It’s unlikely that Congress will put money into Yucca Mountain in a year when a member of the Republican Senate majority is up for reelection in the project’s home state, an expert said during a nuclear energy conference this week.
Money for the long-proposed spent nuclear fuel repository in Nevada is unexpected, but anything is possible in Congress, said Victoria S. Napier, senior vice president of government and public affairs at SNC-Lavalin’s ATKINS, an engineering and construction project management group. Napier, a former Department of Energy official who previously worked as former Gov. Kenny Guinn’s deputy chief of staff, spoke as part of a panel Wednesday at the RadWaste Summit at Green Valley Resort.
“I would be surprised if Yucca Mountain funding was included … from a Senate perspective, only because we’re so close to the midterm election for Sen. Dean Heller,” she said. “It would seem somewhat myopic for them to put that in a bill and announce that several weeks before an election, but in Washington all things are possible.”
Heller is the only Republican Senator running for reelection in a state that Hillary Clinton won in 2016, facing Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen in the general election. Nevada has been officially and nearly unanimously against the Yucca Mountain project for decades, putting millions into fighting the proposal through licensing, litigation and legislation.
Yvonne Gonzalez – Las Vegas Sun – September 5, 2018.
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