ASSOCIATED PRESS

LAS VEGAS (AP) - It will be at least five years before construction can begin at the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal facility, Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said this week, as lawmakers grilled him about delays possibly affecting the creation of new power plants.

During a House subcommittee meeting on Energy Department spending Wednesday in Washington, D.C., lawmakers said the lack of proper waste disposal facilities could endanger efforts to license new power plants at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

"I think we have a very serious problem here," said Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-Ind.

Bodman appealed for patience.

"We really had a process that was broken, and we are trying to fix it," he said. The nuclear industry "is being patient with me. I ask for your patience as well."

Asked by Visclosky when Yucca Mountain was going to open, Bodman said: "I would guess at least five years before we are in a position to put a shovel in the ground to build it."

Bodman, who became energy secretary in January 2005, was questioned about continuing delays in the repository program, and about why the department was not seeking to establish interim storage sites where thousands of tons of radioactive spent fuel now piling up at power plants in 39 states could be kept.

Subcommittee chairman David Hobson, R-Ohio, said he was willing to help, "but we can't do it if you don't have a plan."

The Bush administration has been preparing legislation to speed work on Yucca Mountain, but it has been delayed in negotiations between the Energy Department and the White House.

The department has spent roughly $8 billion to research and begin development of the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

President Bush and Congress approved the project in 2002 with a target date for opening in 2010. But there have been a series of setbacks, leading project officials in recent months to push back the target date to 2012 or later.

A federal appeals court in July 2004 threw out a key radiation health standard, and a Nuclear Regulatory Commission has not validated an electronic document database that was a required precursor for NRC licensing.

Inspection audits by the department and by congressional investigators have raised questions about the quality of work being conducted by DOE and its management contractor, Bechtel SAIC.

Nevada critics of the repository said management is only part of the problem. They maintained that Yucca Mountain is fundamentally flawed for safe disposal of spent nuclear fuel.

"I'm glad to hear he's finally admitting that Yucca has serious problems," Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev. "I agree with him on the first part: Yucca Mountain is broken. But he's wrong about the second part; science has shown that Yucca cannot be fixed."

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., renewed a call for the department to abandon Yucca Mountain and to invest in dry cask technology to keep waste secured at power plants.

"What we really need is a fresh start on our nuclear waste policy, but that can never come so long as Yucca Mountain remains the Bush administration's sole focus," Berkley said.

Click here to view article on -line

Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal