[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 43 (Monday, April 14, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3111-S3113]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
NUCLEAR WASTE POLICY ACT AMENDMENTS
The Senate continued with the consideration of the bill.
Mr. CRAIG. Mr. President, the Senate has before it at this moment,
and has for some days, through tomorrow, the consideration of Senate
bill 104, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1997.
Senator Frank Murkowski, chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources
Committee, and myself, along with a good number of others of our
colleagues, have recognized the need for this Government and this
Congress to clarify its position on high-level nuclear waste and spent
fuel in compliance with the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as
amended in 1987.
As a result of that recognition, that is exactly what we are doing.
We are certainly encouraging at this moment a resounding passage of
this bill tomorrow.
Mr. President, last week my colleague from Alaska, the chairman of
the committee, introduced the substitute. I am discouraged that in
spite of all the work we have done, the administration has not
withdrawn its veto threat of this legislation.
We have listened to the other side. We have incorporated amendments
from the other side. We have now picked up substantially more Members
from the other side who are supporting this bill.
I have recently reviewed, once again, the basis for the veto threat
and I find no remaining legitimate reason for this administration to be
in opposition.
Let me address just a couple of specifics for just a few moments.
The statement of administration policy states that S. 104 would
effectively establish Nevada as the site of an interim nuclear storage
facility before a viability assessment of Yucca Mountain is completed.
Not true. Mr. President, let me repeat, that is an untrue statement.
S. 104 designates the Nevada site as the location for the interim
storage facility after--after--the DOE completes the viability
assessment in 1998.
The statement of administration policy states that S. 104 would
create loopholes in the National Environmental Policy Act. The truth is
that the substitute has lengthened the duration of both licensing and
public participation opportunities. Again, what the President said and
what is in fact in the legislation simply do not relate.
The statement of administration policy states that S. 104 replaces
the Environmental Protection Agency's authority to set acceptable
radiation release standards with a statutory standard. Again, we have
fully addressed this concern. Our substitute reverses the approach on
setting an environmental standard for the deep geologic repository. S.
104, as introduced, set a standard of 100 millirem. Last week, I
addressed this body and set this 100 millirem in the proper context of
everyday risk from everyday living. I noted for my colleagues that we
receive an annual radiation dosage of 80 millirem simply by spending
most of our time inside the U.S. Senate. Why? It is a product of the
radiation that comes from the granite structure around the Senate body
itself. In other words, the normal decay of stone that is part of the
structure of this Capitol.
We have listened, however, to the concerns of our opponents and the
administration, that this legislation should contain a risk-based
standard. We have heard discussions. We have listened to those
suggestions and adopted the recommendations of the National Academy of
Science.
In our openness to enhance the broad bipartisan support already
enjoyed by this legislation, we have listened to all of those
suggestions. Therefore, our substitute now requires that the
Environmental Protection Agency determine a risk-based radiation
standard for the repository.
In other words, we tried to utilize all national and international
standards that are acceptable to the public, based on science, but were
forced to say, OK, you won't believe the truth, then we will allow the
Environmental Protection Agency latitude in developing those standards.
Our substitute directs that the Environmental Protection Agency set
this radiation standard in accordance with the National Academy of
Science's recommendations.
Mr. President, I commend my colleague, the chairman of the Energy and
Natural Resources Committee, the Senator from Alaska, for conducting a
process for developing this legislation and this substitute, in what I
believe to be an unprecedented character of openness and willingness to
hear and respond to the concerns of our opponents. There is simply, Mr.
President, no legitimate remaining basis for the administration's
opposition to this legislation. I urge the President of the United
States not to fight this Congress. This Congress will soon express its
will on the issue and, most likely, the outcome will be the same broad,
bipartisan consensus that we developed in the last Congress.
Mr. President, I said a few days ago on this floor that this
legislation was
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good science and good engineering and good technology, and that there
would be one simple reason to oppose it, and that would be political. I
stand here today with the amendments the chairman has accepted and the
character of this legislation when it comes to final passage. I now can
say in fact that there are no impediments for this administration to
accept this legislation, except for politics, and politics alone.
I am amazed that the President of the United States can say that,
because of his politics, he is willing to ask the American people to
pay an additional $80 billion--or potentially that amount--in a
negative environmental situation, when we are standing here today with
a very positive environmental move that would cost less than about $3
billion to develop an interim storage facility. This facility would
allow the Congress of the United States and the administration to say
to the American people that we will abide by the law, we will adhere to
the courts and the laws that have already been passed by past
Congresses to develop a deep geologic repository, and we will do so in
a timely fashion. That is the issue before the Congress when it
considers S. 104.
I hope my colleagues will join with us in a resounding bipartisan
vote as we deal with this critical national major environmental issue.
We have worked to resolve it in a balanced approach that all can agree
with. I think the efforts of Senator Murkowski will be demonstrated in
a vote that we see cast on this legislation tomorrow.
With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence
of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. LOTT. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. LOTT. Madam President, in 1982, Congress passed the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act and tasked the Federal Government with the handling of spent
nuclear waste from commercial powerplants and military usages. Despite
the clear congressional intent of the act, the Department of Energy has
avoided and delayed positive action regarding temporary and permanent
storage of nuclear waste.
The 1982 act called for a permanent waste repository to be built by
1998. But DOE now says the earliest a repository will be ready is 2010.
Given 15 years of relative inaction, this delay and avoidance history
does not engender faith that the current administration will address
this issue in a timely manner absent congressional action. Regrettably,
the country that harnessed energy of the atom can't seem to accomplish
the basic task of storing and disposing of waste.
The Federal Government promised nuclear energy consumers that it
would develop a plan to dispose of the waste. Congress obligated the
Federal Government to begin the waste collection program in 1998. A
Federal court of appeals ruled in 1996 that this is a binding legal
obligation.
The Federal Government, therefore, has a binding, legal obligation to
pick up the nuclear waste scattered throughout the Nation's coastal
communities, farm lands and industrial centers. It must remove used
nuclear fuel from 34 States that now store used fuel at nuclear
powerplants that were never intended to hold the waste until the end of
time.
Due to the foresight of 15 Senators who reported the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act of 1997 out of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee
and in particularly its architects, Senators Frank Murkowski and Larry
Craig, we are here today to put this program back on the road to
recovering used fuel from commercial powerplants and DOE facilities
that store high-level radioactive waste from defense-related projects.
In 30 years of operation, that waste has amounted to a relatively small
sum, given that nuclear electricity powers 65 million homes at any
given time in the United States. All of the used fuel produced from
nuclear electricity during its history, if stacked end to end, would
span a football field to a depth of almost 4 yards.
While a permanent repository is the ultimate requirement, no one can
legitimately deny that an interim storage facility is an absolute
necessity.
Let's talk for a minute about the cost to the public. America's
electricity consumers have relied upon the availability of nuclear
energy. But such consumption did not occur in a vacuum and without
cost. These energy users have already committed nearly $13 billion to
pay for the Federal waste disposal program--a staggering figure
considering there's nothing to show for such costs to date except for a
few feasibility studies. The bill continues to climb, even as the
Department of Energy says it will be unable to start taking used fuel
by the 1998 deadline.
Some States are so frustrated by the Federal Government's failure on
this program that they are considering withholding their share of the
more than $600 million a year that flows from electricity customers to
the U.S. Treasury. How can we blame them?
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1997, would put an end to
bureaucratic delays and spiraling program costs by integrating three
components:
First, a Federal storage facility for centralized management of used
fuel until a permanent disposal facility is ready;
Second, a continued scientific study on a permanent disposal site at
Yucca Mountain, NV; and,
Third, a transportation network to move used fuel safely from nuclear
powerplants, research reactors and DOE sites to storage and disposal
facilities.
It has been argued by some that we cannot safely transport spent or
used nuclear fuel waste from nuclear powerplants to a central storage
facility. Certainly the naysayers recognize that we do not intend to
throw used nuclear fuel on a truckbed or in a boxcar.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has rigid standards about the types
of containers it permits nuclear waste to be transported in. All such
containers must receive their stamp of approval. Before such approval,
containers must undergo an onslaught of tests without breaking open and
allowing radiation to escape. They must successively withstand a 30-
foot drop onto a flat, unyielding surface; a drop of 40 inches onto a
steel spike; and a fully engulfing fire burning at 1,475 degrees
Fahrenheit.
For proof of the canisters' performance, look at the safety record of
the 2,400-plus shipments of used nuclear fuel that have taken place in
the United States during the past three decades. Not one used fuel
container has ever ruptured during those trips. Radioactive fuel has
never been released, harmed the environment, or caused any injury or
public safety threat.
By shipping to a single storage spot, we are reducing the level of
risk. A remote, desert location would provide an added margin of
safety. Logically, used fuel can be managed more efficiently and
effectively at an individual site than it can at multiple sites.
S. 104 goes further to alleviate safety concerns by ensuring that
Federal funds and resources are channeled to State and tribal officials
for public safety training to handle and manage used fuel long before
the first shipment enters their area.
Many of my colleagues know what it's like to have nuclear waste
sitting in their backyards. Pennsylvania, for instance, currently
stores 2,920 metric tons of uranium at nine nuclear powerplant sites
next door to dairy farms and the fourth largest apple producing region
in the country. Failure to adopt S. 104 would be irresponsible in the
face of current storage arrangements and limitations. By passing S.
104, my colleagues can prove our resolve to end the Nation's nuclear
waste dilemma.
Nuclear waste disposal must not become mired in petty politics. There
is no better time to act on nuclear waste disposal than now. It's the
only prudent and economic course. The greater delay, the greater the
costs to taxpayers and electricity consumers. A new user fee mechanism
proposed in S. 104 would continue funding nuclear waste disposal on a
self-financing basis and adapt the nuclear waste fund to recent changes
in the Federal budget process.
Funds originally intended to cover the cost of the nuclear waste
disposal program have been diverted elsewhere to offset deficit
spending. Detouring waste fund payments may help counteract the
deficit, but it does little to further the Federal Government's
obligation to managed used nuclear fuel. In
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reality, even though consumers have committed more than $13 billion to
the nuclear waste fund, the Energy Department has spent only about $6
billion. That's about 30 cents on the dollar being spent on the waste
program. In America, we live under the premise that you ought to get
what you pay for. Our constituents aren't getting what they paid for.
Inaction on the part of Congress in ordering the Energy Department to
act could force other complications, including whether State utility
regulators will permit additional on-site storage. In Minnesota, the
State legislature was forced to settle the issue and established new,
high-priced requirements for the utility to meet before securing more
waste containers. That costly burden may force utilities to consider
shutting down nuclear plants prematurely. Is nuclear electricity to
become a casualty of misguided DOE planning or continue, through this
legislation, to be a reliable, clean energy source.
Don't forget that this legislation isn't just about finding a
suitable spot for commercial nuclear waste. States like Idaho must
worry about permanent storage for high-level radioactive waste from
defense-related activities and used fuel from research reactors. Idaho
is host to a wide range of defense facility wastes at the Idaho
National Engineering Laboratory. Cleanup of INEL is likely to take
decades. But how does the Federal Government plan to clean up this site
if it has no place to dispose of the high-level waste? Leaving it in
the vicinity of the Snake River and Sun Valley hardly qualifies as
proper action on the part of the Federal Government.
That's why S. 104 calls for DOE to factor those types of used fuel
into its capacity at an interim storage facility and ultimately at a
permanent underground repository. This amount of waste from defense
activities, naval reactors, universities, and foreign research
reactors, at a minimum, must be no less than 5 percent of total
acceptance during a given year.
At Idaho National Engineering Laboratory, the Department of Energy
collects fuel from naval and research reactor projects like
Connecticut, and Illinois' Argonne National Laboratory, New Mexico,
Maryland, Colorado, and California's Aerotest and General Atomics
sites.
DOE is also sending used nuclear fuel to Idaho from foreign research
reactors. Idaho National Engineering Laboratory will accept used fuel
assemblies from the Pacific rim this year, even though the Federal
Government will not commit to taking used fuel from commercial reactors
as it is obligated to next year. And while our taxpaying, electricity
consuming constituents are shouldering the entire burden to develop a
national waste disposal plan, the Department of Energy and the Clinton
administration are willing to have our constituents assume the full
cost of transporting and managing the spent nuclear fuel from foreign
countries with research reactors that can't afford to pay for the
service. Why should we be debating this storage issue with Clinton
administration opposition when the Department of Energy's position is
to help foreign countries with their nuclear waste storage problems
before that Department is willing to address our country's own storage
problems in a meaningful way?
Most importantly, perhaps, let me say that this legislation is
without question the most environmentally sound bill this Congress has
the opportunity to approve.
S. 104 fully complies with the National Environmental Policy Act. It
calls for environmental impact statements for an interim central
storage facility and a permanent, underground repository. Judicial
review of both impact statements ensures acceptable health and safety
standards. It is designed to choose transportation routes that minimize
impact on the environment and population centers--by avoiding densely
populated areas and shipping only along specified rail and highway
routes. States can also participate in the route selection.
By finding a suitable place to store nuclear waste, it ensures that
Americans will continue to enjoy clean, cost-effective nuclear
electricity that is part of the U.S. diverse blend of energy sources.
Since 1973, our Nation's nuclear powerplants have reduce the cumulative
amount of emissions from carbon dioxide, the chief greenhouse gas, by
1.9 billion metric tons of carbon. In fact, it many reasonably be
asserted that S. 104 furthers the Clinton administration's climate
change action plan, which is intended to achieve a Presidentially
imposed U.S. limit to carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by 2000.
That's a reduction of 108 million metric tons of carbon.
Madam President, I would like to address our attempts to work with
the Clinton administration and the Department of Energy to reach an
agreement on how we can expeditiously proceed to resolve this problem.
The plain fact of the matter is that little progress was made during
the past 4 years, and the current position of the administration holds
little hope for much progress during the President's current term of
office. The administration and the Department of Energy continue to
only pay lip service to the problem without offering any meaningful
alternative to the solutions proposed in S. 104.
S. 104 is the fulfillment of the promise of Congress to the American
people and will begin the process of putting in place storage
facilities for spent nuclear fuel. We must continue to find solutions
to potential problems created in the 20th century before we begin to
build bridges to the 21st century. In preparing for our future, we must
clearly remained focused on the present.
The fact is, simply stated, that this country has 109 nuclear
powerplants operating and providing more than 20 percent of our
electricity in a process that produces no harmful air emissions. We
have the responsibility, in return, to ensure that the nuclear waste
from those facilities and from defense-related activities is
safeguarded and managed in a reasonable and reliable manner. This isn't
a decision to impose upon future generations. It is a decision that is
our responsibility to make now.
In closing, I would like to commend Senators Murkowski, Craig, and
all those who cosponsored and worked for the passage of S. 104 for
their diligence in pressing forward and recognizing the importance of
achieving bipartisan support to enact meaningful reform for the benefit
of the American people. Finally it appears that we are going to pass
the legislation which would carry out the intent of that act. If we do
not, it would be another 15 years before we would get a final result
and billions more dollars. We need to act on this legislation. I am
assured that the House is going to act this year, and we can send this
legislation to the President for his hoped-for signature or his veto,
if he feels so inclined. But I think it is a very important issue. This
is in my opinion the most important environmental issue that faces this
country. We have nuclear waste in temporary sites in cooling ponds in
States, buried in South Carolina, Vermont, in my own State of
Mississippi, Idaho, Minnesota, and from the shores of the Atlantic to
the shores of the Pacific. This waste is there and we need action. We
need it now.
This legislation has been carefully drafted. The concerns that have
been raised about transportation are properly addressed here.
Madam President, I urge my colleagues to support this very carefully
crafted legislation.
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