DOE official tainted by bias, Berkley says

Thursday, Feb. 28, 2002 | 11:04 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., is joining critics who say a top Energy Department official has a conflict of interest with two corporations where he used to work.

DOE Undersecretary Robert Card's former firms, CH2M Hill Corp. and Kaiser-Hill Corp., both have contracts with the department for radioactive waste cleanup projects in Colorado and Washington.

Critics charge Card with favoring the two companies in official department business. The critics include South Carolina Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges, who is clashing with the department over waste bound for a site in his state.

Card strongly denied a conflict, and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham defended him. "He's adhering to every ethical obligation," Abraham said in today's Wall Street Journal.

Berkley is highlighting allegations against Card as Nevada officials continue their long battle to poke holes in the DOE's credibility as manager of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste project, a plan to ship the nation's most radioactive nuclear waste to Nevada for permanent burial.

"Faced with issues of this magnitude, I view it as imperative that our government makes decisions honestly, fairly and without bias," Berkley said in a Jan. 22 letter to Abraham.

Abraham sent reams of paper to Berkley's office in response. Her staffers are looking through the material for information that could point to a possible conflict of interest that Card would have with the Yucca project.

Berkley said that Card's long history of work in the nuclear industry is troubling. Nevada officials have pointed to several conflicts of interest at the DOE in an effort to block the Yucca project. In one case, the law firm handling Yucca Mountain legal work for the DOE quit after it was revealed that it also did work for the nuclear power industry.

"These are the people who are determining the future of Nevada," Berkley said. "If their interests are conflicted, this whole (Yucca) project should be scrapped."