Copyright 1999 St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Inc.
St.
Louis Post-Dispatch
June 17, 1999, Thursday, FIVE STAR LIFT
EDITION
SECTION: NEWS, Pg. A9
LENGTH: 288 words
HEADLINE:
PANEL URGES COMPROMISE ON NUCLEAR WASTE DISPOSAL;
SENATE REPUBLICANS ABANDON
DEMANDS FOR STORAGE FACILITY IN NEVADA
BYLINE: The
Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
BODY:
Senate Republicans took a major step
Wednesday toward a compromise on disposing of commercial nuclear waste.
They abandoned their demands for a temporary storage site in Nevada.
Instead, all 11 Republicans on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources C
ommittee joined with three Democrats to advance a bill that would:
* Keep the waste at nuclear reactors in 34 states.
* Transfer
ownership of the waste to the federal government.
Six Democrats
voted against the bill, which goes to the full Senate.
Although
President Bill Clinton's administration has yet to embrace the bill, its passage
in the committee may mark a breakthrough.
For five years, the government
has refused to take responsibility for more than 40,000 tons of highly
radioactive waste now kept at nuclear reactors.
Supporters of a nuclear
waste bill have been stymied in attempts to set up a temporary storage site in
Nevada until a permanent burial site can be built in the state's Yucca
Mountain area.
The industry has argued that the government is
committed to taking the waste and finding a temporary site. But Clinton has
insisted that an interim site would hamper development of the permanent site.
So on Wednesday, Sen. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, proposed the
compromise.
Under the plan, the waste would stay where it is, but the
government would have custody of it until a construction permit for the Yucca
facility is issued.
In turn, utilities would drop lawsuits against the
Energy Department for failing to take the waste.
The six Democrats who
voted against the compromise said it would strip the Environmental Protection
Agency of authority to regulate radiation exposure levels at the Yucca waste
site.
LOAD-DATE: July 15, 1999
