Senate panel told it must rewrite the nuclear waste law before disposal sites can proceed

Congress would have to rewrite the Nuclear Waste Policy Act before the Department of Energy could move beyond preliminary talks toward building permanent disposal sites, witnesses told the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee at a hearing Wednesday, Sept. 23. Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska is a member of the committee.

The department announced memorandums of understanding in July with Utah, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Idaho, according to written testimony from Kathryn Huff, a University of Wisconsin-Madison nuclear engineering professor. Chairman Shelley Moore Capito said it has now signed with six, including her own West Virginia. A host state would take a share of the nation's waste in return for economic activity from the sites, which the department calls Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campuses.

Ratepayers have paid more than $50 billion into the Nuclear Waste Fund, Capito said, but Congress never appropriated enough to cover program costs. Katrina McMurrian, executive director of the Nuclear Waste Strategy Coalition, said the fund's $51 billion balance is "more than sufficient funding for virtually any program work for the foreseeable future" if Congress restores access to it.

Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester said Delaware weighs nuclear investment without a long-term waste solution. "It's a real risk for our communities," she said.

Lake Barrett of the American Nuclear Society's nuclear waste policy task force also testified. No one from a prospective host community appeared.