Guest columnist Larry E. Craig: Is Yucca recommendation being made too hastily?

Larry E. Craig

Friday, Feb. 8, 2002 | 5:25 a.m.

By Larry E. Craig

Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham made the right decision: Abraham has recommended to President Bush that Yucca Mountain is scientifically suitable for burying the nation's high-level nuclear waste.

This is a significant milestone in this country's effort to find a resting place for spent nuclear fuel and the radioactive wastes that are the legacy of our Cold War victory.

Although these high-level wastes are currently safely stored at approximately 150 locations around the country, those sites were never intended to be permanent. Moreover, the Department of Energy took on a legal obligation to begin managing spent nuclear fuel from commercial power plants. That obligation began Jan. 31, 1998, and the meter is now running up a significant bill for taxpayers.

The urgent need for a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel is why the Yucca Mountain site has been subjected to extensive scientific study. A total of nine sites were studied between 1982 and 1987, and the cost of continued technical investigation of other potential sites did not make Yucca Mountain the designated repository by default. At the time Congress narrowed the field to only one site, scientists had already collected a lot of information about Yucca Mountain. A comparison of the sites pointed clearly to Nevada as most promising, which is why scientific attention has been focused on Yucca Mountain since then.

Opponents of Yucca Mountain expound at length about how dangerous it would be to transport nuclear waste to a repository site. I confess to being very confused by these arguments. Apparently, the only time it is dangerous to transport nuclear waste is if it is on its way to Nevada.

Tons of high-level nuclear waste have crossed America for decades, including more than 2,400 shipments of spent nuclear fuel. Idaho alone has completed more than 4,600 shipments of high-level nuclear waste. In not one instance -- ever -- has a shipment cask released radioactive material. Further, waste is being shipped from 40 countries around the world right now to the United States for storage, and research reactors across America are also shipping nuclear waste.

The United States has never had any problems with these shipments because nuclear-waste transportation casks have been subjected to every imaginable test to ensure their safety. Casks have been dropped onto steel spikes, hit by locomotives, crashed into walls at 70 miles per hour.

In addition, an extensive process for public hearings has already started and will continue, whereby states, local communities and emergency response authorities can express concerns, have questions answered and receive appropriate emergency-response training. But it is not useful to conduct the training and hearings now, when this program is at least a decade away and the Department of Energy has not selected transportation routes.

Some have asserted that our nation's reluctance to reprocess used nuclear fuel made a geologic repository the only option. Such an assertion ignores the recommendations made by the National Academy of Sciences in 1990. The Academy found there is worldwide consensus that deep geologic disposal is the best option for disposing of these wastes. Reprocessing does not even eliminate the need for a repository. Every time spent fuel is reprocessed, its radioactive byproducts require disposal.

In fact, 16 nations are studying geologic repositories, including every nation that currently reprocesses its spent nuclear fuel. Although I support federal funding to explore new technologies to handle nuclear waste, it is our duty to the safety of future generations to continue the process of repository development -- one which will result in a safe, permanent resting place for these wastes. It would be irresponsible to hope for a technological silver bullet and ignore the environmental obligations of today.

Opponents of Yucca Mountain mischaracterize national policy that would allow continual study of Yucca Mountain for 50 to 300 years after spent fuel disposal begins. Having a repository that is more easily monitored can only strengthen public confidence in Yucca Mountain, because the public can have more assurance that rigorous scientific inquiry can easily and regularly be applied to the site.

Everyone can agree that the decision about the site's suitability as a geologic repository should be based on sound and thorough science. I have great respect for the governor of Nevada and for my Nevada colleagues in the Congress who represent the Silver State, and do it admirably. I appreciate the difficulties of this process and their need to do whatever they can to advocate the views of Nevada's citizens and take the political actions necessary.