The Mescalero option

Abstract

The troubled state of the nations`s nuclear waste program is now more apparent than ever from the heated controversy that has emerged over a joint storage venture between some 30 utilities and the Mescalero Apache tribe of New Mexico. Tired of waiting for the government to make good on its promise to store nuclear waste, the utilities have struck out on their own. A monitored retrievable storage (MRS) facility for nuclear waste would give the utilities a place to store upto to 10,000 metric tons of spent fuels. Fees could run as high as $25 million per year. The Mescalero MRS facility would be developed and operated by a corporate entity owned in part by the utilities, with the Mescalero tribe holding the majority share. For this joint venture to succeed the utilities and Mescaleros must prevail over strong opposition by New Mexico officials and environmental and nuclear activists, all of whom want spent reactor fuel kept out. Spent fuel would be shipped to the reservation by rail. Sealed canisters containing the fuel would then be removed from the transport casks and inserted in fixed storage modeus providing massive shielding. Ownership of the fuel would remain with the utilities, andmore » the license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, to be based on extensive environmental and safety studies, would initially be for 20 years. By law the Department of Energy (DOE) is supposed to begin accepting spent fuel from the utilities on January 321, 1998. But nothing has been accomplished to this end - despite nearly 12 years since the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. The most obvious and most likely, solution to the utilities problems is a congressional mandate for DOE to build an MRS at the Nevada Test Site either at or near Yucca Mountain.« less