Pete Domenici: “Today my fellow Senators I am introducing legislation that I believe will place the Department of Energy's nuclear waste…”

“Today my fellow Senators I am introducing legislation that I believe will place the Department of Energy's nuclear waste program back on track. As we all know, the history of the Yucca Mountain project has been rocky at best. The Yucca Mountain project has a very long pedigree, starting back to the late 1950's when the National Academy of Sciences reported to the Atomic Energy Commission suggesting that burying radioactive high-level waste in geologic formations should receive consideration. In the 1980s, when Congress decided to pursue a geologic repository, we were quite optimistic--so optimistic that we told the Department of Energy--DOE--to enter into contracts with utilities that promised that we would begin taking nuclear waste off their hands by 1998. Well, obviously that didn't happen. What did happen was that the courts found that the government is liable for its failure to meet its contractual obligation. While moving more slowly than planned, DOE's nuclear waste program has made progress toward making the goal of a permanent geologic repository for nuclear waste a reality.”