Rod Grams: “After this exchange of letters, I still felt troubled by Mr. Pena's inability to provide specific answers about how he…”

“After this exchange of letters, I still felt troubled by Mr. Pena's inability to provide specific answers about how he and the Clinton-Gore administration intend to resolve our Nation's nuclear waste storage problem. Because I have not received a sufficient response to date, I objected to an effort to expedite full consideration of Mr. Pena's nomination late last week. Since that time, however, I had a telephone conversation with the Secretary-designate over the nuclear waste issue. While I am still concerned with his continued lack of specific answers, I was pleased to hear Mr. Pena agree with me and the Federal courts that any resolution of this issue ultimately involves Federal responsibility. Contradicting what DOE Under Secretary Grumbly stated before the Energy and Natural Resources Committee last month, Mr. Pena provided verbal assurances of his commitment that our nuclear waste storage situation is a Federal problem worthy of a Federal solution. But what that means is taxpayers will still be asked to pay extra for the DOE's failure to do its job, and it creates the possibility of taxpayer liability high enough to make the public bailout of the savings and loan collapse seem small in comparison.”