[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 94 (Thursday, June 27, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5501-S5502]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. WYDEN (for himself, Ms. Murkowski, Mrs. Feinstein, and Mr. 
        Alexander):
  S. 1240. A bill to establish a new organization to manage nuclear 
waste, provide a consensual process for siting nuclear waste 
facilities, ensure adequate funding for managing nuclear waste, and for 
other purposes; to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I rise today to join my colleagues in 
introducing the Nuclear Waste Administration Act.
  This bipartisan legislation, which has been years in the making, is 
also cosponsored by Senators Ron Wyden, Lisa Murkowski, and Lamar 
Alexander.
  This legislation represents our best attempt to establish a workable, 
long term nuclear waste policy for the United States, something our 
Nation lacks today, by implementing the unanimous recommendations of 
the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
  First, the bill would create an independent entity, the Nuclear Waste 
Administration, with the sole purpose of managing nuclear waste.
  Second, the bill would authorize the siting and construction of three 
types of waste facilities: a ``pilot'' waste storage facility for waste 
from shut down reactors, additional storage facilities for waste from 
other facilities, and permanent repositories to dispose of nuclear 
waste.
  Third, the bill creates a consent-based siting process for both 
storage facilities and repositories, based on the successful efforts to 
build waste facilities in other countries.
  The legislation requires that local, tribal, and State governments 
must consent to host waste facilities by signing incentive agreements, 
assuring that waste is only stored in the States and communities that 
want and welcome it.
  Fourth, the bill would direct the fees currently collected from 
nuclear power ratepayers to fund nuclear waste management, currently 
about $750 M annually, into a new Working Capital Fund available to the 
Nuclear Waste Administration to fund construction of waste facilities.
  Finally, the legislation ensures that the new Nuclear Waste 
Administration will be held accountable for meeting Federal 
responsibilities and stewarding Federal dollars.
  The Nuclear Waste Administrator will be appointed by the President 
and confirmed by the Senate. The Administration will be overseen by a 
five-member Nuclear Waste Oversight Board, modeled on the Defense 
Nuclear Facilities Board. The administration will have an Inspector 
General. The administration will not be able to access the corpus of 
the Nuclear Waste Trust Fund until it reaches agreement with a host 
community. Appropriators may limit the administration's spending, if 
necessary. Finally, if the agency fails to open a nuclear waste 
facility by 2025, additional funding will cease.

[[Page S5502]]

  The United States has 104 operating commercial nuclear power reactors 
that supply \1/5\ of our electricity and nearly 75 percent of our 
emissions-free power.
  However, production of this nuclear power has a significant downside: 
it produces nuclear waste that will take hundreds of thousands of years 
to decay. Unlike most nuclear nations, the United States has no program 
to consolidate waste in centralized facilities.
  Instead, we leave the waste next to operating and shut down reactors 
sitting in pools of water or in cement and steel dry casks. Today, 
approximately 70,000 metric tons of nuclear waste is stored at 
commercial reactor sites. This total grows by 2,000 metric tons each 
year.
  In addition to commercial nuclear waste, we must also address waste 
generated from creating our nuclear weapons stockpile and powering our 
Navy.
  The byproducts of nuclear energy represent some of the nation's most 
hazardous materials, but for decades we have failed to find a solution 
for their safe storage and permanent disposal. Most experts agree that 
this failure is not a scientific problem or an engineering 
impossibility; it is a failure of government.
  Although the Federal Government signed contracts committing to pick 
up commercial waste beginning in 1998, the Federal government's waste 
program has failed to take possession of a single fuel assembly.
  Our government has not honored its contractual obligations. We have 
been sued, and we have lost. So today, the Federal taxpayer is paying 
power plants to store the waste at reactor sites all over the nation. 
The cost of this liability is forecast to reach $20 billion by 2020.
  As we try to manage our growing national debt, we simply cannot 
tolerate continued inaction.
  In January 2012, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear 
Future completed a two-year comprehensive study and published unanimous 
recommendations for fixing our Nation's broken nuclear waste management 
program.
  The commission found that the only long-term, technically feasible 
solution for this waste is to dispose of it in a permanent underground 
repository. Until such a facility is opened, which will take many 
decades, spent nuclear fuel will continue to be an expensive, dangerous 
burden.
  That is why the commission also recommended that we establish an 
interim storage facility program to begin consolidating this dangerous 
waste, in addition to working on a permanent repository.
  Finally, after studying the experience of all nuclear nations, the 
commission found that siting these facilities is most likely to succeed 
if the host states and communities are welcome and willing partners, 
not adversaries. The commission recommended that we adopt a consent 
based nuclear facility siting process.
  Senators Wyden, Murkowski, Alexander, and I introduce this 
legislation in order to begin implementing those recommendations, 
putting us on a dual track toward interim and permanent storage 
facilities. The bill also reflects much work by former Senator 
Bingaman, who put forward a similar proposal as one of the last bills 
he wrote.
  In my view, one of the most important provisions in this legislation 
is the pilot program to begin consolidating nuclear waste at safer, 
more cost-efficient centralized facilities on an interim basis. The 
legislation will facilitate interim storage of nuclear waste in above-
ground canisters called dry casks. These facilities would be located in 
willing communities, away from population centers, and on thoroughly 
assessed sites.
  Some members of Congress argue that we should ignore the need to 
interim storage sites and instead push forward with a plan to open 
Yucca Mountain as a permanent storage site.
  Others argue that we should push forward only with repository plans 
in new locations.
  But the debate over Yucca Mountain, a controversial waste repository 
proposed in the Nevada desert, which lacks State approval, is unlikely 
to be settled any time soon.
  I believe the debate over a permanent repository does not need to be 
settled in order to recognize the need for interim storage. Even if 
Congress and a future president reverse course and move forward with 
Yucca Mountain, interim storage facilities would still be an essential 
component of a badly needed national nuclear waste strategy.
  By creating interim storage sites, a top recommendation of the Blue 
Ribbon Commission, we would begin reducing Federal liability while 
providing breathing room to site and build a permanent repository.
  Interim storage facilities could also provide alternative storage 
locations in emergency situations requiring spent nuclear fuel to be 
moved quickly from a reactor site.
  Both short- and long-term storage programs are vital. Permanently 
disposing of our current inventory of nuclear waste will take several 
decades.
  Because of that long timeline, interim storage facilities allow us to 
achieve significant cost savings for taxpayers and utility ratepayers 
by shuttering a number of nuclear plants.
  One thing is certain: inaction is the most costly and least safe 
option.
  Our longstanding stalemate is costly to taxpayers, utility ratepayers 
and communities that are involuntarily saddled with waste after local 
nuclear power plants have shut down.
  It leaves nuclear waste all over the country, stored in all different 
ways.
  It is long overdue for the government to honor its obligation to 
safely dispose of the Nation's nuclear waste.
  This will be a long journey, but we must take the first step.
                                 ______