Nuke industry concentrates on licensing of Nevada dump

Benjamin Grove

Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2002 | 11:04 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Now that Congress has approved Yucca Mountain, nuclear industry officials have shifted their lobbying priorities, a top industry leader says.

In this "post-Yucca vote era," top nuclear industry executives have two top goals, said Joe Colvin, president and chief executive of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's leading lobby group.

One: prod lawmakers to approve a record $593 million budget for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump project for next year. President Bush requested the amount but Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., has already moved to cut the funding.

And two: help the Energy Department compile an application for a license for Yucca Mountain.

The Energy Department must apply for the license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission before construction can begin. The department plans to submit the application in December 2004.

Colvin said the department needs help assembling the complex application. The Chicago-based law firm of Winston & Strawn, hired by the department to help compile the application, quit the job last year after two years of work. The firm, which has a department that specializes in nuclear industry regulation law, left amid conflict-of-interest charges. The firm strongly denied any conflict, but said the controversy was distracting.

The department should hire another firm to fill the expertise vacuum left by Winston & Strawn's departure, Colvin said.

"I'm not sure we (NEI) can fill that," Colvin said.

NEI officials, who led the pro-Yucca lobbying effort in Congress, are now keeping close tabs on how the Energy Department assembles the application -- without taking an active role, Colvin said.

The department has been briefing top industry executives on the progress of the application, Colvin said, adding that the meetings were "informal" question-and-answer sessions.

Industry executives are offering limited input, Colvin said. Industry officials have expertise to offer the department in the area of NRC licensing because nuclear plants -- and their on-site waste storage areas -- are licensed and regulated by the NRC.

"The effected entity in all this -- us -- doesn't have much say," Colvin said during an interview at an energy conference held Tuesday in Washington. "The Department of Energy has no experience in licensing under the Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing process. We are trying to look out for our own interests."

Nevada lawmakers have always been suspicious of communication between the pro-Yucca lobby group and the department precisely because NEI has such a vested interest in the project earning NRC approval.

"It sounds like a conflict of interest, doesn't it?" Reid said. "You can't have some private entity advising a government agency on what to do."

Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., added, "The Department of Energy is, and always has been, in bed with the nuclear industry."

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said the nuclear industry is doing everything it can to assure the license application is approved.

"I never trust an industry that has some self-interest," Ensign said. "That's why it's important we have watchdogs. That's why we have to be vigilant to make sure all the licensing requirements are met."

Nuclear industry officials also are standing behind pro-Yucca lawmakers who have goaded the department to submit the application as much as a year early, Colvin said. He said the accelerated timeline is "doable," although department officials have repeatedly said December 2004 is a firm target.

On another matter, Colvin said NEI is not yet pushing lawmakers to increase the capacity of Yucca Mountain. By law, the underground tunnels 1,000 feet below the surface would hold no more than 77,000 tons of waste.

But Yucca will be full roughly 25 years after it opens. Energy Department officials acknowledge that Yucca will have to be expanded -- or a second dump will have to be constructed -- as long as power plants continue to operate.

Still, NEI won't have to throw its lobbying weight behind that issue for years, Colvin said.

The influential group has other more immediate Yucca-related issues to advocate, Colvin said. Colvin said NEI eventually wants Congress to take Yucca "off-budget."

As it stands, nuclear utility ratepayers, and the Defense Department, contribute hundreds of millions of dollars each year to a federal fund that ultimately will pay for Yucca. Lawmakers allocate an annual Yucca budget to the Energy Department each year from the fund.

But nuclear industry officials would like to see Congress set aside the money so that it is not subject to the annual political whims of lawmakers. They have been frustrated with efforts led by Reid to slash the budget each year. They say lawmakers would still have oversight of the project, just not budget-setting authority every year.

Nevada lawmakers oppose the proposal. It amounts to an "open checkbook," Gibbons said.

"This is a terrible idea," he said.