U.S. nuclear waste disposal programs progressing, but slowly Plans to create disposal sites for the United States' high- and lowlevel radioactive wastes lurched ahead recently amid continuing controversies over where to locate permanent repositories. Congress will soon consider a temporary storage plan to address the mounting accumulation of spent nuclear fuel at civilian reactors, and the Department of Energy is poised to open a New Mexico repository for the government's low-level radioactive waste. Following word this summer on the status of their application to EPA, DOE officials optimistically predict that the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in Carlsbad, N.M., will accept its first waste in May 1998, almost a decade after its original opening date. The search for a suitable government waste site began in 1955. "There are many unknowns, including lawsuits, but as things stand now, we will be ready," said WIPP spokesperson Donavan Mager. The underground WIPP repository is set in salt formations 2150 feet below the surface. It is designed for permanent disposal of low-level radioactive debris and mixed chemical waste from DOE's nuclear facilities. One of the last obstacles is getting approval from EPA. The agency said in August that the WIPP compliance application was complete and final approval could come by April 1998. "We expect to start receiving wastes 30 days after that," said Mager. But some environmentalists and local residents, who have opposed the program since the beginning, vow to postpone the opening. "We are going to do whatever we can to stop it, including suing at every opportunity. We think it is going to be a disaster," said Janet Greenwald of Citizens for Alternatives to Radioactive Dumping in Albuquerque. Meanwhile, the civilian radioactive waste program is mired in a mixture of politics, public opposition, and economic reality. As approved by Congress, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (and an amended version in 1987) gave states responsibility for low-level waste disposal. The federal government took on the task of siting and
A tractor-trailer hauls special nuclear waste canisters along a road toward the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.
operating a waste repository to handle spent fuel rods and otiier highly radioactive materials from the nation's nuclear power plants. As originally envisioned, the highlevel waste site would be in operation by 1988. DOE has selected a location in Nevada's Yucca Mountain and is conducting extensive feasibility studies to see whether radioactive wastes can be stored safely. With the program nearly a decade behind schedule, anxious utilities have been stockpiling spent fuel rods and are pressing Congress for temporary solutions. An estimated 28,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel is being stored at more than 100 commercial reactor sites nationwide. Approved by the Senate in April and awaiting action in the House, the legislation would create a temporary storage site at the Nevada Test Site near the proposed permanent repository at Yucca Mountain, which won't open until after 2010. The temporary site would open by 2000. But there has been opposition from the White House, and supporters do not appear to have enough votes to override a presidential veto. "We think the White House needs to step up to the plate and offer some alternatives instead of continually saying, 'no, no, no'," said Steve Kerekes of the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group. The low-level waste program hasn't fared much better. Given responsibility for low-level wastes from nuclear power plants, research centers, and medical facilities, states were given a choice: build a disposal facility alone or
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in a compact agreement with other states. Several states and compacts have made progress, but none is even close to constructing a waste repository. A Midwestern compact has selected a location in Boyd County, Neb. Texas and California also have selected sites, although both have been delayed by congressional inaction. Congress is expected to take action on both sites later this year. Other states have either fallen behind in their site selection, procrastinated, or declined to address the responsibility. Many lost their incentive in 1996 when South Carolina, host to the only commercial disposal site in the East, reneged on a promise to shut its borders to out-of-state wastes. Others, facing public opposition and the expected $100 million price tag per disposal site, have questioned the need for so many facilities, because the quantity of low-level waste has dropped from 4 million cubic feet annually in 1980 to 400,000 cubic feet last year. "What was envisioned as a big problem getting bigger has, in fact, gotten a lot smaller," said Paul Genoa of the Nuclear Energy Institute. The drop in waste production—and lack of nuclear power expansion envisioned by Congress in 1982—has many people wondering if the low-level radioactive waste program should be reevaluated, even though the prospect does not seem politically palatable at the moment. "Congress needs to take a fresh look," said Auke Piersma of the Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project. —RAE TYSON
