Bush mulls Yucca dump

Benjamin Grove and Erin Neff

Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2002 | 11:22 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham briefed President Bush on Tuesday about why a nuclear waste dump should be built at Yucca Mountain, despite widespread opposition within Nevada.

Bush made no decision but is inclined to approve the site as early as Friday, several officials said.

Energy Department spokesman Joe Davis declined to offer details about the meeting and said Abraham had not set a timetable for his recommendation.

"When we make a recommendation, we'll let you know," Davis said.

Republican Gov. Kenny Guinn and Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and John Ensign, R-Nev., lobbied Bush last week to block the project.

Several Nevada officials said Tuesday that Bush may be carefully weighing the arguments made by the state's top politicians and wanted a quick response from Abraham.

Bush has not decided on Yucca Mountain, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said, declining to say which way the president is leaning.

"The president had a good opportunity to listen to both sides on the issue and follow up with questions," Fleischer said of the sessions with Abraham and the Nevadan delegation.

Many officials had predicted before the Nevada leaders' meeting with Bush that Abraham would make his recommendation Monday and Bush would immediately endorse it. White House sources have said the president will likely get the recommendation and approve it as soon as Friday.

The silence from the Energy Department and White House raised questions among Yucca Mountain critics about the debate going on within the Bush administration.

It would be good news for the state if Bush put off the decision, said Bob Loux, director of the Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency, a Yucca project watchdog.

"That's been our theory all along, that a delay works for us," Loux said.

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said it's her hunch that Bush's political and policy advisers may be at odds over whether to proceed with Yucca now, though she said she couldn't be sure. She said she couldn't predict when Bush would act.

"I was raised in Las Vegas, I only bet on sure things," Berkley said.

Berkley press secretary Michael O'Donovan noted that a decision on Friday would make sense, "because it seems to be the M.O. for the DOE, which releases bad news on Fridays so the press can't properly cover the news."

Reid's press secretary Nathan Naylor said the senator is hoping Bush does not decide immediately upon receiving Abraham's recommendation.

"We've gone in there and presented our case and we hope he takes this more seriously," Naylor said. "For every day that goes by (without a decision), it is a win for the country and for all of those who are concerned about a rush to judgment about Yucca Mountain."

Guinn's spokesman Greg Bortolin said the governor believes his meeting with Bush bought Nevada some time by raising some important issues.

"We have no reason to believe that the president is doing anything other than carefully considering what was presented," Bortolin said.

Abraham told Guinn last month he would recommend the site, but has yet to present formally to Bush a document outlining his recommendation. By law, he had to wait 30 days before doing so, which passed Saturday.

The law gives Guinn 60 days to override a presidential decision.

The governor has promised to veto the recommendation, but said he hasn't decided whether he will do so immediately or let the clock run through the 60 days first.

Guinn said part of the state's strategy involves keeping that decision secret until it happens.

Congress then would have 90 legislative days to counter Nevada's objection by majority votes in both houses.

The timing of those actions could determine where in the election the Yucca debate falls.

Abraham traveled to Los Angeles last week and was still editing the recommendation and the supporting material he will give to Bush. Aides said it was ready for presentation, but Fleischer said Abraham did not give it to the president Tuesday.

White House officials believe Yucca Mountain would pass Congress.

But sources with Nevada's congressional delegation said each day that passes gives Reid, Ensign, Berkley and Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., more time to win more votes.

Today Berkley will send a "Dear Colleague" letter to House members about the transportation issue. Tomorrow she plans a follow up letter about the cost of the project, she said.

Nevada lawmakers also are planning a Thursday press conference on Capitol Hill, possibly complete with a fake nuclear waste cask and truck bubbling with the help of dry ice, provided by an anti-Yucca activist group.

The event is expected to be attended by the state's four lawmakers and citizens and environmental groups and possibly Democratic House leadership.

The White House is mindful of the politics of the decision, one administration official said.

A move to move ahead could endanger re-election prospects of Republican Guinn, although he has no serious Democratic rival now. Three House seats are at stake in Nevada, including one new one based on the 2000 Census. Fleischer said politics would play no part in Bush's decision.

Abraham, who notified Nevada officials on Jan. 10 that he will recommend the site to the president, called it a "scientifically sound and suitable" place to bury the nation's used reactor fuel now kept at the power plants.

The Energy Department's schedule calls for opening the site to waste shipments by 2010. That timetable could be overly optimistic, government and industry officials acknowledge.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.