Bush OKs Yucca Mountain for storing nuclear waste

Associated Press WriterWASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush on Friday approved Yucca Mountain in Nevada as the site for long-term disposal of thousands of tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste, according to congressional sources.

An announcement was expected from the White House later. Bush's chief of staff, Andrew Card, notified key members of Congress of the decision.

Nevada officials have argued the government can't ensure the public will be protected over the thousands of years the waste will remain dangerous. They plan to file a formal objection turning the matter over to Congress.

Congress will then have to decide, by majority vote of both houses, whether to uphold Bush's decision or side with Nevada and find another site for the more than 40,000 tons of waste now kept at commercial reactors in 34 states.

Bush, following the recommendation of his energy secretary, concluded that the Yucca Mountain site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas is scientifically sound. Administration officials have cited security reasons for consolidating the waste underground at a single location.

The president's action marks a major step in the decades-long dispute over what to do with the radioactive waste generated by commercial nuclear power plants and by the government nuclear weapons program. The waste at commercial reactors is growing by 2,000 tons a year.

Unless Congress sides with Nevada, the Energy Department's next step will be to get a license for the Yucca facility from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, a process that could take several years. No waste is expected to be shipped to the site before 2010 and even that target is likely to slip.

Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham recommended a green light be given to the Yucca project in a letter to the president late Thursday. He said a review of 20 years of scientific studies had convinced him that the waste could be kept in volcanic rock 950 feet beneath the Nevada desert without risk to public health or the environment.

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., called the decision to go ahead with the Yucca project "a hasty, poor and indefensible decision" at a time when "the science does not yet exist" to ensure the waste can be contained.

Under a 1987 law, which limited the scientific studies on a waste site to Yucca Mountain, Nevada can file an objection and stop the project. But Congress, in turn, can override the objection.

Any waste site also would have to get approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

If it is built, the Yucca Mountain facility would hold up to 77,000 tons of used reactor fuel rods from 73 operating and mothballed nuclear power plants in 34 states as well as waste from federal weapons facilities.

Some of the radioisotopes will remain deadly for more than 10,000 years.

Abraham said he told the president in his letter that he "could not and would not recommend the Yucca Mountain site without having first determined that (it will) ...protect the health and safety of the public."

The energy secretary said the decision to go ahead with the project was "based on sound scientific principles."

Abraham notified,