Judges hand Nevada a Yucca Mountain win

Three judicial panels deciding what issues will be argued in Nevada's battle to block licensing of the Yucca Mountain waste dump handed Nevada a major victory today.

Bruce Breslow, director of the Agency for Nuclear Projects, said the judges ruled 222 of the state's "contentions" " objections to the project " in for the licensing process.

He said only seven of the state's contentions were tossed out.

"This is a huge victory for the state of Nevada and a crushing blow to DoE's efforts to steamroll the state in the licensing process," Breslow said. "We've been bringing up these issues for 25 years and been told we'd have our chance in court.

"This shows the judges are listening," he said.

In general, those contentions deal with safety, environmental and transportation issues involving the dump. Breslow said one of the most important is the issue of corrosion of the casks which would hold the waste and the government's decision not to install drip shields over them to keep mineral-laced water from dripping on them.

While that means Nevada can raise nearly every objection it has to the repository designed to hold 78,000 tons of high level nuclear waste, it also raises the price of the battle.

 He said the state has $6.4 million in federal money for the licensing battle over the next two years and $2 million in the budget from the state. He said the state's legal team has estimated that, with that many issues to be decided, the fight will cost $20 million.

He said Nevada will try to convince the federal government it should increase funding to the state to properly defend its case.

He said even though the licensing process has begun, it won't happen quickly. Breslow said with discovery, depositions from the experts on both sides and extensive hearings, he believes it will take the full four years before the Atomic and Safety Licensing Board renders a decision to forward to the full Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Breslow received the news in a 153 page decision issues Monday.

"This will define the scope of things," he said.

The order also recognizes a list of parties to the licensing case in addition to the federal Department of Energy: Nevada, the Nuclear Energy Institute, the state of California, Nye, Clark, White Pine, Churchill, Esmeralda, Lander and Mineral counties, and Inyo County, California.