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Hearings this week in Las Vegas on the federal government’s plans to store highly radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain drew little public attendance. But Nevada officials and several other groups showed up to raise 320 objections to the plan.
Saturday, April 4, 2009 | 2 a.m.
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Some years ago, an earthquake interrupted a meeting of the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board — precisely at the moment participants were discussing how a future earthquake could affect a nuclear repository at Yucca Mountain.
After the quake passed, discussion casually resumed.
It was as if that day’s earthquake and Yucca Mountain’s future “were in parallel universes,” recalls Abby Johnson, nuclear waste adviser to Eureka County.
Johnson said the same surreal feeling surrounded Yucca Mountain licensing hearings this week in Las Vegas. The proceedings rolled on as if the administration of President Barack Obama hadn’t all but killed funding for the project, as if Congress and the nuclear industry weren’t hashing out “Plan B” for nuclear waste storage, as if the secretary of energy hadn’t said he had no intention of seeing Yucca Mountain built.
The hearings in a nondescript building east of McCarran International Airport were the latest stops in the federal government’s meandering effort to store 70,000 tons of nuclear waste inside the mountain 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Taking in the expansive modern hall specifically constructed for hearings on the project, Johnson appeared in awe that the day had finally arrived. After so many lawsuits, hearings, debates and disagreements between Nevada and the Energy Department, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission — the federal agency that is the impartial decider of the project’s fate — would finally hear testimony about who could challenge the government’s license application, and what could be alleged.
Each group seeking to raise a concern about the license application sat at a table facing the dais, briefcases at their sides filled with reams of documents supporting their arguments.
The three days of hearings were a kind of pretrial, but the stakes were high. Every contention thrown out at this stage would be one less opportunity to make a case later against the repository or, in the case of the nuclear energy industry — in favor of it. One less chance to examine the controversial science on the feasibility of safely storing nuclear material for thousands of years.
The biggest of the alleged holes in the Energy Department’s Yucca license application, according to Nevada, is that the project’s safety plans rely on installing 11,000 titanium drip shields 100 years from now, after the waste has been placed inside the mountain. Installing the drip shields would require technology that hasn’t been invented, the state says, and the application does not consider the effects if the drip shields cannot be installed.
Nevada, several counties and others would like to bring forward hundreds of other concerns about the Energy Department’s science. They say it fails to take into account expected changes in precipitation tied to global warming, fails to use the right calculations for volcanic activity, fails to properly anticipate how fast waste canisters will corrode and fails to substantiate that the department could block air traffic over the mountain to avoid air crashes. These groups also argue that environmental impact statements didn’t sufficiently consider the effect of transporting waste to the site.
In all, there were 320 contentions from 14 groups.
The Energy Department says none of these critiques should be heard because they all violate technical requirements of the regulations.
Below an eagle seal, the first of three panels of three judges each took their seats Tuesday morning to hash out the arguments. Ten years ago, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission created an entire section of federal code, Part 63, specific to the Yucca Mountain process. Many details of the code had never been interpreted.
Chairman Paul Ryerson began by asking for any procedural questions.
There was one: Lead Nevada attorney Martin Malsch wondered if, given that the Obama administration has indicated it does not wish to see the Yucca Mountain project to completion, the Energy Department attorneys were still representing the department’s position.
“It’s the only answer we have and we are making that assumption,” Ryerson said, nodding toward the Energy Department attorneys.
The reversal of federal policy on Yucca has been sudden and, from Washington’s perspective, decisive.
Even the Yucca project’s most ardent supporters acknowledge it is not likely to be built.
Finding another solution has become the priority in Washington. So far, that includes setting up a blue-ribbon panel to explore alternatives for disposing of nuclear waste.
In the meantime, at least, the licensing process continues.
Energy Department spokeswoman Stephanie Mueller said the department is still evaluating the legal and financial implications of revoking the license application.
Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Senate committee that continuing the licensing process with the commission could help inform future nuclear waste policy.
All of that would suggest the department is fighting a fight it doesn’t really believe in.
If that is the case, participants in the Las Vegas hearings couldn’t tell. Yucca Mountain foes and supporters said they were taking the licensing at face value, as a process that could, some day, net a repository. They noted that if the Energy Department doesn’t pull the license application, the process will likely extend beyond the four years allotted to it, and by then a new administration could restore its design and construction funding.
“I don’t think this is going through the motions at all,” said Bruce Breslow, who three months ago became executive director of the Nevada agency charged with fighting the repository plan. “There’s massive money behind this and the Department of Energy is saying everyone’s contentions against the project should be thrown out. They won’t give an inch.”
Throughout the three days of hearings, Energy Department attorneys, led by Donald Silverman and Alex Polonsky, presented a spirited defense of their positions against a barrage of pointed questions from commission judges. Many times various judges indicated they may be inclined to side with Nevada and others to let contentions go forward, to be decided later in the process.
Why, the judges wondered aloud again and again, had the Energy Department contested all 229 contentions that Nevada submitted? It seemed disingenuous, they repeatedly said.
During the second day of hearings, some judges admonished not only the Energy Department but the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s own advisory staff, who had agreed with the department in all but 19 cases that Nevada’s contentions should be tossed.
“Should ... we conclude that a significant number of the Nevada contentions are clearly admissible ... for me at least both DOE and the NRC staff will have lost credibility,” Judge Alan Rosenthal said in a prepared statement Wednesday morning. “The staff would to its detriment create the impression that it is not a disinterested participant in the licensing process but, rather, a spear carrier for DOE. Once such an impression has been garnered, there remains little reason to credit anything the staff might have to offer.”
The agency’s attorneys and the commission staff denied they were acting in bad faith.
“We did not proceed on the predetermined basis to challenge contentions nor to throw everything against the wall to see what sticks,” Silverman, an agency attorney, said Wednesday afternoon. “We take our ethical obligations seriously.”
Commission staff members also defended themselves.
Judge Michael Farrar said Tuesday it appeared as though staff members were treating protests of the Yucca Mountain case with a higher bar to entry than protests filed against past commission cases.
“We did not arbitrarily raise the bar,” said Mitzi Young, representing the staff. It’s not fair to compare the Yucca repository case to other nuclear licensing because the case is unprecedented, she said.
Final decisions won’t be made until May, but Yucca project supporters and foes agreed the sometimes snappy remarks from judges are signs they’re willing to act independently.
Paul Seidler, a spokesman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group, said, “This is a legitimate process. It’s designed to be above politics.”
Outside the hearing room, the lines have become blurred between Yucca supporters and detractors since the Energy Department leadership reversed course on the issue.
But inside the hearing room, there was no such confusion.
Seidler took a front-row seat for the drama.
“They’re all playing a role in this process,” he said.
Summary:
"The Energy Department says none of these critiques should be heard because they all violate technical requirements of the regulations. In the meantime, at least, the licensing process continues. This is a legitimate process. It's designed to be above politics."
The license process is continuing as Yucca Mountain is STILL the law and no other viable plan has been implemented via the current administration. To kill the license would violate law and rain down a whole NEW set of law suites from the utility companies (in addition to the hundreds of millions we are currently paying in PRESENT litigation fees).
The Obama administration will NEVER decide on a viable alternate to Yucca Mountain, rather just play along with the license application investigation process and Secretary Chu's "Blue Ribbon" panels.
All of this will take well over the four years of Obama's presidential reign.
Then after that, a real leader will hopefully be elected to the office of president and get the ball rolling again on a viable nuclear waste plan.
Hopefully the root cause of Nuclear Power's demise, Harry Reid, will also be out of the picture.
Nuclear power is needed as a viable alternative to coal. Wind and solar can currently power only a small percentage of our nation's needs. The political plans of Reid/Chu/Obama exists in a non-scientific fantasy world that can so easily be conjured up with political rehtoric and speaches.
aBadReid.com has more information on this process.
What a amazing site(Yucca). Very well protected, and safe. But maybe we should just leave those spent fuel rods above ground at each plant? This way those terrorist have an easier target.
The reason they press on is because they live in the real world, not the fantasy world Harry and his ilk live in.
Berzon's article starts out with some rather misplaced parallel-worlds dramatism. Minor earthquakes are rather common, this one had no effect locally. Would you have expected seasoned scientists and engineers to throw up their hands at a minor tremor and say that even though it is fine for people to still live here, this proves that a hardened facility some distance from here is not appropriate?
The second parallel-worlds comparison was equally silly. The Department is pursuing the license application according to a directive from Congress voted on by both houses and signed by a president. That means it is a law. No one has changed that law, therefore it is in force, and DOE is following that law in doing what it is doing.
What is very strange, however, is --during this process mandated by law-- laying off about 1500 people actually doing the work that supports this process over the last 2 years (about 400 this year, many scientists and engineers with NO hope of being able to stay in Nevada with its non-diverse economy).
In this national and local economic climate these layoffs are simply cruel. Doubly-cruel given that money is being sent to many locations right now to prevent layoffs! But these people deserve special scorn because they were helping DOE execute a law that is locally unpopular.
Given the amount of money in the Nuclear Waste Fund that is dedicated to this work, the cuts made were unnecessary from any government-frugality argument: the money cannot be used for work not related to fulfilling the mandates of this specific law.
I look forward to seeing the outcome of this "first-of-a-kind" licensing process. Sure, we have a transuranic waste repository in New Mexico currently operating, but it works under an EPA permitting process, not under an NRC licensing process. This is a first, let's play it out and see where it goes. Then the government can make a new decision knowing whether or not Yucca Mountain is viable from a licensing perspective.
Congress can redirect the nation's radioactive waste management work at any time. When it does so, by law, we can expect that the DOE will execute that new law, just as it currently is doing its level best to execute what current law tells us to do.
"The Obama administration will NEVER decide on a viable alternate to Yucca Mountain,
rather just play along with the license application investigation process and Secretary Chu's "Blue Ribbon" panels."
Until or if Obama changes the NWPA Obama must follow the law.
I APOLOGIZE for using the word "us" in my above 12:02 PM note. I DO NOT speak for the DOE when expressing my personal views in a response to a newspaper article. The word should have been "it" : the DOE will do what 'it' is directed to do by law.
The pro-nuclear guy who characterizes Nobel Prize winner Secretary Chu as "unscientific" shows the depth of his integrity and understanding.
But you don't need a Nobel Prize to understand what a dead end nuclear power is. Just look at what new plants around the world are costing. How's $.20+/kWh grab ya for wholesale power? Plants in Turkey and Finland to get a sense of just how high the prices can go: 50% to 70% higher than solar thermal power plants like Solana, now underway in Arizona. Oh, and by the way, when the solar plants get old, their energy price goes to about 2 cents per kWh and they have zero waste to dispose of. And they operate day and night just like the nukes, because they have energy storage built in.
As the solar power construction boom gets going in Nevada, everyone will benefit.
That Solana solar generating station project KeepNVStrong is referring to would be the largest solar power plant in the world generating a measly 280MWe, comparied to a typical 2-unit nuclear plant which generates over 2,200Mwe.
Not that exploring solar alternatives isn't prudent but hardly the answer (low capacity) to our (Nation's) current and future generation needs.
Much of the costs associated with nuclear generation are the result of government mandates, politics and cost inefficiencies. (Yucca a tragic example)
Consider all of our processing inefficiencies utilized in the production and usage of electricity, nuclear power is the most viable large scale method of producing electrical energy in America.
What is surreal is that the press fails to recognize that Obama and Chu are violating a law passed by Congress to designate Yucca Mountain as the place for waste to be emplaced. Regardless of whether you agree or not with the NWPA, this blatant disgreard for the law of the land should be raising alarm across the country. Instead, the press views this as acceptable and normal. No wonder China is concerned that America is not going to be a viable country in the future.
The current administration is playing a PR game. This being Jimmy Carter's second term, you'd think he'd know better by now. Yucca Mountain will be the site.
Yucca Mountain, surrounded by deficient politicians!
Let's put things into perspective. For some 20+ years Nevada politics has opposed Yucca Mountain. It has been passed into law by congress, given approval "position statements" by the US Chamber of Commerce, IEEE, The Nuclear Energy Institute, American Nuclear Society, the IBEW 35th International Convention in support of nuclear energy and of legislation to ensure a national nuclear waste disposal facility, and over half of the U.S. Governors support the Yucca Mountain facility.
Now some have called Yucca "junk science" this seems a rather immature statement given the institutions noted above who also support that science. Based on recent national events one could easily state that America is more inclined to be experiencing "junk politics" rather than science. Having toured the Idaho National Laboratory just last week Nevada's challenge to the "science" of the DOE and NRC are quite baseless. On JAN-15 2008 Bob Loux testified to the NV Legislative Committee on High Level Radioactive waste that the majority of anti Yucca science was being purchased from China, Japan and the UK. Interesting that some of these same countries have purchased advanced reactor and used fuel research projects from the Idaho and other National Laboratories.
Remember that America built the first nuclear energy industry and the first nuclear navy. All American people will be "short changed" by politics vs science and all should protest the unfounded "offshore" opposition science to Yucca Mountain. Embrace the Yucca Mountain Project and nuclear technology commerce development for Nevada's citizens.
Gary Duarte, Director
www.usnuclearenergy.org
Sparks, NV
This is RIDICULOUS!!!
YMP was approved by a MAJORITY and is allowed to be pushed beyond its budgetary limits by NIMBY players who dont have AMERICA's future in their best interest.
We wont get any new nuclear power sources until we solve the waste issues. At least let this location get empowered, even if only for a trial run.
Anything to reduce payments to current storage locations at the utilities.
We NEED the new power plants for another reason:
they will produce HYDROGEN as a by-product. Fuel for the transportation industry that WILL reduce our need for OIL.
If OBAMA ADMIN had intelligence to go with their oratory skills, they would of given GM a contract to make PROPANE powered vehicles for govt use that could be converted to HYDROGEN in the near future. So many benefits...
And, as to solar power, what they arent mentioning is the storage needs are still relying on batteries that are even more harmful to the environment and dont last long enough to be cost effective.
Then again, they also continue to ignore the reality of ETHANOL and its negatives.
sir OGRE? OK, well, I didn't make this connection until you mentioned it, but boiling water reactors (BWRs, not pressurized water reactors or PWRs) naturally generate hydrogen through irradiation and hydrolysis of water. That hydrogen is collected and then recombined with oxygen to turn it back into water.
Perhaps there is a way to siphon off that hydrogen, compress it into a liquid, and use it as a fuel?
If this is a viable hydrogen source, then we ought to suggest that utilities build large BWRs rather than PWRs, they could be dual-purpose energy-machines!
I imagine it is not currently being done because of a slow hydrogen-production rate. But I am having an audacity-of-[BWR-hydrogen]-hope attack!
If there is a nuclear engineer in the crowd, please either add fuel to this hydrogen-fire, or throw a LOT of cold water on it. Thanks either way.
Couldnt we just throw REID and PELOSI into the fire instead???
;-)/Harrumph
Abevanluik wrote:
"sir OGRE? OK, well, I didn't make this connection until you mentioned it, but boiling water reactors (BWRs, not pressurized water reactors or PWRs) naturally generate hydrogen through irradiation and hydrolysis of water. That hydrogen is collected and then recombined with oxygen to turn it back into water.
Perhaps there is a way to siphon off that hydrogen, compress it into a liquid, and use it as a fuel?
If this is a viable hydrogen source, then we ought to suggest that utilities build large BWRs rather than PWRs, they could be dual-purpose energy-machines!
I imagine it is not currently being done because of a slow hydrogen-production rate. But I am having an audacity-of-[BWR-hydrogen]-hope attack!
If there is a nuclear engineer in the crowd, please either add fuel to this hydrogen-fire, or throw a LOT of cold water on it. Thanks either way."
Abevanluik, I have contacted a source to inquire about off-gas hydrogen reclamation (current process recombines as you've mentioned), hopefully I'll have a response by next weekend regardiug feasibility (modifying nuclear processing systems is typically not cost effective).
On another note, BWR's are actually injecting hydrogen into their primary coolant loop to mitigate inter-granular stress corrosion cracking (IGSCC) of componets i.e. reactor inner walling, piping, etc.
I'll post what I find out.
Careful out there.
You are turning LV Sun into a useful resource instead of for kitty litter box purposes.
;-0
Will be looking forward to Harley's response.
As to the Ogrish person, I bet the virtual Sun would work very well in your virtual litter box for your virtual cat. You are obviously reading and contributing to it before use, is that to make it more odor-absorbent?
For those who can even try to make reason of the low cost of renewables compared to nuclear, you are beating a dead horse. For those who would actually study and educate yourselves on comparable energy providers, you would find nuclear is cheaper. Renewables should be a part of our portfolio for energy requirements but, they cannot and will not sustain our needs for the base load consumption we need and certainly will require in the future. Renewables will cost us dearly, and with little return as far as capacity or value. Nuclear, at this point is a great option, it will finally make this generation worth while, we have squandered technology, industry and jobs away to make fanatics happy, all the while leaving our kids with little to make a living for themselves. We need Yucca, we need nuclear, we can use, at this point, what we can to turn this country around.
Ah, the "Dead Horse" approach! ;-)
Lets rename Yucca Mtn: DEAD HORSE MOUNTAIN!!!
If you want to see the ineptness of govt and why we shouldnt allow them to dabble in national healthcare, you only need to examine the conversion to ETHANOL from MTBE as an additive.
It took them along time to end the use of MTBE, despite the reality of it contaminating GROUND water resources.
It should of been STOPPED immediately and not allowed mfgs to use up existing supplies.
Ethanol still has a possible future, but only if they end its reliance on corn alone.
Then again, why bother if we switch over to Propane vehicles in the near future; maybe Hydrogen beyond that?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTBE
And, stop looking for an involved nuclear process to make HYDROGEN. Just use basic electrolysis from any surplus power the nuclear plant creates, for now.
SHEESH!
The lessons learned and the techology developed over the past 60 years not only in America but throughtout the world should be utilized in modernizing and expanding our commerical nuclear electrical power generation fleet, NOT seeking ways to dismantle it while forfeiting future techologies surrounding it to others.
The LOONEY LEFTIES in the Pacific NWest want to chase Boeing completely out of the state in order to end the traffic and air pollution problems.
They totally ignore what they contribute to the economy, and that NOAA has shown SEA air pollution comes mostly from China.
You only have to see what our educational system has produced with their PC Liberal curriculum at the local McDonalds. They need a register to tell them how much change to return.
Kind of wish those old BELL LABS movies about science were brought back to PBS now. It would be a start.
;-)
PS Wonder how many lefties actually own Solar/Wind stocks. I know Pelosi does:
"Pickens' Clean Energy Fuels Corporation (CLNE)."
Its why she voted against oil drilling off the CA coast.
The probability that anyone would ever be harmed by release from a repository at Yucca Mountain is zero. These scenarios for harmful exposure are patently incredible. Even spent fuel, if we are foolish enough to bury a valuable resource, could be wrapped in Saran Wrap and it will never get into ground water at concentrations that could cause cancer; the evidence suggests that there might even be beneficial effects of the minuscule doses people might get some millenia down the road. Intrusion scenarios by people who don't know what they're looking for and don't know what they've found when they inadvertently drill into a waste container are ridiculous. The anti-nuclear activists have added some insane requirements since I retired 14 years ago (titanium?), and their goal of constipating nuclear energy development in America may well succeed as a result, and our descendents will curse them.
FWIW:
The world's power demands are expected to 60% by 2030, with the world-wide total of active coal plants over 50,000 and rising. The IEA (International Energy Agency) estimates that fossil fuels will account for 85% of the energy market by 2030.
World organization such as the IEA are concerned about the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels, and coal in particular. The combustion of coal contributes the most to acid rain and air pollution, and has been connected with global warming, due to the chemical composition of coal and the difficulties of removing the impurities from this solid fuel prior to its combustion.
Electricity generation is responsible for a large fraction of CO2 emissions; and for 41% of U.S. manmade carbon dioxide emissions. Coal power stations are the least carbon efficient power stations in terms of level of carbon dioxide produced per unit of electricity generated. Currently, carbon capture and storage of emissions from coal fired power stations is not viable.
Radioactive trace elements found in coal i.e. uranium, thorium and other naturally-occurring radioactive isotopes released to the environment leads to radioactive contamination. A 1,000 MWe coal-burning plant could release as much as 5.2 tons/year of uranium and 12.8 tons/year of thorium. The radioactive emission from this coal plant is 100 times greater than a comparable nuclear power plant; including processing output, the coal power plant's radiation output is over 3 times greater.
Coal is abundant in the world and generally cheaper for power generation. Most of the developing world uses coal for its power production, including countries such as China and India.
FWIW: (repost typo)
The world's power demands are expected to increase 60% by 2030, with the world-wide total of active coal plants over 50,000 and rising. The IEA (International Energy Agency) estimates that fossil fuels will account for 85% of the energy market by 2030.
World organization such as the IEA are concerned about the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels, and coal in particular. The combustion of coal contributes the most to acid rain and air pollution, and has been connected with global warming, due to the chemical composition of coal and the difficulties of removing the impurities from this solid fuel prior to its combustion.
Electricity generation is responsible for a large fraction of CO2 emissions; and for 41% of U.S. manmade carbon dioxide emissions. Coal power stations are the least carbon efficient power stations in terms of level of carbon dioxide produced per unit of electricity generated. Currently, carbon capture and storage of emissions from coal fired power stations is not viable.
Radioactive trace elements found in coal i.e. uranium, thorium and other naturally-occurring radioactive isotopes released to the environment leads to radioactive contamination. A 1,000 MWe coal-burning plant could release as much as 5.2 tons/year of uranium and 12.8 tons/year of thorium. The radioactive emission from this coal plant is 100 times greater than a comparable nuclear power plant; including processing output, the coal power plant's radiation output is over 3 times greater.
Coal is abundant in the world and generally cheaper for power generation. Most of the developing world uses coal for its power production, including countries such as China and India.
The thing is that of all the proposed sites Nevada was considered the worst. The best sites in Texas and one other state in the south had more powerfull senators that rode ruffshod over our powerless senator at the time because they didn't want in their state.
LV4LIFE, that was simply not the case. The process of site selection went from 9 to 5 to 3 for characterization. The three for characterization werein Nevada, Washington and Texas. All three met the long-term safety goals extant at that time, so the decision came down to ease and cost and safety of reposiotry characterization and construction.
Right or wrong, in your view, it was decided within DOE that if a choice was to be made to only characterize one site, DOE would want Congress to choose Yucca. Several key Congress persons were informed of DOE's judgement.
The Texas site in bedded salt meant drilling one or more shafts through the Ogallala aquifer, and although Germany had shown how this could be done by freezing the mud as one drilled down, until a liner could be put in place to hold back the wet sediments in the aquifer, they had an accident and showed this is not easy.
The site in Washington was workable, in basalt, but its working temperature at repository level was about 60 celcius, which made it a somewhat difficult proposition for characterization and construction.
Yucca Mountain, at that time, was thought to be easier to enter, excavate, characterize and build in.
My point is that the decision as suggested by DOE was a rather intelligent one based on what was known at the time. But I do remember some Congressional types saying some very insensitive things about what informed their individual voting decisions. That is unfortunate and makes Nevadans, including myself, angry at their lack of intelligence, ethics, and attitute toward this state.
But that does not mean, to me, that we should reverse the decison now that DOE is in the process of showing a group of independdent and capable experts at the NRC why a Yucca Mountain repository would be safe. Let that process play out,then let the nation make an informed decision.
FYI:
On April 2nd the State Senate on a bipartisan vote approved the repeal of a nuclear plant construction moratorium in Minnesota.
Currently no nuclear power plant can be constructed in the state.
But amendment supporters argued it was time to rekindle the nuclear power debate.
"The amendment is the start of the discussion," said Sen. Amy Koch, R-Buffalo.
Koch's parents live within minutes of the Monticello nuclear power plant, she explained.
Sen. Mike Jungbauer, R-East Bethel, another amendment supporter, expressed frustration over energy politics.
Jungbauer deemed alternative energy alone as woefully inadequate to supply future energy needs.
He styled the promises of wind and solar energy "a great lie to the public."
Sen. Jim Carlson, DFL-Eagan, argued that the issue of nuclear power doesn't belong in the hands of politicians.
"I see this as a technology issue and not a political issue," he said on the Senate floor.
Sen. Steve Murphy, DFL-Red Wing, whose district includes the Prairie Island nuclear power plant, echoed the sentiments of Carlson.
"You can walk up and hug these casks," he said of the spent fuel storage casks at Prairie Island.
"It's nothing to be afraid of," he opined of nuclear energy, saying technicians understood how to handle the radioactive fuel.
But opponents stood up on the Senate floor, too.
Sen. John Doll, DFL-Burnsville, spoke of the challenges presented by nuclear waste.
"This is a moral issue, if nothing else," said Doll.
Sen. Ellen Anderson, DFL-St. Paul, described nuclear power as perhaps holding promise -- but today isn't the day for more plants, she argued.
But the amendment passed -- a moratorium repeal bill in the House failed last week in the committee.
Gov. Tim Pawlenty supports the removal of the moratorium.