Senate may begin talks to classify nuke waste

Suzanne Struglinski

Monday, May 3, 2004 | 10:34 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- A Senate committee could start deciding this week whether the Energy Department has authority to classify radioactive waste as high-level or low-level waste.

Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., is said to be working on language to be included in the defense authorization bill that would give the Energy Department the authority, overturning a court ruling made in July 2003.

The department argues that without the authority, more waste would go to the potential Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage site. But Nevada and critics of the site are more concerned with the department changing rules it does not like, particularly one made by a federal court.

The U.S. District Court in Idaho said that under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, the department could not separate liquid waste at sites in Washington, New York, Idaho and South Carolina into high-level waste and low-level waste with the intention of leaving some on site and moving some to Yucca. Instead, all of the millions of gallons of waste now stored in tanks would need to be treated and shipped to Nevada.

Since then the Energy Department has unsuccessfully lobbied Congress to get legislative authority to separate the waste. In the 2005 budget the department is holding back $350 million in federal money earmarked to clean up radioactive sites unless Congress or a court grants it authority to classify radioactive waste as high-level or low-level material.

The case is on appeal to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. South Carolina and five other states, including Washington and Idaho, said the district court was right and the case should not be overturned.

Graham's office would not confirm what would be brought up next week, if anything, but released a statement saying "Senator Graham continues to work on a legislative solution that will give DOE the necessary authorization to continue full-scale cleanup efforts at Savannah River Site. This is a high priority for Senator Graham and one he hopes can be pushed through Congress in the near future."

However, the Natural Resources Defense Council received copies of potential language to be offered during meetings next week by Graham's office. The language appears to be created by the department's Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs Office.

Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., head of the Senate Strategic Forces subcommittee, said in February he also wanted the change to be included in the defense authorization bill.

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., sits on the Senate Armed Services Committee with Graham. The committee will start compiling the bill during several closed meetings this week.

"DOE has played fast and loose with the rules for storing and the rules for shipping nuclear waste and we will stand opposed to it as we have," Ensign's spokesman Jack Finn said. "He will actively oppose it."

Natural Resources Defense Council attorney Geoff Fettus, who argued and won the Idaho District Court case, called the language a "get out of jail free card" for the department since it would leave waste at sites that it was supposed to clean up.

"This is case of DOE changing the rules of the game, just like that they've done at Yucca Mountain," Fettus said.