Word: yucca
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Number of tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste that Energy Secretary Abraham Spencer recommends be buried in Yucca Mountain, 90 miles from Las Vegas...
...report, however, has even more pessimistic conclusions that have Reid cheering. The Energy Department has projected that the Yucca Mountain repository will end up costing $57.5 billion and it wants to finish the project by 2010. But the GAO report predicts that the Energy Department not only won't meet those goals but that it also "has no reliable estimate of when, and at what cost, such a repository could be opened." Getting the repository up and running by 2013 is even "questionable," the GAO concludes...
...Reid thinks he's struck the fatal blow. "This report could very well signal the beginning of the end of the Yucca Mountain project," he predicts. He and Berkely had ordered up the GAO probe after an anonymous whistleblower sent a letter to the Energy Department's inspector general charging waste, fraud and abuse in the Yucca project. The GAO findings also come on the heels of revelations that a Chicago law firm the Energy Department hired to help guide the project through the licensing process had been lobbying Congress on behalf of the nuclear industry. The firm denied...
...fast. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, who's furious that the GAO report was prematurely leaked, dismissed the study as "fatally flawed." Abraham appears intent on recommending to President Bush soon that the nuclear waste be located at Yucca. If Bush agrees, Nevada's governor and legislature can still veto the site. But Congress then has 60 days to override the state's disapproval. If it gets to that point, count on Reid to use all his powers as Senate majority whip to block the congressional override...
...have a fight on his hands. Bush needs the Yucca repository. His energy plan, unveiled last May, envisions building more nuclear power plants, which now supply 22% of the nation's electricity. But he can't expand nuclear power unless he finds a place to store its refuse for the long-term. Bush will push hard for Yucca and he'll have allies in Congress. Thirty-six states have the nation's 104 nuclear power plants. Don't bet on their congressional delegations standing with the Nevadans if it means radioactive garbage piling up in their backyards. So look...