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Independent Yucca Review Raises Questions
Mark Graffis wrote:
> Environment News Service
>
> Independent Review Questions Approval of Yucca Mountain
>
> By Cat Lazaroff
>
> WASHINGTON, DC, January 25, 2002 (ENS) - Scientific uncertainties make it
> impossible to ensure that a proposed nuclear waste dump in Nevada would
> remain safe for the thousands of years necessary to protect the environment,
> suggests a review by the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board.
>
> While the board (NWTRB) has found "no individual technical or scientific
> factor has been identified that would automatically eliminate Yucca Mountain
> from consideration as the site of a permanent repository" for the nation's
> nuclear waste, the review found a variety of problems with the studies that
> aim to ensure the safety of the site.
>
> The NWTRB study questions the adequacy of the computer models used to
> project how the site's natural features, including geological and hydrologic
> formations, will protect the stored wastes. The report also raises concerns
> about how well casks designed to contain the wastes for the 10,000 years
> required by lawmakers will hold up to the potential tests of time, natural
> and manmade disasters.
>
> "Gaps in data and basic understanding cause important uncertainties in the
> concepts and assumptions on which the DOE's performance estimates are now
> based," NWTRB concludes. "Because of these uncertainties, the Board has
> limited confidence in current performance estimates generated by the DOE's
> performance assessment model."
>
> "The Board's view is that the technical basis for the DOE's repository
> performance estimates is weak to moderate at this time," the NWTRB
> concluded.
>
> However, "the Board makes no judgment on the question of whether the Yucca
> Mountain site should be recommended or approved for repository development,"
> the report says.
>
> The Department of Energy (DOE) says the NWTRB report provides "valuable
> independent confirmation of a critical conclusion" reached by the DOE after
> 24 years and $4 billion of research: that Yucca Mountain would make a
> suitable repository. Earlier this month, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham
> announced that the agency intends to recommend to President George W. Bush
> that the Yucca Mountain site is scientifically sound and suitable to hold
> radioactive waste.
>
> Yucca Mountain is the only site now under consideration as a permanent
> repository for high level radioactive wastes, including spent fuel from the
> nation's 103 nuclear power plants. Nevada itself has no nuclear reactors.
>
> The NWTRB says that "eliminating all uncertainty associated with estimates
> of repository performance would never be possible at any repository site."
> Therefore, government officials and policymakers will have to determine "how
> much scientific uncertainty is acceptable," the board wrote.
>
> The Board recommended that the DOE "continue a vigorous, well integrated
> scientific investigation to increase its fundamental understanding of the
> potential behavior of the repository system."
>
> Under Secretary of Energy Robert Card said Thursday that the DOE is
> committed to reducing uncertainties about the safety of the Yucca Mountain
> site by using estimates of its performance projecting thousands of years in
> the future.
>
> "The [Energy] Secretary is committed to ensuring the safety of citizens of
> Nevada and of the nation, a timely recommendation on a repository, and an
> ongoing course of research that would last so long as the repository is in
> its operating and monitoring period," Card said, noting that research could
> continue "as much as 100-300 years after its opening."
>
> Card pointed out that the NWTRB did not disagree with the DOE that a
> repository at Yucca Mountain "would be safe throughout its operating and
> monitoring period, hundreds of years into the future." Card said there is no
> legitimate scientific organization that disagrees on this issue.
>
> If President Bush decides to recommend the site, the state of Nevada will
> have the opportunity to disapprove the recommendation. If Nevada disagrees
> with Bush's recommendation, Congress will be responsible for designating a
> repository site for development.
>
> "The Board's review of the 24 years of scientific study at Yucca Mountain is
> important, as is the decision on whether or not to address the country's
> nuclear waste problem at this time," Card said, "given the impacts to
> national security, environmental protection, and continued clean up of
> nuclear waste."
>
> Spent nuclear fuel and high level radioactive waste is now scattered across
> 131 sites in 39 states, Card noted.
>
> Many Nevada officials oppose the planned repository. On January 24, the city
> of Las Vegas and Clark County, Nevada filed court documents charging that
> DOE approval of the Yucca Mountain site will cause "immediate and
> irreparable harm" to Las Vegas.
>
> "Today's legal action represents our continued commitment to working with
> the governor and other elected officials as we pursue every option to keep
> Nevada from becoming the nation's nuclear waste dump," wrote Clark County
> Commission chair Dario Herrera in a written statement.
>
> The petition, filed in a federal appeals court, asks the court to delay the
> DOE's official recommendation that the site be approved. By law, Energy
> Secretary Richardson must wait until February 10 to recommend the site - 30
> days after he gave official notice to Nevada Governor Kenny Guinn of his
> intentions.
>
> The state of Nevada filed a lawsuit on December 17, 2001 to halt the Yucca
> Mountain Project The state alleges that Energy Department's ground rules for
> judging whether the site is suitable for nuclear waste storage are contrary
> to what Congress intended.
>
> If President Bush does approve a nuclear dump at Yucca Mountain, Governor
> Guinn plans to continue his opposition.
>
> "I can veto a decision by the President of the United States, and then
> within 90 days it has to go to both houses of Congress, the Senate and the
> House, and they have to overrule with at least a simple majority veto,"
> Guinn said earlier this month.
>
> More information about the Yucca Mountain Project is online at
> http://www.ymp.gov
>
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