Posted:
April 18, 2008
Editor’s note: The following is excerpted from a story that appeared in the April 11 Las Vegas Review-Journal.
Political support for a Yucca Mountain repository eroded
further on Wednesday when a leading Senate advocate of nuclear power said it
has become “foolhardy” to plan to store used nuclear fuel at the Nevada site.
Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said the strategy to place
spent nuclear fuel underground has become badly outdated in light of advances
in waste reprocessing that could wring more energy from the assemblies.
Even after nuclear fuel has been recycled, the resulting
waste products might not need to be placed in the Nevada volcanic ridge, he
said.
At that point, the waste would be less toxic and could be
stored safely in salt formations in New Mexico or elsewhere.
“The current strategy of limiting our options to a
permanent repository for the disposal of spent fuel is deeply flawed,” Domenici
said. He said he was writing a bill that would alter the “Yucca only” approach.
“I’m talking about a bill that will start over and draft
new law that puts America on a new path for commercial waste,” he said after a
Senate energy and water subcommittee hearing on the Yucca Mountain budget.
The senator’s comments are reflective of a shift among
key lawmakers frustrated by a decade-long delay in developing the Yucca
Mountain repository, and who now are more amenable to alternatives they say are
becoming more viable.
In the meantime, the Department of Energy continues to
work toward licensing and building an industrial site 100 miles northwest of Las
Vegas to handle 77,000 tons of waste generated by the government and commercial
utilities.