LAS VEGAS (AP) — Nevada officials say a federal appeals court hearing this week on a collection of lawsuits will give the state its best chance to block the government’s plans to entomb nuclear-reactor waste under a mountain 90 miles outside Las Vegas.
“Part of our strategy has always been the court,” said U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, a leader of the state’s fight against the Yucca Mountain project.
Mr. Reid said he hopes that the three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia will “kill it, change direction or slow it down.”
For 25 years, the state has lacked the political clout to stop the Yucca Mountain project, failing in Congress and with the White House.
The public debate will culminate in oral arguments before the appellate panel Wednesday on a case involving six state lawsuits against the federal government. A ruling is likely this summer.
“This is the state’s best chance,” said Bob Loux, Gov. Kenny Guinn’s top anti-Yucca aide. “There’s still the licensing arena if we fail, but the playing field is certainly more level in the legal arena than in the political arena.”
Nevada is challenging the Environmental Protection Agency radiation limits for areas around the site, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s licensing rules and the Energy Department’s environmental standards for studying and recommending the site.
The nuclear energy industry also is suing the government, saying it missed a 1998 deadline for finding a place to store the spent fuel accumulating at 103 commercial reactors and at industrial and military sites.
The Energy Department would spend 25 years filling tunnels with metal casks containing 77,000 tons of spent nuclear reactor fuel. The site then would be sealed. Scientists expect it to remain radioactive for at least 10,000 years.
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