Wednesday, June 5, 2002 | 11:19 a.m.
WASHINGTON -- A key Senate panel approved Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste repository today, leaving one final congressional hurdle for the project: the full Senate.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved the controversial plan, 13-10, sending the measure to the full Senate for a vote by the end of July.
The 23-member committee voted mostly along party lines to approve Yucca Mountain as the permanent burial site of the nation's nuclear waste.
Only one Republican, Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado, voted against Yucca. Three Democrats voted for Yucca: Sens. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Bob Graham of Florida and panel Chairman Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico.
Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham cheered the committee's "bipartisan" vote.
"The Senate must now decide whether to leave nuclear waste stranded at 131 sites in 39 states or allow the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to make the independent determination that Yucca Mountain is suitable to serve as a geological repository," Abraham said in a written statement.
Nuclear industry officials also hailed the committee. The site is "a key element of U.S. energy security, our national security, environmental protection and the future growth of our economy," said Joe Colvin, president of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's top lobby group.
Bingaman, who had not publicly discussed how he intended to vote, said the Energy Department had amassed enough scientific evidence for a congressional site recommendation. He added that experts at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would have the final say.
It's unclear when that vote will happen. By law, the Senate must vote by July 25, a committee staff member said today.
The Senate's leading Yucca advocate, Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, said Democratic and Republican leaders would work out a timetable.
It's possible senators could vote this month, he said.
The committee vote was an important victory in the long history of the project, he added.
"It's a big one, relative to what the taxpayer's have invested in Yucca," he said.
When asked about how he felt about the upcoming full Senate vote, Murkowski said, "Good. We'll prevail, despite the lobbying of our good friend, (Nevada's Democratic) Sen. (Harry) Reid."
Reid and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., have been lobbying colleagues against Yucca Mountain with limited effect. The House overwhelmingly voted to approve the measure, and so far, Reid and Ensign have struggled to get much support, especially among Republicans.
Today Ensign revealed a parliamentary tactic he and Reid plan to use to try to block a vote. Under unique rule in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, any senator can bring the resolution to the floor for a vote. That breaks with Senate tradition that only the Senate majority leader -- currently Democrat Tom Daschle of South Dakota, -- can call for a vote. Daschle, who opposes Yucca, has said he would not call for a Yucca vote.
If another senator brings the resolution forward, Reid and Ensign plan to challenge the action on the grounds that only the Senate leader can do that -- despite what the Nuclear Waste Policy Act says, Ensign said.
History is on their side, Ensign said.
In five other rare cases in the 1990s when rules allowed any senator to bring a bill forward, the legislation was not voted on without the majority leader calling for the vote, Ensign said.
"It's a very dangerous precedent to set for Republicans or Democrats," he said.
Ensign and Reid are putting great faith in the planned procedural maneuver. "That's our last bag of tricks," Ensign said. "It's our best hope."
Reid said, "We need some Republicans to help us, and we'll take that help procedurally or substantively."
The resolution passed with only brief discussion from the committee.
Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., a nuclear power advocate, said he had wrestled for a long time on how to vote. Today he voted against Yucca. But he said if it came down to a close full Senate vote, he would not cast the deciding vote against it.
"I've struggled with this. I'm almost in anguish on this vote. I didn't sleep much last night. As we approach this vote, I still struggle," Carper said.
Also voting against Yucca was Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash.
She cited the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which said that scientific study had not proved Yucca sound.
"This is a complex problem in which we need to see the answers and the science," she said.
Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, a Yucca advocate, said scientific studies at Yucca Mountain would be complete in a few years, by the time the Energy Department applies for a waste-dumping license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The full Senate vote will mark another historic milestone in Yucca's history.
The Energy Department has been studying the site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas for 20 years and spent roughly $6 billion to determine if the site could safely isolate the nation's most radioactive high-level nuclear waste for 10,000 years.
Abraham recommended the site to President Bush in February, and Bush quickly approved it. The House approved Yucca on a 306-117 vote May 8.
If the Senate passes Yucca, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would have to approve the site, which could take several years. No waste would be shipped to Yucca Mountain until 2010 at the earliest.
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