Tuesday, February 08, 2005
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

YUCCA MOUNTAIN: Project's deadline falls back

Repository's opening to slip at least two years, official says

WASHINGTON -- The Energy Department's top manager for nuclear waste disposal said Monday the Yucca Mountain repository will slip at least two years beyond its planned 2010 opening, while another DOE official said the delay could be even longer.

The comments marked the first time that DOE officials have said publicly that mounting technical, legal and budget problems will delay the government's goal to start accepting highly radioactive spent fuel for burial in Nevada at the turn of the decade.

"I believe it is a little bit more than a year-to-year slip, to be honest with you," Margaret Chu, director of the Office of Radioactive Waste Management, said. "Because we have budget uncertainty, we're hoping 2012."

Chu commented after the Energy Department's announcement of its proposed 2006 spending plan for Yucca Mountain. The department is asking Congress to allocate $651 million, which is about half what it projected last year would be needed if the program were on track.

Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said the new request "is money we think we can spend responsibly on Yucca Mountain based on the current situation we are dealing with."

DOE officials have said the Yucca project was thrown off kilter by a federal court ruling last summer against the repository's radiation protection standards and by a Nuclear Regulatory Commission order to rebuild a 4-million document electronic database.

DOE in November abandoned a plan to file a 45-volume repository license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission by the end of 2004. A department official said Monday that because of legal uncertainties, an application might not be handed to the NRC this year even if DOE finishes it.

Chu said the Environmental Protection Agency expects to rewrite a radiation standard by the end of this year. But EPA and DOE officials retracted the statement later, with an EPA official saying a draft standard might be issued by this summer. The official said he could not say when it would be finalized.

Nevada officials who have worked to derail Yucca Mountain on safety grounds said they were cheered by the latest slippage. "Delay is our friend, and time is our ally," said Richard Bryan, a former governor and U.S. senator.

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said DOE credibility is shattered by the shifting timelines. "Adding two years to the schedule does not change anything," Berkley said. "They cannot make a safe repository."

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., said "all the time in the world will not be enough for DOE to open Yucca Mountain," and Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said any delay "brings it one step closer to final defeat."

Nuclear utilities and officials from states that want to get rid of their radioactive waste are frustrated, said Martez Norris, administrator of the Nuclear Waste Strategy Coalition.

"We've been very, very concerned about how this program is falling behind," said Norris, who said coalition members will meet shortly to discuss the matter.

Among items that might be brought up, Norris said, is whether to call for the Yucca Mountain Project to be removed from the Energy Department and given to a "quasi-government operation" to manage.

The Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry lobby group, is less concerned, spokesman Mitch Singer said. He said nuclear power companies are satisfied DOE is showing slow progress.

"What they are telling us is as long as they are perceiving progress toward Yucca Mountain, and they are perceiving progress, they are not concerned and that is not an impediment to building new nuclear plants," Singer said.

No official announcement has been made, but the Energy Department began shifting the Yucca Mountain Project from the 2010 goal after Congress declined to fund the repository fully last year, said Ted Garrish, the project's deputy director.

"When we did the budget last year, we made it clear if we didn't get $880 million, there was no way that 2010 is going to work," Garrish said. At the end of a long fight, lawmakers approved $577 million.

Garrish said a Yucca Mountain opening could stretch longer than 2012 depending on obstacles ahead. DOE expects more legal challenges from Nevada and from environmental groups and more fights in Congress over spending for the $58 billion project.

"I don't think we have a position" on a new target date, Garrish said. "There are so many things."

The Energy Department budget proposes to grant $3.5 million to Nevada for Yucca Mountain oversight and $7 million to be divided among counties.