Huntsman takes N-storage opposition to Cheney

WASHINGTON — With the Nuclear Regulatory Commission poised to grant a license for storing high-level nuclear waste in Tooele County, Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. took the state's opposition directly to Vice President Dick Cheney Tuesday.

And he liked what he heard.

"He did his homework, he was in a receiving mode and he had some questions," Huntsman said after the meeting. "We got a very good response."

Huntsman, who met with the secretary of Homeland Security earlier in the day, used his Washington, D.C., meetings — his second on the nuclear waste issue in a month — to hammer home a point he said the NRC has ignored.

The research and design of the facility proposed by Private Fuel Storage were developed before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, he said. But the world changed that day, and Huntsman said the NRC has failed to consider homeland security issues as part of its deliberations.

"They looked at safety, but they did not look at security," Huntsman told the vice president. "That is the message we are trying to get to the highest level."

PFS, a consortium of nuclear power utilities, wants to store as much as 40,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel in above-ground canisters on Goshute tribal lands in Skull Valley in remote Tooele County. The waste would stay there until a permanent facility was opened, presumably at Yucca Mountain, Nev.

Earlier this year, the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, a quasi-judicial body that reviews license applications for the NRC, recommended that PFS be granted a license. The board is currently considering a state request to reconsider, but even Huntsman said the decision to grant the license is expected.

Consequently, the state is focusing its opposition efforts on blocking PFS through other administrative means, including appeals to the Department of Interior, which would still be required to approve the lease with the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes and to grant approval for a railroad spur to the site.

Huntsman's meeting with Cheney elevates the stakes by bringing Homeland Security into the mix — something where the White House might want to intervene.

"We have got to get people thinking about (the Homeland Security risks)," Huntsman said. "And Homeland Security has been left out. But the realities of life today have changed substantially since 9/11."

And, he added, the NRC has "not done due diligence on homeland security. So why not now?"

And if not the NRC, maybe the White House will listen.

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E-mail: spang@desnews.com