December 20, 2007
Joint City-Council Impact Alleviation Committee Meeting

By Dave Maxwell

Washington D.C. attorney Barry Newman gave a presentation before the Joint City/Council Impact Alleviation Committee in Caliente December 4. It was basically the same presentation he had given at the County Commissioners meeting the day before. He explained the NCR licensing program and possible timeline decisions coming for the Committee and Lincoln County. However, with Department of Energy officials backing off their previous announced application date, the information Newman gave will likely change quite a bit.

DOE has steadfastly clung to a vow that their application would be ready by June 30, 2008, to apply to the NRC for a license to build the long-stalled nuclear waste site at Yucca Mountain.

On December 13, Project Director Ward Sproat announced that budget cuts being debated in Congress would most likely force the DOE to revise its goals. Depending on how much money lawmakers devote to Yucca, the schedule could be pushed back months or longer.

Sproat reported that until the budget is resolved, “I will not be able to answer the question, with certainty, whether I will be able to get a license application in by June 30, or whether I will be able to get a licensing application in by 2008.”

DOE officials have, for a long time, tied the fate of the Yucca Mountain project to their ability to score money from Congress to build the $57 billion complex. This new development marks the first time they have publicly raised the idea of backing away from the one date the department has been declaring with confidence. Yucca Mountain is where DOE wants to bury 77,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste.

DOE has often said they wanted to have the site open by 2017, but many experts think it will more likely be around 2025.

Nevada Senator Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, is reportedly seeking to cut the Yucca budget to below $400 million, much less than the $494.5 million that President Bush requested about a year ago.

In other action at the JCCIAC meeting, Jeremy Drew and Candace Jordon led the discussion of the Caliente Rail Corridor Special Project Study just completed by the team of Robison/Seidler and Resource Concepts, Energy and Railroad Consulting, and L & H Consulting. The report, in two volumes, detailed the impacts, alternatives and recommended mitigations of the private and public land proposed to be crossed by the DOE Caliente Rail Corridor and two alternative studies by the team at Cottontail Pass and the Lincoln County Short Route.

Jerry Parker with Energy and Railroad Consulting talked about an alternative rail line going from the Eccles siding through Antelope Valley. This route would connect with the DOE Caliente Rail Corridor at the Bennett Pass location, or further south in Dry Lake Valley in the Cliff Springs allotment, to meet the Lincoln County Short Route. Parker felt this alternative would eliminate most of the conflicts with the many private property owners in Meadow Valley, would be shorter to build and keep the grade, and remove conflicts with Bennett Pass area grazing operators.