A divided U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has decided to wait a few months before deciding whether to order the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to restart license review of the Department of Energy (DOE) application to develop a nuclear waste repository at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain.
In an order issued Aug. 3, the three-judge panel for the court decided to put its ruling on hold in hopes Congress might address funding for the NRC license review as part of its Fiscal Year 2013 budget package.
The court said that it would hold the case “in abeyance” for now and asked the parties to file, no later than Dec. 14, updates on FY 2013 appropriations with regard to the Yucca Mountain license.
In May, attorneys for the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC) and plaintiffs from various state and local governments argued that NRC defied a congressional mandate by electing to stop the license process.
NARUC and the states alleged that the NRC, and in particular former Chairman Greg Jaczko, acted politically instead of scientifically after DOE, which filed the Yucca Mountain license application in June 2008, asked to withdraw its application in March 2010, claiming that the Nevada venue is no longer an option.
The NRC has argued that it was not pouring good money after bad, because the $10m it had available for the Yucca license review would not be enough to finish the job.
The Obama Administration has opposed the Yucca Mountain project, eventually impaneling the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to evaluate options for the back end of the nuclear cycle.
READ MORE...
No comments:
Post a Comment
This is an unmoderated blog. Please be professional and respectful as you post.