Vermont Yankee: What to do with spent fuel?

Vermont Business Magazine, Aug 01, 2004 by McQuiston, Timothy

Vermont Yankee's Cosgrove said the federal government is required by statute to find an appropriate site, whether its Yucca Mountain or somewhere else.

Roadblocks

Throwing the Yucca Mountain site into further doubt was a recent threejudge US Court of Appeals for DC ruling that said the federal Environmental Protection Agency had to consider protecting the public against radiation releases beyond 10,000 years. While the court gave essentially a split decision to a filing

from the state of Nevada, it potentially has added another potential roadblock.

The July 9 decision, on the one hand, said the federal government's procedure in siting the facility was constitutional, which the State of Nevada argued it was not, but then said the safety of the site had to considered beyond the 10,000-year standard, which Nevada hailed as a great victory.

"In its present form, I think the current proposal is dead, said Loux.

Meanwhile, Williams said: "The US Department of Energy does not expect the court decision to delay the licensing process at Yucca Mountain. In fact, the DOE intends to have an application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on schedule in December.

Lou said, "There's a lot of opposition and it's not going to go away. You can't get elected here without pledging your undying opposition to Yucca Mountain."

Meanwhile, the Nuclear Energy Institute's Executive Vice President Angie Howard said, "Congress' 2002 endorsement of the Yucca Mountain site and the Department of Energy's work at the site are unaffected by this ruling."

She said the EPA and the NRC could revise their regulation to extend the compliance period beyond 10,000 years, or Congress could enact legislation empowering the EPA to deviate from the beyond- 10,000-year recommendation. That recommendation came from the National Academy of Sciences.

Both sides have said these issues could wind up before the US Supreme Court.

Another potential roadblock could literally appear on the roadways. Nevada is prepared to challenge the federal government on the issue of transporting the highly radioactive spent fuel.

The state likely could find plenty of allies - governmental and private advocates, environmentalists, etc - all along the way from Vermont (or any reactor site) to Nevada. While Yucca Mountain is on federal property, the transportation paths, even in Nevada, would have to cross private and state property.

"The problem for the government," Loux said, "is that they have to find a good site and then worry about other things like transportation."

In Vermont, the ideal plan would be to put the spent fuel casks right onto trains. The NRC has approved containers to travel by truck, as needed, from the sites scattered across the United States.

Here in Vermont Douglas Administration's policy, as it was with the Dean Administration, is that the federal government is legally required to find a permanent disposal site.

It was based on Dean's recommendation that Senator Leahy voted in favor of Yucca Mountain. The Dean Administration argued that the last place to indefinitely store the spent fuel was on the Connecticut River. Leahy's assessment of the safety of the Yucca Mountain site was predicated on the DOE recommendation.