DOE official says Yucca unlikely to open on time

Suzanne Struglinski

Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2005 | 11:14 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- The Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository is not likely to open on time, the Energy Department's top Yucca official said Monday.

Margaret Chu, the department's assistant secretary who oversees the repository project, was asked after a budget briefing Monday if the department was backing away from its target opening in 2010.

"I think we are," she said. "We're hoping for 2012."

It was the first time anyone from the department has publicly acknowledged that the 2010 target opening date will be missed.

The project, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has been hampered by various problems and missed its self-imposed deadline of December 2004 to get its license application in to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The department aims to submit its license application by the end of this year.

"It all comes back eventually to how much funding we can get, how fast we can get the funding to build the repository," Chu said during the briefing. "It's going to take a lot of money to build and operate a repository."

Bruce Carnes, the associate deputy secretary, did not back down from the 2010 date during the briefing but made clear to reporters that the department does not have unilateral control over the timeline.

"We are going to take first things first," Carnes said. "We are going to get our license application in by the end of calendar 2005. What we don't know is how long it is going to take NRC to review that application or what other matters might come up, but right now we are on track for 2005. We can adjust our schedule accordingly."

Carnes said the department will be working with Congress to change budget rules to allow ratepayer money collected in the Nuclear Waste Fund to go directly toward the project.

The department rolled out its fiscal year 2006 budget Monday, with a $651 million request for the repository, including $427 million for the license application and other work and $85 million for transportation.

Bob Loux, director of Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects, said the department is in "fantasy land" and that the latest statements from the department proved to him the department was just not ready to file the application last year, regardless of any court ruling.

The delay came as no shock to Nevada's congressional delegation, whose members for years have been pointing out what they see as flaws in the project.

"I think Margaret Chu and the administration can say 2010, 2012, but I suggest they start looking at 20-never," Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said. "They will never be able to make Yucca Mountain the appropriate site. There is no way to safely store nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain."

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said "any delay in this ill-conceived program brings it one step closer to final defeat."

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said "all the time in the world would still not be enough" for the department to open the repository.

"Delay after delay costs the taxpayers billions and billions of dollars on a project that the courts have ruled doesn't meet sufficient safety standards," Reid said.

A ruling by a federal appeals court last July threw out the project's radiation protection standard, leaving a hole in the environmental rules and the commission's licensing guidelines. The missing standard coupled with the department's problem loading required documents into the commission's database forced the department to miss its deadline and look instead at this year.

Chu said the Environmental Protection Agency plans to get a proposed standard out in late spring and finalize it by the end of the year.

"We are hoping everything will be in sync on the schedule," Chu said. "When they get the proposed rule out, we will basically see what are the options so we can get ready and start working on that."

Loux doubted that the standard could be fixed that quickly.

"EPA is a very cautious agency," Loux said. "I don't think they (EPA) are capable of doing it in that timeframe. They don't even have an administrator."

An EPA official would only confirm that the agency aims to get the standard done by the summer and could not release any other information. Since the court's ruling last year, the agency has said it is working on the issue but has not elaborated.

Mitch Singer, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's main lobbying group, said the delayed date is not a surprise but waste could still be stored on-site at Yucca before everything is completed. He also said the expected revisions to the radiation standards should not impede the license application. Portions of the application can be done without a standard in place, he said.

Lawyer Joe Egan, who represents the state on Yucca issues, also doubted the new standard would be done by the end of the year.

"That would be a world record," Egan said.

It took about eight years to get the first standard finished. Egan also pointed out that the NRC will have to change its licensing rules too, which could take an additional two years after the EPA finishes the standard. The commission may not review the license without the new guideline in place.

The department also has to get millions of documents into the commission's database by June, or six months prior to them filing the application.

Give all that, "it sounds like they are boldly ambitious" with their projections, Egan said.

The department's $651 million request is lower than the $880 million request it submitted for this fiscal year. Chu did not answer questions regarding why this year's request is lower. She pointed out that the amount proposed for 2006 is higher than the $577 million Congress approved for this fiscal year.

"We are resetting the license application date," Chu said. "This is after very careful thoughtful planning and we came to the conclusion that our first priority is going to be a high quality license application. We are hoping to achieve that by the end of the year."

Reid said he doubts they will.

"Given DOE's abysmal Yucca Mountain track record, I have every confidence they'll be unable to meet the delayed, or any other, deadline," Reid said. "I don't believe Yucca Mountain will ever open, and Nevada and the country will be safer for our successful efforts to stop the project."