Yucca Mountain News Clips
Wednesday, December 10, 2003
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Las Vegas SUN
December 10, 2003
Nevada threatens DOE over funding loss
State should get millions for Yucca oversight, Sandoval argues
By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN
WASHINGTON -- Nevada is threatening to file more lawsuits against the Energy Department unless it restores funding for state and local oversight activities for Yucca Mountain by Jan. 1.
Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval sent a letter to Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and Office of Management and Budget Director Joshua Bolten on Monday, stressing the department's legal obligation under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act to give the state money for oversight activities.
President Bush's 2004 budget request eliminated the $2.5 million provided to Nevada and $6 million for local governments for research and other oversight activities for the planned nuclear waste storage site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
"In some cases, Nevada's scientific studies are the only such studies being undertaken by anyone, insofar as DOE prematurely ceased its Yucca site characterization activities prior to you recommending the site to President Bush on February 14, 2002," Sandoval wrote in both letters.
Nuclear Waste Project Office Executive Director Bob Loux said Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., secured $1 million for the state and $4 million to be split among county and local governments for Yucca oversight activities. Loux said the department did not request the money. The House spending bill that funds the project did not contain that money; only the Senate bill had it.
Reid is the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee that creates the Energy spending bill that allocates the money for the program each year. The $580 million approved for the project next year is an $11 million decrease from Bush's request but also marks the largest budget for the program since its inception sources say.
Gov. Kenny Guinn sent a letter to Abraham in February expressing his "extreme concern and surprise" over the state funding elimination and also reminded the department of the law requiring payment to the state "to foster public confidence in the integrity of the proposed repository."
But Sandoval wrote that Guinn has not received a response to his letter, almost nine months later and that the 2005 funding may also be threatened.
"Please be advised that Nevada will seek legal redress against DOE in the federal Court of Appeals if funding for Nevada's necessary oversight activities at Yucca Mountain is not restored by January 1, 2004," Sandoval wrote Abraham.
He asked Bolten for "OMB's assistance in getting DOE to restore Nevada's funds, recognizing of course that this is ultimately the Secretary's decision" before offering the same advice.
Tom Sargent, Sandoval's spokesman, said Nevada wants the money restored to the budget, to try to ensure that the funding will remain in place.
Energy Department and federal Office of Management and Budget officials did not return phone calls in time to comment for this story.
The state already has several pending court cases opposing the Yucca Mountain project. Oral arguments are to be heard in Washington on Jan. 14.
With his letter, Sandoval included a 1995 letter from the Energy Department's chief financial officer and its analysis by its general counsel noting that the department has to make payments to Nevada for oversight activities.
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Las Vegas SUN
December 10, 2003
Top Yucca experts to discuss license application process
By Suzanne Struglinski
<suzanne@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN
WASHINGTON -- Nevada's top Yucca Mountain experts will gather in Virginia during the next three days to discuss technical elements of the project and the upcoming license application process.
Steve Frishman, technical policy coordinator for the Nevada Nuclear Waste Project Office and Susan Lynch, technical program director, will attend along with about 30 other experts and consultants working for the state on the project.
Nuclear lawyer Joe Egan, whom the state has hired to lead its legal case against the Energy Department's planned nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain said the meeting will allow all the experts, including those from other countries, to gather in one room to talk about technical aspects of the upcoming license application.
The consultants are paid for using money earmarked to Nevada from the Nuclear Waste Fund, the account that collects fees from nuclear utilities to pay for the project, and some state money, Egan said.
The department anticipates submitting its Nuclear Regulatory Commission license application in December 2004 for the Yucca project, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Nevada will have the opportunity to object to elements of the document and file its own data supporting its objections.
The commission has three years to review the application once it formally accepts the Energy Department's submission.
Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval, Nuclear Waste Project Office Executive Director Bob Loux, other state technical experts and Egan held a similar meeting in August to discuss plans for the upcoming court case.
Oral arguments are to take place in Washington on Jan. 14.
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Las Vegas SUN
December 10, 2003
NRC working on system to allow public access to licensing documents
By Mary Manning
<manning@lasvegassun.com>
Las Vegas SUN
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is working on an electronic computer system to allow the public access to millions of documents relating to licensing of a proposed high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.
Called the Licensing Support Network, the system will make scientific and technical information available to the public without restrictions, Dan Graser of the NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel said.
The network is expected to be ready six months before the Energy Department submits a license application to build a repository to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The department has said it will submit an application next December.
The Licensing Support Network Advisory Review Panel met in Las Vegas on Tuesday to discuss the system with the Energy Department, nuclear industry, state and local representatives who will be using the system when the Energy Department files an application for a construction license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Making Yucca Mountain information available to the public and others watching the progress of the nuclear repository has been a concern since 1986.
Seventeen years ago the NRC established the concept of a computer access system, Jeff Ciocco of NRC's Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards said.
So far the NRC has received 40 comments on the regulatory guidelines for the computer-based system, Ciocco said.
The public has until Jan. 12, 2004 to comment on the final regulatory guidelines before they are adopted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
"We expect minor revisions to the draft regulatory guidelines," Ciocco said.
Public access for those without computers at home is available at the DOE's Yucca Mountain Science Center, 4101-B Meadows Lane, DOE's National Nuclear Security Administration Office, 2621 Losee Road, Building B-3, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas Lied Library, the University of Nevada, Reno, DOE's Yucca Mountain Science Centers in Beatty and in Pahrump.
To learn how to navigate the LSN site, click on the "Help" button on the navigation bar at the top of the page for a list of help topics.
The website is www.lsnnet.gov. Comments may be submitted there.
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Las Vegas SUN
December 10, 2003
Letter: State GOP plays game on Yucca
Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval is reportedly filing a formal complaint with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. A series of meetings between the NRC and the Environmental Protection Agency to discuss Yucca Mountain is not open to Nevada officials.
Seems the Republican Sandoval, chair of George Bush's Nevada re-election committee, lacks political clout. Sandoval should seek Gov. Kenny Guinn for help.
It was Guinn at Bush's recent money fest in Las Vegas who introduced Bush as his "personal friend." I'm sure Guinn could get Sandoval into the meetings if he contacted his "friend."
Could it be that Sandoval and Guinn are playing a game with the people of Nevada? Who do these two Nevada Republicans really work for, Bush's Republican Party or the people of Nevada?
Andy Heresz
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Free Lance-Star
December 10, 2003
Public questions North Anna plans
Public has its say on environmental aspects of Dominion Power's application for new reactors at Lake Anna
By RUSTY DENNEN
Proposal for two more nuclear reactors causes some concern
Some wanted more information. Some wanted questions answered and some wanted no part of Dominion Virginia Power's plan to build up to two more reactors at its North Anna plant.
That was the gist of a two-hour Nuclear Regulatory Commission-sponsored public hearing attended by about 100 people Monday night at Louisa County Middle School.
Jerry Rosenthal, president of Concerned Citizens of Louisa, a local watchdog group, said the application raises many safety concerns. Not the least among them, he said, is a plan to eventually ship highly radioactive spent fuel from the plant to a national repository planned at Yucca Mountain, Nev. More reactors would mean more spent fuel to move, he said.
For now, the spent fuel is being stored in above-ground casks on the site each time a reactor is refueled.
"Do they really have confidence that this waste is going to be moved?" he asked. The repository won't open until at least 2010.
"Security is another big issue," Rosenthal said, with all that material sitting around as a potential target for terrorists.
Another consideration for the NRC to consider in Dominion's application, Rosenthal said: "Putting [more reactors] here would have no chance but to reduce property values."
Eugene S. Grecheck, vice president of nuclear support services for Dominion, said the company has no plans to build any new reactors, but is filing the application for an early site permit to preserve that option, should it decide to build.
The permit, if approved by the NRC would be good for 20 years. Dominion would have to secure a construction permit if it decides to build.
Demand for electricity is projected to rise by 50 percent over the next 20 years, Grecheck said, and the company must be ready.
"We need to be planning todayWe need to take a long view over the next 20 to 30 years," he said, adding that practically all the generating plants built over the past 10 years burn natural gas. Natural gas is problematic, he said, because of rising prices and much of the future supply is in politically unstable areas of the world.
Nuclear would be a good alternative, Grecheck said.
Bill Borduin, representing the 800-member Lake Anna Civic Association, said that the thousands of people who live along Lake Anna--formed to cool the plant's reactors--want to be sure that several items be reviewed in the plant's environmental impact statement.
Among the concerns are water quality from any new construction, security, an evacuation plan, health of fish and plants, spent fuel, and reactor design and performance.
Terri Jones, speaking for First Baptist Church in Louisa, said she is worried that more nuclear materials at the plant could affect public health.
"What is happening to people who play in the water and eat fish?"
Other speakers questioned the need for more power-generating capacity, suggesting that more environmentally friendly power sources such as wind generation, should be encouraged instead.
Dominion filed its early site permit application Sept. 25. The process allows resolution of safety, environmental protection and emergency planning issues relating to a site before a company decides to build.
Utilities in Mississippi and Illinois have also filed the applications.
North Anna has two reactors in operation. Units 1 and 2 went into operation in 1978 and 1980, respectively.
Two more units were under construction, but by mid-1981, plans for those were shelved and the units scrapped.
To reach RUSTY DENNEN: 540/374-5431 rdennen@freelancestar.com
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State of Nevada
Agency for Nuclear Projects
www.state.nv.us/nucwaste/
nwpo@nuc.state.nv.us
775-687-3744
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