County, McCain Express Views on Yucca Mountain
The Clark County (Nev.) Commission will formally renew its opposition to the Yucca Mountain Project and proclaim June 2008 as "Yucca Mountain Awareness Month" at its regularly scheduled board meeting on June 3, according to a press release.
"The Commission's staunch opposition to the repository has been steadfast," said Commission Chair Rory Reid. "We have two decade's worth of scientific, technical, and socioeconomic study with which to provide meaningful input to the licensing process."
The Department of Energy is expected to submit its license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this month. Clark County intends to actively participate in the upcoming licensing proceeding.
Clark County has opposed the project, intended to store the nation's high-level nuclear waste and spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain, for more than 20 years. The site is located approximately 100 miles from Las Vegas.
In related news, presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain said that there may not be a need for a nuclear waste storage facility.
"I would seek to establish an international repository for spent nuclear fuel that could collect and safely store materials overseas that might otherwise be reprocessed to acquire bomb-grade materials," McCain (R-Ariz.) said in a speech on international nuclear security at the University of Denver.
"It is even possible that such an international center could make it unnecessary to open the proposed spent fuel storage facility at Yucca Mountain," McCain said
Randy Scheunemann, McCain's senior foreign policy adviser, said the idea of an international repository is only practical in Siberia.
McCain's regional spokesman, Jeff Sadosky, said McCain is "just looking at new proposals out there. He believes they have merit and should be looked at because they could potentially alleviate the need for the Yucca Mountain site."