Nuclear Waste Policy Act 1996

[Lisa Marina Brooks <lbrooks@Citizen.Org>]

  ****ACTION ALERT****
  
  House Leadership considering a vote on S. 1936, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.
  
  Republican leadership in the House will decide soon on the fate of S. 1936.  
  The push to bring it to the House floor is an attempt to pass the Nuclear 
  Waste Policy Act without a conference.  It appears that if H.R. 1020 were 
  brought to the floor, Senators Bryan and Reid (both D-NV), would filibuster the
  conference vote at a costly period with the elections approaching and 
  floor time short.  If the house were to pass S. 1936, no conference would be 
  required and the bill would go straight to the President.
  
  The vote on S. 1936, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, was like the proverbial 
  glass of water: half empty or half full, depending on one's perspective.  The 
  bill passed 63-37, but the promised veto from President Clinton can be 
  sustained with only 34 votes.
  
  The decision to bring the Senate version to the floor will depend on a count 
  the nuclear industry is conducting now.  Please call, fax, or E-mail your 
  Representative and ask him/her to oppose the House version of S.1936.  
  Lets keep this bill from coming to the floor.
  
  The Capitol Switchboard number is (202)224-3121.  Direct line and fax numbers 
  as well as E-mail addresses for Representatives can be found on Critical 
  Mass' voting index (http://www.essential.org/CMEP.).
  
  The bill is an effort by the nuclear industry to slash environmental standards and begin the
  unprecedented transportation of high-level nuclear waste.  The bill would transfer title and liability
  for these materials to taxpayers before a long-term solution to the nuclear waste problem exists.
  
  A skunk by any other name...
  
  S. 1936 is an effort to slash environmental standards, transfer title of 
  nuclear waste to taxpayers, and start the largest nuclear waste transportation 
  enterprise in history before a long-term solution is at hand.   S. 1936 also 
  includes provisions that increase the likelihood that the Nuclear Waste 
  Fund will not be sufficient to cover the costs of the nation's high-level 
  waste program, increasing the potential taxpayer liability. 
  
  Some talking points on the bill follow.  Updated fact sheets are on the 
  Critical Mass Web Page (www.essential.org/CMEP) in the Fact Sheets section of 
  Radioactive Waste Policy.
  
  S. 1936 would:
  
  - Mandate the transportation of radioactive waste through communities across
    the country
  - Establish a repository radiation exposure standard that allows members of the 
    public to receive radiation doses four times that allowed by current 
    regulations for radioactive waste storage facility.  The standard set by 
    S. 1936 poses a lifetime risk of one cancer death for every 286 exposed 
    individuals
  - Transfer title and liability for high-level waste to the taxpayer before a 
    repository opens
  - Eliminate repository site suitability standards
  - Carve loopholes in the National Environmental Policy Act
  - Preempt local and state laws
  - Preempt or curtail all federal and state environmental laws
  - Order the DOE to begin interim storage construction without NRC approval
  - Curtail public participation
  
  
  * Opening a so-called interim nuclear waste dump in Nevada would mandate the 
  largest nuclear waste transportation enterprise in history.  Over 95 percent of 
  the radioactivity in the nation's nuclear waste would hit the roads and rails 
  of 43 states, exposing millions to unwarranted risk. Safety standards for the
  transportation casks are inadequate and do not require compliance testing of 
  full-scale models.   
  
  * If citizens are to accept the risks of transportation, there must be some 
  substantive rationale for moving high-level nuclear waste.  Currently, no 
  such reason exists.  Every operating reactor will remain a high-level waste so
  long as it continues to split atoms.  
  
  * The Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board, which is the nonpartisan, 
  scientific oversight body for the nation's high-level waste program, has found
  that there is no reason to pursue "interim" storage now.
  
  * Taxpayers should not have to assume liability for irradiated fuel in the 
  absence of a long-term plan for the nuclear waste's ultimate disposition.  
  Until such a plan is in place, title and liability should remain in the hands 
  of those who chose to generate the materials.
  
  * Shipping waste to a seismically site in Nevada is premature. Studies to 
  determine whether Yucca Mountain is suitable for a repository are incomplete.  
  If Yucca Mountain proves unsuitable, waste shipped all the way to Nevada may 
  have to be shipped again.
  
  * Nevada, which has no nuclear reactors, vigorously opposes the dump.  If 
  Congress forces the facility upon the state, the Republican rhetoric of 
  "returning power to the states" will be exposed as rank hypocrisy.  The only 
  way to place a dump in Nevada is over the objections of its citizens, 
  state government, and entire Congressional delegation.
  
  * Congress already targeted Nevada as a repository host for political, not 
  scientific, reasons. Current law, however, forbids the location of an interim 
  facility in Nevada, a prohibition designed to ensure the integrity of the 
  studies at Yucca Mountain.  Congress shouldn't break faith with a state that 
  has already fallen victim to the nuclear industry's whims or run roughshod over
  environmental standards to do so.  
  
  
  For more information contact Bill Magavern at:
  cmep@essential.org
  
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