks the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to review the new rules.

Meanwhile, officials with the Nuclear Energy Institute, the leading nuclear industry lobby group, are considering whether to intervene to state their case for the Yucca repository, spokesman Mitch Singer said. NEI officials are reviewing the suit and likely will decide in early January, he said.

Federal law requires that Yucca-related lawsuits, which normally could take a year or more to resolve, be expedited. Still, a timetable for the suit is uncertain, lawyers said.

Nevada officials expect the federal government will file a motion to dismiss the suit, said Joe Egan, a Washington-area lawyer hired by Nevada for the suit.

The lawsuit asserts that since Congress first wrote Yucca-related legislation in the early 1980s, federal law has stressed that natural geologic features should protect waste from elements such as water, weather, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. "Engineered barriers" would merely provide added protection, the lawsuit said.

" ... No form of man-made or engineered barrier or container, based on known technology, is capable of serving as a reliable and safe permanent repository for such wastes for such periods," it said.

Energy Department officials stress that they would rely on both the geologic features of Yucca Mountain and sophisticated man-made systems, which include alloy containers designed to last 10,000 years, plus titanium "drip shields."

"We're not relying on one more than the other," department spokesman Joe Davis said. "They work hand in hand."

Energy officials said that under the direction of the National Academy of Sciences, department officials merely updated siting guidelines to match new rules from the Environmental Protection Agency and Nuclear Regulatory Commission -- rules that take into account a "total system performance."

Scientific advancements have led to better waste containers since 1984, when the department was first developing repository guidelines, Energy lawyer Lee Liberman Otis said in letter sent Friday to Gov. Kenny Guinn.

Guinn had asked the department delay the effective date of the new rules, but it denied the request.

The letter states that federal law mandates a "multiple-barrier system" that includes engineered barriers.

But Nevada officials say the letter missed the point.

"Our argument is that you can't ignore the geology, and that is what they're doing," Egan said.

"The fundamental principle of geologic isolation is being undermined by DOE's siting guidelines in an attempt to make Yucca Mountain work, despite Yucca Mountain's blatant geologic deficiencies," Guinn said in a statement.

The lawsuit is just one part of a strategy Nevada officials are using to delay and hopefully kill the Yucca repository. Despite their efforts, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham is expected in the coming weeks to recommend Yucca to President Bush as the nation's nuclear waste repository. Bush then could recommend it to Congress, where it would meet Nevada opposition.

Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., said only naturally occurring material that has been around for thousands of years, such as rock, should be considered as a viable material to isolate waste for 10,000 years.

"To me, engineered barriers are something you should not consider in designing a nuclear waste repository," Gibbons said. "Man has never built anything to last 10,000 years."

The new rules are a "sham," Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said.

"They (Energy Department officils) are playing games here that are extremely transparent," Berkley said. "They can't comply with the law, so they want to change the law with rulemaking."

Meanwhile, Energy officials in Las Vegas were explaining that they don't have all the answers on whether Yucca Mountain will work as a national waste burial ground. A continued step-by-step approach to further study is necessary, they said.

Water seeping through fractures in Yucca's rock is "the No. 1" concern for the Energy Department to study, according to William Boyle, a department license and regulatory adviser.

It doesn't know how much water is inside the mountain or how fast it moves through the repository site. There is no final repository design, Boyle said.

The department has not calculated which combination of underground tunnels, metal containers and drip shields would best keep water away from the waste, Boyle said.

"We need to go out there and see if what we thought was there is there," Boyle said.

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