Defense to pay less for Yucca work

Suzanne Struglinski

Friday, Nov. 7, 2003 | 10:55 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- The Defense Department will pay almost $38 million less for next year's work on the Yucca Mountain Project than originally planned, forcing the project to take more from nuclear power users, according to terms in a defense authorization bill approved in the House today.

Lawmakers authorized $392.5 million for the Defense Department's share of the proposed nuclear waste storage site, planned for 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. A total $580 million has been approved for the project for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, after a push by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., to cut the DOE's request of $591 million.

Originally the Nuclear Waste Fund, money collected from nuclear utilities earmarked for the project, was to pick up $161 million of the total. The DoD, which also will store waste at the site, was to pay the rest.

Now close to $187 million would come from the waste fund and the balance from DoD.

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., sat on the authorization bill conference committee and fought to keep the amount low.

"I said, listen, Harry Reid fights for cut in funding in the non-military side, so I made it a top priority," Ensign said.

Meanwhile, efforts by the Energy Department to limit public access to certain information about the Yucca Mountain Project were stripped from the defense authorization bill approved by conferees last night.

An early version of the bill contained language that would have allowed the department to prohibit the dissemination of certain unclassified information pertaining to the potential nuclear waste storage site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

"I drew a line in the sand," Ensign said, noting he told the conferees he would not approved the bill with the language in it. "They needed by vote on it," Ensign said.

The Nevada House delegation wrote a letter to the heads of the House Armed Services Committee in July saying they were "gravely concerned about the implications of the proposed changes to the law" since it would give the department "the authority to shut the American public out of the Yucca Mountain Project process."

"At a time when the Department of Energy is pursing the approval of the Yucca Mountain Project license application by December 2004 -- yet still has over 200 key technical issues to resolve -- it is not prudent to exclude any interested party from the process."

Public Citizen representative Michelle Boyd confirmed the language was not in the bill late Thursday.

Public Citizen and numerous other organizations against the project also sent a letter to the conferees calling for the language to be removed.

Meanwhile, the conferees kept in language by Ensign and Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev. that calls for an independent epidemiological study of exposure to perchlorate -- the main ingredient of solid rocket fuel and a known toxin -- in drinking water to be completed by June 1, 2002.

The study would asses the public health threat of perchlorate, especially in pregnant women and infants.

"We need a comprehensive study to learn how various levels of perchlorate in drinking water affect the human body," Porter said. "The new language will mandate the Pentagon to undertake such studies, an important step toward improving our understanding of how of these chemicals impact humans," he said.