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Nuclear Waste: Abraham Says Yucca Mountain Might Be Too Small The design of the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada might be too small to store all the waste expected within the next 10 years before it becomes operational, U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said yesterday (see GSN, May 9). There are currently 45,000 tons of nuclear waste in temporary storage sites throughout the United States, and another 20,000 tons are expected to be created by nuclear power plants before the Yucca Mountain facility is operational, Abraham said in testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. The repository is expected to receive 3,000 tons of waste per year for 23 years when it is scheduled to be opened in 2010, Abraham said. The nuclear industry has estimated that U.S. plants produce 2,000 tons of waste per year, according to the Associated Press. Engineers could later expand the repository to hold more waste, Abraham said. Congress originally limited Yucca Mountain to hold 77,000 tons of nuclear waste, but a future energy secretary could consider expanding the repository after 2007, he said. Senators Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and John Ensign (R-Nev.), both Yucca Mountain opponents, said the nuclear waste production figures undercut any national security argument since waste will still have to be stored in temporary sites once Yucca Mountain is filled. Thousands of tons of “this stuff is still going to be (stored) around the country,” Ensign told Abraham, who agreed (Associated Press/New York Times, May 17). Neither Reid nor Ensign are members of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. Chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), however, allowed the two senators to question Abraham during the hearing, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. The hearing was one of three scheduled before the committee votes on a resolution that would override Nevada Governor Kenny Guinn’s veto of the Yucca Mountain site (see GSN, March 29). The committee’s vote is scheduled for June 5 (Steve Tetreault, Las Vegas Review-Journal, May 17). No Waste Shipment Routes Selected Yet, Abraham Says Meanwhile, contrary to some claims by Yucca Mountain opponents, the Energy Department has not yet selected any nuclear waste shipment routes to Yucca Mountain, Abraham said in his prepared testimony. No routes have been selected because a repository site has not yet been designated, he added (see GSN, March 14). “Thus any suggestion that the department has chosen any particular route or mechanism is completely fictitious,” Abraham said. “Those decisions have not been made, and cannot possibly start to be made until the site has been designated and the department has the opportunity to work with affected states, local governments and other entities on how to proceed.” Waste shipments would not occur for eight years, giving the department time to develop safe transportation routes, Abraham said. “This will afford ample time to implement a program that builds upon our record of safe and orderly transportation of nuclear materials,” he said (Energy Department release, May 16). Reid, however, disputed Abraham’s claims that nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain could be transported safely based on the department’s past history of shipping hazardous waste, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. “It’s Harvard logic, but we’re here to sort right through that,” Reid said. The materials classified as “hazardous waste” can also include items that are lightly contaminated with radiation, such as hospital gowns and medical instruments, he said. “You add all those together, and it wouldn’t pack the punch of one truckload of nuclear waste,” Reid said (Tetreault, Las Vegas Review-Journal).
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