Todd Jacobson
RW Monitor
6/27/2014
House lawmakers are expected to take up the Energy and Water Appropriations Act after taking a break for the Independence Day recess, though the prospects for completing the bill have been thrown into turmoil with the Senate version of the bill stalled. The bill will be considered under a modified open rule, meaning an unlimited amount of amendments will be allowed to be offered by lawmakers. The House Appropriations Committee cleared the bill last week, and the House Rules Committee established the parameters for debating the bill on Tuesday night, though the bill isn’t likely to be taken up by the full House until the week of July 7, when lawmakers return from a brief one-week recess for Independence Day.
House appropriators are looking to breathe new life into the shuttered Yucca Mountain high-level waste repository project, including more than $200 million to support licensing review. The bill would provide $150 million to the Department of Energy “to carry out the purposes of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982,” which designates Yucca Mountain as the site for a repository; and $55 million to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to continue the adjudication of DOE’s Yucca Mountain License application. The bill would also include $55 million for used nuclear fuel disposition research and development, up $25 million from Fiscal Year 2014 and $6 million above the DOE budget request
