SUMMERLIN, Nev. — The state of Nevada plans to submit 30 to 50 new contentions with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission against building a permanent nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, the state’s point man on the project said Wednesday.
Should the NRC ultimately approve a license for construction of the underground storage site, state lawsuits would follow, Robert Halstead, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, said at the ExchangeMonitor’s RadWaste Summit.
Contentions are part of the commission’s adjudicatory process for the Energy Department’s license application for Yucca Mountain, which the NRC suspended 2011. About 15 of the new contentions would address threats to groundwater from storing tens of thousands of tons of spent fuel and high-level radioactive waste under Yucca Mountain, while others would focus on separate topics such as the project’s impact on tribal lands in the region.
“The key issues, as I’ve said, in the licensing proceeding is going to be whether or not the repository can prevent radioactive contamination of groundwater for more than 1 million years, as required,” he told the audience.
Nevada officials say the evidence to date does not prove it can, while supporters of sending the waste to Yucca Mountain say it has been shown to be safe.
The NRC in 2009 admitted 218 contentions filed by the state, on matters such as waste transport, the impact on Las Vegas, and the storage method for the material.
“If the full licensing proceeding were to resume, and all of Nevada’s assumptions have been based on the assumption that it will resume, we plan to adjudicate all 218 admitted contentions in opposition to DOE’s license application,” Halstead said. “We plan to submit an additional 30 to 50 contentions.”
The full legally mandated proceeding, should it advance, could cost $2 billion and take five years, Halstead said.
He said the new contentions would not be submitted until the NRC resumes the adjudicatory process, which Halstead believes would not occur until after the agency receives additional funding for the work. The Trump administration has requested $30 million for NRC licensing activities on Yucca Mountain for fiscal 2018, which begins on Oct. 1; the House of Representatives passed legislation with the funding, the Senate Appropriations Committee’s corresponding legislation provides no money for DOE and NRC to work on the project.
The adjudicatory process would culminate in the commission’s decision on whether to approve the recommendation on licensing from its Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel. Only when that occurs will the state decide whether it needs to sue, Halstead said. The state is preparing cases on a number of fronts, including that DOE rather than the NRC should have prepared an environmental impact statement for Yucca Mountain on groundwater.
Nye County Board of Commissioners Chairman Dan Schinhofen, speaking at the conference alongside Halstead, said he supports the filing of additional contentions if it means moving the review process forward. He reaffirmed his belief that science facts, not politics, should determine whether the Yucca Mountain facility is built in his county.
“The state has 30 to 50 new contentions, we welcome them, we’re happy to hear them,” Schinhofen said, emphasizing the jobs and economic development the facility could bring to Nye County.
