Washington, D.C. – Nevada Senators Harry Reid and Richard Bryan today successfully avoided the first possible vote on S.1287, The Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act, allowing the democrats time to fully review the legislation before action on the bill commences next week.

"This battle to stop Yucca Mountain is not over, if anything it has only just begun. Unfortunately those who are driving this bill in the Senate have refused to reveal the changes in their legislation and that has made it more difficult to plan our response," said Reid. "But this delay will give us time to analyze their new bill and to gather support in the Senate against ramming through the Yucca Mountain legislation."

"The significance of our being able to delay a procedural vote on the nuclear waste bill is that the Republican leadership has, for the first time, agreed to share their latest amended version of their bill with us this week, rather than on the day the bill goes to the floor of the Senate for consideration. Obviously, we would have been severely handicapped in our efforts to oppose this legislation if we did not have the ability to review the legislation before the rest of the Senate," Senator Bryan stated.

In agreeing not to contest the motion to proceed, Reid and Bryan avoided a procedural vote which could have been used by Republican led advocates of the bill to misrepresent support for nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain.

"At the core, this is still a fight to prevent the rules from being changed midstream. The Energy Department is afraid they cannot meet their own scientific standards, especially for the protection of groundwater," said Reid. "We must also not overlook the danger that is inherent in moving thousands of tons of deadly nuclear waste to Nevada. The safety of 50 million Americans and their communities could be put in jeopardy because of attempts to ram through this misguided legislation."

Consideration of S.1287 in the Senate is now set to begin next week.