WASHINGTON — Despite losing by a landslide in the House, Nevada leaders still hope that a friendlier Senate will block using Yucca Mountain to store the nation's nuclear waste — a plan that would send thousands of shipments through Utah.
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The House voted 306-117 Wednesday to use Yucca Mountain. Utah's House members split over whether that is good or bad, and Utah's senators said Thursday they are re-evaluating their previous support of Yucca.
Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, opposed Yucca, saying shipments it would bring through Utah are too dangerous. Reps. Chris Cannon and Jim Hansen, both R-Utah, voted for Yucca, saying it is the best way to prevent nuclear waste storage instead of at a proposed private facility on Utah's Goshute Indian Reservation.
Despite the big loss Wednesday, Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., still saw hope in the Senate where Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., wields power as the majority whip, or No. 2 Democrat.
"A majority of Democrats in the U.S. House voted against Yucca Mountain (by a one-vote margin, 103-102), and hopefully that will be able to help Sen. Reid as he attempts to defeat the bill in the (Democratic-controlled) Senate," she said.
Helping Nevada is Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., who had earlier vowed that Yucca was "dead" as long as he is leader. But he later said he hadn't looked closely enough at expedited procedures required for consideration before he said that, which may prevent many parliamentary procedures normally available.
Senate leaders say they expect a Senate vote in July, and a series of three hearings on Yucca are expected to begin next week.
Odds seem to favor approval of Yucca anyway. Congress Daily reported Thursday that 45 of 100 senators have already committed to support Yucca Mountain. Only 17 are on record opposing it, and the rest are undecided.
Sens. Orrin Hatch and Bob Bennett, R-Utah, are among those officially undecided. Spokesmen for both said that while they have voted for Yucca in the past, they are re-evaluating support.
During debate Wednesday, Matheson denounced plans for Yucca, saying resulting interstate shipments are too dangerous and complained they would continue a history of dumping on the West and exposing its residents to unfair risk.
"By opposing the transcontinental shipment of nuclear waste, we take care of all those millions of people who live along the roads and tracks to Yucca Mountain," he said.
But Hansen and Cannon said voting against Yucca Mountain would not stop interstate waste shipments, contending they may go instead to the Goshute Reservation facility in Utah.
"If nuclear waste will be moving around the West, I don't want it to stop in Utah," Cannon said.
Hansen said, "This vote comes down to two bad choices for Utah. Do you want nuclear waste to travel across the state to be buried deep under a mountain in the middle of a high-security installation in Nevada, or do you want nuclear waste to travel halfway across the state to be left out in the open, guarded by a handful of rent-a-cops underneath a busy military (flight) training range? For me, that's an easy call," Hansen said.
But Matheson said opposing Yucca Mountain might stop all shipments for a time, and hopefully improvements in technology might eliminate the need to move them at all from where they are now stored on-site at nuclear power plants.
"Why are we moving this waste at this time? We are not running out of storage space at existing sites, and in the coming years technological advancements in reprocessing and recycling may very well take care of much of the waste," Matheson said.
But Hansen said, "While some may want to pretend that voting against Yucca Mountain is a vote against transportation of nuclear waste, the truth is that without Yucca Mountain the (Goshute) Skull Valley proposal would be one step closer to reality."
Cannon said that while energy companies have said the Goshute facility would only be temporary, "The reality is that once that site accepts waste, it will essentially become permanent. Today's vote assures that no Utah site will ever be used for nuclear waste storage."
The House vote was to override an earlier veto by Nevada Gov. Kelly Guinn of President Bush's designation of Yucca Mountain as the national nuclear waste repository — an unusual power made available in the 1980s by an amendment pushed by Hansen.
A simple majority of both houses of Congress is necessary to override Guinn's veto.
E-mail: lee@desnews.com