Dive Brief:
- Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff found no safety concerns, but also stopped short of recommending the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste facility move ahead, in the final volumes of a safety review of the proposed facility released this week.
- According to the report, while the facility could be operated safely, the Department of Energy has not met certain land and water rights requirements noted in previous volumes of the report.
- A final decision on the project would come only following a supplement to the DOE's environmental impact statement, hearings, and review by the full NRC, the Hill reports.
Dive Insight:
NRC staff have now completed five volumes of a safety review on the Yucca Mountain proposal, concluding that subject to proposed conditions the facility could operate safely. But in a statement, NRC noted staff recommended the commission "should not authorize construction of the repository because DOE has not met certain land and water rights requirements."
DOE submitted its Yucca Mountain application in June 2008, and NRC staff published the first volume of the safety report in August 2010.
U.S. Senator Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said Congress must now provide funding for the licensing process to continue, and transfer control over the land and water rights to DOE.
“The American people have spent 30 years and $15 billion to determine whether Yucca Mountain would be a safe repository for our nation’s civilian and defense-related nuclear waste," Inhofe said."Today, with the public release of the last remaining volumes of the Safety Evaluation Report, Americans will finally know the complete technical conclusion about the safety of Yucca Mountain."
