‘60 Minutes’ tackles Yucca Mountain issue

Kirk Baird

Friday, Oct. 24, 2003 | 5:27 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION Oct. 24 - 25, 2003

The story's components:

A multibillion-dollar central repository for nuclear waste 90 miles northwest of the fastest-growing city in the United States.

Major cities including Chicago, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Salt Lake City, where the nuclear waste will pass through, either on highways or railways.

Proponents who maintain the transportation of the 77,000 tons of hazardous waste is safe, while opponents worry about the potential for disaster.

It all adds up to a classic "60 Minutes" report, as the long-running investigative news program tackles the Yucca Mountain saga today at 7 p.m. on CBS (Channel 8).

"This is a weighty issue that the whole country has to deal with, something ongoing since the dawn of the nuclear age: What do we do with this?" Kevin Tedesco, spokesman for "60 Minutes," said in a phone interview Thursday from New York.

"It's coming to a head now and the battle ground seems to be Las Vegas, Nevada, as well as the highways and railways of the cities."

The story, as reported by Steve Kroft, offers a look at Yucca Mountain and the transportation of nuclear waste to the facility, Tedesco said.

"Our job in this case is to let people know this is the byproduct of your electricity for many of you and that the government is planning to move it along railroads to this city," he said. "People should know this and that it's going to be coming to Nevada on the railroad tracks and highways near their homes."

Among those interviewed for the piece include Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham and Las Vegas Sun Editor Brian Greenspun.

In the report, Greenspun recalls watching nuclear testing with his father and Las Vegas Sun founder, Hank Greenspun.

"He would take us up to the top of Mount Charleston when we were little kids so that we could watch the blasts. You could see the mushroom clouds go off and we thought that was the neatest thing in the whole world," Greenspun says. "And then minutes later, or what seemed like minutes later, this pink cloud would come over and we would get sprinkled with dust. No one ever thought anything of it. Thirty, forty years later, we are the thyroid cancer capital of the world."

Greenspun also states his belief that Nevadans are being forced to accept the waste because of a lack of political clout.

"Congress started looking around and said ... 'Who has only two senators and one representative? ... And who lives in a place that is perceived, at least, to be nothing but desert and wasteland?' " he says.

Meanwhile, Reid asks: "How are you going to haul the most poisonous substance known to man ... though cities, towns, past farms, businesses, churches, schools, residences? This is the big secret that (Department of Transportation) has."

Abraham, however, maintains that the transportation of the nuclear waste, which will remain hazardous for 10,000 years, will be safe.

"I think there's a general understanding that we move hazardous materials in this country ... an understanding that federal government knows how to do it safely," he says.

This isn't the first time "60 Minutes" has broadcast a report on Yucca Mountain.

On Feb. 18, 1996, the show aired a piece reported by Morley Safer, titled "The $12 billion Piggy Bank."

Tedesco said the focus of that story was that billions had been spent on the Yucca Mountain project but no one was sure when, if or how it would be used.

"This is really not an update," he said.