Thursday, May 20, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Officials brace for cuts in Yucca budget

Lawmaker repeats warning of deep reductions, says Bush administration took 'poor gamble'

WASHINGTON -- Energy Department officials are weighing the impact of potentially deep budget cuts in the Yucca Mountain Project, making calculations of layoffs and delays for the proposed nuclear waste repository.

Seeking to head off a budget crisis, DOE managers are re-examining their finances after being warned that Congress might allocate only a small amount for Yucca Mountain next year, officials said. Their report will be sent to Capitol Hill in a few days, they said.

Rep. David Hobson, R-Ohio, chairman of a House subcommittee that is preparing to write an energy spending bill, repeated on Wednesday a warning that DOE's $880 million nuclear waste request for 2005 might be chopped to $131 million.

"I don't believe in coming here and telling you everything is rosy, because it is not," Hobson said in a speech to the U.S. Transport Council, an association of nuclear waste shippers. "I don't have the money."

The Energy Department plans to file a repository license application in December and has stepped up its activity to form a transportation strategy to get highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel shipped from reactors in 34 states.

But the Yucca Mountain budget suddenly has become complicated because the Bush administration also wants Congress to make accounting changes in the fund that pays for the repository program.

The reclassification has run into roadblocks, creating a shortfall in how much money might be available for Congress to spend on the Yucca project, Hobson said.

"I don't have the flexibility to steal money from other accounts in the energy and water bill to make up for shortfalls in Yucca Mountain," Hobson said.

This is not the first time the Yucca Mountain Project has faced a severe budget crunch.

In 1995, the Clinton administration requested $630 million along with a budgeting change that proved unpopular in Congress.

The Energy Department ended up with only half its requested amount, forcing a major restructuring and hundreds of layoffs amounting to one-third of its contractor workforce, officials said.

Hobson said he is trying to persuade the White House to send Congress an amended DOE budget that restores Yucca Mountain funding, or to shift money from nuclear weapons programs or environmental cleanups to the repository effort.

Another possible option might be for the White House to carry out the budgeting change administratively, Hobson said.

But Rick Mertens, energy branch chief of the White House budget office, said, "In our view, that is not something the executive branch can unilaterally do. We're looking at the options, and there aren't any easy ones."

Hobson said the Bush administration took "a poor gamble" by pushing to reclassify the nuclear waste fund in the face of obvious opposition from Nevada's senators, who oppose any initiative that would make it easier for the government to send nuclear waste to the state.

Sens. John Ensign, R-Nev., and Harry Reid, D-Nev., blocked the proposal in the Senate Budget Committee earlier this year. Aides said they are being watchful for other attempts to get it passed.

Hobson characterized the administration's Yucca Mountain budget plan as "a three-way bank shot."

"I don't think you could pull this off in the Senate when the Nevada senators have their hands in all the pockets," he said.