House panel backs bill to revive Nevada nuclear waste dump
Measure also supports plan for temporary storage site, which could be located in New Mexico
WASHINGTON — A House panel on Wednesday approved a bill to revive the mothballed nuclear waste dump at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, while also moving forward with a separate plan for a temporary storage site in New Mexico or West Texas.
A company wants to create a temporary storage site for spent nuclear fuel rods near Carlsbad. A second company has proposed a temporary storage facility in West Texas near the New Mexico border but has put that plan on hold.
Supporters said the Yucca Mountain bill represents a comprehensive package to solve a nuclear-waste management problem that has festered for more than three decades. The House Energy and Commerce Committee approved the bill, 49-4, sending it to the full House. Rep. Ben Ray Luján, D-N.M., was among those voting against the measure.
Republican Reps. Greg Walden of Oregon, Fred Upton of Michigan and John Shimkus
of Illinois said in a joint statement that the bill is good for taxpayers, communities and ratepayers. Walden chairs Energy and Commerce, while Upton and Shimkus chair energy and environment subcommittees.
Thirty years after Congress designated Yucca Mountain as the sole site for a permanent repository for nuclear waste, “It’s now time for the federal government to fulfill its obligation and permanently dispose of the spent nuclear fuel sitting in our states, alongside our lakes, rivers and roadways,” the lawmakers said.
The Trump administration has proposed reviving the longstalled Yucca project 100 miles from Las Vegas, Nev. Trump’s budget would spend $120 million to restart a licensing process for the Yucca site, which Nevada officials from both parties fiercely oppose.
Energy Secretary Rick Perry told a Senate hearing last week that he understands the political opposition but said the U.S. has a “moral obligation” to find a longterm solution to store spent fuel from its commercial nuclear fleet.
“This is a sensitive topic for some, but we can no longer kick the can down the road,” Perry said.
While the fight over Yucca resumes, lawmakers say they hope to make progress on a plan to temporarily house tons of spent fuel that has been piling up at nuclear reactors around the country.
Holtec International, a nuclear fuel manufacturing and management company based in Florida, filed an application in March with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to create a temporary storage facility for spent fuel rods in southeast New Mexico. The proposed site is about 15 miles north of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, the U.S. Department of Energy’s underground disposal facility for radioactive waste from the nation’s nuclear weapons complex.
New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, a Republican, is a supporter of the project. U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., has said he won’t support an interim disposal site for nuclear waste without a plan for permanent disposal, saying he fears any waste shipped to New Mexico could be left there indefinitely.
Waste Control Specialists, based in Dallas, last year filed an application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to store spent nuclear fuel at its facility in Andrews, Texas, just east of the New Mexico border. But in April, the company, citing financial reasons, asked the commission to suspend its review of the application.
The nuclear industry has said temporary storage must be addressed since the licensing process for Yucca Mountain would take years under a bestcase scenario for supporters.
Rep. Doris Matsui, D-Calif., who helped draft the compromise bill, said it’s important to remove nuclear waste being stored at decommissioned nuclear power plants, such as the Rancho Seco and San Onofre sites in California.
“Although I think all of us feel that the language isn’t perfect, I am pleased that it provides a light at the end of the tunnel for facilities like Rancho Seco that have stored waste on-site for decades,” Matsui said.
But Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., called the House bill “dead on arrival in the Senate.”
Heller, who is up for re-election next year, said “the only real solution to our nation’s nuclear waste problem is through consent-based siting” that stores nuclear waste in sites where local officials approve.
“We owe it to the American taxpayer to move past the failed policies of Yucca Mountain. I will continue to stand with the state of Nevada and fight this reckless proposal every step of the way in the U.S. Senate,” Heller said.