Ensign warns DOT of Yucca risks

Benjamin Grove

Wednesday, Oct. 10, 2001 | 10:38 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., today urged Department of Transportation officials to consider the risk of terrorist attacks on shipments of radioactive waste as part of a broader look at terrorist threats to the nation's trains, trucks, buses and airplanes.

Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks Nevada officials have demanded that federal officials analyze risks to trucks and trains that eventually could haul high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain for permanent storage. Yucca is the proposed site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas that, if approved, could become the nation's first high-level waste burial ground.

The Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee today held a hearing on terrorist threats to the nation's buses, trucks and hazardous materials shippers. Committee member Ensign told witnesses from the DOT that putting waste on cross-country rail and highway routes to Nevada would be even more dangerous than leaving it where it now sits -- at nuclear power plants and government storage sites.

DOT research and special programs administrator Ellen Engleman said the department was examining the issue. Ensign vowed to send her more written questions to explore the topic further.

"In the past, the question was 'What if one of these shipments crashes?' " Ensign said after the hearing. "Now it's 'What if someone blows it up?' It's a completely different scenario."

Ensign's comments during the hearing were partially in response to statements from leading Yucca project supporter Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, who this week said waste would be more secure at Yucca than at scattered sites around the country.

"I wanted it on the public record that while he thinks that it is less dangerous to have it in one place, I think it is more dangerous to have it in one place" because of the risks of shipping it there, Ensign said.

The committee considered testimony from bus and truck experts.

Lawmakers have said the nation may need new rules for obtaining a commercial driver's license; higher standards for shipping hazardous materials; and better methods of tracking shipments.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is urging shippers to strictly follow security procedures and to take advantage of new shipping technologies in locks, seals, alarms and engine controls, agency administrator Joseph Clapp said in prepared testimony.