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THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY’S ROLE IN 

MANAGING CIVILIAN RADIOACTIVE WASTE 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND ECONOMY 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND 

COMMERCE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

JUNE 1, 2011 

Serial No. 112–54 

( 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce 

energycommerce.house.gov 

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

Chairman 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

Chairman Emeritus 

CLIFF STEARNS, Florida 

ED WHITFIELD, Kentucky 

JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois 

JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania 

MARY BONO MACK, California 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon 

LEE TERRY, Nebraska 

MIKE ROGERS, Michigan 

SUE WILKINS MYRICK, North Carolina 

Vice Chairman 

JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma 

TIM MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

BRIAN BILBRAY, California 

CHARLIE BASS, New Hampshire 

PHIL GINGREY, Georgia 

STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana 

BOB LATTA, Ohio 

CATHY MCMORRIS RODGERS, Washington 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

LEONARD LANCE, New Jersey 

BILL CASSIDY, Louisiana 

BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

DAVID MCKINLEY, West Virginia 

CORY GARDNER, Colorado 

MIKE POMPEO, Kansas 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California 

Ranking Member 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan 

Chairman Emeritus 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York 

FRANK PALLONE, JR., New Jersey 

BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois 

ANNA G. ESHOO, California 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

LOIS CAPPS, California 

MICHAEL F. DOYLE, Pennsylvania 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

CHARLES A. GONZALEZ, Texas 

JAY INSLEE, Washington 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

MIKE ROSS, Arkansas 

ANTHONY D. WEINER, New York 

JIM MATHESON, Utah 

G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina 

JOHN BARROW, Georgia 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, Virgin Islands 

(II)

(III) 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND ECONOMY

JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois 

Chair 

TIMOTHY F. MURPHY, Pennsylvania 

Vice Chairman 

ED WHITFIELD, Kentucky 

JOSEPH R. PITTS, Pennsylvania 

MARY BONO MACK, California 

JOHN SULLIVAN, Oklahoma 

CHARLES F. BASS, New Hampshire 

ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio 

CATHY MCMORRIS RODGERS, Washington 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

BILL CASSIDY, Louisiana 

CORY GARDNER, Colorado 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

FRED UPTON, Michigan, ex officio 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

Ranking Member 

TAMMY BALDWIN, Wisconsin 

G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina 

JOHN BARROW, Georgia 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

FRANK PALLONE, JR., NEW JERSEY

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

LOIS CAPPS, California 

JOHN D. DINGELL, Michigan 

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California, ex officio 

(V) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hon. John Shimkus, a Representative in Congress from the State of Illinois, 

opening statement ................................................................................................ 1 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 2 

Hon. John Barrow, a Representative in Congress from the State of Georgia, 

opening statement ................................................................................................ 3 

Hon. Joe Barton, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, 

opening statement ................................................................................................ 4 

Hon. Henry A. Waxman, a Representative in Congress from the State of 

California, opening statement ............................................................................. 6 

Hon. Gene Green, a Representative in Congress from the State of Texas, 

prepared statement .............................................................................................. 52 

WITNESSES

Hon. Shelley Berkley, a Representative in Congress from the State of Nevada 8 

Hon. Doc Hastings, a Representative in Congress from the State of Washington .................................................................................................................... 11 

Hon. Mike Simpson, a Representative in Congress from the State of Idaho ..... 13 

Mark E. Gaffigan, Managing Director, Natural Resources and Environment, 

U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) .................................................. 15 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 17 

Gregory H. Friedman, Inspector General, Department of Energy ...................... 36 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 37 

Peter B. Lyons, Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy, Department of Energy ........................................................................................................................ 46

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 48 

Gary Hollis, Chairman, Nye County Board of County Commissioners, Nye 

County, Nevada .................................................................................................... 73 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 76 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 145 

Martin G. Malsch, Partner, Egan, Fitzpatrick, Malsch and Lawrence, on 

behalf of the State of Nevada .............................................................................. 80 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 82 

Greg R. White, Commissioner, Michigan Public Service Commission ................ 95 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 97 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 149 

Christopher A. Kouts, Former Acting Director of Department of Energy’s 

Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management ........................................... 106 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 108 

Answers to submitted questions ...................................................................... 153 

SUBMITTED MATERIAL

Letter of June 1, 2011, from Mr. Waxman and Mr. Green to Messrs. Upton 

and Shimkus, submitted by Mr. Waxman ......................................................... 129 

Letter of May 27, 2011, from the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s 

Nuclear Future to Messrs. Upton and Shimkus, submitted by Mr. Green ..... 124 

Letter of May 31, 2011, from the Board of County Commissioners of Clark 

County, Nevada to Mssrs. Shimkus and Green, submitted by Mr. Green ...... 127 

Resolutions from Nevada counties, submitted by Gary Hollis ............................. 131 

(1) 

THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY’S ROLE IN 

MANAGING CIVILIAN RADIOACTIVE WASTE 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 1, 2011 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND ECONOMY, COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 1:15 p.m., in room 

2322 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. John Shimkus 

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Members present: Representatives Shimkus, Barton, Whitfield, 

Pitts, Murphy, Bass, Cassidy, Gardner, Dingell, Green, Inslee, 

Butterfield, Barrow and Waxman (ex officio). 

Staff present: Carl Anderson, Professional Staff Member; Gary 

Andres, Staff Director; Charlotte Baker, Press Secretary; Mike 

Bloomquist, Deputy General Counsel; Sean Bonyun, Deputy Communications Director; Todd Harrison, Chief Counsel, Oversight and 

Investigations; Cory Hicks, Policy Coordinator, Energy and Power; 

Katie Novaria, Legislative Clerk; Chris Sarley, Policy Coordinator, 

Environment and Economy; Peter Spencer, Professional Staff Member, Oversight; Kristin Amerling, Democratic Chief Counsel and 

Oversight Staff Director; Tiffany Benjamin, Democratic Investigative Counsel; Alison Cassady, Democratic Senior Professional Staff 

Member; Jocelyn Gutierrez, Department of Energy Detailee; and 

Caitlin Haberman, Democratic Policy Analyst. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN SHIMKUS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I call this hearing to order to recognize myself. 

This is a part of our ongoing effort at the committee to make certain we are providing safe and sustainable long-term storage of 

high-level spent nuclear fuel. Specifically today, we focus our attention on the part the Department of Energy plays and the process 

by which decisions have been made when it comes to a long-term 

repository. 

No matter if you support the continued use of nuclear energy or 

if you don’t, we have a responsibility to deal with existing spent 

nuclear fuel and high-level waste materials from our Nation’s defense complex. As we sit in this room, spent nuclear fuel from commercial power plants is piling up and remains scattered around the 

country in two-thirds of our States. 

It was always the determination that the Federal Government, 

not the individual states and not the utility companies, would take 

responsibility for the safe storage of spent fuel and other nuclear 

2 

materials. After a careful search, we found a scientifically proven, 

geologically ideal site to store these materials that is on secure, 

federal property, in a remote desert, deep under Yucca Mountain. 

Now we are at a crossroads. Politics, not science, is driving the 

debate. It is time for us to decide if we will keep our end of the 

deal with the Nation’s citizens by delivering exactly what they have 

been paying for all these years, or if we will waste ratepayers’ and 

taxpayer money by failing to deliver on our end of the contract. 

Recently, the Government Accountability Office released a report 

examining the results of the Obama Administration’s withdrawal of 

the Yucca Mountain license application. What GAO found was this 

unilateral decision comes at a cost of $15 billion so far, 9.5 billion 

of it directly collected from every American’s electricity bill. But the 

fleecing of taxpayers won’t end there. GAO estimates taxpayers are 

already on the hook for $15 billion and an additional $500 million 

for each year the project is delayed beyond 2020. Meanwhile, the 

U.S. Treasury will be paying out taxpayer dollars, not ratepayer 

dollars, in judgments to utilities for DOE’s breach of contract. 

Billions of dollars and over 30 years of research from our Nation’s top scientists were jettisoned, not for technical or safety reasons, but as the GAO report stated, ‘‘social and political opposition 

to a permanent repository, not technical issues, is the key obstacle.’’ 

When I visited Yucca Mountain last month, I heard firsthand the 

overwhelming support from local residents and officials from the 

seven surrounding counties. We will hear firsthand of that support 

today from those representing locals closest to Yucca Mountain, 

locals who raise families in that area and know it is safe. Those 

who would be directly affected the most took it upon themselves to 

ensure the safety of their children and grandchildren through an 

independent scientific investigative program, and what they found 

was high-level nuclear fuel could be stored at Yucca Mountain 

while keeping their water supply safe, a major concern, particularly for locals. They also know it has the ability to infuse desperately needed jobs both directly and indirectly related to the 

Yucca Mountain site. 

We must not let the political games stop us from keeping a promise to taxpayers. The licensing process for Yucca Mountain must legally continue so that we can give the American people the surety 

of a safe, centralized, permanent storage site for spent nuclear fuel. 

I want to thank all of our witnesses for being here today to give 

us their perspective on moving forward. I look forward to their 

verbal testimony and willingness to answer any questions members 

may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Shimkus follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN SHIMKUS

I call this hearing to order and recognize myself for 5 minutes. This is part of 

our ongoing effort at the committee to make certain we are providing safe and sustainable long term storage of high level spent nuclear fuel. Specifically today we 

focus our attention on the part the Department of Energy plays and the process by 

which decisions have been made when it comes to a long term repository. 

No matter if you support the continued use of nuclear energy or if you don’t, we 

have a responsibility to deal with existing spent nuclear fuel and high level waste 

materials from our nation’s defense complex. As we sit in this room, spent nuclear 

3 

fuel from commercial power plants is piling up and remains scattered around the 

country in two-thirds of our states. 

It was always the determination that the federal government—not the individual 

states and not the utility companies—would take responsibility for the safe storage 

of spent fuel and other nuclear materials. After a careful search, we found a scientifically proven, geologically ideal site to store these materials. That’s on secure, federal property, in a remote desert, deep under Yucca Mountain. 

Now we are at a crossroads. Politics, not science, is driving the debate. It’s time 

for us to decide if we will keep our end of the deal with the nation’s citizens by delivering exactly what they’ve been paying for all these years, or if we’ll waste rate 

payer’s and taxpayer money by failing to deliver on our end of the contract. 

Recently the Government Accountability Office released a report examining the 

results of the Obama Administration’s withdraw of the Yucca Mountain license application. What GAO found was this unilateral decision comes at a cost of 15 billion 

dollars so far—9.5 billion of it directly collected from every American’s electricity 

bill. But the fleecing of taxpayers won’t end there. GAO estimates taxpayers are already on the hook for $15 billion and an additional $500 million dollars for each 

year the project is delayed beyond 2020. Meanwhile, the U.S. Treasury will be paying out taxpayer dollars, not ratepayer dollars in judgments to utilities for DOE’s 

breach of contract. 

Billions of dollars and over 30 years of research from our nation’s top scientists 

were jettisoned—not for technical or safety reasons—but as the GAO’s report stated, 

‘‘social and political opposition to a permanent repository, not technical issues, is the 

key obstacle.’’ 

When I visited Yucca Mountain last month I heard firsthand the overwhelming 

support from local residents and officials from the seven surrounding counties. We 

will hear firsthand of that support today from those representing locals closest to 

Yucca Mountain. 

Locals who raise families in that area and know it is safe. Those who would be 

directly affected the most took it upon themselves to ensure the safety of their children and grandchildren through an independent scientific investigation program. 

And what they found was high-level nuclear fuel could be stored at Yucca Mountain 

while keeping their water supply safe—a major concern particularly for locals. They 

also know it has the ability to infuse desperately needed jobs both directly and indirectly related to the Yucca Mountain site. 

We must not let the political games stop us from keeping a promise to taxpayers. 

The licensing process for Yucca Mountain must legally continue so that we can give 

the American people the surety of a safe, centralized, permanent storage site for 

spent nuclear fuel. 

I want to thank all of our witnesses for being here today to give us their perspective on moving forward. I look forward to their verbal testimony and willingness to 

answer any questions members may have. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. With that, I will yield back the balance of my time 

and recognize the ranking member, Mr. Barrow from Georgia. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN BARROW, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF GEORGIA 

Mr. BARROW. Thank you, Chairman Shimkus, for holding this 

hearing, and I appreciate the participation of all of our witnesses 

today. 

Mr. Green has asked me to fill his chair in his absence, and I 

would like to think that at least in part is because he knows something about my district that makes this hearing particularly important to me. Considering both the commercial and the defense applications, I probably represent as many people touched by the nuclear industry as anyone else in Congress. 

I am proud to represent the expanding Plant Vogtle in Burke 

County, Georgia, and I also represent a large percentage of people 

who work at the Savannah River site just across the river in South 

Carolina. The workers, the families and associated industries attached to those facilities number many thousands, and other posiVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:32 Aug 01, 2012 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 112\112-54 060111\112-54 CHRIS
4 

tive economic impacts are very high. For example, Burke County 

collects about 75 percent of all its tax revenues from just Plant 

Vogtle. That is a lot of schoolbooks, police cars and trash pickups 

from just one corporate citizen. 

However, those benefits bring challenges. The nuclear industry is 

only as safe as we make it. Up to this point, we have managed the 

processes and the waste well, and we have had a very safe industry. However, as the industry grows as it is doing in Georgia and 

a couple of other places around the country and as the waste accumulates, we need to have a concerted waste management strategy. 

I believe we are too far down the Yucca Mountain road in time 

and in money to turn back now, but if we aren’t going to pursue 

Yucca, then we need to be working together on another strategy 

and we need to stick with it. That is one reason why I am disappointed that the Blue Ribbon Commission was unable to participate today. The Blue Ribbon Commission was recently in my district at Vogtle and at Savannah River site. I am hopeful they will 

have some concrete consensus solutions to offer, and I suggest that 

it is in the committee’s best interest to have them back as soon as 

possible. 

I know the witnesses today will have some good insight on the 

way forward. I want to thank them for their time, I want to thank 

the chairman, and I yield back. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

As Mr. Barton makes his way up here, the chair would like to 

recognize the chairman emeritus, Mr. Barton, for the 5 minutes 

which hopefully he will apportion out to Mr. Whitfield and Mr. 

Gardner if he shows. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOE BARTON, A 

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF TEXAS 

Mr. BARTON. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank our distinguished first panel of Members. It is good to see you and we are 

especially glad that Congressman Hastings is back and we are 

hope you are healthy. Just remember, this is the Energy and Commerce Committee. No more shenanigans like you were trying earlier. 

Mr. Chairman, our Nation is sitting on 13,000 metric tons of 

spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. Our Nation is 

sitting on over 65,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel from commercial nuclear power plants in 75 sites in 33 states. That is 

78,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel in over 80 sites in over 33 

states. Yucca Mountain was approved by the previous Administration as a repository for our nuclear waste. As you well know, we 

spent over $15 billion in taxpayer and ratepayer funds through 

2009. It is clear that safe and permanent storage of nuclear waste 

is a critical element of a long-term energy strategy. Study after 

study has shown that Yucca Mountain is suitable for storage of 

that waste. 

We are now here today to discuss the Department of Energy’s 

reckless decision to terminate the Yucca Mountain repository. In 

my opinion, the Administration decided to ignore the science and 

circumvent the law. This Administration has for what I think are 

political reasons determined that Yucca is not a workable option 

5 

and is proposing that millions of taxpayer dollars be spent in further studies. I think it is unsettling that DOE stopped short of 

characterizing Yucca as unsuitable, instead choose unworkable. It 

seems clear that this Administration did this to circumvent the law 

as defined by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act to avoid explaining to 

the Congress the basis for their determination. 

We know that the economic impact of DOE’s decision is tremendous. There is no guarantee that a more acceptable or less costly 

alternative can be identified, which will only prolong the need for 

interim storage of spent nuclear fuel at existing reactor sites. 

Delays in opening a repository have already created an estimated 

$15.6 billion in taxpayer liability plus an additional $500 million 

for each year beyond 2020. This is not only a financial issue but 

it is also a national security issue. We cannot have over 78,000 

tons of radioactive waste scattered across 75 sites. We need a central repository. In my opinion, that repository is Yucca Mountain. 

At this point I would like to yield to the distinguished subcommittee chairman, Mr. Whitfield. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. Thank you, Mr. Barton. 

I would just like to say, this is, in my view, a perfect example 

of a wasteful Federal Government on a very important project. You 

have already heard about the amount of money that has been 

spent, $15 billion. You have heard about 65,000 tons located in 33 

States and 75 sites. You have heard about the legal liability of the 

Federal Government being sued by nuclear power plants because 

the Federal Government has not taken responsibility for this material, and that is an ongoing liability. That liability is already in excess of $15 billion. Estimates could easily go up to $50 billion. And 

it is no wonder the American people are frustrated with the Federal Government and this $14 trillion federal debt that we have. 

So I want to thank Chairman Shimkus for having this important 

hearing to bring attention to the predicament we find ourselves in, 

and hopefully we can find a solution, and I would yield back. 

Mr. BARTON. I am supposed to yield to Mr. Gardner but I don’t 

see him. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. If the chairman emeritus would yield to Mr. Murphy from Pennsylvania? 

Mr. BARTON. OK. I would yield the remaining time to Dr. Murphy. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you very much. 

We know that the States are suing the Department of Energy because the mandate with an application approved waste storage in 

Yucca Mountain, and the utilities have sued the DOE to halt further collection of fees, arguing that the country no longer has a disposal plan after ruling out Yucca Mountain. Simply put, the Administration is acting in violation of the law. 

You have heard about other members about the 65,000 metric 

tons of spent fuel and the 75 different sites of storage. While nuclear provides 20 percent of electricity in this country and with superb advancements in technology like small modular reactors and 

passive systems, it stands poised for renaissance but only if the Administration gives the taxpayers an explanation, offers to Congress 

a workable solution, not saying this is unworkable, and also acts 

6 

in accordance with the law to apply the law, not to selectively enforce the law, and I yield back. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

The chair now recognizes the chairman emeritus, Mr. Waxman, 

for 5 minutes. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. HENRY A. WAXMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA 

Mr. WAXMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I am a strong advocate for serious oversight. Throughout my 

service on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform 

and this committee, I have led numerous investigations into governmental agencies, private companies and entire industrial sectors, and I take the role of congressional investigator very seriously. 

Today this committee is holding its second hearing on the decision to shut down the Yucca Mountain waste repository project. 

Questions have been raised about this decision, and I support a fair 

and impartial inquiry. But that does not appear to be what this 

committee is doing. Even before the committee launched its investigation, Chairman Shimkus had apparently already reached his 

own conclusions. 

In January, the chairman told The Hill that he wanted to ask 

questions about whether the decision to ‘‘pull the plug’’ on Yucca 

Mountain was ‘‘all politics.’’ He stated that he thought people already knew the answer to that question, but ‘‘you should go 

through the process of asking the questions.’’ 

Then, last month, he called the decision to halt the Yucca Mountain license application and review ‘‘politics at its worst at its highest levels.’’ Full committee Chairman Upton has made similar comments. 

A congressional investigation should be a genuine inquiry, not a 

process of asking questions to reach a predetermined conclusion. 

At our first hearing, the chairman tried to prevent members from 

asking relevant and important questions, and I believe was off-base 

in his criticism of my right to question the NRC chairman, Gregory 

Jaczko. The latest affront to fairness is the effort to prevent Democratic staff from attending committee interviews of fact witnesses. 

Ranking Member Green and I wrote a letter today to Chairmen 

Upton and Shimkus protesting this new policy, which I ask to be 

made part of the hearing record. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.] 

Mr. WAXMAN. Excluding Democratic staff from committee interviews is inappropriate and it is inconsistent with committee precedents. The practice denies nearly half the members of the committee equal access to relevant information about the investigation. 

It wastes taxpayer resources by necessitating duplicative interviews, and it calls into question the basic fairness and credibility 

of the committee’s inquiry. 

Our job should be to keep an open mind in the investigation and 

follow the facts where they lead. If the evidence shows that the Department of Energy decided to close Yucca Mountain for invalid 

7 

reasons, we should not hesitate to be critical. But we should also 

not prejudge the facts or use unfair and partisan procedures in conducting this investigation. 

Mr. Chairman, we are still at the early stages of this investigation. I hope we can resolve these procedural differences so we can 

focus on the work of the investigation. We can do it together, and 

I think that is the best goal of an oversight investigation, to work 

together to see if we can get the facts and then follow them wherever they may lead. 

I hope this hearing and the witnesses we will hear from today 

will help get us back on track, and I yield back my time. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

Before we go to the witnesses, I would ask unanimous consent 

for 1 minute to respond to the comment. Is there objection? 

Mr. WAXMAN. Reserving the right. Would you give me a potential 

minute to respond if I feel it is appropriate? 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I would, sir. 

Mr. WAXMAN. OK. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you. First of all, the issue raised is not 

timely with this hearing but the point we want to raise is that the 

majority staff has been in discussion with this issue in good faith 

with the minority staff but we also have raised the issue that you 

are asking for a double standard. It is my understanding that the 

minority has had meetings with other witnesses during this session 

of Congress and has not included the majority or provided notice 

to the majority. If we are going to have a rule about this, it has 

to apply to both sides equally, and I think if you agree to allow us 

when you are questioning your folks, we can reciprocate by having 

you with ours, and I think that would be a great way to resolve 

this conflict. 

It is my understanding that when you all were in control in the 

last Congress, Republicans were not included in all the discussions 

with potential witnesses and conducted interviews without notifying members on our side. Having put that on the table, I would 

just say if we can come to agreement where when you are interviewing your witnesses, you invite us, we will invite you when we 

are interviewing, and I think that can resolve the conflict. I yield 

back my time. 

Mr. WAXMAN. I thank you for yielding to me. 

It is important to distinguish between consulting with agency experts to understand policy issues and bringing in fact witnesses to 

obtain information relating to an investigation of alleged wrongdoing. There is no question that the interviews of the NRC employees from which the minority were excluded were in fact fact witnesses regarding our investigation, and I think if we agree that 

when we interview anybody who has pertinent information on the 

facts of the investigation, that we all should be included, and I 

think your suggestion would be appropriate. 

My staff has spoken with the three of the individuals who were 

interviewed, and each of them spent several hours in these interviews, so in fact, as a reality, what we did is spent more time with 

the same witnesses we should have been there together. In the investigation relating to Yucca Mountain licensing process, the minority has not conducted any fact witness interviews either with or 

8 

without the majority. We have instead been focused on reviewing 

and understanding the documents that have been produced to the 

committee on this matter. In fact, we identified a fact witness we 

believe to be important for the committee to interview, and we will 

discuss that with you. 

But I think you lay out a compromise that should help us reach 

an agreement. If we are going to have witnesses that are pertinent 

to the investigation, give us facts that we want to know about. Just 

as we share documents, we should interview those witnesses together. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. If the gentleman would yield his time, I would just 

say as he knows real well, I am not the chairman of the full committee so I am speaking as the chairman of the subcommittee, but 

I will have to run this all through Chairman Upton. 

Mr. WAXMAN. Well, I will certainly have to run it through my 

subcommittee ranking member. Mr. Barrow will certainly be involved in that. He is sitting in the chair of the ranking member. 

My last point is, I thought you said we had identified. The point 

was, if we identify, we will share it with you, and we think we 

should work together in interviewing them, and I hope the full 

committee chairman shares the position that you put out and that 

I have suggested affirmative response to. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Is the gentleman yielding back his time? The gentleman yields back his time. 

Now we will welcome our colleagues. If it is OK with my colleagues, we will start from the left and go to the right, or ladies 

first. It may be not politically correct, but with that, we would like 

to recognize the Hon. Shelley Berkley from the great State of Nevada, and you are recognized for 5 minutes. Your full statement 

can be submitted into the record, and so the time is yours. 

STATEMENTS OF HON. SHELLEY BERKLEY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF NEVADA; HON. DOC 

HASTINGS, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE 

STATE OF WASHINGTON; AND HON. MIKE SIMPSON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF IDAHO 

STATEMENT OF HON. SHELLEY BERKLEY 

Ms. BERKLEY. Thank you very much, Chairman Shimkus, Ranking Member Barrow and members of the committee. Thank you for 

inviting me to testify today. 

Let us get right to the point. Nevadans have been saying no to 

Yucca Mountain for decades, and we will continue shouting no at 

the top of our lungs until this effort to shove nuclear waste down 

our throats has ended. I don’t know who you met with but I can 

tell you the latest polls show that 77 percent of the people of the 

State of Nevada don’t want nuclear waste stored at Yucca Mountain. Why? Because we don’t want our home turned into a nuclear 

garbage dump, and we oppose more wasteful spending on a $100 

billion dinosaur in the Nevada desert that should have gone extinct 

years ago. 

I know members of this committee will hear today from others 

who will say that Nevada’s efforts to stop the dump is all political 

and has nothing to do with science. Hogwash. The truth is that NeVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:32 Aug 01, 2012 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00014 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 112\112-54 060111\112-54 CHRIS
9 

vada’s opposition has always been based on the danger that Yucca 

Mountain poses to our State and our Nation, and Nevada’s resolve 

only hardened in the face of renewed efforts to force us to accept 

this fatally flawed dump, given the true risk it represents. 

Make no mistake: the Yucca Mountain project was born of politics starting with the infamous 1987 screw Nevada bill, and why 

was it politics? Because the State of Nevada had a very small delegation at that time and we were unable to protect the State from 

the 49 others. You want to talk about science? There are no radiation standards that currently exist because there is no way to create radiation standards to protect the public from nuclear waste 

with 300,000-year half shelf life, and there is a GAO report that 

shows thousands of e-mails that make a mockery of so-called scientific studies. I would be glad to present those to you as well. 

Originally, they were going to store nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. Then they realized there were groundwater problems so we 

were going to store it in containers with a titanium shield to protect it from the dripping water. Then they realized that wasn’t 

enough because the titanium shields were going to erode. So then 

they were going to build concrete bunkers to contain the titanium 

shields that contained the canisters, and then the last Secretary of 

Energy in the Bush Administration actually said he was going to 

create an army of robots that were going to go down to Yucca 

Mountain because man can’t go down there to be able to protect 

us from the nuclear waste leakage. 

This legislation, the screw Nevada bill, did away with any pretense of science and it eliminated every other site under consideration as a dump location. At the same time, the nuclear industry 

and its allies have worked for years to silence Nevada’s criticism 

and to minimize the fact that the proposed dump is located smack 

in the middle of an active earthquake zone. This is an area that 

has been rocked by violent earthquakes in the recent past and we 

know the risk it creates. Proponents of the dump have also sought 

to dismiss scientific findings showing that water will enter Yucca 

Mountain, causing rapid corrosion of waste canisters and resulting 

in release of dangerous radioactive materials, and dump backers 

have worked tirelessly to downplay the risk to millions of Americans living along the transportation routes from decades of waste 

shipments barreling down our Nation’s roads and railways with 

each canister a potential terrorist target or accident waiting to happen. Whether caused by human error, mechanical failure or a deliberate strike, a massive release of these deadly materials threatens to kill or injure Americans, to release radioactive contamination and to shut down major portions of our interstate highway system and rail system. 

When it comes to plans for Yucca Mountain, the fact remains 

that you could never eliminate the risks that will accompany shipping nuclear waste across more than 40 States through communities utterly unprepared to deal with radioactive contamination. 

We are talking about shipments passing homes, hospitals, schools 

every single day for four decades, and even more incredible, at the 

end of those 40 years, there will even be more waste in the cooling 

ponds than there were when the shipments began, and that is because as long as a plant is operating, some amount of nuclear 

10 

waste will always remain at the nuclear facility, and that is why 

the threat posed by Yucca Mountain must be weighed against the 

availability of dry cask storage as an affordable solution to this 

problem and it is available today. Using this method, we can secure 

waste at existing sites in hardened containers where they can remain for the next 100 years until we figure out what to do with 

this garbage. 

The nuclear industry is already utilizing dry cask storage at various locations around the United States. There is no reason we 

should not require plants to begin moving waste right now from 

cooling pools into hardened containers. This would also give our 

Nation time to find a true solution to addressing the nuclear waste 

issue that does not involve dumping $100 billion down a hole in the 

middle of the Nevada desert, particularly at a time that we can ill 

afford it. Surely, we can do better than a dump plan that is incredibly dangerous, decades behind schedule and whose budget has 

ballooned with every passing year to a staggering sum, even by 

Washington standards. At the end of the day, the cost to build and 

operate Yucca Mountain will exceed the amount it would cost to 

settle lawsuits by plant operators seeking payment for the cost of 

moving waste into dry casks. 

It is also extremely important to remember that moving ahead 

on Yucca Mountain won’t mean savings for families in nuclear 

States. Instead, they will continue paying the Yucca Mountain tax 

that is slapped on power bills each and every month. At a time 

when our Nation is debating spending cuts, I am truly amazed that 

those that favor Yucca Mountain continue to demand that we open 

the floodgates and let tens of billions of dollars in additional spending come pouring out. 

The good news is that we do not have to go down this fiscally 

irresponsible path. Earlier this year, Congress passed a package 

that fully eliminates funding for the Yucca Mountain project. The 

time has come to let this boondoggle die and to permanently end 

efforts to breathe life back into a program that is too dangerous 

and too costly for our Nation. 

In conclusion, Nevada remains, in case you don’t already know, 

opposed to more wasteful spending on a failed $100 billion project 

that threatens lives, the environment and the economy of my community and others across the Nation. I will lay my body down on 

those railroad tracks to prevent any train that has nuclear waste 

in it from going to Yucca Mountain. I make that pledge to you and 

the people I represent. Nuclear waste can remain on existing sites 

in dry cask storage for the next century, giving us time to find an 

actual solution to replace the failed Yucca Mountain project, and if 

anybody watched what was happening in Japan and still has the 

audacity to suggest this for the people of our country, shame on us 

all, and Germany just announced that they were ending their nuclear program because they have no way to safely store nuclear 

waste. If Germany can figure that out, by gosh, the United States 

of America should be able to figure that out too. 

I yield back the balance of my time. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. It is a good thing I have a great relationship with 

the trucking industry. Thank you. Obviously, all Members will 

have as much time as they need for their statements. We do appreVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:32 Aug 01, 2012 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 112\112-54 060111\112-54 CHRIS
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ciate your time, and we do appreciate your passion, and we have 

been opponents on this issue for many, many years. 

Ms. BERKLEY. Yes, I am hoping to bring you on to the right side 

of this issue. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I think I am. 

Now I would like to recognize the chairman of the Interior Committee, Doc Hastings, for as much time as he may consume, around 

5 minutes, and welcome back to Washington and welcome to the 

committee. 

STATEMENT OF HON. DOC HASTINGS 

Mr. HASTINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank 

you for inviting me to go second. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, for 

the opportunity to testify regarding the importance of Yucca Mountain project to my district and to the Nation as a whole, and my 

concerns regarding the Department of Energy’s action to illegally 

dismantle this program. 

First and foremost, there should be no disputing that Yucca 

Mountain is a national repository for high-level defense waste and 

commercial spent nuclear fuel. Congress has voted to reaffirm this 

decision several times. Billions of dollars and many years have 

been spent studying what to do with nuclear waste, and Yucca 

Mountain was determined to be the answer. It is the law, period. 

Now, some may disagree with the law but it is the law. 

For more than 16 months, the Obama Administration acting 

through the Department of Energy has acted outside the scope of 

the law in order to pursue a purely politically driven mission to 

shut down the Yucca Mountain project. Time and time again DOE 

has been asked to provide technical scientific evidence to justify 

their reasons to withdraw the license application for Yucca Mountain. They have been unable to provide any reason, only stating 

that Yucca Mountain is no longer ‘‘workable.’’ 

What is truly not workable is the uncertainty that faces our commercial nuclear power industry as they look to a future that may 

require them to house spent nuclear fuel on a site for decades because there is no geological repository ready to accept it. The same 

is true for the communities across the Nation that are hard at 

work cleaning up the high-level defense waste that is the legacy of 

our country’s nuclear weapons production program. Commercial 

spent fuel and high-level defense waste are to be stored alongside 

each other at Yucca Mountain, and it made sense to talk about 

them together. 

The State of Washington, the State of South Carolina and leaders in my hometown community have failed a lawsuit challenging 

Department of Energy’s ability to withdraw the Yucca Mountain license application yet the Administration continues to rush to terminate the project before the courts rule or before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s vote is released on this matter. In addition, 

the GAO recently released a report that determined that the decision to dismantle the Yucca Mountain project was political and not 

based on sound science. 

My district in central Washington is home to the Hanford nuclear site, part of the top-secret Manhattan Project that developed 

12 

and constructed the first atomic bomb. The work done at Hanford 

helped win World War II and later provided the nuclear deterrence 

that helped defeat communism and end the Cold War. Today, Hanford is the world’s largest environmental cleanup project, and the 

high-level defense nuclear waste at Hanford is slated to be shipped 

to the national repository at Yucca Mountain. Right now, the Department of Energy is building a critical $12 billion plant that will 

treat 53 million gallons of high-level defense waste currently stored 

in underground tanks at Hanford and turn it into safe, stable, 

glass logs that are scheduled to be stored at Yucca Mountain. The 

waste treatment plant, which is a $12 billion plant, which is over 

halfway done, is being built to meet specifications designed to 

match the geological structure and makeup of Yucca Mountain. 

The Department of Energy is requesting increased funds to reduce 

the risk and complete the waste treatment plants sooner than the 

expected 2016 time frame. Changing the goal posts at halftime will 

unnecessarily add risk to the project and has the potential to waste 

limited cleanup dollars that are already difficult to secure. 

The waste treatment plant must move forward, but that requires 

more than proper funding. It requires Yucca Mountain. And I have 

an article I would like to submit for the record detailing this, if I 

may, Mr. Chairman, an article on this issue. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Is there objection? Hearing none, so ordered. 

Mr. HASTINGS. Thank you. I will submit that. 

Delaying or abandoning Yucca Mountain means that Hanford 

will be home to high-level defense waste even longer, the Federal 

Government’s legal commitment to our State won’t be kept, and 

cleanup progress at Hanford will be jeopardized. With more defense 

waste slated to go to Yucca Mountain than any other State in the 

union, the stakes for my State of Washington cannot be higher and 

the risks could not be more real. 

In addition, Richland, which is just south of the Hanford project, 

is the home to the Pacific Northwest’s only commercial nuclear 

power plant, the Columbia generating station. The spent nuclear 

fuel from this plant is also slated to go to Yucca Mountain but 

without Yucca opening, the spent fuel will have to be kept on site 

for an unknown amount of time at great expense to the taxpayers 

and ratepayers. In my district, we understand that nuclear power 

is safe and that it provides good-paying jobs but all of this being 

jeopardized by the Administration’s decision to shut down Yucca 

Mountain. At a time of record debt, massive bailouts and trilliondollar deficits, our country cannot afford to waste billions of dollars 

going back to the drawing board on a national repository. It is time 

for the Administration to follow the letter of the law, as I pointed 

out in my opening remarks, and to bring the Yucca Mountain 

project online and accept the shipments of the spent nuclear fuel 

and high-level defense waste. 

I would like to again thank you very much for the opportunity 

to be here, and with that, I yield back my time. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you very much, Doc, for joining us. 

Now, I would like to recognize appropriator cardinal, Mr. Simpson, from the great State of Idaho. 

13 

STATEMENT OF MIKE SIMPSON 

Mr. SIMPSON. Before I start, let me just say for the record that 

I haven’t been questioned by either the majority or the minority 

staff. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And I am not sure you would want to be. 

Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I 

thank you for the opportunity to testify before your committee on 

the Department of Energy’s Yucca Mountain decision. 

I have been now in Congress for 121⁄2 years. For 81⁄2 years, I 

have served on the Appropriations Committee and the Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, which funds the 

DOE including the DOE’s nuclear energy division. In my short 

time in Congress, there have been three Administrations, four or 

five Secretaries of Energy and numerous nuclear energy administrators and under secretaries. Each Administration has its own priorities concerning the direction the department takes with respect 

to addressing the energy needs of our country, particularly nuclear 

energy. I lived through the IFR bubble, the GNEP bubble, the 

NGNP bubble and the current SMR bubble. The most frustrating 

dilemma I faced is this: After spending billions of dollars going into 

ever-changing directions, how do you sustain a program with a 20- 

to 30-year lifetime frame in an environment of ever-changing policies? What can we show the taxpayers for our investments? To 

make it clear, it is not a problem that I blame on the DOE. New 

Administrations and Secretaries are elected and appointed to enact 

their vision of the future but it is a reality that the short-term nature of our political cycles does not lend itself to solving long-term 

problems. 

One of the ways we address this dilemma is by enacting statutes 

passed by Congress and signed by the President. These statutes become the law of the land, binding on future Congresses and Administrations. No Administration or Congress can unilaterally decide 

the law doesn’t apply to them. If the Administration or Congress 

decides it doesn’t like the current law, there are ways to change it: 

enact a new law. Absent that, the current law binds us all. 

One of the most glaring decisions by the Administration to ignore 

this fundamental principal of law is the attempt by the Administration to unilaterally withdraw the license application for Yucca 

Mountain currently before the NRC and to mothball Yucca Mountain. Let me be perfectly clear here. We all know why this decision 

was made. It wasn’t about science or the suitability of Yucca Mountain or even the need for a geological repository for high-level nuclear waste. It was a promise made during the heat of a presidential campaign. It was pure politics. 

We could spend days debating the suitability of Yucca Mountain 

as a geological waste repository or the over 50 scientific studies 

that have been done on Yucca Mountain. We know more about this 

patch of earth than probably any other patch of earth in the world. 

We could talk about the $15 billion already spent on Yucca Mountain, the $9.5 billion collected from the utility consumers for the 

nuclear waste fund and whether that should be paid back to the 

consumers as well as the $956 million paid out as the result of the 

74 lawsuits resulting from the government’s failure to receive spent 

fuel or the GAO investigation which concluded ‘‘DOE’s decision to 

14 

terminate the Yucca Mountain repository program was made for 

policy reasons, not technical or safety reasons’’ or the fact that this 

interpretation is supported by volume 3 of the NRC’s safety evaluation report. 

But all of this really isn’t the point. The point is, the President 

is obligated to follow the law of the land as enacted by Congress 

and signed by a previous President. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act 

was amended in 1987 to designate Yucca Mountain as the repository for high-level nuclear waste for whatever reason. I was not a 

Member of Congress at the time but that law passed and Yucca 

Mountain became the law of the land. Following a veto by the Governor of Nevada, the House voted to override the Governor’s veto 

by a 306-117 vote, and the Senate followed suit by a 60-36 vote. 

Yucca Mountain is still the law of the land. 

Congress has reaffirmed its position. In fact, I have with me 

here, and I want to ask to put them in the record because they are 

available, 34 recorded votes in recent years assembled by the CRS 

in which Congress has reaffirmed its support for Yucca Mountain. 

I can’t fault Secretary Chu or Secretary Lyons for pursuing this 

policy decision. After all, they work for the President and he made 

this misguided decision to ignore the law. Based on these simple 

facts, the NRC licensing board reviewed the Administration’s request to withdraw the Yucca Mountain licensing application and 

denied that request nearly one year ago, June 29, 2010. The commission reviewed and voted on the licensing board decision but has 

yet to release its ruling nearly a year later. The NRC is supposed 

to serve as an independent watchdog which is driven by science, 

not politics. Unfortunately, the chairman of the NRC has lost sight 

of its mission in order to effect a political outcome that has eroded 

the reputation of the NRC at a time when the public confidence is 

needed most, and he should be replaced. 

Again, I repeat, the issue of siting the Nation’s nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain is a matter of law, not politics. It 

serves as the clearest example of an ever-changing policy which is 

costing the taxpayers billions of dollars and diminishing our ability 

to advance a long-term energy policy for our country, and I thank 

you, Mr. Chairman, for inviting us here today. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I want to thank my colleague, Mr. Simpson, and 

my colleagues for joining us. 

It is the tradition of this committee not to follow up with questions but to move. We have two more panels that we have to meet 

with and so we want to thank you for your time, and we will see 

you on the floor for votes. 

Without objection, the vote totals that Mr. Simpson had mentioned will be entered into the record. Having no objection, so ordered. 

[The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.]*************** COMMITTEE INSERT *************** 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I would like to place the first panel, Mr. Gaffigan, 

Mr. Friedman and Mr. Lyons. We want to thank you for joining us. 

As per the previous panel, we will start from my left, your right, 

and each of you will be recognized for 5 minutes. Your full statement can be submitted for the record. To begin with, I would like 

to ask Mr. Mark Gaffigan, Managing Director of Natural Resources 

15 

and Environment for the U.S. Government Accountability Office. 

Thank you for your attendance, and you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENTS OF DR. MARK E. GAFFIGAN, MANAGING DIRECTOR, NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT, U.S. GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE (GAO); GREGORY H. 

FRIEDMAN, INSPECTOR GENERAL, DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY; AND DR. PETER B. LYONS, ASSISTANT SECRETARY 

FOR NUCLEAR ENERGY, DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY 

STATEMENT OF MARK E. GAFFIGAN 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I 

am pleased to be here. 

First of all, I want to summarize my remarks in three areas, basically the current status of Yucca Mountain and the Nation’s nuclear waste policy, the nuclear waste policy alternatives that have 

been discussed, and lastly, sort of lessons learned from past experience that may help inform our future as we go forward. 

First, the Nation’s policy for nuclear waste disposal is in dispute, 

creating great uncertainty about its future direction. In 1957, the 

National Academies of Science first endorsed nuclear waste disposal in a geological repository as the means for permanently disposing of nuclear waste. However, achieving a permanent policy 

leading to an acceptable repository has proven to be both costly and 

difficult. Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act from the 1980s, the 

Federal Government made a commitment to take the Nation’s nuclear waste and DOE has been investigating Yucca Mountain a 

permanent repository, culminating in a license application to the 

NRC in 2008. 

However, after decades of work and expenditures of about $15 

billion in today’s dollars, DOE is now seeking to withdraw its application. DOE has not cited any technical or safety issues but has 

stated that Yucca Mountain is not a workable option, in large part 

because of the lack of public acceptance by the people of Nevada. 

This decision is being challenged both in the courts and by a board 

ruling that the Nuclear Waste Policy Act requires DOE to continue 

with the application. While these matters remain unresolved, DOE 

has proceeded to terminate Yucca Mountain in a definitive manner 

that will make it more difficult to reprise should they be compelled 

to do so. 

In lieu of pursuing Yucca Mountain, DOE established a Blue Ribbon Commission to consider alternative waste disposal strategies. 

Based on past work, we have identified three categories of alternatives. The first alternative is keeping the waste on site at about 

80 different sites, both commercial and defense sites in the United 

States. This is the path of least resistance option since it is our current de facto policy for disposal. However, it does not address the 

commitment of the U.S. government to take possession of the 

waste. As has been pointed out, taxpayers have already paid nearly 

$1 billion in legal judgments because of the government’s inability 

to meet its obligation. Estimates are that another $15 billion will 

be paid out by 2020 with the bill estimated to be another $500 million per year after that, again, coming from the taxpayers through 

16 

the Department of Justice’s judgment fund. Also, with continued 

onsite storage, DOE may not be able to meet commitments to 

States to remove defense-related waste. This could have negative 

impacts such as jeopardizing Navy shipments of spent fuel and the 

refueling of Navy warships. 

A second general alternative is centralized interim storage. While 

this may offer some relief from onsite storage, such a facility faces 

the same siting challenges, and DOE states it does not have the 

authority to implement such a facility. 

Finally, the third option remains a geological repository, the goal 

of the Yucca Mountain project. Despite the promise of future technology that may reduce the demands on a geological repository, the 

best thinking of experts today is that no matter what, there will 

be some amount of waste in need of permanent disposal and that 

a geological repository is the only feasible option for permanently 

disposing of nuclear waste. 

Lastly, I would like to address lessons learned that might be instructive for future nuclear waste policy. DOE’s recent policy decision to terminate Yucca Mountain due to a lack of public acceptance has been criticized because it was not based on any technical 

or safety reasons. However, if we are to learn anything from the 

Nation’s struggle to implement nuclear waste policy, it is the lesson 

that public acceptance is just as important a consideration as any 

technical or safety issues. Transparency, economic incentives and 

education are important tools in achieving public acceptance of any 

future nuclear waste policy. 

A second broad lesson is that consistent policy, funding, and 

leadership will be crucial in successful nuclear waste management. 

Many stakeholders have suggested that an independent organization not subject to political changes with a predictable funding 

stream may be best suited to carry out this policy. 

In closing, let me emphasize that any nuclear waste policy option 

whether it be continued onsite storage, centralized interim storage 

or a move to a permanent repository will offer benefits but face serious costs and challenges. With the current uncertainty in the Nation’s nuclear waste policy direction and potential competing directions of that policy, those costs and challenges only increase with 

little additional benefit. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That concludes my opening statement. I have submitted a formal statement for the record, and I 

welcome your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Gaffigan follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you very much. 

Now, I would like to turn to Mr. Gregory Friedman, Inspector 

General at the Department of Energy. Welcome, sir. 

STATEMENT OF GREGORY H. FRIEDMAN 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Rather than repeat many of the statistical points and data that 

has been provided already, let me abbreviate my already abbreviated statement, which contains a synopsis of the work that we 

have done in Yucca Mountain over time and it is more expanded 

in my full statement, which I hope will be submitted for the record. 

Getting down to the nub of the matter, our work to date has 

highlighted a number of issues that require the continued attention 

of department management. For example, as has been mentioned, 

delays in the opening of Yucca Mountain have, as demonstrated by 

a number of financial and performance reviews, increased the ultimate cost of disposal of waste intended for Yucca Mountain. Closure of the project could significantly impact the department’s future environmental remediation liability currently estimated to be 

$250 billion. We will further evaluate the impact of the closure as 

part of the ongoing financial work that we do at the Department 

of Energy. Further, unless the repository or other alternative strategy becomes available in the near term, the department may miss 

a number of deadlines which are part of tri-party settlement agreements. As a result, the department may be subject to significant 

assessments due to missed deadlines. As of September 30, 2010, 

more than $800 million has been expended from the Treasury’s 

judgment fund for payments to commercial nuclear waste producers for delayed acceptance of nuclear waste. In addition, the department has estimated its contingent liability for spent nuclear 

fuel litigation to be approximately $15.4 billion. 

In summary, in our judgment, the need to develop a viable, effective and acceptable path forward for nuclear waste disposal becomes more pressing day by day. The United States has announced 

plans to dismantle a significant part of its nuclear waste stockpile 

with the unavoidable reality of increasing the volume of defense 

nuclear waste. Further, commercial nuclear waste, which was to 

represent 90 percent of the high-level waste stored at Yucca Mountain, continues to be generated at nuclear power facilities across 

the Nation. 

To paraphrase one draft recommendation from the Blue Ribbon 

Commission on America’s Nuclear Future, which was established 

by the Secretary of Energy at the request of the President in January 2010, the United States should proceed expeditiously to develop 

an integrated, comprehensive plan for managing the back end of 

the nuclear fuel cycle. 

Mr. Chairman, this concludes my statement. I would be pleased 

to answer any questions that you or the subcommittee may have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Friedman follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you, Mr. Friedman. 

Last but not least on the first panel is Dr. Peter Lyons, Assistant 

Secretary for Nuclear Energy at the Department of Energy. Sir, 

welcome, and you have 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF PETER B. LYONS 

Mr. LYONS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Ranking Member and 

members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify 

before you today. 

By way of introduction, I grew up in Nevada. I worked at the Los 

Alamos National Laboratory with frequent assignments at the Nevada Test Site. When I led the lab’s energy and environmental programs, all work on Yucca Mountain and reprocessing of fuel reported to me. More recently, I visited the Tunnel Complex many 

times while working for Senator Pete Domenici and as an NRC 

commissioner. I have devoted 42 years of public service to the Nation’s needs for and uses of nuclear technology. I am convinced that 

nuclear energy must remain a part of our Nation’s clean energy 

portfolio, an acceptable solution to the Nation’s management of 

used nuclear fuel and high-level defense waste as a prerequisite for 

nuclear power to play this role. 

Secretary Chu has emphasized that a successful management 

significant for used fuel must be founded on strong technical criteria and public acceptance. The GAO made the similar conversation that overcoming social and political opposition is crucial. For 

example, there are successful repository programs in Switzerland, 

Finland, Sweden and France where public involvement and consultation are heavily emphasized. Our own experience with the 

Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, or WIPP, illustrates our success with 

achieving social and political acceptance for a permanent repository 

and stands in stark contrast to the Yucca Mountain project. As the 

Secretary has stated, it is time to move beyond the 25-year-old 

stalemate over Yucca Mountain. I agree, and I accepted this position with full support for the Administration’s position. 

Let me turn to two interrelated statements made in the GAO report with which the department has very serious concerns. First, 

the GAO presumes that the Yucca Mountain repository would have 

opened on a date certain, and second, GAO presumes that an alternative would take longer than the Yucca Mountain repository to 

implement. The GAO report uses 2020 for operations as a firm date 

and expresses concern that the department did not provide GAO 

with a more precise date. Yet the department has consistently stated that the 2020 date was subject to a number of contingencies 

over which the department has no control. Thus, there was always 

considerable uncertainty about when or whether the Yucca Mountain repository would open. Among other things, that opening 

would require new legislation for land withdrawal, a second NRC 

license, presuming the first one were issued, and a new 300-mile 

railroad, and many related actions hinging on availability of Stateissued permits. All of these would have faced persistent opposition 

from the State in Nevada. 

In shutting down the Yucca Mountain project, DOE is committed 

to building better, more workable alternatives. In fact, as the GAO 

report notes, if a more widely accepted alternative is identified, it 

47 

carries the potential for avoiding costly delays experienced by the 

Yucca Mountain repository program. That is a point that Secretary 

Chu has emphasized. Thus, the department disagrees with the 

GAO statement that the proposed termination of Yucca Mountain, 

which had been planned to be opened in 2020, will likely prolong 

storage at reactor sites, which would increase onsite storage costs. 

There is simply no basis to assume that the termination of Yucca 

Mountain will prolong this process. There may be other alternatives that can be put in place sooner than Yucca Mountain might 

have opened. 

I would also like to highlight another statement in the report to 

which the department takes exception, namely that a final impact 

of terminating Yucca Mountain is that communities may be even 

less willing to host nuclear fuel repositories or other storage sites 

in the future due to further erosion of DOE’s credibility. Quite to 

the contrary, a new start with Secretary Chu’s emphasis on public 

acceptance I believe can lead to enhanced credibility of the department, and as further proof, the department’s leadership of the 

WIPP program enjoys very strong support from the local community. 

In conclusion, the department is acting responsibly in terminating the Yucca Mountain project. We can and we should do better than the Yucca Mountain project. Working together, the Administration and the Congress can seize an opportunity to craft a new 

option with a higher certainty of success. I personally look forward 

to the chance to put a successful used nuclear fuel management 

program into practice that will serve future generations and above 

all enable them to enjoy the benefits of clean, safe nuclear power. 

Thank you, and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Lyons follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you, Dr. Lyons, and I would encourage the 

first panel to stick around for the second panel because you will 

have some local folks from the State of Nevada who probably already have some acceptance of this position. 

I would like to begin my first round of questioning and recognize 

myself for 5 minutes, and I will start with Mr. Gaffigan. How much 

has been expended on Yucca Mountain development? How much 

money have we spent? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. About $15 billion in today’s dollars. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And where did that money come from? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. About $10 billion from the nuclear waste fund 

and another $5 billion from appropriations. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And how does the nuclear waste fund get its 

money? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It is a tax on the ratepayers, pay a one-tenth of 

a cent. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Which ratepayers? Just those that—— 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Those who benefit from nuclear power. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Of the money from ratepayers, are those fees still 

being collected? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Absolutely. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Of the taxpayer funds, what happens to taxpayer 

spending if Yucca Mountain is terminated? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. The taxpayer spending continues. Current estimates are $15 billion through 2020. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And what happens to this liability for each year 

a repository is not accepting waste past 2020? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Current estimates are $500 million per year. 

Those are DOE’s estimates. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And what other costs might the taxpayer face if 

this nuclear waste issue is delayed? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. There will be costs associated with the judgments. 

There are about 72 lawsuits currently brought and about 6 have 

settled, so there will be Department of Justice costs involved with 

it. There will be costs associated with the waste on the defense side 

in terms of perhaps more storage needed at these various defense 

facilities because Yucca Mountain is not available or some other repository. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Great. Thank you. 

Dr. Lyons, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is the law that governs 

nuclear waste and spent fuel disposal policy, is it not? 

Mr. LYONS. Yes. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And the law says that the Department of Energy 

must study, characterize for suitability, and develop a repository at 

Yucca Mountain, correct? 

Mr. LYONS. That is correct. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. That is what the law says. The law says further 

that DOE shall file an application for a license to construct the repository, correct? 

Mr. LYONS. Yes, sir. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The law also established the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management and a director for that office, correct? 

Mr. LYONS. Yes. 

52 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The law actually makes clear DOE’s—and I want 

to note for the record for the transcript, all these questions have 

been responded to affirmatively by Dr. Lyons. 

The law actually makes clear DOE’s duties and obligations in the 

development of Yucca Mountain, and those obligations presently 

are to support the application pending before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, correct? I am talking about the law. 

Mr. LYONS. As you know, sir—— 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I am talking about the law so be very, very careful 

how you answer this. What does the law say? 

Mr. LYONS. That is what the laws, and—— 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you very much. Now I will go to the next 

question. What provision of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, what 

provision of the law is the Secretary relying on to withdraw the application? 

Mr. LYONS. I am not a lawyer, sir. Our general counsel has reviewed that and believes that the Secretary has the authority to 

withdraw the application. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I think you might need to get with your general 

counsel, and you better be very careful in answering these questions. 

And I am out of time—I am not out of time but I have finished 

my questions. I will now turn to the ranking member, Mr. Green. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I apologize for being 

late. I know we finished opening statements and I would like to 

ask unanimous consent to place an opening statement into the 

record. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Green follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. GENE GREEN

Thank you Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing and I want to thank the witnesses for appearing before the committee to discuss the issue of Yucca Mountain. 

As you may know, I recently toured Yucca Mountain when I went on a CODEL 

organized by Chairman Shimkus. I appreciated the opportunity to view the facility 

up close and to meet with some of the local individuals, including folks from Nye 

County, to hear their thoughts on Yucca Mountain. 

There has been a lot of discussion in this committee on the decision by the Administration not to proceed with Yucca Mountain. As I’ve stated several times before, 

The US alone produced 806 billion kilowatt hours of nuclear power in 2008, making 

us the biggest producer of nuclear power in the world. 

The President has said he supports investments in alternative forms of energy 

and Secretary Chu has testified before this committee that we will be unable to 

meet the President’s goals if we do not continue to invest in nuclear energy. This 

of course means we will have an increase of nuclear waste and we will need to safety store it. 

As we look toward and focus on investing more in nuclear energy we will still 

have radioactive waste. Even if we have better short term storage than we have 

now, we will still need somewhere to put that waste 25, 50, or 100 years from now. 

Let me be clear, no matter what decision we make on Yucca Mountain, we still 

have a nuclear waste disposal issue. So, the 25 year old dilemma remains and we 

will need to resolve this situation sooner rather than later. 

I want to thank the witnesses and with that I yield back my time. Thank you 

Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. GREEN. I would also like to ask unanimous consent to place 

into the record a letter from the Blue Ribbon Commission on AmerVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:32 Aug 01, 2012 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00058 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 112\112-54 060111\112-54 CHRIS
53 

ica’s Nuclear Future, and also from the chair of the Board of County Commissioners of Clark County, Nevada. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Without objection, so ordered. 

[The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.] 

Mr. GREEN. I thank our panel for being here. I think most of you 

know that a number of us did a congressional trip to Yucca Mountain last month, and I appreciate the opportunity to view up close 

what are the decisions or what has been going on since the 1980s, 

and I appreciate the opportunity the folks from the local county to 

express their concern or their interest in reopening Yucca Mountain from the decision. While on the trip, I heard various reports 

on the actual cost of building Yucca Mountain, and I know from the 

testimony of Mr. Gaffigan, it was $14 billion? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. We put it all in today’s dollars, about $15.4 billion. 

Mr. GREEN. OK. Is there any of that that could be recouped if 

we decided to, you know, forget about it and look for another longterm facility? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. That money is spent. 

Mr. GREEN. Any opinion from any other witnesses on the panel? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, Mr. Green, we pointed out in our Lessons 

Learned report that the retention of the intellectual property derived as a result of the expenditures associated with Yucca Mountain is an extremely important focus of the department, should be 

an important focus of the department, so hopefully if the decision 

is sustained to terminate the site, there will be a tremendous body 

of knowledge that will be useful going forward. That is certainly 

our anticipation and our hope. 

Mr. LYONS. I would agree with Mr. Friedman. 

Mr. GREEN. Do each of you agree that we should have some longterm storage facility? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. I would say that the National Academies of 

Science back to 1957 has said we are going to need some form of 

permanent repository, no matter—and that is the current thinking 

today, even if we go to some new technologies, there will be some 

waste and we will need to dispose of it in a permanent solution. 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. I would agree with Mr. Gaffigan’s comments, Mr. 

Green. 

Mr. LYONS. I would also agree, and the Blue Ribbon Commission 

recently in their draft recommendations so stated as well. 

Mr. GREEN. Well, I guess I have some concern because I know 

the only other alternative is along the Texas border and New Mexico, and we could just be opening another can of worms if we started out there. Obviously in Nevada, nobody runs for office out there 

saying they support Yucca Mountain. I don’t know if anybody 

would run for office in New Mexico if they would say they want to 

support a high-level nuclear storage facility in New Mexico. That 

is one of my concerns about it, that we need one, and we spent 

$15.4 billion and now in the last year and a half the decision has 

been made to literally put a fence across it and shut it down. 

How long would it take us if we started anew right now? Did 

Yucca Mountain actually start in 1982, the discussion of it, or the 

decision on the site or the pathway to get to the decision? 

54 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. I think early on it was one of nine sites that was 

considered, and eventually that was winnowed down to about three 

sites by 1987 and then the 1987 amendment directed that only 

Yucca Mountain be considered, so it is fair to say at least—— 

Mr. GREEN. When did the decisionmaking start? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It is fair to say we have been at this since the 

mid-1980s. I don’t know if Dr. Lyons would like to elaborate. 

Mr. LYONS. No, I would agree that there is some characterization 

work that probably started even before 1982. 

Mr. GREEN. So we are talking about 25 years to where we are 

now, and do you think if we decided to do something that it would 

take another 25 years to get there? 

Mr. LYONS. I think it is important to note, sir, that as the Blue 

Ribbon Commission works through this process and evaluates successful models from both within the country, WIPP, and in the 

international community that there may well be approaches to the 

management as well as the selection that will be suggested by the 

BRC that can lead to a much more expeditious movement on this. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Would the gentleman yield on that real quick? 

Mr. GREEN. I would be glad to yield. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Dr. Lyons, is it true that the Blue Ribbon Commission was given a mandate not to consider Yucca Mountain? 

Mr. LYONS. The Blue Ribbon Commission is not a siting commission. They are not considering any—— 

Mr. SHIMKUS. But they were given a mandate not to even consider Yucca Mountain? 

Mr. LYONS. They are simply not a siting commission, sir. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So that is a yes? 

Mr. LYONS. They are not a siting commission. That is the statement I would make, sir. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So nothing, interim storage, nothing would be considered with Yucca Mountain? If they are doing centralized regional storage sites, Yucca Mountain could not be considered? 

Mr. LYONS. I didn’t say that. I simply said they are not a siting 

commission. They are not evaluating sites. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. It is my understanding that the Blue Ribbon Commission was given explicit directions not to consider Yucca Mountain. Would you dispute that? 

Mr. LYONS. It is my understanding that they are simply not a 

siting commission. They are not considering sites. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I yield back. 

Mr. GREEN. Well, and my concern is, and it is more of a statement than a question, is that we have all over the country sites, 

two of them in Texas, where we are actually storing them on-site, 

and we would hope that we would have some long-term permanent 

storage. I support recycling so we don’t have to put as much there, 

but that is not available in our country, but that is my concern is 

that by starting over a year and a half ago, then, you know, it 

could be 25 years, maybe longer, but even that, we are looking at 

10 years away, and a lot of our temporary storage sites were not 

designed to be the long-term that they are now. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you. 

Mr. LYONS. If I may, Mr. Green, the Blue Ribbon Commission 

may recommend, since I certainly can’t speak for what their final 

55 

recommendations will be, may recommend other paths such as interim storage that could lead us to at least useful options far sooner than a repository could be in operation. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

The chair recognizes the vice chairman of the committee, Mr. 

Murphy from Pennsylvania. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Are the current sites at nuclear power plants and other facilities 

above and below ground in concrete containers, etc., suitable for 

safety? 

Mr. LYONS. Yes, Mr. Murphy. That is reviewed on a regular basis 

by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

Mr. MURPHY. And they are adequate for how long? 

Mr. LYONS. Excuse me? 

Mr. MURPHY. They are adequate for how long? I believe I read 

some studies where some are good for 30 years or so. 

Mr. LYONS. The decision recently reached by the NRC—— 

Mr. MURPHY. Just give me a number. 

Mr. LYONS [continuing]. Was 30 years after the cessation of operations at the site. We have research programs—— 

Mr. MURPHY. I just have to keep going. It has taken us 30 years 

to get this far. Does DOE maintain a record of the balance of the 

nuclear waste fund? 

Mr. LYONS. I am sure they do, sir, but I—— 

Mr. MURPHY. Or how it is broken down by source or anything? 

Mr. LYONS. I don’t have those numbers but I would assume it is 

available. 

Mr. MURPHY. Can you get us that information? 

Mr. LYONS. We will provide that for the record. 

Mr. MURPHY. I would also like to know if DOE is continuing to 

maintain that record, if it is available to the public, at least to the 

State PUCs and make sure it is updated, and I would like to know 

if we can have that information. That would be helpful. 

Mr. LYONS. Well, the number is around $25 billion. I am not 

positive of the exact number. 

Mr. MURPHY. We would to know how the fund is broken down. 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. That is correct. And it can be provided broken 

down. 

Mr. MURPHY. Given that it has taken about 30 years to get this 

far, what makes you think you can suddenly complete this by 

2020? 

Mr. LYONS. I didn’t say we could do it by 2020. I said we may 

be able to do it sooner than Yucca Mountain—— 

Mr. MURPHY. There is absolutely no basis to assume the termination of Yucca Mountain will prolong the process, you said. 

Mr. LYONS. I said that there is as g question in my mind whether 

Yucca Mountain will open. As to how soon one could do an interim 

storage site probably could be—— 

Mr. MURPHY. I am trying to go by the law here, sir, and I hope 

you are too, but the law that Congress signed by the President as 

we have gone through my Administrations here says that this is 

the site that was selected. So I have to ask, is there something unsuitable scientifically about the Yucca Mountain site? 

56 

Mr. LYONS. The license application submitted by the Department 

of Energy—— 

Mr. MURPHY. Is it unsuitable? Yes or no. Unsuitable, yes or no? 

Scientifically based, is it unsuitable, yes or no? 

Mr. LYONS. The license application was based on the technical 

criteria. 

Mr. MURPHY. Is it unsuitable? Yes or no. 

Mr. LYONS. In the DOE’s judgment on their application, it 

met—— 

Mr. MURPHY. You stated that GAO noted that overcoming social 

and political opposition was crucial, and so in the midst of the social and political opposition, I am assuming. I am trying to find out 

if it is scientifically credible or not. Did DOE mess this all up over 

the 30 years? Do we not trust anything you do and basically say 

that all the work that DOE has done in the last 30 years on deciding that Yucca Mountain is suitable or not, is that scientific garbage or is it scientifically credible, yes or no? 

Mr. LYONS. As I indicated, sir, the license application—— 

Mr. MURPHY. I am trying to find out—— 

Mr. LYONS [continuing]. Was based on the technical criteria. 

Mr. MURPHY. So what does that mean? Is it suitable or not? Is 

it scientifically suitable or not? This is really not hard to do, sir. 

It is a yes or no. There are only two words you get to say, yes or 

no. 

Mr. LYONS. In the judgment of DOE, yes. They don’t have the 

final answer. 

Mr. MURPHY. That is important. So given that this is suitable, 

I have to find out this thing. Now, you mentioned some legal counsel in relation to Mr. Shimkus’s question. I would like you to provide to this committee all communications regarding the judgment 

from legal counsel at the Department of Energy saying that they 

don’t have to comply with the law, oral, written, e-mail, anything. 

It is important that we have an opportunity. Will you provide that 

for us? 

Mr. LYONS. The department has provided about 40,000 pages already. We will try to provide what you mean. 

Mr. MURPHY. It is important that we have this really parsed out 

so we understand when someone receives legal advice not to comply with the law, I would really like to have that there, not just 

say here is 40,000 pages. I hope you can do that. 

Back to the question here with regard to—now that DOE has 

ruled that the site was suitable back in 2002 and you just confirmed it, a reversal is going to require new physical evidence that 

the criteria suitability are not met and then DOE would have to 

follow several explicit steps laid out in the statute, in the law instead of just walking away. Do you have that physical evidence 

that this site is no longer suitable? 

Mr. LYONS. Again, sir, as was pointed out in my testimony and 

by other speakers already, Secretary Chu has made the statement 

that a workable solution—— 

Mr. MURPHY. Just the facts. 

Mr. LYONS [continuing]. And public acceptance. 

Mr. MURPHY. I am asking the facts. What we don’t get to do is 

to say we get to selectively enforce laws based upon that the polls 

57 

change or we need votes in States. I am asking you from a scientific—because this is where DOE either is credible as an organization or it lacks credibility. I really want it to be a credible organization. I have the highest respect for many of the scientists in 

there, and this is an opportunity to either be a scientist or go by 

polling and politics. 

Has there been some physical evidence that says this site is no 

longer suitable which therefore says you are compliant with the 

law by saying we don’t have to do Yucca Mountain anymore? Is 

there some scientific evidence out there that says it is not suitable? 

Mr. LYONS. As I stated, the license application was based on 

technical criteria. Based on general counsel, the Secretary’s view is 

that we do have the authority to withdraw—— 

Mr. MURPHY. I didn’t ask if you had the authority. I am not sure 

I am getting anywhere, Mr. Chairman, but I hope you would provide that information to us because that is the crux of what we are 

doing today. 

Mr. LYONS. We will continue to provide information as best we 

can. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Barrow, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BARROW. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

A moment ago when we were going over the subject of the cost 

that has been invested in the program so far, there was an attempt 

to explain some of the value we recouped from this, the knowledge, 

the information, the lessons learned. What I would remind you is 

that the more you spend on something of doubtful authenticity, the 

more likely you are to think you have the real deal. If you spent 

$5 million on a pen-and-ink sketching that is reported to be a 

Leonardo da Vinci, you are very likely to believe it is the real deal. 

If you paid $5 for it, you know it is a fake. The point I want to 

emphasize is, this vast difference between the value of a lesson 

learned and the cost of a lesson learned, and I am not exactly sure 

we have a good understanding of the difference, what the magnitude of the difference is in this particular case. 

I want to try to see where we go from here. I want to change the 

subject just a little bit. I had been present when Secretary Chu has 

summed up the cost to the American consumer of the fact that we 

were a nuclear pioneer country in this world and we went down a 

bunch of different paths and got different designs for different reactors here and there. It is part of the legacy costs of being the pioneer and going first and actually developing all kinds of different 

ideas. He was talking to one of his colleagues in France, and his 

French colleague says it is very simple what the problem is you 

Americans, you have 80 different reactors and one cheese; we have 

80 different cheeses and one reactor. It is a good lesson to learn. 

We have 80 different waste repositories in this country, whether 

we know it or not and whether we like it or not, and we have a 

whole array of approaches toward dealing with the problem for the 

foreseeable future. Some of these are wet storage, dry storage. 

Some are a lot more stable, some are a lot more safe than others. 

Meanwhile, the American consumer has been paying for this longterm repository program that has stopped dead in its tracks right 

58 

now. Two-thirds of the cost has just been paid by ratepayers, 

whether they know it or not and whether they like it or not and 

whether they support it or not. Another third of this has been paid 

by the general fund by taxpayers chipping in their income taxes to 

run the government. All the money that has been paid in so far I 

gather has been spent but the money is still coming. 

One question I have, and maybe this is addressed in part to the 

Blue Ribbon Commission but I want to address it to you all, is 

what can we do to divert that income stream to provide some stability, some predictability and some safety in the meantime for all 

those utilities that are running and operating these plants now and 

trying to operate these 70 waste repositories on site that we have 

got right now? For example, if the money they are forced to extract 

from customers in the form of an excise tax on the rates they are 

paying can be diverted back to those utilities on the condition that 

it be used to take wet storage and turn it into dry storage, something that is inherently unstable and likely to get loose into something that is very stable, an asset that would not be stranded, 

something that would have lasting value no matter what we are 

going to do in terms of a long-term repository, wouldn’t that be a 

useful thing to do in the meantime? Does anybody have any suggestions along those lines of what we can do with the current mess 

we are in? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. I would say there are a couple hurdles. You know, 

under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the money is being collected 

for a long-term repository, and we talk about maybe using it for a 

centralized repository. DOE is saying they don’t have the authority 

to use that fund for that so there would have to be some change 

in law for that. 

In the meantime, industry is saying if you are not going to pursue a long-term repository, stop collecting the money. DOE is proceeding to collect the money. In fact—— 

Mr. BARROW. That would require a law, wouldn’t it? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. And they are proceeding on the basis of a Yucca 

Mountain by 2020. That is how they base their rates. So, you know, 

Mr. Lyons may have some doubt about the 2020 date but it is still 

being used by DOE as the best alternative going forward. 

Mr. LYONS. If I may add to that? 

Mr. BARROW. Go ahead, Dr. Lyons. 

Mr. LYONS. The Department of Energy recognizes it has the responsibility for the long-term management of the used fuel. As that 

fuel is being generated at your Plant Vogtle, for example, whatever 

the future option is going to be, that still will require handling by 

the Department of Energy. That is the rationale for continuing to 

collect the fee, and there has been no rationale, at least demonstrated to date, to change that fee. 

Mr. BARROW. Well, here is my concern. I recognize you all’s need 

to set aside a little something in the future for handling the 

charges you all are going to incur in the future, but you don’t have 

any ideas of when you are going to be handling nothing, and we 

are handling it right now. My ratepayers are handling it right now 

and our customers are handling it right now. 

My question is—and the questioning has shined a light on a 

problem when you have a law that tells you what this policy is 

59 

going to be, it is going to take 25 years to implement and a lot of 

annual appropriations bills that have to get through both Houses 

of Congress in order to implement. I mean, if we are going to have 

to have a change in law to do anything positive, can we at least 

open the discussion and put on the table the idea of changes we 

can all agree on to try and manage the problem on site as long as 

it takes us to get our act together? Because what took an act of 

Congress to start us down the course and a plan that required several Congresses to go along with it is going to require another act 

of Congress to fix. Let us have an interim strategy we can all agree 

on. Let us try to work together on that. That would be my suggestion. 

Thank you. I yield back. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Pennsylvania. 

And just for the record, they are supposed to call votes at 2:30. 

We will try to get one or two more rounds of questioning before we 

go down to vote but we will have to adjourn because there are 

three votes in a row and not everybody will be through, so we will 

have to recess. 

The gentleman from Pennsylvania is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. PITTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Gaffigan, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 created a federal legal obligation to accept nuclear fuel and dispose it in a geologic facility. Is that correct? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. There was a commitment on the part of the Federal Government to take possession of the waste and explore a 

long-term repository. 

Mr. PITTS. So is it accurate to say in light of this law that Congress resolved how to manage spent nuclear fuel and high-level 

waste back in 1982? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It was a decision made by the Congress to pass 

the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. That is correct. 

Mr. PITTS. The development of the act was not the development 

of a single Congress or some partisan maneuvering, was it? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. No. 

Mr. PITTS. In point of fact, in 1982 when the Nuclear Waste Policy Act was enacted, there was a Republican President, a Republican Senate and Democrats firmed controlled the House. In 1987, 

when Congress determined Yucca Mountain consistently of the top 

three sites was to be examined for a repository, there was a Republican President and Democrats controlled both the House and Senate. In 2002, leadership of the Congress was reversed but Congress 

overwhelmingly resolved to support Yucca development 306-117. So 

when the Nation through its elected representatives resolved how 

to solve the nuclear waste problem, it did so in a consistently bipartisan fashion, wouldn’t you agree? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Those are policy decisions based by the Congress. 

Mr. PITTS. Dr. Lyons, the Department of Energy motion to withdraw the license application said ‘‘the Secretary has decided that 

a geologic repository at Yucca Mountain is not a workable option 

for long-term disposition.’’ Was the Secretary’s decision based on 

internal department scientific evaluation by the Administration? 

60 

Mr. LYONS. As I indicated, the license application was based on 

the technical criteria and the Secretary in his evaluation recognized the importance of technical criteria and social acceptance criteria. 

Mr. PITTS. Was it based on any scientific evidence that Yucca is 

not workable? 

Mr. LYONS. No, it was based on the concern that there are two 

major criteria, as I indicated. 

Mr. PITTS. Isn’t there in fact ample scientific evidence that Yucca 

is workable and safe? 

Mr. LYONS. That would remain to be determined if this were to 

move through the process, sir. In the DOE’s estimation when they 

submitted the license, that was their determination. 

Mr. PITTS. Has the department determined that Yucca Mountain’s repository is not suitable to meet the relevant safety standards for long-term storage of spent fuel and nuclear waste? 

Mr. LYONS. No, there is no data that has been presented along 

those lines. However, again, the decision has made to withdraw, 

and whether that—and the legality of that is being tested both 

through the NRC and the courts. 

Mr. PITTS. In fact, DOE still stands behind the quality of its application that the repository can be built and protective of the public health for 10,000 years and more. Isn’t that the case? Doesn’t 

DOE in fact admit as much in its application to the NRC? 

Mr. LYONS. Those were the technical criteria and others that 

were deemed met by the Department of Energy. 

Mr. PITTS. So technically speaking, Yucca Mountain remains a 

workable option. Why is it not workable in DOE’s view? 

Mr. LYONS. I don’t know how else to say it, sir, other than the 

Secretary in his view, which I agree with, views both technical criteria and social acceptance criteria as key to ever moving ahead towards successfully opening a repository. 

Mr. PITTS. What scientific evaluations has DOE performed to 

make this determination? 

Mr. LYONS. I believe I just indicated that it was a question of social public acceptance. 

Mr. PITTS. So this is the opinion of the Secretary. Did DOE inform this opinion? Was anyone from the White House or the Administration involved in this decision in any way? 

Mr. LYONS. That was before I was involved. I simply can’t answer that, sir. I know the Secretary certainly has the benefit of 

general counsel that it was within his rights to withdraw the application, and that is now in the courts and the NRC. 

Mr. PITTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

The chair recognizes the chairman emeritus, Mr. Dingell, for 5 

minutes. 

Mr. DINGELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your courtesy. 

This is to Mr. Gaffigan. We have here a splendid situation where 

the Federal Government has invested huge sums of money in a 

thing that we cannot use. We have taxed the daylights out of the 

ratepayers, and how much is that fund that we have taxed into the 

ratepayers? 

61 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Currently, the current balance is about $25 billion and about—— 

Mr. DINGELL. How much have we spent of that on what? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Almost $10 billion. 

Mr. DINGELL. Almost 10. And what—— 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Just to clarify, we spent about 10, plus there is 

another 25 sitting there. 

Mr. DINGELL. So we have got a gigantic hole in the ground. Now, 

tell me, there is a lawsuit going on in this matter, is there not? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. There is, sir. 

Mr. DINGELL. And the Federal Government is being sued, but because of the mercy and the charity of the plaintiffs in that lawsuit, 

it has never progressed to the point where it is going to lead to a 

judgment. Is that right? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. There was some oral arguments taken in March 

of this year. The basic gist of those arguments was whether there 

was a final action of the government, whether the NRC was going 

to rule, so that was the gist of the oral arguments. We haven’t 

heard anything since. 

Mr. DINGELL. I am just a poor Polish lawyer from Detroit, but 

you have stated that DOE officials stated they have frequent meetings and focus groups to help guide the shutdown. Can you tell me 

what that means? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. We had a hard time knowing what that means. 

We asked—— 

Mr. DINGELL. Does DOE know what that means? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Well, I think they know what it means but we 

asked them, could they at least document what they have in terms 

of a shutdown. 

Mr. DINGELL. Did they explain it to you? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. They said they had a draft plan, they were working on it, and this is something the IG looked at. 

Mr. DINGELL. Has that draft plan been submitted to anybody, 

Mr. Chairman? 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Not that I know of. 

Mr. LYONS. No, sir, the draft plan was not completed, and instead the department moved ahead as expeditiously as possible to 

shut down by the end of fiscal 2010. 

Mr. DINGELL. Could we get the draft plan? I think it would be 

nice if you would share it with us. Would you submit it, please? 

Mr. LYONS. I honestly don’t know if it is completed, sir. If it is 

available, yes. 

Mr. DINGELL. I don’t care whether it is completed. Submit the 

darn thing to the committee and we will tell you what we think 

of it. 

Now, in your testimony, Secretary Lyons, you said that DOE 

takes exception to a statement in the GAO report that a final impact of terminating Yucca Mountain is that communities may be 

even less willing to host spent nuclear fuel repositories or other 

storage sites in the future due to further erosion of DOE’s credibility. You go on to say that on the contrary, a new start could lead 

to enhancement of the credibility of the department’s approach. I 

don’t mean to make light of a difficult situation but to your knowlVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:32 Aug 01, 2012 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00067 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 112\112-54 060111\112-54 CHRIS
62 

edge have communities around the country been volunteering to 

host a nuclear waste repository? 

Mr. LYONS. Yes, sir, there have been communities that have corresponded with the department. 

Mr. DINGELL. Who has volunteered to do this? 

Mr. LYONS. One I am aware of is in New Mexico around the 

Carlsbad area. There may be others. I don’t know. 

Mr. DINGELL. Is that for high-energy waste or—— 

Mr. LYONS. Again, this is local communities supporting, yes, sir. 

Mr. DINGELL. Now, Mr. Friedman, how much is closing out the 

Yucca Mountain project costing the Federal Government? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. You know, Mr. Dingell, I am not sure of the answer to that question. 

Mr. DINGELL. Would you please get it and submit it for the 

record? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. If I can, I certainly will. 

Mr. DINGELL. It isn’t going for peanuts, is it? It is costing lots 

of money, isn’t it? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. No, no. They have spent a great deal of money 

on the licensing support network and finalizing some of the technical studies that have been done. 

Mr. DINGELL. Now, how much is it estimated that the closeout 

of Yucca will impact the Department of Energy’s environmental remediation liability? Do you have any estimate on that? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. We do. We expect that it will be—— 

Mr. DINGELL. Would you submit that and the answer to that for 

the record? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. I certainly will. 

Mr. DINGELL. Now, how much has the United States invested in 

the Yucca Mountain project? How much of that was from the nuclear waste fund, i.e., the ratepayers, and how much from the Federal Government, i.e., the taxpayers? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. It was about two-thirds, one-third, two-thirds 

from the rate fund, about $10 billion—— 

Mr. DINGELL. What does that come down to, Mr. Gaffigan? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Where does that what? 

Mr. DINGELL. How much does that come down to coming out of 

the skin of the ratepayers and taxpayers? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Ten billion from the ratepayers and about $5 billion from the taxpayers, and that doesn’t include any of the judgment fund. 

Mr. DINGELL. Now, you know, fellows, I know my questions seem 

repetitive and everybody who comes up here from the department 

gets the same because we have all heard about how much spent 

nuclear fuel is stored at various sites around the country and we 

just destroy the damn stuff. We don’t reprocess it the way the 

French do but we dig holes that cost lots of money. And then we 

sit around and you guys come up and explain to us and a little 

while later somebody else runs the committee and then you come 

up and explain to us again, or your successors do. And so we have 

got a facility here that everybody wants to do something with. We 

have got a resource that we are not using. We are threatening nuclear, which is extremely important to this country in an energy 

shortage and all the other problems that we have, and it seems 

63 

that we have no long-term plans for dealing with spent nuclear 

waste and the best we can say is that you seem to be proceeding 

down a very dangerous path with more and more and more of this 

stuff piled up. And Members of the Congress need to know what 

is going on. We need to protect the funds collected and we need to 

have a long-term solution, either storage that will work or reprocessing, and when are you going to get to this? This question was 

going on when I was chairman of the committee, and as a matter 

of fact, it was going on when I was a young member of this body. 

When is it that I can look forward to being young enough that I 

am going to get an answer on these questions? 

Mr. LYONS. I think the best answer, sir, is that that is the charge 

of the Blue Ribbon Commission. They will have their interim report 

in July of this year. I am looking forward to that report, and I too 

have been working many years to understand what the long-term 

solutions acceptable in this country will be. 

Mr. DINGELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

Just for notice to my colleagues, first a question. We have votes 

on the floor. We are going to finish with the Chairman Emeritus 

Barton for 5 minutes and then we will recess. The question to my 

colleagues is, what is your pleasure to ask the first panel to come 

back, because some of you have been waiting to address questions 

to them, or do we go to second panel? You want the first panel? 

Mr. BARTON. I think you should let this panel come back because 

some of the members—— 

Mr. SHIMKUS. That is my question, and that is what I am posing 

to my colleagues, and I think that we will ask you to come back 

after votes to finish. 

The chair recognizes Chairman Emeritus Barton for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BARTON. Thank you, and I know that we have to vote so I 

am going to go through this pretty quick. 

We had the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1982 as amended in 

1987. That is 29 and 24 years ago. Under that law, the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy are authorized to find a permanent repository for the high-level nuclear waste 

both from civilian and military applications in this country. 

Through a convoluted process, Yucca Mountain was chosen as the 

repository. It has been through innumerable hearings, studies, but 

back in 2008 a license application was tendered to the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission by the Department of Energy. I think the 

law gives them 4 years to make a decision. With the change in the 

Administration, the Obama Administration last year asked to withdraw that application. The board empowered to make the decision 

whether the application should be withdrawn in a very unusual decision chose not to allow it to be withdrawn and now we have got 

a very convoluted process at NRC where we are trying to determine whether there is a vote or isn’t a vote, and we are in discussions on a bipartisan basis with the Chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission about that issue. 

The purpose of this hearing is to determine what the legal criteria are for the Department of Energy to terminate Yucca Mountain, and the distinguished Deputy Secretary or Under Secretary 

64 

has said, if I heard him correctly, that that decision was based on 

social public acceptance. Is that correct, Dr. Lyons? 

Mr. LYONS. As Secretary Chu has testified many times, yes, he 

views both technical criteria and public acceptance—— 

Mr. BARTON. Where in the NWPA does it say that social public 

acceptance is a criteria? 

Mr. LYONS. I didn’t say it was in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. 

I said that it—— 

Mr. BARTON. Then why is that a variable in the decision-making 

process? 

Mr. LYONS. Again, sir, our Secretary has the benefit of legal 

counsel, and this is in the courts and in the NRC—— 

Mr. BARTON. If the Secretary of Energy decided that the Yucca 

Mountain wasn’t acceptable because it was in the desert, would 

that be a criteria? If he just decided he didn’t like the color purple, 

would that be a criteria? 

Mr. LYONS. I think you know our Secretary, sir, and he would 

have substantially stronger criteria. 

Mr. BARTON. I don’t think social public acceptance is a criteria 

under the law. 

Mr. LYONS. As I noted in my testimony, there are many, many 

actions that are still required if Yucca Mountain were ever to open. 

Many of those decisions require permits and concurrences from the 

State of Nevada. 

Mr. BARTON. But my understanding is that everybody at your 

level and above has to hold up your hand and take an oath of office 

or an oath to uphold the Constitution and defend the laws of the 

United States and all of this. We have a current public law that 

has not been amended that gives the Department of Energy the authority to tender an application. That application has been tendered. The Secretary decided to withdraw it but the board responsible for accepting that withdrawal said no. So I would assume the 

Secretary of Energy is knowingly and willfully violating federal 

law. 

Mr. LYONS. Well, as you are aware, sir, the day after the ASLB 

made that decision, then the commission decided that they wished 

to take review. That is their prerogative as the commission. 

Mr. BARTON. And we are in a, it is not a negotiation but we are 

certainly in a situation where we are trying to determine with the 

chairman and the current members of the NRC just what they 

have decided or not decided to do, and that is a convoluted mess 

if I have ever seen one. 

Mr. LYONS. I certainly can’t comment on what is going on at the 

NRC, but between the NRC and the courts, because this is also in 

the courts, the legality of that withdrawal is going to be determined eventually. 

Mr. BARTON. Well, I have got 51 seconds. If this Congress affirmatively states that the application should continue to be reviewed 

and that Yucca Mountain should continue to be considered according to current law, is the Secretary of Energy and the President of 

the United States going to honor that law? 

Mr. LYONS. If we are ordered by one of those mechanisms that 

is not appealed to resume the license, we have indicated repeatedly 

in testimony that yes, we can and will. However, at part of our 

65 

thinking, Congress has not provided any appropriations in fiscal 

year 2011. 

Mr. BARTON. I have a feeling we will, before the end of this year, 

do so. 

With that, I yield back, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And just to correct the record, that is not true. We 

stopped funding for the last half of fiscal year 2011 in the C.R. The 

first part of the fiscal year was under a continuing resolution that 

still had it, and that is another issue of debate. 

The chair recognizes Mr. Inslee for as much time as he can consume before we have votes. 

Mr. INSLEE. Thank you. 

This is very disturbing on a couple of bases. One is, in my State, 

the State of Washington, we have people very diligently trying to 

follow their obligations legally and in their profession getting this 

waste ready to ship to Yucca. They are going to be ready to ship 

9,700 canisters to Yucca. They are doing their job, but the department is not doing its job, and that is on a local concern. 

But on a national concern, I just think this situation is one of 

a failed state. They talk about failed states around the world. Because of the failure to follow the clear law here, this is the equivalency of a failed state. We reached a national decision. It is unpopular in one local part, a beautiful part of the country, as it will 

be in any part of the country that we ever have this decision made, 

and yet we can’t execute a decision. 

Now, this sort of flagrant statement that social acceptance is now 

a legal criteria, I don’t understand. I will just ask Dr. Lyons, how 

are we ever to build anything like a nuclear waste repository anywhere in the United States if social acceptance is a mandatory criteria to build something? 

Mr. LYONS. I used the example in my testimony of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, which has the strongest local acceptance, and I noted that there are a number of international examples where with careful education with transparent processes, 

there has been strong acceptance of repository programs. 

Mr. INSLEE. So why didn’t you do the same thing in Nevada? 

Mr. LYONS. I also indicated in my testimony—— 

Mr. INSLEE. Are you saying there is something unique about Nevadans that make them unique in the United States and this will 

be welcome as rosewater in the rest of the United States? 

Mr. LYONS. Sir—— 

Mr. INSLEE. It is going to smell the same no matter what name 

we put on it, and this is just a failed policy looking for another social acceptance criteria failure around the United States. What evidence do you have that there is any more socially acceptable place 

for this particular situation? 

Mr. LYONS. I provided the example of the Waste Isolation Pilot 

Plant. That is a different repository, different type of repository, 

but it is a repository and it has strong local acceptance. 

Mr. INSLEE. And obviously in the decision-making of the department based on the best science and geology and hydrology, we decided Nevada was the best place, but now you are telling me we 

are going to maybe look for a less scientifically credible, less geologically stable, less hydrologically isolated place because we might 

66 

get a little better social acceptance. That is a failed policy by a 

failed state, and I have to tell you, regardless who the Administration is, an abject failure to follow federal law here is most disturbing and it is unacceptable, and I don’t really want to belabor 

you with too many more questions. I just want to tell you it is unacceptable by any Administration of any party. To make its decision when we are dealing with this number of curies of radiation 

based on social acceptance is just not a winner for this country. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. 

The votes are being called right now. There are three votes. That 

is probably going to run around 30 minutes. We will see who comes 

back, who hasn’t asked questions of the first panel, and if not, be 

prepared to answer questions but having done this before, it may 

be it for you all but you need to be here in case someone wants 

to ask you all a specific question. 

I will recess this hearing subject to the call of the chair. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. GARDNER [presiding]. We will go ahead and resume the hearing. I recognize myself for 5 minutes for my opportunity to question. 

Thank you very much for being here today and your time to 

share with us. Just a couple of quick questions for you based on 

some previous testimony by Dr. Lyons. I heard a great deal of discussion regarding social acceptance, the social acceptance theory as 

it pertains to the Yucca Mountain license. Mr. Gaffigan, can you 

cite any statutory authority for social acceptance criteria? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Not in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. 

Mr. GARDNER. Mr. Friedman, can you cite social acceptance criteria in the statute? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Not that I am aware of. 

Mr. GARDNER. Dr. Lyons, can you cite statutory authority for social acceptance? 

Mr. LYONS. I am not citing statutory authority, sir, but what I 

have tried to indicate is the number of steps that would be required to ever open Yucca Mountain, steps that Nevada stands, I 

believe, in opposition to, and I believe they could very successfully 

block that. 

Mr. GARDNER. So you would agree that there is no statutory authority or basis for social acceptance theories as criteria? 

Mr. LYONS. Not specifically in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. 

Mr. GARDNER. So the answer is no, then, there is no statutory 

authority for social acceptance? 

Mr. LYONS. No. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you. And what is the theory of your legal 

counsel when he believes that social acceptance is a valid criteria? 

Mr. LYONS. Our Secretary has outlined that many times. The 

briefs that are our general counsel has filed either with the NRC 

or in the court cases, those are available; your staff has them. That 

spells out the position of the general counsel. I certainly won’t try 

to repeat it. I am not a lawyer. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you, Dr. Lyons. 

Mr. Friedman, your role as Inspector General, what is that role 

in a nutshell? 

67 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, I have four responsibilities, Mr. Gardner. 

One is to act as an independent set of eyes and ears for the Secretary and for the Congress. Two is to bring to justice those who 

are attempting to defraud the people of the United States. Three 

is to be independent fact finders in high-profile controversial matters, and four is to give the U.S. taxpayers a seat at the table when 

important government decisions are made. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you, Mr. Friedman. Mr. Friedman, do you 

believe that the social acceptance criteria is a valid theory? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Mr. Gardner, I don’t exactly know how to answer 

that question, to be honest with you. You asked me whether I 

thought it was in statute, and I don’t believe that it is per se, so 

I would have to say it is somewhat questionable from a legal standpoint, but I am not a lawyer and I am not making legal judgment. 

Mr. GARDNER. Mr. Friedman, in the four roles that you mentioned the Inspector General has under its purview, do you believe 

one of them is to expect or to perhaps visit with the Secretary’s office about the social acceptance criteria that they are using if you 

believe there is no statutory authority? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, we also have a responsibility under the IG 

statute, Mr. Gardner, not to overlap and duplicate what GAO has 

done. So I think it is fair to say that GAO’s report, which has obviously been a major topic of this hearing, has really addressed that 

issue essentially. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you. And a further question, Mr. Friedman. 

You stated that it is likely that the termination of the Yucca Mountain project will significantly impact the department’s environmental remediation liability, which is currently estimated at $250 

billion in future cleanup costs. Have you seen any evaluation by 

the department regarding how its decisions will affect this liability? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. No. What we are anticipating, I indicate in my 

long testimony, my complete testimony, that we will be looking at 

this as the department prepares its financial statements for the 

current fiscal year, and they will be responsible for coming up with 

a revised estimate, which will reflect their judgment as to the impact of the closure of Yucca Mountain on the liability, and we will 

be reviewing that carefully at that time. 

Mr. GARDNER. The Department of Energy’s recent actions to dismantle its nuclear stockpile will increase the volume of defense nuclear waste. How has the department planned to accommodate this 

waste as it shuts down Yucca Mountain? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, Yucca Mountain, approximately 10 percent 

of Yucca Mountain was designated, as I recall, for high-level defense spent nuclear waste. My understanding is that the current 

inventory of waste in that category exceeds even the 10 percent of 

Yucca Mountain that was reserved for that purpose originally. 

There are lots of proposals right now to compact the waste, to mix 

it with—to down blend it, if you will. But the fact of the matter 

is, it will have an impact as the level of the waste grows. 

Mr. GARDNER. Did the Department of Energy consider whether 

its role in START would be compromised by its decisions on Yucca 

Mountain? 

68 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, that obviously is a very fundamental issue, 

Mr. Gardner, and to be honest with you, it is outside of my area, 

my purview. I don’t know the answer to the question. 

Mr. GARDNER. Dr. Lyons, do you know if DOE did any analysis 

under START implications? 

Mr. LYONS. I have not seen such analysis. However, the department recognizes its responsibilities for defense high-level waste. 

That has never been in question. 

Mr. GARDNER. Thank you. My time is expired. 

The chair recognizes Mr. Cassidy for 5 minutes. 

Dr. CASSIDY. On June 29 an administrative court judge—the Department of Energy did not have the authority to close Yucca 

Mountain. 

Mr. LYONS. June 29, 2010. 

Dr. CASSIDY. Yes. But you did anyway. I mean, does the rule of 

law have no say-so? Does the attorney you sought an opinion from 

trump the administrative procedures that have been set up to hear 

your concerns? 

Mr. LYONS. The Atomic Safety Licensing Board decisions are reviewed by the commission. The commission can take review of any 

ASLB decision and the commission—and I was no longer on the 

commission at that time—would like to take review of that decision. That moves the responsibility from—— 

Dr. CASSIDY. Excuse me. I have limited time. So the commission 

has not yet issued its report and frankly, there are some allegations of politicization of the process. But was there a stay upon the 

ruling of the preliminary administrative court, the June 29, 2010, 

board, was there a stay upon that? The ruling has not been released by NRC but clearly you are disregarding it. 

Mr. LYONS. Not being a lawyer, I don’t want to get into a question of what a stay is in this case. I am positive that my statement 

is accurate that the commission has taken the review and the action is with the commission and the—— 

Dr. CASSIDY. But you preempted the action of the commission, if 

you will, because they have not yet issued a ruling but you have 

shut down Yucca Mountain, even though you were told you didn’t 

have legal standing to do so, and if you are not an attorney, I 

would ask next time you bring an attorney because it is really fundamentally the question that is before the taxpayers. We just blew 

$10 billion. It frankly doesn’t look like you had legal standing, and 

I am getting a little bit of a legal rope a dope by you saying that 

you are not an attorney, and I don’t mean to be rude, but imagine 

the frustration. 

Now, let me ask you next. Mr. Friedman’s complete testimony in 

the written portion speaks of a process whereby after you disregarded this Atomic Safety Licensing Board’s ruling and decided 

on 10/1/2010 to shut it down, you declared an abandonment of, 

what was it, 22 metric tons, Mr. Friedman? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. You may be referring to the GAO report, Mr. 

Cassidy. 

Dr. CASSIDY. Oh, I thought it was your report where this was declared abandoned. 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It was some property that was declared abandoned. 

69 

Dr. CASSIDY. Tons. Now, granted it was steel and—— 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Computers, office equipment, that sort of thing. 

Dr. CASSIDY. Yes, trailers, I mean, stuff of both value by bulk 

and by value. Why did you just declare it abandoned? I mean, 

frankly it looks like you were trying to make it so it would be expensive to restart, again, after deciding to disregard the Atomic 

Safety Licensing Board’s ruling. Why did DOE just declare it abandoned? 

Mr. LYONS. Again, sir, those decisions were carefully reviewed by 

our general counsel. Abandonment is one of the mechanisms by 

which property can be disposed. The department was certainly 

working on an expedited schedule to complete the shutdown within 

fiscal year 2010. 

Dr. CASSIDY. So—— 

Mr. LYONS. Or I should say that there is a complete inventory 

underway now and there will eventually, as we go into the closeout 

process, there will be a reconciliation. 

Dr. CASSIDY. One of the two—again, for whatever reason, I came 

back and not entirely organized but one of the men had testimony 

that said that it was a rather hasty shutdown and that the complete sort of gathering of information that would have been beneficial was not done, that I gather intellectual property was lost. Am 

I speaking for one of the two of you? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. I would sort of summarize, I think both the IG 

and GAO had concerns about the lack of a plan to shut down. They 

basically started shutting down in June of 2010—I am sorry, February of 2010 and had basically completed shutdown by September 

of 2010. During that time, there was a draft plan that never got 

finalized. They were trying to get things done quickly, and we 

raised concerns about that. 

Dr. CASSIDY. So it really looks like there was an attempt to abandon the process in a way which it could not be restarted. 

Mr. LYONS. Absolutely not, sir. As part of the quality assurance 

program, as each decision has been made along the way, the technical justification for that must be recorded in writing—— 

Dr. CASSIDY. So who made that decision to abandon tons of material including things that could have been sold for scrap or given 

to other federal agencies, instead, to turn it over to a contractor? 

Who made that decision? 

Mr. LYONS. It was an evaluation on the prospective value of the 

property in that decision. However, I believe both of the reports in 

question here note that the majority of this equipment in question 

was transferred to other DOE sites, particularly Hanford. 

Dr. CASSIDY. Well, I thought I saw where it was abandoned. 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It is declared abandoned, but then under that 

process they can transfer it to other sites, so Dr. Lyons is right. 

Most of it got transferred internally. It was considered unusual but 

DOE had the authority to do that. 

Our concern was, and we put this out in our recommendations, 

that, number one, in some cases they didn’t have a good inventory. 

They would say they are working on and we would say great and 

they should have a full accounting for the inventory and what was 

sold. We still think that remains to be done. And then lastly, we 

70 

think they should consider a plan to restart if they are compelled 

to do so. Those were our two recommendations. 

Dr. CASSIDY. I yield back. Thank you. 

Mr. GARDNER. The gentleman from North Carolina, Mr. 

Butterfield, is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I 

thank the three witnesses for their testimony today. I am sorry I 

could not hear their testimony in their entirety but I will certainly 

work with my staff and look at your transcript as we go forward. 

But Mr. Chairman, by any assessment, this is a very, very complicated issue, but it is clear to me that the Department of Energy’s 

decision to withdraw its application for Yucca Mountain is really 

the cherry on top of a greatly mismanaged federal exercise. I generally believe that the Department of Energy should follow the 

process laid out by the act and maintain focus on the technical and 

scientific elements of Yucca Mountain rather than the political considerations, but I am a realist and I understand that all politics are 

local, and that if any of our respective constituents came to us and 

said this is our number one issue, we would certainly fight tool and 

nail to stop it even if the focus should be technical in nature. 

Notwithstanding, ratepayers in my home State of North Carolina have contributed $900 million of their hard-earned money to help 

finance the construction of a permanent repository for our nuclear 

waste. I believe in nuclear power. I have said it time and time 

again. It makes up over 30 percent of my State’s generating capacity. I am embarrassed to tell my constituents that their contributions have amounted to very little as we appear to be in no better 

position for solving this problem as we were when we started splitting atoms. We have a responsibility to see this process through 

and to make it a high priority. 

So let us talk about some of the options set out by the GAO. Mr. 

Gaffigan, you stated that an independent organization with predictable funding might be a way to overcome some of the administrative issues we have had with Yucca. Would such an independent 

organization have to be created by statute or does the Administration have the authority to create it? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. Currently, no separate authority exists so I think 

it would have to be created. 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. Obviously, you might eliminate some of the 

political capriciousness by granting this agency predictable mandatory funding but eventually the decision to site a repository will be 

inherently political, and we all understand that. That said, outside 

of funding, how could this independent agency be able to overcome 

the political hurdles with any greater efficiency than the Department of Energy? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. We had two lessons learned, and that is part of 

it. That is sort of the first lesson that perhaps some consistent 

leadership policy on where we are going would be a mechanism to 

get there, overcoming the many factors including public acceptance, 

which is recognized by many as a hurdle that should be addressed, 

just as well as the technical and safety issues. The key to those 

sorts of things is transparency, education, economic incentives. 

Those are some of the tools that have been used in other countries 

to gain acceptance for such a site. 

71 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. You talked about greater transparency in the 

process. Where do you see historical transparency gaps and how 

might they be closed? 

Mr. GAFFIGAN. It goes back to the 1960s when they looked at a 

facility in Kansas. There was, you know, a feeling on the part of 

the folks that were out there that there wasn’t full disclosure of 

what the information was. Even in the process of Yucca Mountain, 

there has been some complaints about not full disclosure of the different issues out there, and I think DOE to its credit has worked 

on that and tried to establish some credibility but it still has a 

ways to go, particularly in the eyes of the folks from Nevada. 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. The American people may not take notice of 

this issue based upon the spent fuel issue alone but I guarantee 

you that they will notice when the cost of not completing the 

project becomes known. 

Mr. Friedman, to you, sir, in your testimony, I am told by my 

staff that you stated that the U.S. spent nuclear fuel litigation liability is approximately $15 billion. If the Yucca project is completely scuttled and no clear path is established, when will the government have to make these payments and to whom? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. I don’t know the answer to your question, Mr. 

Butterfield. I can’t give you a precise date. But there will be payments that will have to be made, there is no doubt, and our view 

is that it is likely that there will be a significant increase in the 

gross amount of the payments. 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. And will my constituents and the chairman’s 

constituents and all of our constituents ever see any refund of the 

money that they have contributed to this date? 

Mr. FRIEDMAN. Well, that is not for me to say. I mean, if this 

project actually comes to a close, if there is a legislative fix or 

amendment or series of amendments or new legislation, then it 

wouldn’t surprise me that there would be some attempt to try to 

reimburse those who have made those contributions only to see 

them go for naught. 

Mr. BUTTERFIELD. Thank you. My time is expired. Thank you. 

Mr. GARDNER. The chair recognizes Mr. Bass from New Hampshire for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BASS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

The answer to Mr. Butterfield’s question is that the only way you 

are going to get their money back is to open this project. 

Lots of questions have been asked today, and Dr. Lyons, I have 

to say I almost feel sorry for you. You know what is going on here. 

Everybody in the audience knows what is going on here. The 

Democrats, Mr. Inslee, Mr. Green, all the Republicans know what 

is going on here, and it is unfortunate that we even have to have 

this hearing. The process of debating what to do with high-level 

and low-level nuclear waste began when I was a State rep in New 

Hampshire in the early 1980s and I believe there was a site in New 

Hampshire that was under consideration in some of the earlier 

rounds. We have gone through an excruciatingly detailed and complete analysis. We passed legislation. There have been battles that 

have occurred, as we have heard, through different Administrations, different parties have been in charge, it has been bipartisan, 

72 

and we have come to as good a conclusion as we could possibly 

come to to solve this issue, which is of grave national importance. 

And then the Energy Secretary and the President and perhaps 

others that have a political interest in this issue stopped the 

project, potentially incurred expensive legislation, waste $10 billion 

and possibly $25 billion of taxpayers’ money on the basis of undefined technical criteria and social acceptance, which is an interesting comment, deferring everything to a Blue Ribbon Commission 

that can’t consider any sites. In essence, what we are proposing 

here is that the clock be wound back to the early 1980s again and 

we begin this process over again. 

Now, Dr. Lyons, you are the Under Secretary for Nuclear Energy 

so you are pretty high up in this organization but you can’t make 

any comments. Can you define social acceptance, what it is? And 

again, I feel sorry for you because I know you can’t answer these 

questions because there are no answers to the questions because 

there aren’t any really valid criteria for doing what you are doing, 

but give it a try. 

Mr. LYONS. I am the Assistant Secretary, sir, not the Under Secretary. 

I grew up in Nevada. I visited Nevada. I worked in Nevada. I 

saw the opposition in Nevada growing. I saw it as it was created. 

I have watched over many, many years while Nevada has progressively blocked each of the various initiatives that was attempted 

with regard to Yucca. In my view, there are many, many steps that 

remain before Yucca Mountain could ever be opened. The views in 

Nevada for which I am using the buzzword of public acceptance or 

social acceptance, that opposition that has been spawned in Nevada I believe will continue to block progress towards opening 

Yucca Mountain. 

Mr. BASS. Not one single member of this subcommittee that I 

have seen has come out and shared your view, neither Republican 

or Democratic, and I understand that there are no members from 

Nevada here. Is there any place in the United States where you 

could build this without local opposition, in your opinion? 

Mr. LYONS. Well, I have used the example several times today 

about the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico that enjoys 

very, very strong local and regional support, and the way that process developed as well as the way repositories have been sited in 

other countries, which is what the BRC is evaluating, I think provides extremely important lessons as to how to do this job right 

and get the public education, general the public acceptance which 

I am convinced can be achieved. 

Mr. BASS. I beg to differ with you. I think that it has been pretty 

clear that the GAO, the Inspector General, we will hear a later 

panel that this project was ready to go. The taxpayers have funded 

it. The taxpayers are going to be on the hook for billions and billions of dollars more if we don’t proceed, and the justification for 

its hopefully suspension, not termination, as of yet undefined technical criteria, social acceptance criteria, and what is not mentioned 

is political criteria. 

With that, Mr. Chairman, I will yield back. 

Mr. GARDNER. The gentleman yields back. 

73 

That concludes the testimony of our first panel, and thank you 

very much for your time and commitment to be here today and for 

bearing with us through the votes. Thank you. 

We will stand in recess subject to the call of the chair. We have 

got a 4:00 markup beginning, and we will give you as much information when we will reconvene. 

[Recess.] 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Welcome to the second panel. There was clapping 

as I was coming down the hallway and I thought, oh, man, people 

must love me. No, they just wanted to get the hearing back going 

on. So we will start. I will call the hearing to order, and we want 

to welcome our second panel, and we apologize but actually I am 

very excited to have the second panel here. In order, again, I will 

go from left to right, your right to left, we have on panel two Mr. 

Charles Hollis, Chairman of Nye County Board of County Commissioners, Nye County, Nevada. Good to see you again, sir. Mr. Martin Malsch, Partner, Egan, Fitzpatrick, Malsch and Lawrence, on 

behalf of the State of Nevada, welcome, sir. Mr. Greg White, Commissioner, Michigan Public Services Commission, and Mr. Christopher Kouts, former acting director of DOE’s Office for Civilian 

Radioactive Waste Management. 

Again, your full statement will be submitted for the record. You 

have 5 minutes, and we will start with you, Mr. Hollis. Welcome. 

STATEMENTS OF CHARLES GARY HOLLIS, CHAIRMAN, NYE 

COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, NYE COUNTY, 

NEVADA; MARTIN G. MALSCH, PARTNER, EGAN, 

FITZPATRICK, MALSCH AND LAWRENCE, ON BEHALF OF THE 

STATE OF NEVADA; GREG R. WHITE, COMMISSIONER, MICHIGAN PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION; AND CHRISTOPHER A. 

KOUTS, FORMER ACTING DIRECTOR OF DOE’S OFFICE OF CIVILIAN RADIOACTIVE WASTE MANAGEMENT 

STATEMENT OF CHARLES GARY HOLLIS 

Mr. HOLLIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee. Thank you again for the opportunity to testify about local 

support in Nevada for Yucca Mountain. I am Gary Hollis and I am 

the Chairman of the Nye County Board of Commissioners, the 

State of Nevada. 

As you know, Mr. Chairman, Yucca Mountain is located entirely 

within Nye County. While this testimony is mine, I want you to 

know that it reflects the views of the other four county commissioners as well, and as well as views of many political and local 

leaders in rural Nevada. 

Mr. Chairman, we deeply appreciate that you and Congressmen 

Green and Burgess took the time to visit Yucca Mountain and to 

meet local people in Nevada. As you learned, there many of us who 

live next to Yucca Mountain who support the completion of the licensing process. Most of us who live in the vicinity believe that the 

decision on Yucca Mountain should be made based on sound 

science, and this can only happen by full review by the Nuclear 

Regulatory Commission. If the NRC determines that the repository 

is safe, I favor its construction. 

74 

As I am sure you can understand, no one is more concerned 

about the safety and welfare of the citizens of Nye County than me 

and the other four commissioners. It is my community. My family, 

my friends live and work here. I would never accept a federal facility to be located in my county if I thought it was unsafe, no matter 

what the economic benefits were attached to it. Frankly, I resent 

suggestions that any of the five Nye County commissioners would 

jeopardize the heath and safety of our citizens for any sum of 

money. That would not happen on my watch. 

When Congress passed the 1987 amendment to the Nuclear 

Waste Policy Act, it provided money for local communities impacted 

by Yucca Mountain to fund oversight activities. Nye County used 

that money to create an independent science program. We had unbiased scientists to conduct the work. After years of effort, they 

found no reason to believe that the repository could not be built 

and operated safely. We have provided that information to the Department of Energy and the public. Our work was top quality and 

the results were available to everyone. 

But to get the full picture, we need to see all the evidence from 

every source. That includes information from Nye County, DOE, 

NRC staff and the State of Nevada. We want every piece of evidence to be reviewed so a final determination of the safety of Yucca 

Mountain can be made. That determination can only happen if the 

licensing process is complete. 

Mr. Chairman, if the NRC determines that the repository cannot 

be built and operated safely, I would be the first person to object 

to its construction. I only ask that all of the facts and the science 

are reviewed by the NRC and that the legal process established by 

the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is carried out. Let the facts dictate 

the result, not politics. 

My views are shared by leaders of other rural Nevada counties. 

Upon being elected last year, Nye County Commissioner Dan 

Chinhofen initiated a resolution of support for the licensing application and worked with Esmeralda, Mineral, Lander, Churchill and 

Lincoln counties to do the same. Thus, these six rural counties that 

would see the most impacts from Yucca Mountain called on the 

DOE and the NRC to complete the licensing process. We are willing to live by the results of a fair, scientific review process. I ask 

permission to put all six resolutions in the record, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Is there objection? Hearing none, so ordered. 

[The information appears at the conclusion of the hearing.] 

Mr. HOLLIS. Beyond the political leaders of those other counties, 

a majority of the residents of the county support the license application. 

Mr. Chairman, let me point out that all five current Nye county 

commissioners expressed their support for Yucca Mountain and all 

were elected or reelected by our citizens. Therefore, it is not accurate to say there is no local support for Yucca Mountain. The people that live in the neighborhood do support completion of the licensing process. 

Thank you. I am available to answer any questions you may 

have. I am here with two of the county’s technical professionals, 

and they are available to answer questions as well. Thank you, Mr. 

Chairman. 

75 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Hollis follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you, Mr. Hollis. 

And now I would like to recognize Mr. Malsch. Sir, you are recognized for 5 minutes, and your full statement is in the record. 

STATEMENT OF MARTIN G. MALSCH 

Mr. MALSCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee. I appreciate the opportunity to provide testimony on behalf of the State of Nevada at this hearing today. My name is Martin Malsch. I have practiced law in the nuclear energy field and nuclear waste field for over 40 years in both the public and private 

sectors, and I am Special Deputy Attorney General for the State of 

Nevada. 

The failure of the Yucca Mountain repository program is a direct 

result of decisions taken beginning almost 25 years ago. A decent 

respect for history would have suggested that those decisions created a very high risk of program failure but the lessons of history 

were disregarded. 

The original 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act foresaw many of the 

problems that now afflict the Yucca Mountain program. Among 

other things, it sought fairness and redundancy by requiring multiple sites from which to choose, ultimate locations for repositories 

and it strove for regional equity by setting up site selection programs for two facilities, one in the West and one in the East. 

However, all this was scrapped in 1987. Congress decreed that 

all repository development efforts must focus now on just one site 

in Nevada, and it did so notwithstanding incomplete scientific information and the fact that now spent reactor fuel and high-level 

waste from every region in the country would now be sent to a single Western State with no nuclear power plants or high-level 

waste-generating facilities. 

After 1987, there was only one possible site, and inevitably as 

more and more dollars were spent, it became progressively more 

difficult to admit that the selection of Yucca Mountain had been a 

mistake. But we know now things we did not know in 1987. We 

now know that groundwater will reach the waste at the site in 

about 50 years, not the hundreds or thousands of years that had 

been originally thought. We now know that Yucca Mountain is not 

dry. Total water seepage into the tunnels where the waste will be 

located will be as much as 130,000 kilograms per year. These and 

other serious problems led to even more exotic and doubtful engineering fixes. 

When it appeared likely that the Yucca Mountain site could not 

satisfy certain EPA and NRC licensing requirements, the requirements were simply eliminated. These actions by Congress and then 

by EPA, DOE and NRC destroyed the credibility of the program. 

Public opinion in Nevada which until 1987 had been mixed with regard to Yucca Mountain now solidified into strong, consistent, 

across-the-board opposition, and by annual surveys done between 

1989 and 2010, opposition to the project has remained constant at 

between 63 and over 70 percent. 

While there has been and continues to be some support for the 

project in small rural counties surrounding the site, such support 

cannot be extrapolated to the wider Nevada population. Taken together, the six counties sometimes cited as evincing some level of 

81 

support for DOE’s program comprise only a tiny fraction of the 

State’s population. 

In 2002, Nevada carefully evaluated the effects of a prospective 

Yucca repository on the State, its communities and the economy, 

and that report documents the potential, among other things, for 

significant risks to Nevada’s unique tourism-based economy and 

property value losses and health effects associated with transportation. 

While it can be difficult to terminate a federal project when large 

amounts of money has been spent, there is no sense now in spending good money after bad. DOE’s finding that Yucca Mountain is 

unworkable, the decision to seek withdrawal of the license application and the establishment of the Blue Ribbon Commission to look 

for alternatives for the management and storage of spent fuel were 

all the right and lawful things to do. They had the potential to put 

the country on a path to a safer, more cost-effective and expeditious solution to managing spent fuel and high-level waste. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That concludes my remarks, and I 

would be pleased to answer any questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Malsch follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you, Mr. Malsch. 

The chair now recognizes Mr. White. Again, your full statement 

is in the record and you have 5 minutes. Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF GREG R. WHITE 

Mr. WHITE. Thank you, Chairman Shimkus, and I would like to 

thank you for your leadership on this issue. 

As you know, my name is Greg White and I am Commissioner 

for the Michigan Public Service Commission. I am appearing today 

on behalf of the Public Service Commission in Michigan, electricity 

ratepayers and the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners. 

I have been involved with this issue, the disposal of spent nuclear fuel from commercial reactors, since shortly after the Nuclear 

Waste Policy Act passed in 1983, which established the policy that 

the Federal Government has the responsibility for the safe and permanent disposal of government and commercial nuclear waste in a 

geologic repository, and that the customers that benefit from electricity generated from nuclear power pay for the commercial share 

of the disposal costs. That was the deal, and we agreed to that 

deal. The fee payments to the nuclear waste fund began in June 

of 1983 as required by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. I am here to 

tell you that the is the only component of that program that has 

ever worked as intended. Nearly 30 years later, the Federal Government has our money; we have their waste. 

When the Department of Energy submitted a license application 

to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in June of 2008, we knew 

that it could take 3 to 4 years to carefully review the safety and 

other aspects of this first-of-a-kind facility. We were not prepared 

to learn that after more than 20 years of study and nearly $15 billion that a different Secretary of Energy would withdraw the license application with prejudice in March of 2010 with no indication that the site is unsafe or that the application is flawed. Instead, the motion to withdraw cited only that Yucca Mountain is 

considered not a workable option. 

The Department of Energy took other steps to terminate the 

Yucca Mountain project that are documented in the April report of 

the GAO including disbanding of the Office of Civilian Radioactive 

Waste Management that had managed the program. Like others, 

we have questioned the legal and administrative authority of the 

Department of Energy to disband this office. 

As you know, the Department of Energy requested no appropriations for the waste program for fiscal year 2011 or 2012 except for 

support for the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future. Yet when the Nuclear Energy Institute and the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners suggested that the 

Secretary of Energy suspend fee payments by utilities to the nuclear waste fund in 2009, that was denied with an unconvincing 

pronouncement that all fees are essential. NARUC and the NEI 

have appealed that decision to the Federal Court of Appeals, which 

is pending. 

We can only speculate how much time and money it will take the 

United States to be ready to accept spent nuclear fuel for disposal 

if it is other than Yucca Mountain but it is likely to be decades. 

96 

It seems essential then we seek our and develop one or more central interim storage facilities to take used fuel from the nine sites 

where reactors are currently shut down and the property cannot be 

decommissioned returned to other productive uses because the 

waste remains such as the former Big Rock nuclear power plant in 

Michigan. 

Regardless of what storage, transportation or disposal solutions 

the Blue Ribbon Commission may recommend, they will need certain and reliable financing support. Concerning the financial impacts of terminating Yucca Mountain, a more predictable funding 

mechanism would certainly enhance future waste management. 

Also, an independent organization outside of the Department of Energy could be more effective in siting and developing a permanent 

repository. 

If Yucca Mountain’s termination is sustained, it means starting 

over to find and develop repositories since there is clear consensus 

that least one site is needed in all scenarios. Unfortunately, there 

are too many unknowns to begin to forecast how long it would take 

to authorize, search and select, fully evaluate, license, design, construct and be ready to begin deposits in a new repository yet another 20 years seem to be highly conservative. 

With that, I would conclude my testimony and make myself 

available for questions. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. White follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you. 

Now the chair would like to recognize Mr. Kouts for 5 minutes. 

Again, your full statement is in the record, and welcome. 

STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER KOUTS 

Mr. KOUTS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee. I am Christopher Kouts, former principal deputy director of the Department of Energy’s now-defunct Office of Civilian 

Radioactive Waste Management. I appreciate the invitation to appear before the subcommittee. I will focus my remarks on the recently released GAO report that was discussed earlier by Mr. 

Gaffigan and the Administration’s decision to terminate the Yucca 

Mountain project. 

As background, for 25 years I served in various technical and 

management positions in virtually every program area within the 

office. I became the principal deputy director of the program in 

2007 and was the acting director from January 2009 until I retired 

in early 2010 after 35 years of federal service. While serving in the 

program, I was reminded on a daily basis of the formidable challenges that were given to the program by the Nuclear Waste Policy 

Act. As impatient as those who followed the program have been 

over the years with its progress, I believe that any new attempt to 

establish disposal or interim storage facilities outside the confines 

of the act will be met by many new and likely more vexing challenges regardless of the organization or entity that is established 

to administer the effort. 

Now, why will any new effort be more problematic? The answer 

to that question lies partly in the advance that society has experienced in instant communication and information flow. When the 

program proceeded through the facility siting process in 1980s for 

two repositories and an interim storage facility, the Internet was 

not in place. E-mail was not available to the general public, nor did 

the social media of today exist. The 24/7 news cycle we now live 

in will create many opportunities for those opposed to such facilities to spread rumors and disinformation. As a result, the credibility of any new process will be severely challenged from its inception. 

In addition, the State of Nevada has given a clear blueprint to 

those opposed to such facilities: delay, delay, delay. And it should 

be noted that I do not in any way begrudge the lawsuits or other 

actions the State has taken over the years to attempt to impede the 

project. It was certainly their right to do so, and I fully respect 

that. But accordingly, the time frame of decades noted in the GAO 

report for a new repository is nothing more than notional and does 

not appear to stem from a comprehensive evaluation of the program’s past experience nor the changes that have occurred since 

the 1980s. 

The report suggests that an independent entity outside of the 

Federal Government could be more successful. The ‘‘grass is always 

greener’’ rules here. It is also my belief that Congress should have 

the final word on facility siting and that ultimately any siting decision will be a political decision, informed by thorough technical 

evaluation, just as in the case of Yucca Mountain. 

107 

It is difficult to understand the GAO report’s so-called benefit of 

terminating the Yucca Mountain Project to afford DOE the opportunity to explore other approaches. DOE has no authority to undertake new approaches outside the confines of the Act, and history 

has shown that the consensus needed to develop a new policy path 

will not come easily or quickly. 

Because the development of Yucca Mountain has been such a 

contentious and protracted process, it is being suggested that only 

consensual siting of these facilities should be pursued. I would submit to the subcommittee that the U.S. and international experience 

in this area proves otherwise. In my discussions over the years 

with the directors of repository programs abroad, they have consistently expressed their concerns that, due to the very long timeframes repository programs take to develop, any political consensus 

at the beginning can evaporate with one election, just as it has in 

the United States with Yucca Mountain. At the end of the day, implementing a repository program requires steady, consistent, national leadership. 

In closing, beside its questioned legality, the Administration’s decision to terminate the Yucca Mountain project is disturbing because Yucca Mountain has not failed any technical or regulatory 

test. The thousands of scientists and engineers and others that 

worked on the project over the years believe, as I believe, that the 

site would meet the stringent regulations of the EPA and the NRC 

and assure that these materials would not adversely impact future 

generations and the environment. Given the substantial investment this Nation has made in the site and in the policy that has 

been supported by every prior Administration since 1982, I believe 

the Nation deserves a final and definitive answer regarding Yucca 

Mountain from the NRC licensing process. 

Thank you for this opportunity to discuss these issues, and I 

would be pleased to answer any questions the subcommittee may 

have. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Kouts follows:] 

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Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you, Mr. Kouts, and I will recognize myself 

for 5 minutes for the first round of questioning. 

Again Mr. Hollis, I want to welcome you here, and I think in my 

visit out there, which was my second visit, I think it was even better that I drove because it gave you an idea of how far the definition of local is. The size of the federal property that consists and 

Yucca Mountain is inside, how big is that land mass? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Well, the county is around 18,000 square miles. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I was told that the federal property, the BLM, the 

DOE, the nuclear test site is the size of the State of Rhode Island. 

Is that correct? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Well, the test site is just about the size of the State 

of Rhode Island, but that doesn’t account for the Tonopah Test 

Range and the Nellis Bombing Range. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So it is a large site, and Yucca, the mountain itself 

is not on the outskirts of this Federal Government land. It is my 

recollection that we went through the gate, we still drove 10 or 15 

miles to get to Yucca Mountain. Is that true? 

Mr. KOUTS. If I could answer that question? 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Yes, Mr. Kouts. 

Mr. KOUTS. Mr. Chairman, the site itself, basically half of it is 

on the Nevada Test Site and the other half is on BLM land. So—— 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And so from the security gate, that is how far of 

a drive from the first—I mean—— 

Mr. KOUTS. Well, if you entered around Mercury, since the gate 

that we used to use is now closed, I mean, you probably drove 

about 5 miles form that gate to try to get to a place near the mountain. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So when we talk about local consideration, what 

is your county seat? What is the city, the county seat? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Tonopah, and from where I live, it is 165 miles to 

the county seat. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And Pahrump, which is the town I visited, is that 

the closest community of size? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Yes, it is approximately 34,000. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thirty-four thousand, and it is—— 

Mr. HOLLIS. The county is about 43,000. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So you are local in the region. 

Mr. HOLLIS. Yes. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. So if we wanted to talk to local individuals—now, 

in driving from Las Vegas, it is like—my hometown in Collinsville, 

Illinois, and the State capital is a town called Springfield, it is 

about 90 miles. Isn’t that the distance? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Actually it is probably 130 miles, 135 miles from Las 

Vegas. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. No one in Collinsville, Illinois, would say we are 

local to Springfield and no one in Springfield, Illinois, would say 

Collinsville is local. And so we appreciate your being here and we 

appreciate a local voice in this debate on what the local citizens 

want to do. And all you are asking is for the NRC to make a decision? 

Mr. HOLLIS. That is correct. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Because there is always a debate, and we had the 

commissioners here, and this is not a hearing on the commissioners 

115 

but we feel that the NRC commissioners have voted, and we would 

like to know what the result of that vote is. 

Mr. HOLLIS. Absolutely. That is what we want to know. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And so you are also speaking for other counties 

that are closer in proximity to the city of Las Vegas? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Well, I pretty well speak for all the counties around 

Yucca Mountain that have impact to Yucca Mountain. Those six 

counties that I am talking about and that I have resolutions here 

in support of. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you. 

Mr. Kouts, you mentioned in your bio you were in the Office of 

Civilian Radioactive Waste Management, correct? 

Mr. KOUTS. That is correct, sir. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And that office was enacted by—what statute gave 

that office the authority? 

Mr. KOUTS. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And that law is still valid, correct? 

Mr. KOUTS. Yes, sir, it is. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And who is in charge of and how many people are 

in the Civilian Radioactive Waste Management Office right now? 

Mr. KOUTS. Zero. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And would it be your opinion that if there is no 

one fulfilling the role that is under the law that someone is not 

abiding by the law? 

Mr. KOUTS. Although I am not a lawyer, it would seem to me the 

department is not following the law. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. And I have 11 seconds. How would it would take 

to reconstitute the office and finally reach an answer on how much 

that will cost? 

Mr. KOUTS. Let me preface my estimate by saying that this all 

presupposes that the department did not demolish the office as it 

tried to demolish the licensing process with impunity basically. The 

motion that they filed was with prejudice, which meant that if indeed it was withdrawn from the NRC, it could never be resubmitted. So if the department has treated the office that way, then 

I think it will take many years. If the records are in reasonable 

shape and if you can coax the staff—and I am not talking about 

the federal staff, I am talking about the contractor and scientific 

staff-back and you can get the contractors in place, you are going 

to have to get a law firm again. Having said that, it would probably 

take 2 to 3 years to reformulate the office and to get it in a position 

where it could begin defend the license again, and from that point, 

it will probably take, assuming the NRC has issued their report or 

nearby close to that probably at least another 3 years to get a final 

answer out of the commission, so that will probably be about a 5- 

to 6-year time period. That is my estimate, assuming again they 

didn’t terminate the office with prejudice. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. Thank you very much. My time is expired. 

I would like to recognize the vice chairman of the committee, Mr. 

Murphy from Pennsylvania. 

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Kouts, I wonder if you could tell me a little bit of your background. You are an engineer by trade? 

116 

Mr. KOUTS. Yes, sir. I have two degrees in engineering, and I am 

also a licensed professional engineer. 

Mr. MURPHY. And you have worked with the Department of Energy? 

Mr. KOUTS. I joined the Department of Energy back in 1978 and 

I joined the program in 1985. 

Mr. MURPHY. And you have been involved—when you say ‘‘the 

program,’’ you mean the program with Yucca Mountain? 

Mr. KOUTS. The Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management. I lived through just about all the siting challenges, everything else through the act, and I lived in the program or I was in 

the program during virtually its entire existence. 

Mr. MURPHY. Are you familiar with the legislation that has been 

passed and into law regarding Yucca Mountain? 

Mr. KOUTS. Very familiar. 

Mr. MURPHY. You have read it? 

Mr. KOUTS. Many times. 

Mr. MURPHY. Have you found anything in there which set a 

standard in law which talked about social acceptance of sitings of 

this? 

Mr. KOUTS. No, sir, I have read it many times, and I never found 

anything like that in there. 

Mr. MURPHY. Are you familiar with the Department of Energy or 

anybody involved with any of these projects ever using that as a 

standard to override scientific or legal information? 

Mr. KOUTS. Only the current Secretary of Energy. 

Mr. MURPHY. You heard in the previous testimony multiple times 

related to their counsel and their Secretary of Energy saying that 

that was the standard they were going to use, and it reminds me 

of other standards they used when the White House talked about 

changing some of the other mandates and regulations that come 

up, that they would look at some other social aspects of this as 

well. But I am curious as we go through this if you have any idea 

of any standard in engineering at all where this is applied anywhere else in the universe that we are familiar with. 

Mr. KOUTS. Well, no, sir, I am not, and I think the irony of all 

this as the Nye County representative represented, there is local 

support. There is acceptance of a repository there, assuming—and 

I would say appropriate local support because I think they are concerned about its safety. The bottom line is that just as Dr. Lyons 

indicated that the local community around Carlsbad would like it, 

well, I don’t think the local community around Nye County is any 

different in that regard than Carlsbad. So again, I don’t understand the standard, I don’t know how it was applied. I wasn’t involved in those conversations, so your guess is as good as mine. 

Mr. MURPHY. But you had made some reference before to the 

term ‘‘consensus.’’ Certainly one can find someone in any community that either the NIMBY principle applies or BANANA, which 

means build absolutely nothing anywhere anything. I am interested in the science and trying to find a safe place to put nuclear 

fuel. It is safe where it is now but not long term, if we are looking 

at long-term sites here too. 

The Department of Energy describes Yucca as unworkable, and 

it is a 25-year stalemate. Do you agree with those terms? 

117 

Mr. KOUTS. I don’t believe it has been a stalemate, sir. I think 

it has been a very contentious process, and I would deny that, but 

I don’t believe it was at a stalemate. 

Mr. MURPHY. Those 25 years weren’t spent with just people 

wringing their hands, they were working on scientific information. 

Mr. KOUTS. That is correct, sir, and we had a great victory in 

submitting the license application back in 2008, so I wouldn’t look 

at that as a stalemate. Unfortunately, they truncated the licensing 

process but as I indicated in my testimony, I believe the Nation deserves an answer on Yucca Mountain. 

Mr. MURPHY. And as far as you can tell through your knowledge 

and experience, that answer has not been forthcoming other to say 

they are looking for some consensus or social aspects on this but 

no other. You heard in my previous questioning of the DOE secretary that we have not seen any scientific, legal, any information 

out there of any way, shape or form which would contraindicate 

what has been forth as licensure up to this time? 

Mr. KOUTS. The answer is no, and I will say that as long as I 

was principal deputy and acting director in the program during 

this Administration, I was never asked for any technical information regarding the site, so my assumption was that technical information was not part of the Secretary’s decision-making process, 

and had anyone else in my program been asked for it, I would have 

known about it. So the bottom line is, to my knowledge the Secretary’s decision was not a technical one, at least he didn’t ask for 

any information from the program for it, and he must have used 

other criteria which again since I wasn’t part of the decision-making process I can’t comment on. 

Mr. MURPHY. I thank you. 

And with that, I yield back. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman yields back his time. The chair recognizes the ranking member, Mr. Green from Texas. 

Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I appreciate the patience. I apologize to our witnesses. We actually had a markup of the full committee downstairs on a bill I was 

working on and also I met with the chair on a little pipeline from 

Canada legislation that we are working on, but I appreciate it. Obviously energy is really important where I came from, and I appreciate the opportunity a few weeks ago to come out to Yucca Mountain. I have supported it for my whole career in Congress, and it 

was good to see on the ground what was happening. 

Mr. Kouts, in your testimony you mentioned the potential challenges with restarting the selection process for a nuclear waste 

storage facility. I have concern about that process, as I said with 

our earlier panel. You mentioned your disagreement and GAO’s 

recommendation or independent commission and Congress should 

have final say. Do you also take issue with the Blue Ribbon Commission and their potential recommendations? 

Mr. KOUTS. If you are asking my opinion about the preliminary 

recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission, I would use 

three words. I would say they are predictable. I would say they are 

disturbing and I would also say they are amusing, and let me try 

to explain why. Predictable in the sense that if you read the President’s Executive Order, it is very clear that the President had 

118 

made up his mind that Yucca Mountain wasn’t an option. He 

talked about in his order that the last 25 years has basically been 

unworkable—not unworkable, he used some other words—but it 

was a very clear charge to the commission about what his views 

were. So what came out of it was, Yucca Mountain obviously was 

not on the table and they want to restart the whole process, and 

that is the real troubling part of it because I don’t think anyone 

at the commission really understands what it will be like for this 

country to go through another siting process for a repository. It was 

a gut-wrenching, very, very difficult time, not only inside the Department of Energy but outside the Department of Energy, and 

now as I indicated with the social media that we have and the opportunity for disinformation, it will be magnitudes more challenging than it was back in the 1980s. 

And let me just finish with the amusing aspect of the preliminary recommendations is that it took so long for them to come up 

with their predictable, disturbing conclusions. 

Mr. GREEN. Mr. Hollis, thank you for being here today, and 

again, thank you for your hospitality. We had a brief meeting 

there. You mentioned your desire to see Yucca Mountain proceed 

if the health and safety of individuals of the areas is protected. You 

mentioned resolutions passed by Nye County and other areas. Can 

you discuss the resolutions and further explain the position of your 

county? 

Mr. HOLLIS. Well, the six resolutions, they are just asking the 

DOE, Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to finish the process, let us finish the license application, and 

that is what we are supporting. We want them to finish their job. 

We can’t make evaluation of the safety of Yucca Mountain without 

all the evidence, and we are asking for all the evidence, and the 

evidence is that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has to follow 

the licensing application. It has to be completed before we will 

know. If it is unsafe, I will be the first one to stand up and say 

no. But if it safe, I will be the first one to say let us build it. 

Mr. GREEN. I typically go with the folks who live in the neighborhood, and you are about as close as folks that live in the neighborhood as you can get. 

Mr. White, in your testimony, you discussed the need to develop 

at least one interim storage facility, that these potential facilities 

could be a net savings to the Federal Government. You suggest one 

of nine potential locations where reactors were shut down. Can you 

further in detail on this suggestion and how could it help solve or 

ease the burden of our nuclear storage dilemma? 

Mr. WHITE. Well, there is a couple different aspects to that question. One of the things we are really concerned about is the fact 

that the program has not performed at all, you know, we have 

nothing, and we have nine sites around the country where there 

are shutdown reactors and many of those plants, for example, the 

Big Rock nuclear plant in Michigan, they have decommissioned 

that site as much as they possibly can. What is left on that 750- 

acre site is an independent spent fuel storage facility. It is just the 

dry casks sitting in a pit, so we cannot return that property to productive use, so we think that there could be some lessons learned 

if we could consolidate at least the fuel at those nine sites, those 

119 

nine shut-down sites, into one location, and it would achieve a savings because currently the customers and the utilities that own 

those sites are paying those costs continually despite the fact that 

they are no longer generating electricity at that site. 

Mr. GREEN. You also discussed financing the disposal of nuclear 

waste in the nuclear waste fund. If the nuclear waste fund were 

not used for the purpose you discussed, what would alternative 

means be for financing disposal of nuclear waste? Because we know 

part of this came out of our ratepayers, including my area, and 

part of it came from just general revenue. Where would we the 

other funding? 

Mr. WHITE. Well, that is a good question, and I don’t have the 

answer to that. We agreed to what I call the deal where the customers would pay the cost. The beneficiaries of nuclear generation 

would pay the cost of the program. What we are frustrated by is 

we have paid and paid and paid and we have nothing to show for 

it, and I can argue that the customers paid for the design of the 

spent fuel pools at the reactors. We have paid for the reconsolidation when those pools filled because the Federal Government 

hadn’t taken the waste. We paid again when that fuel was removed 

and put into dry casks. All the while we are paying for a federal 

program with nothing to show for it. 

Mr. GREEN. I appreciate it. I know my time has run out. Mr. 

Chairman, no matter what happens with Yucca Mountain, we still 

need a nuclear waste disposal facility, and the President supports 

investment in alternative energy, and Secretary Chu actually gave 

testimony before our committee that we are unable to meet the 

President’s goals if we do not invest in nuclear energy. Part of that 

is also finding a place to have a permanent storage, and this means 

we need to have it stored safely somewhere, and if not Yucca, then 

we don’t want to have Members of Congress 25 years from now like 

we are saying OK, where are we going to put this, it is still sitting 

on these sites all over the country. So thank you for the hearing. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I thank my colleague, and now I would like to recognize Congressman Whitfield from Kentucky, who chairs the Energy and Air Subcommittee, so he is very knowledgeable on energy 

issues. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. Well, I hope I can live up to your expectations, 

John. 

Mr. SHIMKUS. I hope you can too. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. Thank you all for being here. We really appreciate it. 

I think it is very difficult myself to come to any conclusion except 

that this Administration is ignoring the law because the Nuclear 

Waste Policy Act of 1982 did set this up. In 2002, Yucca Mountain 

was approved as the site, and for this Administration to pull back 

its application for construction, authorization for construction before any decision has been made, it seems to me is violation of the 

law. Would you agree with that, Mr. Kouts? 

Mr. KOUTS. Let me preface by saying I am an engineer who has 

read the act very many times but I tend to agree with the administrative law judges at the NRC who when they read the act could 

not find any basis for the Secretary to withdraw the application in 

section 214, which is the same section that tells them to submit it. 

120 

If there was a flaw in the license application, then I think the Secretary could pull it back and fix it and then resubmit it, but just 

to withdraw it with prejudice, in other words saying that it is never 

going to be submitted again, I certainly don’t see that authority in 

the act. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. And then obviously the NRC’s construction authorization board agreed with that because they refused to allow 

them to withdraw the application, and that was in June of 2010, 

and so we have had one year for the commissioners to take this 

issue up and make some decision, and I think that anyone who has 

heard Chairman Jaczko testify would certainly walk away with the 

conclusion that he is simply dragging his feet, because one of the 

commissioners whose term is going to be expire maybe the end of 

this month and he knows that the appointment of the next commissioner will be voting with him, and yet to do that is violating the 

policy act. 

So it appears, even a reasonable interpretation is, this is nothing 

but politics. And then I heard you answer Mr. Murphy and say you 

were the acting director of the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste 

Management. So if the Secretary was going to withdraw this application, it would appear that he would come to you for some technical information and yet you testified he did not do so. Is that correct? 

Mr. KOUTS. That is correct, sir. He did not. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. And so if he didn’t want technical information in 

making a decision to withdraw, what kind of information would he 

need to make a decision like that? 

Mr. KOUTS. Well, if I could just give you my experience with the 

program, having been in it for 25 years, and again, I was a career 

SES, I was an acting director, and over the years I have been involved in lots of meetings and been told not to attend lots of meetings, and the ones I have been told not to attend are typically those 

that are among political appointees where they are going to discuss 

political issues. So my assumption was, since I was not involved in 

the decision-making process, that those types of discussions were 

going on. And we did not have a political for the program. There 

was not one appointed. So therefore there was no one from the program politically appointed by the President in those meetings but 

that is what my assumption was because I wasn’t involved. 

Mr. WHITFIELD. Well, I think the logical conclusion is that it was 

political. It was done to help Harry Reid. And the American people 

are the ones that are going to suffer from this. Over $15 billion has 

been invested already. Ratepayers for utilities are paying fees for 

this. Taxpayers are now legally liable to pay over $15 billion in 

judgments against the Federal Government because they cannot 

live up to the responsibilities of the policy act of 1982. 

So it seems to me—and then you take the six counties closest to 

the repository, as Mr. Hollis has testified, actually support the Nuclear Regulatory Commission at least going through the process 

and making some final decision and have adopted resolutions basically to that effect. So I don’t think there is any question that this 

is bad news for the American people, it is costly to the American 

people, taxpayers, and it is probably a violation of the Nuclear 

Waste Policy Act of 1982. 

121 

Mr. SHIMKUS. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

Mr. Kouts, I appreciate your testimony. I think the GAO analysis 

kind of supports your assertion. Yucca Mountain is the most studied place on the planet, and I think you were there for most of the 

studying. 

I just want to remind the second panel that the record will remain open for 10 days. This hearing may be followed up by individual questions by my colleagues, so if you could then answer 

those and get those back to us as expeditiously as possible, we 

would appreciate it. 

We will continue to move forward on addressing these disconcerting events that many of us question the legality of, and look 

forward to moving types of legislation that will help enter another 

voice of what the vast majority of representatives of this constitutional republic would like to do based on previous agreements and 

laws passed. 

So we thank you for your testimony and appreciate your time. 

Members have 10 days to submit questions for the record. And 

with that, this hearing is now adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 5:00 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned. 

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