Editorial: Being safe is not a ‘failure’

Tuesday, Aug. 8, 2006 | 7:22 a.m.

A representative of the nuclear power industry pointed out a salient fact last week at a hearing before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.

"In order to fully recognize the benefits that nuclear power offers, a solution must be found to the problem of disposal of used nuclear fuel," J. Barnie Beasley Jr. told committee members. He is president of Southern Nuclear Operating Co., which operates nuclear power plants in Georgia and Alabama.

He was correct on that point. But in further remarks he failed to acknowledge that a solution has not yet been devised. He said the federal government "must" take responsibility for the waste produced by power plants.

But that's not a viable solution, as the federal government does not have a safe storage site available. Beasley complained bitterly that the federal government's program to bury the waste at Yucca Mountain - 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas - has been a "failure."

But in designating Yucca Mountain as the sole site for burying the waste now accumulating at the nation's active and decommissioned power plants, the federal government recognized Nevada's right to challenge the plan's safety. Over the years Nevada has discovered multiple reasons why Yucca Mountain could never safely contain high-level nuclear waste.

Can that really be described as a failure? Only by those so determined to build more nuclear power plants that they would overlook the potentially lethal hazards associated with Yucca Mountain.

The congressional action that started the search for a geologic solution, the 1982 Nuclear Policy Waste Act, set a deadline of Jan. 31, 1998, for beginning to bury the waste. Now Energy Department officials are saying it will be 2017 at the earliest before Yucca Mountain could be ready. We do not believe it can ever be demonstrated as safe.

Safety issues pointed out by Nevada are the reasons why Yucca Mountain is in limbo. Should the original deadline have been kept despite design flaws that could have created a catastrophe? We agree with Beasley that "a solution must be found." But that solution is not Yucca Mountain.