Yucca Mountain News Clips
Friday, September 3, 2004
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Reno Gazette-Journal
September 02, 2004
At convention's end, Nevada supporters praise Bush
By Anjeanette Damon and Carla Roccapriore
As President Bush accepted the Republican Party´s nomination Thursday, local supporters praised his acceptance speech and hailed him as a strong leader against the war on terror.
About 20 people at the south Reno home of Gary and Rebecca London watched Bush´s speech, often applauding in sync with the crowd in New York City´s Madison Square Garden.
“I think this says it all right here: ‘freedom or terrorism?´’ said Reno resident Wayne Paddock, 68, referring to the words printed on red, white and blue stickers handed out at the home. “He made his point and I thought he did very well.’
His wife, Cathy Paddock, 66, described Bush´s speech as exceptional and encouraging.
“He showed compassion and hope,’ she said. “He has that side to him, that caring side that comes through.’
Frank Troppe, 42, of Reno, said he connected with Bush, especially when the war was discussed.
“I got choked up when he talked about meeting with the military families,’ Troppe said. “It bought back to me how much sacrifice our military has given the last few years. He did a great job of humanizing the challenges.
“As much as I care about taxes, they are of so little importance compared to the personal leadership he´s offering. I´d vote for him even if he was going to raise taxes.’
A group of eighth graders from Little Flower School, at the party with their parents, wore Bush campaign buttons.
“I liked that he talked to victims of Sept. 11 and he felt sympathy for them,’ said Rachael Brahler, 13. “He´s a good speaker and he keeps you interested when he talks.’
Olivia London, 13, said she and Bush agree on important issues.
“He doesn´t believe in abortion and I feel that way, too,’ she said.
Added Chante Paddock, 13, “I like how he addresses the issues at hand.’
Contacted after the speech, Pam duPree, executive director of the Washoe County Democratic Party, said that Bush mentioning Sept. 11 and former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in the same sentence appeared he was suggesting the two were connected. She called it “an incredible cover-up for misguided policies in Iraq.’
DuPree also said Bush used empty rhetoric when discussing how his administration would help working families.
“Isn´t it interesting he didn´t tell us how his administration plans to support working families? He said ‘we need to support working families,´ but didn´t say how,’ duPree said. “If someone can explain to me and America´s working families how the Bush administration policies are helping us, we need clarification because we don´t see it and we´re not experiencing it.’
During Bush´s speech, the Kerry campaign enlisted its Republican supporters to call other Republicans to find those who are dissatisfied with their party´s nominee.
“We have a more important message to deliver to them than negative attacks and smear strategies because that is all we´ve seen out the Republicans this week,’ said Sean Smith, Nevada spokesman for the Kerry campaign. “We want to offer them a positive and hopeful change for the future.’
Smith said it is not the campaign´s intents to “disrupt the president or disrupt people who want to hear him.’
“We have a very aggressive outreach to all sorts of constituencies,’ Smith said. “Republicans for Kerry is something we´ve been building for a while and we just thought it would be a good time to unveil it during the Republican convention.’
Bush supporter Rebecca London, 40, a Reno Republican, said she´s aware that not all people vote along party lines.
“You vote your conscience,’ she said. “I know of Democrats voting for Bush.’
In Reno, volunteers for America Coming Together, a political non-profit organization campaigning against Bush, held a news conference before the speech to criticize the president on common campaign themes: Yucca Mountain, the “middle-class squeeze’ and veterans benefits.
Paul Stockton, a 23-year-old Reno student who fought in the early months of the Iraq war before being discharged from the Navy this year, denounced Bush for invading Iraq.
“I definitely don´t like being deceived,’ Stockton said, referring to Bush´s early assertions that weapons of mass destruction would be found in Iraq. “It was an unsubstantiated war. It is not something I consider myself proud to have been involved with.’
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Las Vegas SUN
September 03, 2004
Letter: Store nuke waste where it is made
This is in response to the Aug. 12 letter from Francy Johnson, who said she "couldn't care less about Yucca Mountain" and that she disagrees with the Sun's opinion that it is the most important issue facing Nevadans.
There are numerous problems in Nevada, including our lack of water. To suggest, however, that we don't care or that we shouldn't be concerned about a waste dump in our backyard is only silliness.
Contrary to her opinion, the people who work at Yucca are indeed concerned about health problems. As to where to put the waste, I would strongly suggest that it be stored where it is made.
Mary Beam
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Las Vegas SUN
September 03, 2004
Letter: Voters can't trust Vietnam-dodging Bush on Yucca
Ben Barnes, a former speaker of the house in Texas and a former lieutenant governor of that state, recently stated that he is ashamed of himself for having helped President Bush and the sons of other wealthy families get into the Texas Air National Guard to avoid serving in Vietnam. He went on to say that, after seeing the names of the dead soldiers on the Vietnam Memorial, he became even more ashamed of himself.
President Bush, however, has denied using his influential name to get into the National Guard. But now, with the evidence presented by Barnes, the media and all citizens should view everything President Bush says with extreme caution. I say this as a lifetime Republican and a veteran of the U.S. Army.
Can we believe anything Bush says with respect to issues important to us? Can we trust him to look after the interests of those of us who are not wealthy and politically connected? Can we believe he won't approve the dumping of nuclear waste from all over the country here in Nevada unless it is safe?
Eugene Osko
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Las Vegas SUN
September 02, 2004
Lawsuit cites warnings of toxic dust at Nevada nuclear dump site
By Ken Ritter
Associated Press
LAS VEGAS (AP) - Two former industrial hygienists claim in new court filings that they were fired after warning government contractors about toxic dust in the first tunnel at the site of a planned national nuclear waste repository in Nevada.
Contractors completed the test tunnel for the Yucca Mountain project in 1997 in record time, said Joe Egan, a lawyer representing workers claiming they were exposed to dangerous silica dust.
"They sacrificed the workers to save time and money," Egan said Thursday.
The companies have denied the allegations first made in a civil lawsuit filed in March in Clark County District Court. It seeks class-action status and unspecified damages.
"We're going to vigorously defend our position," said Beatrice Reilly, an official with the chief Yucca Mountain contractor, Bechtel SAIC Co., who said she spoke for all the contractors.
Drilling began in 1992, but a mandatory respirator protection program did not begin until March 1996.
Judy Kallas, a former industrial hygienist for Omaha, Neb.,-based Kiewit Construction Co., alleged that her supervisor ordered her in 1996 to change her notes about toxic silica levels in tunnels. Kallas was fired later that year.
Former Bechtel SAIC Co. industrial hygienist Wilbert L. Townsend was dismissed in March 2002, a month after warning supervisors that workers were being overexposed to silica and other harmful dust, the document said.
Egan estimated that 1,200 or more workers and visitors were exposed over the years to dangerous levels of dust at the site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Silicosis is an incurable and sometimes fatal lung disease that can develop years after exposure to silica dust.
Egan also is lead attorney in Nevada's fight against the government plan to bury the nation's radioactive waste at the Yucca site.
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On the Net:
Yucca Mountain project: http://www.ymp.gov
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Las Vegas SUN
September 02, 2004
Lawyers underscore Yucca silica dangers
By Benjamin Grove
<grove@lasvegassun.com>
Sun Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON -- Attorneys who filed the lawsuit against Yucca Mountain contractors on the grounds that they did not warn workers about the dangers of silica dust are attempting to paint it as one of the worst industrial disasters in U.S. history.
The case may eventually compare to the "Hawk's Nest Incident" of the 1930s, when a tunneling company ordered workers into a mountain in West Virginia, despite documented health risks of silica exposure, said Joe Egan, the Washington, D.C.-area lawyer who filed the lawsuit.
"There are many people who will die prematurely as a result of this," Egan said of the Yucca workers.
Egan on Wednesday filed an amendment to the original class action lawsuit he filed in March on behalf of former Yucca Mountain employee Gene Griego and others who were involved with Yucca drilling or were otherwise exposed to silica in the mountain tunnel from 1992 to 2003. Griego worked at Yucca from 1993 to 2002 and was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease last year.
The amended lawsuit lists nine corporate defendants -- contractors involved with Yucca tunneling and research, including Bechtel National Inc., Bechtel SAIC Co., Parsons Brinckerhoff Construction Services and former contractor TRW Environmental Safety Systems, a subsidiary that was later folded into Northrop Grumman Corp. Corporate officials were not available for comment.
The amendment offers more evidence that the contractors intentionally and willfully exposed workers to danger to save time and money. In some cases, the contractors ignored the safety directives of the Energy Department, the suit says.
The amendment includes more information from new research into Energy Department documents and new interviews, Egan said. Egan is the lawyer who is also leading Nevada's effort to challenge the Yucca project in federal court.
"In short, although defendants completed the five-mile long main tunnel loop at Yucca in 1997 in record time, they did so by deliberately sacrificing their workforce and ... visitors to meet deadlines, save costs, and earn award fees, intentionally deceiving their workers about the hazards, thereby imposing harm upon them," the amended suit says.
The amendment serves to put the scope of the case in historical context, Egan said. As many as 1,500 workers may have died as a result of their work at Hawk's Nest in West Virginia, the lawsuit says.
The Energy Department has estimated that 1,200 to 1,500 workers were exposed "significantly" to silica and erionite dusts at Yucca, according to the original suit.
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New York Times
September 02, 2004
Nuclear Storage at Yucca
To the Editor:
Re "Roadblock at Yucca Mountain'' (editorial, Aug. 23):
The arguments for burying dangerous nuclear waste in Nevada are based on false premises.
Perhaps the cruelest falsehood is that if we could only bury our nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, we could forget all about it. In fact, Yucca Mountain can't store more than 77,000 tons of waste, and more than that will exist in six years when the repository is scheduled to open.
The recent federal court ruling confirmed that safety standards for Yucca Mountain aren't stringent enough to protect the public from nuclear waste. Your editorial suggested that Congress should ignore the recommendations of the National Academy of Sciences, and simply lower the safety standards for the permanent storage of this deadly material.
But legislation won't make nuclear waste safe, and burying it in Yucca Mountain won't make the problem go away. The proper solution is to ensure that nuclear waste is safely stored, protected and monitored on site.
Harry Reid
John Ensign
Las Vegas, Aug. 24, 2004
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Nevada Appeal
September 2, 2004
A Yucca Mountain of paperwork to do
Nevada Appeal editorial board
Why were we worried about Yucca Mountain? Oh, we know the reasons - geological fault lines and underground aquifers, leaky casks and nationwide transportation, shaky science and political gamesmanship.
But we overlooked a significant factor in the process than could mean the nuclear-waste repository is a long ways from being started in Southern Nevada. Federal bureaucracy.
This week, a federal board which oversees such things said the Department of Energy had failed to provide electronically all its documents supporting the Yucca Mountain project.
The DOE argued it had posted some 5.6 million pages of documents. Lawyers for the state of Nevada countered that about 30 million hadn't been posted, nor had about 4 million e-mails.
The posting of documents for anyone to read (at www.lsnnet.gov) is an important part of the open process of planning the nuclear repository. It's something the Energy Department agreed to do, and now the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board is holding it to that promise.
How long it will take to produce the rest of the documents seems to be anybody's guess.
The Atomic Safety board's opinion is that it won't take the Energy Department "a significant amount of time." That would be a matter of a few months, apparently throwing a wrench in the department's plan to submit an application for the repository by the end of this year.
Yet the Energy Department had 15 years to get ready before it announced on June 30 that all the documents were available. It didn't make it.
We don't mean to overstate the importance of this particular deadline, but we simply haven't seen much evidence from the Department of Energy over the years that it can actually accomplish a project as risky and complex as Yucca Mountain.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
September 02, 2004
Yucca complaint points to unsafe toxic dust levels
Lawsuit accuses contractors of withholding information, deceiving tunnel workers
By Keith Rogers
Review-Journal
Workers and visitors inside Yucca Mountain inhaled unsafe levels of toxic dust in 2002, five years after a tunnel was completed to study whether the mountain can safely entomb nuclear waste, attorneys claim in court papers filed Wednesday.
The second amended complaint against contractors who carved the five-mile tunnel asserts the companies systematically deceived workers and withheld information about levels of lung-scarring dust that should have required them to wear protective gear.
One of the plaintiffs, Judy Kallas, a former industrial hygienist for Kiewit Construction Co., stated that her supervisor, Barry C. McNeill, ordered her in 1996 to "change her field notes about the dust levels in the tunnel" so the companies could avoid providing workers and visitors with respiratory protection.
"They basically sacrificed the workers," said Joe Egan, an attorney for the plaintiffs, who is also Nevada's lead nuclear waste lawyer in the state's fight against the project.
"About 1,000 to 2,000 people have a very elevated risk of contracting diseases, some of which are fatal," he said in a phone interview from Washington, D.C.
The amended complaint states that a Bechtel SAIC Co. industrial hygienist, Wilbert L. Townsend, warned his supervisors Feb. 20, 2002, that workers in the tunnel's south ramp would be overexposed to silica and other types of harmful dust in less than four hours. "The respirable dust in our tunneling environment is not simply nuisance dust. It is indeed biologically active," he reported.
The lawsuit was filed against Bechtel SAIC Co. and a host of other Department of Energy contractors in March on behalf of Yucca Mountain tunnel workers. It was amended in April to, among other things, add visitors Judy Treichel and Steve Frishman. They had toured the mountain numerous times as independent contractors for the state.
A Bechtel SAIC spokeswoman said her company's attorneys had not seen the newly amended complaint late Wednesday and could not comment on it.
Tom Janssen, a spokesman for another defendant, Kiewit Construction Co., said, "We're looking into it."
The amended complaint noted that in 1998, a year after the tunnel was completed, an operations manager had prior knowledge of the dust hazard as crews were about to construct a smaller, cross-drift tunnel. "Resumption of tunneling 'once again presents the possibility for our underground work crews to become grossly contaminated with silica containing dust,' " the complaint quotes TRW's Operations Manager Robert Sandifer as saying.
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Las Vegas Review-Journal
September 02, 2004
Nevada official delivers first national speech
Attorney general tells delegates Bush has helped make Americans safer
By Erin Neff
Review-Journal
NEW YORK -- Attorney General Brian Sandoval got his first glimpse of national prime-time politics Wednesday night, speaking to the Republican National Convention as a featured public official and sharing President Bush's convention-viewing box with the first couple and other dignitaries.
Sandoval has been involved in Nevada politics for years as an assemblyman, chairman of the Nevada Gaming Commission and statewide elected office, but the speech was his first with a teleprompter and his first in the national spotlight.
He was helped by the convention's speech coach, who taught him Tuesday which words to "punch," how to make eye contact and use hand gestures.
Although he was chosen for the four-minute spotlight in part because of his Hispanic background, he made no mention of his ethnicity in his remarks, which centered on President Bush's commitment to fighting domestic crime.
"For America to fulfill its promise as the land of opportunity, each of us must be safe from crime," Sandoval, who spoke early in Wednesday's schedule, told delegates. "President Bush has made great strides in making America safer."
The Nevada delegation, dressed in baseball caps with a N and matching navy and red polo shirts with "Nevada" on the back, cheered and mugged for the C-SPAN cameras.
"As I watched him today, I saw not only the next governor of Nevada, but possibly a future president of the United States," alternate delegate Ellie Lopez-Bowlan said.
Lopez-Bowland and delegate Joe Cortez, both of whom are Hispanic, said Sandoval serves as a wonderful role model for the Hispanic community because of his family values.
The speech was greeted with pride by the Sandoval family. Relatives had been using e-mail to implore everyone they know to tune in and watch him live from New York.
As the state's top law enforcement officer, Sandoval kept his remarks focused on crime.
A personal touch came at the onset of his speech, when he mentioned the recent birth of his third child.
"And so I come before you not only as an attorney general, but as a father, a father intent on preserving the American dream for my children and the children of countless others," he said to applause from the state delegation.
In an interview before his speech, Sandoval expressed first-time jitters, steeling for his virgin voyage with a teleprompter and saying he hoped to live up to the party's expectations of him.
Bush-Cheney Campaign Chairman Marc Racicot, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee, said Sandoval is "a source of great pride for Nevada."
"We point of course to Brian's election as a Hispanic and a young member of our leadership across the country," Racicot said.
He said Sandoval's role in leading Bush's re-election in Nevada is "a sign of great promise within the Republican Party and in our capacity to attract the best and the brightest."
Four of Sandoval's five constitutional office colleagues were on the floor to watch his debut. Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt skipped the trip to keep an eye on the state's affairs.
"I think he looked really comfortable up there," Gov. Kenny Guinn said.
But Sandoval did not play well to Democrats back home, who argued he passed up a great opportunity to tell a national audience that he disagrees with President Bush on Yucca Mountain.
Sandoval has sued the administration over its proposal to site the nation's high-level nuclear waste inside the mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Judy Treichel, executive director of the Nuclear Waste Task Force, said Sandoval's access could be used to benefit Nevada residents battling 43 other states nationwide.
"It would have been a good thing to bring up that the state of Nevada is challenging the government," Treichel said. "But I guess that's unrealistic and unpolitic for him to challenge and poison the well."
Rep. Shelley Berkley and Sen. Harry Reid, both D-Nev., held a news conference Wednesday in Las Vegas before Sandoval's speech and urged him to use the platform to raise awareness of the issue or step down as campaign chairman.
Berkley said Sandoval has a conflict of interest as an elected official with a duty to defend Nevada in the courts against the nuclear waste repository but one who serves as the co-chairman of the Bush-Cheney re-election committee.
"Brian Sandoval has forgotten why he was elected," she said. "I want to call on Brian Sandoval to use his four minutes of fame tonight to stand up and speak up and denounce that platform and this administration for continuing to move forward with bringing nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain."
Echoing Berkley, Reid accused Sandoval of pandering to the Republican Party, calling him a "cop-out and a sellout."
"I'm terribly disappointed in Brian," he said. "I thought he had more integrity."
Sandoval said the access he has to the president has given him an insight most Nevadans do not have.
"When I've been in Washington and whenever I've met him, I've made an effort to explain our opposition to the project," Sandoval said.
He said Bush's decision to approve the repository despite unresolved scientific issues that make him and other Nevada leaders shudder was "intellectually honest."
"He has been consistent and honest with the people of the state," Sandoval said. "He said he would base the decision on science, and he continues to say that he did just that and that he would stand by any decision by the courts."
Sandoval said he was grateful for the opportunity to speak to the nation but shrugged aside any talk of running for higher office.
He said he is committed to finishing the two years left on his term and in running for re-election in 2006.
"That would be my intent," Sandoval said. "This is good training for whatever I choose to do."
Review-Journal writer Juliet V. Casey contributed to this report.
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Reno Gazette-Journal
September 01, 2004
Bush campaign manager downplays Yucca Mountain
By Faith Bremner
Gannett News Service
NEW YORK — The Bush-Cheney campaign is counting on Nevada voters giving the president a break when it comes to his support of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump, President Bush´s campaign manager said Wednesday.
In an interview with reporters at the Republican National Convention, Ken Mehlman said Nevadans have more concerns than the nuclear waste dump the federal government wants to build about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. He said they´re also worried about terrorism, an area where Bush scores high marks with voters, and they support the president´s economic agenda, which Mehlman credited with producing 86,000 new jobs in Nevada since 2001.
“At the end of the day, there are a lot of issues the voters will vote on,’ Mehlman said. “Do you agree on everything? Not necessarily. But you have to make a judgment about what do you want in the president of the United States as a leader.’
Perhaps symbolizing Nevadans who put other issues first, state Attorney General Brian Sandoval was a convention speaker Wednesday night, despite representing the state in its lawsuit against the federal government to try to block the Yucca Mountain dump.
A Reno Gazette-Journal/News 4 poll conducted two weeks ago of 600 likely Nevada voters indicates that Yucca Mountain will be an important issue for a majority of Nevadans when determining their vote for president. Fifty-three percent of all Nevada voters and 57 percent of Washoe County voters said the dump will figure heavily into their decision.
Other public opinion polls show Bush and Democratic candidate John Kerry are neck-and-neck in Nevada. Both campaigns are targeting the growing state and its four electoral votes.
Bush two years ago signed legislation designating Yucca Mountain as the nation´s nuclear waste repository. President Clinton vetoed similar legislation in April 2000.
Democrats like to say Bush flip-flopped on Yucca Mountain because in 2000 he promised Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn, a Republican, that he would not approve the site unless it was “deemed scientifically safe.’
Republicans accuse Kerry of flip-flopping because over the years he cast several votes in favor of the Nevada site.
“He actually voted for the (1987) ‘Screw Nevada´ bill, which ensured that Yucca would be the site for this, and he wrote a letter (to the federal government) saying take this stuff out of my state and put it in Nevada,’ Mehlman told reporters.
John Kerry supporters say his votes were either procedural or authorized a study of the project. Kerry in 2000 and 2002 voted against legislation to make Yucca Mountain the official, final site.
And the Democratic Party platform reads: “We will protect Nevada and its communities from the high-level nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, which has not been proven to be safe by sound science.’
A Kerry spokesman said, “The difference between these two candidates on Yucca Mountain is night and day.’
“John Kerry has promised to stop it in its tracks,’ said Kerry spokesman Sean Smith. “George Bush is doing everything he can to bring the nation´s nuclear waste to Nevada.’
Mehlman said Bush supports having an impartial, science-based process for ultimately determining where the nation´s nuclear waste should go.
“The thing you get with the president … is you get somebody who tells you what he´s going to do and then he follows the process,’ he said. “That is what voters in whatever state on whatever issue should want.’
Smith said a July federal court ruling shows the Bush administration did not base its decision on good science. The judge said the project´s radiation protection standard did not meet legal requirements set by the National Academy of Sciences.
“Bush´s EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) cooked the science and the judge kicked it back to the Bush administration to try again,’ Smith said. “Until the science is right, there´s no way this most dangerous substance on Earth should come to Nevada.’
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Reno Gazette-Journal
September 01, 2004
Sandoval warms up Republican delegates
By Faith Bremner Gannett News Service
NEW YORK — Nevada Attorney General Brian Sandoval made his national debut at Madison Square Garden, praising President Bush´s leadership in a four-minute, prime-time speech to the Republican National Convention on Wednesday.
Nevada delegates, in navy-blue T-shirts with Nevada written across the back, stood at attention, clapped and cheered wildly while Sandoval spoke about what President Bush has done to fight crime and protect children from crime.
“He was excellent. He is a great speaker, and he presented a topic that´s really important to everyone — the protection of children,’ said first-time delegate Greg Stewart of Incline Village.
“I´m excited for Brian, I think he did a great job,’ said Secretary of State Dean Heller, also a delegate. “Whatever Brian does to elevate and expose Nevada is good for all of us.’
Back in Nevada, leading state Democrats denounced Sandoval´s support of Bush in the face of the president´s approval of the proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain.
Sandoval has led the state´s latest legal fight on the project but co-chairs the Bush re-election campaign in Nevada and has defended the president´s decision to transport 77,000 tons of the nation´s most radioactive waste to the state.
In a Las Vegas news conference, U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and U.S. Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Las Vegas, called on Sandoval to use his speech to denounce the GOP platform that supports increased use of nuclear power and creation of “an environmentally sound nuclear waste repository.’
“If he really wanted to send the president a message about nuclear waste, Brian Sandoval would resign as chairman of the Bush campaign in the Silver State and he would tell George Bush that Nevada is not for sale, even if that means setting aside his own political ambitions,’ Berkley said in a written release.
Sandoval has said he and the president have “agreed to disagree’ on Yucca Mountain and that he will continue to fight the project in the legal arena.
Sandoval´s speech was one of about 15 that helped warm up the audience for the night´s principal speaker, Vice President Dick Cheney. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, Democratic U.S. Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, former President Reagan´s son, Michael, and Lynne Cheney also spoke.
One reason the Bush campaign invited Sandoval to speak is that he´s the only Hispanic Republican to hold statewide elected office.
Sandoval told the convention that he and his wife, Kathleen, recently had their third child and that he shares President Bush´s goal of keeping America´s children safe. He lauded the president for signing legislation that helps prosecutors fight child pornography and go after criminals who prey on kids and use the Internet to lure children into sex crimes.
“Thanks to the leadership of our president, America is safer for our children,’ Sandoval said. “It´s safer for the rest of us, too.’
He told delegates that the president has not forgotten domestic violence while pursuing the war on terrorism.
“From Project Safe Neighborhoods to the president´s fight against identity theft, from his anti-drug strategy to his plan to eradicate gun crime in America, this president has demonstrated an ability to lead and deliver results,’ Sandoval said.
Reno Gazette-Journal staff writer Anjeanette Damon contributed to this story.
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Las Vegas Mercury
September 02, 2004
Backstory: Scratching the surface
By Michael Green
Whether you vote early, late, not at all or multiple times, politicians often end up involved in something that makes you scratch your head. Here are some notes about dandruff prevention:
• State Sen. Ann O'Connell understandably is displeased. A citizens group accused her of supporting higher taxes. Since it's impossible to explain the 2003 Legislature in a 30-second ad, unless you just repeat the phrase "mass hysteria" several times, her campaign did the next best thing by attacking the attackers. In algebra, as in politics, a negative multipled by a negative usually equals a positive. As the announcer explained, those claiming to form the citizens group really aren't citizens. They are lawyers and casino executives.
In other words, illegal aliens practicing law and running casinos attacked O'Connell. Either that, or O'Connell's ad is as silly as the ads claiming she backs higher taxes. Indeed, O'Connell was virtually a heroine to many of those now attacking her when she opposed higher taxes during the previous two decades. But this time she opposed the higher taxes her newfound enemies wanted.
Well, casino executives, lawyers and other folks have the right to do just what they're doing. And it's hard to feel sympathetic toward O'Connell, whose major legislative accomplishment has been to oppose just about everything that would make Nevada a better place to live. But her campaign's response, while illogical, also is superb in one way and migraine-inducing in another.
The superbness lies in picking on lawyers, whom people never seem to like until they need one. Perhaps O'Connell's exposure to the Legislative Counsel Bureau, which once ruled that a judicial opinion said exactly the opposite of what it said, has soured her on them as much as the university system counsel's office has soured me. But I happen to like most of the lawyers I have known, and many happen to be public-spirited citizens. I also like chocolate, and find more agreeing with me on that subject than on lawyers.
The migraine has to do with gaming. O'Connell is a very conservative Republican. That tends to define her as the sort who would support the biggest business around. Instead, her campaign has put her on the side of Daniel against the (MGM?) lion.
• George W. Bush is trying to turn his lie about Yucca Mountain to his advantage. Apparently, when Gaul was divided, Bush thought it was spelled Gall and took all of it.
In 2000, with Bush in trouble on the nuclear waste issue, Nevada Republicans asked him to say something--anything. He wrote a letter to Gov. Kenny Guinn, explaining he would rely on "sound science" in making his decisions, then returned his crayons to their original location. In 2002, The Rug ignored sound science and chose Yucca Mountain for the dump.
How to respond in 2004? By pointing out that Sen. John Kerry voted for the dump several times. How did Kerry respond? By doing an ad promising not to allow waste to be sent to Nevada.
Those who criticize Kerry supporters for saying Bush promised not to send nuclear waste here are partly right. The Rug actually vowed to use "sound science." But since the science is unsound--or at least not yet sound, according to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals--that means he promised not to send nuclear waste here.
Lost in all this is the obvious. While Kerry cares about Nevada's electoral votes, he also cares about the possibility that, as president, he might deal with the Senate now and then. The Senate's second most powerful Democrat, Nevada's Harry Reid, is known to feel strongly about nuclear waste. If Kerry becomes president--pray hard that he does--and tries to send waste here, could Reid be a little less cooperative on other issues?
Fair enough. But has it occurred to anyone that only a moron, a pathological liar or someone who holds every Nevadan in utter contempt would try to make the kind of case on Yucca Mountain that the Bush campaign is making? You'd think they would be crazy enough to claim that Kerry isn't really a war hero because he wasn't badly wounded enough and opposed the war after having fought in it.
Oh, yeah. The Bush campaign is doing that.
• By now, you may have watched some of the Republican National Convention and seen the party's gentler side. You know, compassionate conservatives like Arnold Schwarzenegger, who boldly gropes where no man has groped before; Rudy Guiliani, whose fine response to Sept. 11 almost made us forget his policies encouraged policemen to stick plungers up the anal orifices of some suspects; Zell Miller, the Georgian who started attacking Democrats as soon as he wasn't running for office anymore and now devotes himself to repealing constitutional amendments and the result of the Civil War; and Sen. John McCain, whose Vietnam heroism hasn't stopped him from consorting with Republicans who have questioned his sanity and manhood.
One goal, some Republicans say, is to show voters what Bush is really like and where he's headed. Whatever you think of Bush, he has been in the White House 3 1/2 years. Isn't that enough time to find out?
And you wonder why so much head-scratching goes on. It isn't dandruff.
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Las Vegas Mercury
September 02, 2004
ACTing out
America Coming Together's Las Vegas branch uses humor and hands-on approach to mobilizing voters
By Andrew Kiraly
Mackie Allen has knocked on a dozen-odd doors so far and gotten nothing. The asphalt's starting to bake as noon nears on a recent Saturday, but the 17-year old Allen is undaunted. "I can't wait to vote, but in the meantime, my thinking is that I can try to get others to. When I do get someone [registered], I can't wait to get back to the van. 'I got someone registered!'"
So far today, that prospect looks bleak. This downtown block at 15th Street and Bridger Avenue is filled with nobody-homes, doesn't-live-heres and not-a-citizens. Later, Allen meets up with other America Coming Together canvassers, Kristin Lewis and her daughter Megan, who've had about the same luck. Still, Lewis is unfazed; they fall back on legendary tales of registration watersheds, manna from political heaven.
"One time I had a woman with eight kids, and she sat them all down right there in her living room and registered them to vote," Lewis says. "I've had people chase me down the street [to register]. Some of them think if we're dumb enough to come out here in this heat to knock on doors, maybe there is something to this election." ACT's goal: Steering Nevada John Kerry's way by getting at least three votes in each of 24 high-Democrat, low-turnout precincts.
These paid canvassers are part of the veritable army of ACT, one of the "527" groups that have ballooned into a big blip on the radar this election season. 527s--named after the section of the tax code, essentially a loophole, that birthed them--sprang up in the wake of the recent round of campaign finance reform. They're political action committees in many cases funded by millionaires (ACT, for example, was initially endowed by philanthropist and hedge fund investor George Soros) and special interest groups that hope to give a divided electorate a nudge or two. The now-infamous Swift Boat Veterans for Truth is a 527.
But on the streets of Las Vegas, there's no 527 as ferociously local, tenaciously grassroots and creative as Americans Coming Together. As the Republican National Convention unfolded in pomp and splendor this week, ACT was its usual ruthless self, launching numerous press conferences to counter RNC hype. Indeed, ACT's "press events" can themselves be exercises in cackling subversion. It has organized human chains representing the broken promises of the Bush administration. It has spoofed "Wheel of Fortune" with the wheel filled with Bush-bashing categories. Members even delivered a cake to local Republican Party headquarters on West Sahara Avenue--as in "Bush can't have his cake and eat it too on the Yucca mountain issue." (The GOPers reportedly chucked the dessert in the garbage). Call ACT a bunch of highly effective court jesters.
"One of the great faults of the American left and of politics in general is it doesn't have much of a sense of humor," says Kevin Griffis, ACT Nevada's spokesman. "It comes back to that old adage you can catch more flies with honey, in this case by putting a very serious subject in a different context."
Which isn't to say that ACT can't be serious. That side comes in the form of Anna Franker, the Nevada branch's no-nonsense field director who heads up the street-level canvassing.
"In the last 20 years or so, [political action committees] have relied on TV ads to get out the vote. But we know that in the past, traditional door-to-door campaigns have worked also--just never in 115-degree heat."
But is the walk worth the talk? Franker declines to say how many voters ACT has registered or how many canvassers ACT employs, but they do seem to be making a difference. One Saturday canvassing session, with the help of the California group Driving Votes, netted 162 voter registrations, according to ACT's website. The question is whether those new registrants will actually vote. Some observers aren't so sure.
"This election is the big trial run for 527s," says University of Nevada, Reno political science professor Eric Herzik. "The big issue with these registration drives is that you can get people registered, but will they actually vote? The demographic they're registering doesn't have a very good track record of voting. It's good to go out and get people registered, but the yield of the registrant to the actual voter has not been very strong."
Franker counters that ACT isn't just bringing newbies into the fold, but also galvanizing registered voters who might not have hit the polls four years ago.
"People always focus on the voter registration aspect, and that leads to a misconception about the actual work a field campaign can do," she says. "We're not just registering voters. It's a multipronged attack. We're talking to registered voters about the issues that matter them and motivating them to vote as well."
Maybe ACT will be the thing to turn blue the state that gave George W. Bush its four electoral votes in 2000. But in Herzik's view, the more things change, the more they stay the same.
"These 527s are a really interesting new wrinkle," says Herzik, noting that many of these grassroots groups ultimately trace back to big money sources. "But they also show how hard campaign finance reform is. Every time you close one avenue, another one opens up." But for ACT, there's a lot to do in a loophole.
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Yale Daily News
September 2, 2004
Nuclear waste may blow vote for Bush
In November, the road to the White House may go through Nevada. Up U.S. Highway 95 and beyond the town of Indian Springs lays a latent political hotbed: Yucca Mountain. Sitting 100 miles northwest of "Sin City," Yucca Mountain is the planned location of a federal nuclear waste repository and could prove to be the deciding factor in the Bush-Kerry showdown of 2004.
The Yucca project, passed by Congress and approved by President Bush in 2002, calls for the shipment of over 75,000 tons of nuclear waste from around the United States into Nevada -- for long-term storage buried in the slopes of Yucca Mountain. Senator Kerry has told the citizens of Nevada that he would nix the project if elected president, thus providing a clear alternative to the incumbent Bush on an issue of tremendous local importance.
The significance of the Yucca issue to Nevada cannot be minimized. Even in the midst of a political environment so heavily dominated by terrorism and security related concerns, anxieties over nuclear waste threaten to overshadow the prominence of the Iraq dilemma as well as traditional economic concerns in the minds of Nevada voters. Indeed, the Yucca issue itself could very well tilt the state in the Democrats' favor on Nov. 2, as current polling statistics indicate that about 70 percent of Nevada residents are opposed to the Yucca plan. Strategists from the GOP have wisely recognized that Kerry's stance on Yucca could cost their party Nevada's five electoral votes and have therefore been working to portray Senator Kerry as inconsistent on the issue.
The Bush campaign has recently stated that while the Massachusetts Senator has voted against the project in some instances, he has voted for it on six occasions between 1987 and 1997. But to assert that Senator Kerry has flip-flopped on the issue or is unsure of his beliefs would be an oversimplification of the facts. Kerry has voted for the Yucca project only on procedural motions to advance the project but has voted against every direct vote of authorization. For example, Kerry's vote in 1987, which President Bush most strongly criticizes, canceled studies of alternative storage sites -- therefore authorizing a study of Yucca Mountain's viability as the country's sole storage facility. The 1987 vote does not appear to be out-of-step with his current advocacy, as it still left the option of leaving the nuclear waste scattered at various sites around the nation -- which is exactly for what he voted when the issue came to its final vote in 2002.
Additionally, what seems equally important to consider is that Bush's record on the Yucca issue is not exactly spotless either. During his year 2000 campaign, candidate Bush promised Nevada that he would not approve Yucca unless it met scientific approval for safety and environmental concerns. But President Bush later approved legislation in 2002 authorizing the Yucca project, despite concerns that a scientific consensus had not been reached. Whether science was really on Bush's side does not appear to be a concern of importance, as Nevada residents have voiced their unhappiness with the plan.
It is perfectly understandable that the majority of Nevada residents are opposed to using Yucca Mountain as the nation's nuclear waste repository; having tons of radioactive waste shipped from around the nation into one's backyard is not exactly the most attractive of options. Concerns over possible radioactive terrorism run high, and accidental leakage into the groundwater of Nevada would bring whole new meaning to the phrase "hitting it big in Vegas." Historically, the Yucca issue has been a solid indicator of Nevada voting sentiment: Clinton became an outspoken critic of Yucca, and he carried the state in 1992 and 1996, and Bush took a razor thin lead in 2000 only when he mimicked Gore's opposition to Yucca. It therefore appears that Kerry's stance on the issue, despite his supposed flip-flop, may be exactly what he needs to race past Bush in the perceived dead-even dispute for Nevada.
If Nevada does indeed elect Kerry, then it may bode very well for his national prospects. After considering the number of electoral votes up for grabs, the winner of Nevada may go on to become the next occupant of the Oval Office. In 2000, Bush won Nevada's five electoral votes, giving him the push he needed to squeak out a four-vote win in the electoral college. With the 2004 election promising to be just as close a contest, it would be no surprise if Kerry's promise to Nevada led him straight to the steps of the White House.
Howard Kim is a sophomore in Jonathan Edwards College.
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AlterNet
September 1, 2004
Environment? What Environment?
By Sunny Lewis
Environment News Service
There's been no mention at the Republican convention of natural resource conservation, or energy, forests, water, oil, oceans, chemical contamination or the environmental causes of disease.
None of the speeches made in New York have addressed, or even mentioned, the environment. First Lady Laura Bush spoke about watching her husband "wrestling with these agonizing decisions that would have such profound consequence for so many lives and for the future of our world."
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger recalled coming to the United States from Austria and becoming a Republican after listening to President Richard Nixon speak because he "sounded more like a breath of fresh air."
Education Secretary Rod Paige defended the No Child Left Behind program under which, he said, "States, not Washington, set the standards. Schools that need assistance get assistance."
Opening the convention on Monday night, Senator John McCain spoke of the necessity of war in Iraq. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, M.D. spoke of medicine and drugs and denigrated trial lawyers.
But there was no mention of natural resource conservation, or energy, forests, water, oil, oceans, chemical contamination or the environmental causes of disease.
The Republican Party platform, approved by the convention on Monday, includes several statements of environmental policy most related to the supply of energy – support for drilling in the Arctic, for a revival of the nuclear power industry, for clean coal and hydrogen research.
It hails the record of President George W. Bush in "incorporating appropriate labor and environmental concerns into U.S. trade negotiations," and facing with China "shared health and environmental threats, such as the threat of HIV/AIDS, SARS, and other infectious diseases...."
It upholds the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment, which declares "private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation." This clause has been used to require compensation when an environmental regulation reduces the value of property or makes any part of a parcel of property unusable. "We oppose efforts to diminish the rights of private citizens to the land they own," the platform states.
The platform urges Congress to pass the President's energy bill, which "includes over 100 recommendations, nearly half of which addressed renewable energy, energy efficiency, and conservation." The policy statement warns that "Recent electricity blackouts, the California energy crisis, natural gas and oil price spikes, and high gasoline prices remind us that only a comprehensive energy policy will produce energy stability for America's families and businesses."
The future of energy lies in clean coal research and development and President Bush's Clear Skies Initiative which "would create a $50 billion private market to deploy these clean coal technologies," the Republican platform says.
The policy statement supports FutureGen, a $1 billion initiative to build the world's first zero-emissions fossil fuel plant that integrates carbon sequestration and hydrogen production research. A hydrogen economy would be of "enormous benefit" and put the United States on "the cutting edge of energy technology," the platform says.
The FreedomCar Partnership and Hydrogen Fuel Initiative include $1.7 billion over five years to begin building hydrogen cars and the infrastructure to support them is part of this platform plank.
Drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge should move ahead immediately using "sophisticated technologies," says the Republican platform.
"Our Party continues to support energy development in the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), which, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, holds as much as 16 billion barrels of oil – enough to replace oil imports from Saudi Arabia for nearly 20 years. The drilling footprint can be confined to just 2,000 acres (the entire refuge contains 19 million acres), about the size of Washington's Dulles Airport, on ice roads that melt away in the summer, leaving little trace of human intervention. We have already wasted precious time."
"If the previous Administration had not vetoed the ANWR proposal passed by the Republican Congress in 1995, at this moment ANWR would be producing up to one million barrels of oil a day," the platform states, referring to the administration of President Bill Clinton.
Natural gas development is endorsed. Republicans strongly support removing unnecessary barriers to domestic natural gas production and expanding environmentally sound production in new areas, such as Alaska and the Rocky Mountains. "Increasing supply, including the construction of a new natural gas pipeline from Alaska to the lower 48, will bring needed relief to consumers and make America's businesses more competitive in the global marketplace," the platform states.
Establishment of mandatory, enforceable reliability rules for electric utilities to reduce the likelihood of future blackouts is part of the platform; a reference to the blackout of August 2003 that left some 50 million people in the northeast and Canada without power for up to 48 hours.
Republicans say they support renewable energy through extension of the production tax credit for wind and biomass, as well as efforts to expand the use of biodiesel and ethanol, which can reduce America's dependence on foreign oil while increasing revenues to farmers.
Nuclear power finds ample support in the Republican camp. It "provides America with affordable, emissions-free energy. We believe nuclear power can help reduce our dependence on foreign energy and play an invaluable role in addressing global climate change."
President Bush "supports construction of new nuclear power plants through the Nuclear Power 2010 initiative, and continues to move forward on creating an environmentally sound nuclear waste repository," the platform says, referring to the Yucca Mountain repository in Nevada for which the Department of Energy is preparing a license application.
The platform plank on communities gives environmental conservation a nod, saying the framework in which communities can flourish "requires access to affordable and accessible health care, protection of America's environment and natural resources, the maintenance of public safety and prosecution of people who violate the peace of communities, guaranteed rights and equal opportunities for all members of society, and compassionate help for our fellow citizens who are trapped in unhealthy or harmful situations."
Except for the balloons, and the confetti and streamers, that has been the extent of the Republicans' consideration of the environment at the convention. The 100,000 balloons, plus the 300 pounds of "flame retardant and environmentally sensitive" confetti and streamers, are biodegradable.
Sunny Lewis is editor-in-chief of Environment News Service, an independently owned, continuous, real-time wire service covering the environment.
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The Tennessean
September 1, 2004
TVA spending millions on storage for spent fuel
By Duncan Mansfield
KNOXVILLE — The Tennessee Valley Authority, its nuclear waste storage pools overflowing or nearing capacity, is spending millions of dollars storing spent fuel at its reactor sites while waiting for the Department of Energy to open a permanent repository.
The nation's largest public utility, though not alone in its predicament, has more than 2,260 metric tons of spent fuel on its hands with no plans to slow down its nuclear program.
The storage pool at the Sequoyah station near Chattanooga is full, and the pool at the Browns Ferry station in Athens, Ala., is expected to reach capacity next year.
Already, TVA has spent more than $25 million building additional dry-cask storage space at Sequoyah. Some 44.6 metric tons of waste was moved out of the storage pool to the above-ground casks in June.
Similar storage costing more than $22 million is being built at Browns Ferry, where TVA has two operating reactors and is spending $1.8 billion to restart a long-shuttered third reactor in 2007.
TVA officials say dozens of other nuclear utilities are similarly hamstrung by DOE delays in opening a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
TVA recently won a U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruling that could lead to recovery of storage costs on grounds that DOE breached a 1983 contract to dispose of TVA's nuclear waste beginning in 2002.
Meanwhile, TVA says the dry-cask interim storage option is a proven technology already used or planned at 38 nuclear plants.
''I think our first consideration is ensuring the safety of our employees and the safety of the communities where we operate,'' TVA director Skila Harris said in an interview.
''We have invested in the technology and the security measures at those sites that would protect safety. So in terms of safety, I don't consider that an issue.''
Beyond that, she said, the nuclear industry ''has long anticipated that there might be delays in completion of a permanent repository.''
With the support of the White House and Congress, DOE hopes to have Yucca Mountain operating in 2010.
But Nevada is waging a court battle, and a federal court in Washington declared in July that even a 10,000-year radiation safety standard proposed by the government was insufficient for the site.
''This is a reflection of poor planning by the nuclear industry,'' said Steve Smith, director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.
''They have continued to generate this waste even though they don't have a long-term storage operation for it.''
''This is sort of the birds coming home to roost, so to speak, on the banks of the Tennessee River,'' he said, noting that all three TVA nuclear stations, TVA's touted alternatives to smog-causing coal-fired power plants, are along the river.
Harris, who as an energy consultant studied the finite nuclear waste storage issue as early as the late 1970s, said Yucca Mountain ''is ultimately a political issue more than it is a technological issue.''
Smith disagreed. Ensuring the safe storage of material that will remain radioactive ''for longer than recorded history is a real scientific and technical challenge. It is something that sort of pales human ingenuity.''
TVA, meanwhile, is studying the possibility of building a next-generation nuclear plant at its unfinished Bellefonte site in Alabama. TVA's third operating nuclear plant at Watts Bar in Tennessee, which came on line in 1995, has adequate space in its spent fuel pool until 2018.
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WCCO
September 2, 2004
Xcel Wants To Extend Life Of Nuclear Reactors
Minneapolis (AP) Xcel Energy officials said the company hopes to extend the lives of its three nuclear power reactors in Minnesota, a position that drew criticism from environmental groups.
The utility said it will seek permission from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to renew the operating licenses of the nuclear plants. Together, the plants -- one in Monticello, the other two at Prairie Island in Red Wing -- produce about one-fifth of the state's electricity.
Company executives, who are seeking a 20-year extension, said they can avoid spending billions of dollars to build new power plants by keeping the reactors working. The reactors began operating in the early 1970s under licenses due to expire in 2010, 2013 and 2014.
Most industry experts said they expect the NRC to renew the licenses, after its technical and environmental reviews.
"The cost of providing electricity is a lot more economical if we can continue to operate those plants," said Jim Alders, Xcel's manager of regulatory projects. "Our analysis shows this will benefit rate payers.."
Environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and the Izaak Walton League, said they are opposed to extending the licenses until Xcel finds a better place to store the radioactive waste produced by the reactors.
Xcel stores spent nuclear fuel produced at Prairie Island in steel casks near the reactors, and the utility is seeking permission from state regulators to build another storage facility near Monticello. The groups said those facilities are not designed to store radioactive waste for thousands of years.
"The potential exists that Minnesota may have to store this waste indefinitely," said Bill Grant, director of the Midwest office of the Izaak Walton League, a conservation group. "We don't want to become a dumping ground."
But if the plants were shut down, Xcel customers could face higher energy bills, industry experts warned. Minnesotans enjoy some of the lowest electricity rates in the nation in part because so much of this state's energy supply comes from coal and nuclear power plants, which are more affordable than natural gas-fired plants.
The closing of one or both of the nuclear plants could leave Minnesota with a future shortfall of electricity. In a recent report, the Minnesota Department of Commerce estimates that the state needs 2,700 megawatts of additional generation capacity by 2015, assuming the two nuclear plants remain in operation.
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Minneapolis Star Tribune
September 2, 2004
Xcel to seek nuclear extension
Chris Serres
Xcel Energy Inc. announced Wednesday that it plans to extend the life of its three nuclear power reactors in Minnesota by 20 years. Environmental groups immediately criticized the plan.
The utility, based in Minneapolis, said it will seek permission from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to renew the operating licenses of its nuclear plants, which together produce about one-fifth of the state's electricity.
By keeping the plants open, Xcel executives said, they can avoid spending billions of dollars to build new power plants. The three reactors -- one at Monticello, two at Prairie Island in Red Wing -- began operating in the early 1970s under licenses due to expire in 2010, 2013 and 2014.
"The cost of providing electricity is a lot more economical if we can continue to operate those plants," said Jim Alders, Xcel's manager of regulatory projects. "Our analysis shows this will benefit ratepayers."
But environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and the Izaak Walton League, said they are opposed to extending the licenses until Xcel finds a better place to store the radioactive waste produced by the reactors.
Xcel now stores spent nuclear fuel produced at Prairie Island in steel casks near the reactors, and the utility is seeking permission from state regulators to build another storage facility near Monticello.
Environmentalists say those facilities are not designed to store radioactive waste for thousands of years, environmental groups say.
"The potential exists that Minnesota may have to store this waste indefinitely," said Bill Grant, director of the Midwest office of the Izaak Walton League, a conservation group. "We don't want to become a dumping ground."
But if the plants were shut down, Xcel customers could face higher energy bills, industry experts warn. Minnesotans enjoy some of the lowest electricity rates in the nation in part because so much of this state's energy supply comes from coal and nuclear power plants, which are more affordable than natural gas-fired plants.
In addition, the closing of one or both of the nuclear plants could leave Minnesota with a future shortfall of electricity. In a recent report, the Minnesota Department of Commerce estimates that the state needs 2,700 megawatts of additional generation capacity by 2015, assuming the two nuclear plants remain in operation.
"Xcel has already proven that it can operate these [nuclear] plants in a safe manner," said Jacob Mercer, a fixed-income analyst at Piper Jaffray & Co. who covers the energy industry. "If it benefits consumers, then why not keep them open?"
Most industry experts said they expect the NRC to renew the licenses, after its technical and environmental reviews. The regulatory agency has never rejected an application by a nuclear company to renew an operating license. In the past four years, 26 nuclear power plants nationwide have had their licenses renewed.
The real opposition centers on the storage issue, and that fight will occur at the state level.
Xcel is seeking permission this fall from the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission to build another waste storage facility near Monticello.
The storage facility would consist of a series of above-ground, concrete vaults spread over an area resembling a large parking lot. Xcel would transport 12- to 14-foot canisters full of spent nuclear fuel from the nuclear power reactors to these vaults. Alders said the vaults can last hundreds of years and can be replaced.
Utilities such as Xcel built the vaults as temporary storage sites until waste could be stored permanently at a national repository. The U.S. Department of Energy says Yucca Mountain in Nevada could serve as such a repository, but the approval process is not complete. Some environmental groups say Yucca Mountain is not large enough to handle the nation's entire supply of waste.
"There is currently no answer to how we dispose of waste that is highly toxic for an incomprehensible amount of time," said Scott Elkins, state director of the Sierra Club. "Until an answer is found, the best alternative is to simply stop producing the stuff."
Chris Serres is at cserres@startribune.com.
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Pahrump Valley Times
September 1, 2004
Nye County purchases Calvada duck ponds
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
Saying they needed to "act now or lose it," the Nye County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously Friday to purchase a community icon - the Calvada eye property, otherwise known as the duck ponds, for $3.2 million.
The 32-acre, oval-shaped parcel dividing Calvada Boulevard west of Highway 160 comes with some empty buildings, accessories, personal property, water and mineral rights, a 60-foot easement to the north and south of Calvada Boulevard and other attachments - including a few homeless cats and the resident ducks.
The only downside of the deal, as far as the commissioners were concerned, is that it puts Nye County into the business of becoming a landlord to eight residential leaseholders of Calvada Club Villas No. 1 at the property's far west end.
The asking price for the Calvada Eye was said to have earlier been $3.3 million, according to commission chair and realtor Henry Neth.
Commissioner Candice Trummell, who has been instrumental in working with the Pahrump Chamber of Commerce and through Nevada's Workforce Development Board, made the motion to acquire the property as a central location for a number of public service agencies and organizations.
The "One-stop" center, as the project is currently known, is the county's gambit to establish a nucleus in Pahrump for attracting industry, developing Pahrump's workforce and generating new sources of revenue for the county.
A steering committee and advisory group of the area's public service providers is scheduled to meet at the new facility on Sept. 9 to iron out its strategies for developing the center, which is to be anchored by a Nevada JobConnect, the 11th in the state.
The property's purchase was prompted by a recent $400,000 allocation from the state Workforce Development Board to the Pahrump Valley Chamber of Commerce to begin the local JobConnect.
"It's all for one and one for all," said Commissioner Joni Eastley, who seconded Trummel's motion. Eastley commended the organizers for their creativity in project design and its potential for revenue generation for Nye County.
Selected welfare offices of the county are expected to move into the new facility and become part of the center.
Commissioner Patricia Cox conditioned the deal on a fair-market appraisal of the property completed within the contracted 30 days before payment. The county was to make a down payment of $100,000 in earnest money after Friday's vote, the money transferred to an escrow account from the county's Account No. 492, otherwise known as the Payments Equal to Taxes fund.
PETT funds, monies provided by the federal government for the Yucca Mountain project in Nye County, have long been the source of the county's funding of special capital expenses for which it has lacked funds.
Chief Civil Deputy District Attorney Ron Kent was to look into utility costs, insurance liability and other pertinent issues.
"I think that this could be an incredible project for this community running into the future," said Neth.
Neth also said the county could sell off some of its scattered Pahrump land holdings to pay for the property. These would not include county trust lands, Neth added.
"In my opinion, I look at that property and think, this (land) could pay for the Eye," Neth said. At current market rates in the Pahrump Valley, the county would find no lack of interest in its parcels for single-family housing, he said.
The board of commissioners would have to approve any sale, but initially the purchase would be covered by the PETT fund, he said.
Originally home to the sales and utility offices of the defunct Preferred Equities Corporation, the site has been home to a restaurant, retail outlets, and served as the town's library for a number of years.
The large Spanish tile-roofed building, most recently utilized by the county to hold district court as mold remediation work continued at the county government complex on East Basin Avenue, contains several conference rooms and offices on about three acres.
The abandoned structures are in a state of disrepair and the roof of the former restaurant leaks. Standing water rests on the outside grounds around the building now.
The seller is responsible for making all repairs before the sale is finalized and the property relinquished in "turnkey" condition, said Victoria Balint, the Pahrump chamber's workforce development director and the moving force behind the center.
Paula Glidden of The Land Office, real estate agent for the seller, and Shelly Bolen, agent for the county, agreed to take reductions to 2.34 percent in commissions for the property's change of ownership.
Reportedly, Bolen at the last minute had received much interest from other potential buyers willing to pay much more for the property than the price agreed to by the seller, Frank Snopko, manager of Rocklin Redeleng LLC, the company which purchased the property out of Preferred Equities' bankruptcy settlement.
The property extends westward from Highway 160, where the company has an exclusive turn-lane onto Calvada Boulevard and its old corporate sign designating its several offices still stands. The large waterfall at the entrance at the highway, maintained and the water bills paid by the Pahrump Rotary, is already owned by Nye County.
The county also already owns the landscaped median along Calvada Boulevard extending from the waterfall to the large expanse of shady parkland, duck ponds, walkways and buildings. Some of the wider section of median near the buildings is included in the sale and badly needs watering and restorative lawn care.
Commissioner Trummell thanked Balint "for bringing the property to the attention of the board of commissioners."
"Now my work really begins," said Balint after the meeting, surveying the several large, broken-off cottonwood limbs, dead grass and unkempt ornamental shrubbery on the outlying grounds. She said she plans to organize a volunteer cleanup of the site.
An outdoor barbecue is planned for the Sept. 9 meeting. Balint said she hopes to have "arts in the park" and "music under the stars" festivities as future public events at the location.
Doug McMurdo contributed to this story.
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Pahrump Valley Times
September 1, 2004
Rodewald takes department heads to task
Elected Officials, Managers will have to Learn to Track Individual Budget Status
By Phillip Gomez
PVT
Nye County government appears to be getting serious about its budgeting responsibilities, but it will likely take a while to flush the rust out of the system.
At a budget review workshop last week in Pahrump, less than a third of the county's department heads showed up, despite having been notified of the meeting with elected officials and the Nye County Board of Commissioners.
Even many elected officials weren't there. Aside from the commissioners, in total only seven department heads were present, plus budget director Charlie Rodewald, who conducted the program.
Rodewald was there to explain the basic reason for "why things are going off track" in the county's overall budget. His answer: "The department heads and elected officials have not been responsible for their (department) budgets.
"You haven't grown up to be responsible for (your) budgets," Rodewald said, initially to Sheriff Tony DeMeo, but generalizing to all the heads of departments and the elected officials. "In the past a lot of babysitting has been going on," he said. "Charlie is not the one responsible for the budget."
Rodewald essentially said that county employees needed to get with the program - meaning the HTE computer software program the county has had online for the past two years - in order to better keep track of allocated funds to run their departments throughout the year.
Despite transfers of $2.7 million in PETT funds to augment the county's budget shortfalls in its general fund for FY 2004, Rodewald reported more bad news: Nye County had still overspent its augmented budget by $222,000. However, he later said that anticipated revenues of some $850,000 would probably offset the imbalance. Still, he added, "I'm not going to hold my breath on that number until I find out.
"It's a problem because staff are not staying within budget. I'm unhappy with it because people know we have a budget problem and they keep spending money," Rodewald said in an interview Tuesday.
PETT funds are the federal Payments Equal to Taxes owed to Nye County in lieu of taxes the county would have otherwise collected for the government's use of Yucca Mountain.
Rodewald used the sheriff's office, the county's biggest department, as an egregious example of the problem. The sheriff's office spent $11.2 million this year with a negative balance of $200,000, Rodewald said, "despite a very generous budget."
Looking outward at the start of a new fiscal year, Rodewald added, "For the sheriff's department in particular, it would appear we already have a problem." To be fair, virtually every department overspent its budget, and more than a few at a percentage greater than that of the sheriff's office.
The new plan is for department heads and elected officials to meet monthly from now on, with the responsibility of presenting a status-of-funds report each month, using a prescribed chart as a visual aid, to the commissioners at their public meetings. The third Thursday of each month was set as the regular meeting date.
"The purpose of these meetings is not to get cut short as we have in the past," Rodewald said. By utilizing the HTE software program's "Detailed Budget Report," department heads will be expected to come up with an accurate accounting of where they stand financially in relation to their annual budget balances.
"It's all a burden on everyone, but that's part of the burden we have (as government employees)," Rodewald said. By keeping tabs on their budgets, Rodewald said the county's department heads would be able to keep from discovering problems in March or April, when it is too late to fix them.
The computer program will allow managers to determine the percentage of their budgets they have spent at any particular time of the year, Rodewald said. Line items break down the respective departmental budgets further, showing various sub-accounts, everything from uniform allowances to advertising and printing costs.
Other management tools of inquiry in the program allow managers to manipulate figures in their accounts to give them a better idea of their cash flow.
"The whole point is," Rodewald said, "the tools are there for you all to use."
County Commission Chairman Henry Neth said that department heads will have to answer to Nye County Manager Michael Maher if they didn't begin to use the computer program and produce the required "show and tell" reports. Maher would be responsible to the board of commissioners for riding herd on the department heads to get the budget under control. And the board would hold Maher to account for the others, Neth said.
If the commissioners failed in that regard, the voters would be the final arbiters - free to elect new board members to the commission, Neth added.
"That's why I'm so excited about these meetings," he said. "We've never done this before, and it's time."
But Rodewald said he doubted that all department heads had "the comfort level" with the computer program to navigate their way around their budgets. He advised them to ask questions if they didn't understand what their responsibilities were or how to obtain the information required of them.
"We're all big folks ... you've got to ask the questions. If you just sit back ... I don't feel that should be my problem," he said of his role as budget director.
Neth instructed Maher to get the staff to do a weekly, or even daily, update of their budgets. "We have to start taking responsibility in this county," he said. In a regular business, people would be replaced if they refused to take responsibility for their jobs as department heads, he said.
"We're in a new age. This old adage, 'We work for the government,' has got to go. If it's important, you go after it every day."
Rodewald said, "We're not sitting in a situation that's one of a kind." Every jurisdiction in the country is facing the same crisis of having to cut back services, he said. "We haven't bitten that bullet yet because we have PETT funds. But we're fooling ourselves if we think that that is always going to be there as a source to use."
In the concern over meeting the swelling needs of citizens with the Pahrump Valley's runaway growth, Rodewald said, "There's another fact of life: You can't do everything you want to do."
Rodewald also commented on the commissioners' plan to go ahead and hire two new employees for the assessors' office. The idea is that they will offset their salaries by enabling the office to bring in more revenue from uncollected property taxes.
"There's this (state mandated) lag between getting the new assessed values on the books and seeing the net results," Rodewald said. "We'll see some of the effects next year, but we'll always be behind in the (increasing demands for costly services)."
County Manager Michael Maher said he would set up the computer training for employees who needed it, but he threw in a caveat to keep things in perspective: 24 percent of Nye County's expenses are under the control of the county manager while the county commissioners control 76 percent of expenses.
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Pahrump Valley Times
September 1, 2004
Beatty concerned with NTS water
CAB Members Say Ground Water Flow Unpredictable
By Richard Stephens
PVT
Practically all of the Beatty Town Advisory Board meeting held Aug. 25 was given over to a presentation on hydrology relating to the Nevada Test Site.
The presentation by the NTS Community Advisory Board started with a course in Hydrology 101 from UNLV environmental studies student Savanna Reid. She was followed by CAB member Jenny Nelson, who, as a resident of Amargosa Valley, has a special interest in knowing when and where radioactive contaminants might migrate off the Nevada Test Site.
The presentations underscored what has been said several times before. Although the flow from the test site is generally to toward the south and southwest, the area involved is so large and underground structure and formations are so complex and variable that no one can say with any degree of certainty where contaminants from the Nevada Test Site might flow - or when.
Reid said that no one could say whether contaminants might be headed strait for Oasis Valley (Beatty is at its southern end), or whether it might bypass it altogether.
And it is also possible that once any contaminants covered that distance they might be so diluted as to pose no health hazard.
In talking about where the groundwater in the area comes from, Nelson said that very little of it comes from precipitation. Almost all the water penetrates shallowly into the soil and is lost to evapo-transpiration.
The bulk of the water is glacial melt from the last ice age. She said that the water in her own well approximately five miles south of Lathrop Wells was tested, and that she was told it was approximately 36,000 years old.
Town Board member Bert Bertram was rather pointed in his questioning regarding the placement wells drilled by the Department of Energy to monitor for radiation in groundwater. "We've had some indication from DOE that they are 'not in the business of chasing plumes,'" said Bertram, "But from a Beatty perspective, they'd better be chasing plumes."
Reid said that it might be more productive to word the request more precisely. She said that there were around 800 possible plumes, and that the DOE was not prepared to chase all of them, but they might be amenable if asked to investigate a particular plume.
CAB Chairman Charles Phillips said that his board would be making monitoring well recommendations in October. He said that the ability of a community advisory board to make such recommendations is unprecedented, and that other groups around the country have expressed envy at the level of cooperation his group has had from the DOE.
Nelson said results of groundwater testing by the DOE are published in the Annual Site Environmental Report, and that a copy is available in the Amargosa Valley library and should also be in the Beatty library.
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PhysicsToday
September 01, 2004
Court Rules Against 10 000-Year Radiation Safety Standard at Yucca Mountain
Saying the Environmental Protection Agency "unabashedly" ignored a National Academy of Sciences report on future radiation levels at the facility, a US appeals court sends the radioactive waste problem back to Congress.
In the hours after the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rendered its 9 July decision on the future of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste facility, all sides in the case were declaring victory. At the Department of Energy, Secretary Spencer Abraham said he was "pleased" with the decision and noted that the court "dismissed all challenges to the site selection of Yucca Mountain. Our scientific basis for the . . . project is sound."
Out in Nevada, where Yucca Mountain is located, State Attorney General Brian Sandoval all but pronounced the project dead, saying, "Simply put, Yucca is stopped in its tracks because the court recognizes that the project isn't rooted in sound science. We wouldn't trade places with the opposition." Sandoval was referring to the court's ruling that the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) 10 000-year safety standard for the facility doesn't follow the 1992 Energy Policy Act.
Back in Washington, DC, the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), the organization that represents the nuclear industry, was expressing confidence that DOE would be able to meet the "eventual standard" of radiation safety for Yucca and that "the licensing process for the repository will continue without interruption or delay." NEI added that the "scientific basis for the facility . . . is still sound today."
So the science is sound or it isn't, depending on whether you are in favor of or opposed to the federal government's plans to move some 77 000 tons of high-level radioactive waste into the mountain, beginning in 2010. Most of the waste is now sitting in pools and dry-storage casks at more than 100 interim storage sites in 39 states.
The nuclear industry would like to see the waste go to Yucca Mountain, and so would DOE and the Bush administration. Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry would like to shut down the Yucca Mountain project, as would most local, state, and federal politicians from Nevada.
What exactly did the court rule, and what does that ruling mean for Yucca Mountain's prospects? The court consolidated 12 lawsuits against Yucca into one case, and then dismissed all challenges to the project—except one. The court ruled that the EPA "unabashedly rejected" earlier findings by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) that said "some potentially important exposures [to radiation] might not occur until after several hundred thousand years."
The academy, in a 1995 report, said that the radiation standard for the facility should be measured at "the time of peak risk, whenever it occurs." That could be on the order of a million years, the academy noted.
In passing the 1992 Energy Policy Act, Congress required the EPA to set standards for Yucca Mountain consistent with the time frame for radiation risks as determined by the NAS. The EPA, according to the court, intentionally disregarded the NAS peak-dose standard as, quoting from an EPA regulation, "not practical for regulatory decision making." Instead, the EPA settled on a 10 000-year standard based on "policy considerations," the court said.
The court concluded that the EPA must either issue a revised standard that is "consistent with" the NAS peak-dose standard "or return to Congress and seek legislative authority to deviate from the NAS report."
"It was Congress that required the EPA to rely on NAS's expert scientific judgment," the court decision said, "and given the serious risks nuclear waste disposal poses for the health and welfare of the American people, it is up to Congress—not EPA and not this court—to authorize departures from the prevailing statutory scheme."
DOE, as the owner of Yucca Mountain, was expected to challenge the ruling, but the three-judge appeals panel was unanimous, and several congressional observers said the assumption on Capitol Hill is that the ruling will stand. If the court ruling does stand, the solution lies in Congress's changing the law to be consistent with the
10 000-year standard the EPA is using. None of the parties involved is advocating a radiation standard based on containment for hundreds of thousands of years or more.
Not an easy vote
"This is a real problem that the advocates don't know how to get around," said a congressional staff member who follows the issue. "The way around it is passing a law that says it's okay to use the 10 000-year standard, but that's not going to be an easy vote up here."
One of Yucca Mountain's chief advocates, Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM), said that if the decision stands, "the ramifications are enormous. It may go well beyond Yucca. It may be the end of the nuclear industry."
But with Kerry on record against the project, and Nevada lawmakers in both the House and Senate opposed to the Yucca Mountain repository, the odds of passing a relaxed radiation standard are not high. That is especially true in an election year when Nevada is considered a swing state in play for both Democrats and Republicans.
The problems relating to Yucca Mountain are not limited to the court ruling. A budgeting disagreement between the White House and Representative David Hobson (R-OH), chairman of the energy and water subcommittee of the House Committee on Appropriations, has resulted in a drastic cut in the fiscal year 2005 budget for Yucca Mountain.
The administration wants $880 million for the facility in FY 2005, but to keep the overall budget numbers down, it submitted a budget request of only $131 million. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) proposed that the remaining $749 million should come from fees paid into the nuclear waste fund—a multibillion-dollar fund contributed by the nuclear industry over many years to cover the cost of storing radioactive waste.
The dispute arose because the nuclear waste fund exists only on paper. The money that the nuclear industry pays goes into the general fund and is not set aside for radioactive waste costs. So the OMB proposal to "reclassify" nuclear waste fees so they could be used for Yucca Mountain means $749 million would be taken from the general treasury. Thus far, Congress has balked.
"OMB played Russian roulette when they assumed the House and Senate would pass the proposed reclassification language," Hobson said. Other lawmakers described the OMB plan as "muddled" and a "budget gimmick." Legislation has been introduced to authorize the OMB reclassification, but its prospects are uncertain. Should the House reverse course and authorize $880 million for Yucca Mountain, the prospects for quick action—or any action—in the Senate prior to the presidential election are not good.
Congressional staff members and other observers expect that a continuing resolution will be passed to keep funding Yucca Mountain at FY 2004 levels until both the court case and funding dispute can be resolved.
Jim Dawson
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Monticello Times
September 01, 2004
Xcel seeks extension for MNGP license
By Eric O'Link
Xcel Energy announced Wednesday morning that it will seek a 20-year license renewal on its Monticello Nuclear Generating Plant (MNGP), theoretically keeping the plant operational until 2030.
Xcel´s board of directors authorized the company to pursue operating licenses for both its Monticello facility and its Prairie Island nuclear plant near Red Wing. Those power plants are the only two nuclear plants in Minnesota.
The 40-year operating license for the Monticello plant-which houses a single-unit 600-megawatt reactor-expires in 2010.
MNGP Site Vice President Tom Palmisano said Wednesday in a telephone interview with the Times that, from the perspective of Nuclear Management Company, he was pleased with Xcel´s decision.
“We feel this is very good news for the sate of Minnesota, as well as the Xcel employees, the Nuclear Management employees and the community of Monticello,’ he said. “I just can´t emphasis enough how positive this is.’
Nuclear Management Company operates MNGP and six other nuclear power plants in the upper Midwest, including Prairie Island. Xcel owns MNGP.
Palmisano said NMC fully supports Xcel´s decision for license renewal and is prepared to file the application to the NRC on Xcel´s timeline. That will be in early 2005.
“Monticello is a good performing plant,’ Palmisano said. “It´s an asset for the citizens of the state of Minnesota. We feel the right decision is to operate Monticello beyond the end of the current license. ... This is a great plant; it runs well and it´s going to continue to run well.’
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) requires that five years before a nuclear power plant´s license is set to expire, the plant must file an application to extend the its operating license or create a decommissioning plan.
Jim Alders, Xcel´s manager of regulatory projects, further explained Wednesday´s announcement. He said the license renewal process had several steps that will probably take about two years to complete.
“If you step back from 2010 and work through all of the things that have to happen in order to get a license renewed, about now is the time a decision had to be made to decide whether to continue to operate the plant,’ Alders said.
This fall, Alders said, Xcel will apply to the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission for a certificate to store spent fuel rods in dry cask storage on the MNGP site.
The plant has enough storage space in its fuel rod pool to store spent rods until 2010, Alders said. In order to continue to operate, the plant will have to establish on-site storage. The utilities commission will consider the economics of operating MNGP in the future and require an environmental impact statement for the site from the environmental quality board.
Alders said the ongoing delays in preparing Nevada´s Yucca Mountain site for spent fuel rod storage will not affect MNGP´s application for on-site waste storage.
“It doesn´t have any direct impact on our plans,’ he said. “Obviously, the sooner Yucca Mountain national repository is available, the lower the storage requirements will ultimately be.’
Early next year, Alders said, Xcel and NMC will begin the application process for an extended operating license.
“That process is deigned so that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can be assured that processes and monitoring are in place, so that as the plant gets older any indications of reduction in performance can be identified early on, and dealt with as part of the maintenance of the plant,’ Alders said. “We´re confident that the facility can continue to operate into the future.’
Once the Public Utilities Commission has given approval for dry cask storage and the NRC has approved the license extension, the matter goes before the Minnesota Legislature for review. Alders said the legislators could approve the extension, do nothing, or deny it. The extension would occur in the first two cases.
Alders said this decision would probably come in 2007.
Xcel will also now begin plant assessments in preparation for license extension at the two-reactor, 1,600-megawatt Prairie Island plant. Its licenses expire in 2013 and 2014. Nationwide, the NRC has approved license extensions on 26 plants and has 16 requests pending.
“The power plant has been a good neighbor to Monticello since 1972,’ Monticello Mayor Bruce Thielen said Wednesday. “It´s always been the city council´s position that we will do what we need to do to assist Xcel in re-licensing and continue to keep them a viable entity in Monticello.’
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Alabama NewsFlash
September 01, 2004
TVA spending millions to store overflowing nuke waste
By Duncan Mansfield
The Associated Press
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The Tennessee Valley Authority, its nuclear waste storage pools overflowing or nearing capacity, is spending millions storing spent fuel at its reactor sites while waiting for the Department of Energy to open a permanent repository.
The nation's largest public utility, though not alone in its dilemma, has more than 2,260 metric tons of spent fuel on its hands with no plans to slow down its nuclear program.
The storage pool at the Sequoyah station near Chattanooga is full and the pool at the Browns Ferry station in Athens, Ala., is expected to reach capacity next year.
Already, TVA has spent more than $25 million building additional dry-cask storage space at Seqouyah. Some 44.6 metric tons of waste was moved out of the storage pool to the above-ground casks in June.
Similar storage costing more than $22 million is being built at Browns Ferry, where TVA has two operating reactors and is spending $1.8 billion to restart a long-shuttered third reactor in 2007.
TVA officials say dozens of other nuclear utilities are similarly hamstrung by DOE delays in opening a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
TVA recently won a U.S. Court of Federal Claims ruling that could lead to recovery of storage costs on grounds that DOE breached a 1983 contract to dispose of TVA's nuclear waste beginning in 2002.
Meanwhile, TVA says the dry-cask interim storage option is a proven technology already used or planned at 38 nuclear plants.
"I think our first consideration is ensuring the safety of our employees and the safety of the communities where we operate," TVA director Skila Harris said in an interview.
"We have invested in the technology and the security measures at those sites that would protect safety. So in terms of safety, I don't consider that an issue."
Beyond that, she said, the nuclear industry "has long anticipated that there might be delays in completion of a permanent repository."
With the support of the White House and Congress, DOE hopes to have Yucca Mountain operating in 2010.
But Nevada is waging a court battle, and a federal court in Washington declared in July that even a 10,000-year radiation safety standard proposed by the government was insufficient for the site.
"This is a reflection of poor planning by the nuclear industry," said Steve Smith, director of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy. "They have continued to generate this waste even though they don't have a long-term storage operation for it."
"This is sort of the birds coming home to roost so to speak on the banks of the Tennessee River," he said, noting that all three TVA nuclear stations, TVA's touted alternatives to smog-causing coal-fired power plants, are located along the river.
Harris, who as an energy consultant studied the finite nuclear waste storage issue as early as the late 1970s, said Yucca Mountain "is ultimately a political issue more than it is a technological issue."
Smith disagreed. Ensuring the safe storage of material that will remain radioactive "for longer than recorded history is a real scientific and technical challenge. It is something that sort of pales human ingenuity."
TVA, meanwhile, is studying the possibility of building a next-generation nuclear plant at its unfinished Bellefonte site in Alabama. TVA's third operating nuclear plant at Watts Bar in Tennessee, which came on line in 1995, has adequate space in its spent fuel pool until 2018.
TVA provides electricity to about 8.5 million people in Tennessee and parts of Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia.
Tennessee Valley Authority: http://www.tva.gov/
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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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