The Senate approved a Bush administration plan yesterday to store much of the nation's nuclear waste beneath Nevada's Yucca Mountain, giving final legislative approval to a project that has been debated for nearly a quarter-century.
Despite strong objections from Nevada officials, gambling industry leaders and environmentalists, the Senate voted 60 to 39 to affirm President Bush's finding that the $58 billion project is "scientifically sound and suitable" and would enhance protection against terrorist attacks by consolidating the radioactive waste underground.
Fifteen Democrats joined 45 Republicans in approving the project, underscoring widespread concern over management of growing nuclear waste piles at power plants in 39 states. Maryland Democrats Barbara A. Mikulski and Paul S. Sarbanes voted against the project while Virginia Republicans John W. Warner and George Allen voted for it. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) did not vote.
In the late 1980s, Congress authorized the Energy Department to consider Yucca Mountain as the sole site to collect and bury nuclear waste, which remains radioactive for thousands of years. It gave Nevada veto rights, however. Yesterday, the Senate joined the House in overriding Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn's objection to Bush's Feb. 15 decision endorsing the plan to bury as much as 70,000 metric tons of radioactive waste in desert tunnels 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
The vote was a victory for Bush and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, who said the project was critical to their efforts to expand domestic energy production. It dealt a blow to Majority Whip Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.), who led the effort to sidetrack the project.
The Senate "cast a very vital and important vote in favor of America's national security, in favor of America's energy security and in favor of this country's environmental security," Abraham said.
The vote ended an intense lobbying effort by the nuclear energy industry and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which spent about $72 million since 1994 lobbying for the project. Senate supporters said the vote will help ensure the future of the U.S. nuclear power industry by keeping it from "choking on its own waste," as Sen. Frank H. Murkowski (R-Alaska) put it.
Reid, Ensign and other opponents called the administration plan "the big lie," a project riddled with technical and transportation problems that will not solve the waste storage problem because spent fuel will continue to pile up at nuclear power plants around the country even with a centralized repository.
We are being forced to decide this issue prematurely, without sufficient scientific information, because this administration is doing the bidding of special interests that simply want to make the deadly waste they have generated someone else's problem," said Senate Majority Leader Thomas A. Daschle (D-S.D.).
While the legislative issue appears settled, the Energy Department still must obtain a license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build and operate the repository -- a process that could take four or five years -- and overcome a series of lawsuits brought by Nevada state officials.
"Our view is that this process is just beginning, not ending," said Joe Egan, Nevada's lead nuclear attorney.
By relying on a combination of geological barriers and hardened steel-alloy storage casks, the administration says the government could safely bury the radioactive refuse for at least 10,000 years without it leaching into underground water or escaping into the environment in harmful doses.
More than 40,000 tons of spent nuclear materials are stored in 131 aboveground sites in 39 states, and about 2,000 tons of new waste is generated annually. The Energy Department's goal is to ship the waste to the Yucca site by rail and truck, beginning in 2010. Critics and the General Accounting Office say that is highly optimistic.
Yesterday's vote followed months of intense efforts by Sens. Reid and Ensign to turn the tide running against them as nuclear waste accumulated at power plants and military weapons sites. From the start, Reid had the backing of most Senate Democrats, and he ardently wooed Democratic freshmen who had not previously voted on the Yucca issue. Ensign had a far harder job.
Day after day, Ensign went to the offices of nearly 40 of his 49 GOP colleagues, toting an inch-thick binder about the project, including detailed maps of possible rail and highway routes through each senator's state. He won praise for diligence, but earned no votes beyond those of the two GOP senators who supported him from the outset -- Ben Nighthorse Campbell (Colo.) and Lincoln D. Chafee (R.I.) -- and independent James M. Jeffords (Vt.).
Several senators expressed concerns about risks to their states as trucks and trains carry radioactive waste to the Nevada repository. Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) wanted to rid Illinois of its large reservoir of nuclear waste, but was deeply troubled by the transportation dangers. After struggling for weeks, he decided to support the project, saying he was satisfied with its safety and would address transportation concerns in separate legislation.
For Utah Republican Sens. Orrin G. Hatch and Robert F. Bennett, there was a different dilemma. They feared that an Indian reservation in Utah's Skull Valley, about 40 miles from Salt Lake City, could become a privately developed waste repository if Yucca was rejected. After a White House meeting on Monday, the two senators pledged support for the Yucca Mountain plan.
"Given the choice before us, I would rather have the waste go through Utah than to Utah," Bennett said.