Senate recess means action on Yucca Mountain delayed

Benjamin Grove

Friday, June 28, 2002 | 9:55 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- The Senate was scheduled to recess for a weeklong holiday today, which means senators delayed action on Yucca Mountain until they return July 8.

Senate advocates of the nuclear waste dump project have vowed to make Yucca a top priority that week. It's expected that a pro-Yucca Republican senator will call for up to 10 hours of debate and a prompt vote on the measure shortly after Congress returns to Washington.

Most observers expect the Senate to muster at least the 51 votes needed to pass Yucca, with nearly every GOP member supporting it, and perhaps 10 or more Democrats.

"It's time we make a decision and move forward with this repository," Minority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., a Yucca supporter, said this week.

Sens. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and John Ensign, R-Nev., intend to try to block a vote with a procedural maneuver. The plan to argue that only the Majority Leader -- Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., who opposes Yucca -- should be calling for votes on any matter.

Usurping the will of the majority leader sets a "dangerous precedent" for the Senate, Ensign said.

But Yucca advocates point to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, which specifically states that any senator can break with Senate tradition and call for a vote on the controversial Yucca issue, despite the will of the majority leader.

"The law expressly permits someone else to act so Congress can work its will before a statutory deadline passes," Yucca advocate Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, said earlier this month.

At issue is a simple resolution that asserts congressional support for constructing a national dump for high-level nuclear waste at the desert site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. By approving the resolution, lawmakers would reject Gov. Kenny Guinn's veto of the project.

President Bush approved the site in February. The House approved it 306-117 on May 8.

Congress, by law, has 90 days to act on Yucca after Guinn's veto. When congressional holidays are considered, that gives lawmakers until July 27, Lott said.

Meanwhile, Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said he will fly to Washington, D.C. July 1 to help lobby key officials against approving Yucca Mountain, at the request of Reid's staff.

Goodman said he will lobby senators about the dangers of transportation and let the senators deal with the procedural issue.

The Senate is the final congressional hurdle for Yucca. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission would be responsible for approving and licensing the site, a process that could take several years.

Nevada officials have filed lawsuits in federal court to kill the project. Yucca would not open until 2010 at the earliest.