[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 2]
[House]
[Page 1853]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                DISTURBING REVELATIONS ON YUCCA MOUNTAIN

  (Ms. BERKLEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. BERKLEY. Mr. Speaker, a newspaper article headline states, 
``Yucca In need of Repair After 9 Years.'' It says that Yucca Mountain 
research facilities, from ground support to railroad tracks, need 
repairs after just 9 years of use.
  Now this is the same Yucca Mountain that the Energy Department is 
proposing to put hundreds of thousands of tons of toxic radioactive 
nuclear waste for hundreds of thousands of years.
  Just this past week Energy Secretary Bodman said, ``There are 
problems with the U.S. Geological Survey work that was done,'' and we 
now know that the work was fudged and they made up the data. ``There 
are problems with the EPA standards,'' and we know they are short by 
290,000 years. ``And there are problems with the efforts of the 
Department of Energy.''
  What did the Department of Energy just say: They can no longer 
estimate how long it will take to ready Yucca Mountain to accept 
nuclear waste or how much it will cost.
  The latest estimate is $308 billion, and now the Energy Department 
says that might not be right. It is time that we stop this boondoggle, 
end this project and let us figure out a sane and sensible way of 
dealing with nuclear energy in this country.

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