To solve the problem of nuclear waste disposal, this federal law is called the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. The United States Department of Energy is responsible for finding a site, building a facility, and operating the repository They studied nine locations for ten years and then narrowed it down to three. More than one hundred of America's commercial nuclear reactors are planned to deposit the worst of their nuclear waste deep into the mountain. It is to be stored permanently, but the project says it will be guaranteed for ten thousand years. The fuel rods are now placed in cooling ponds near the plants.
Most pools are full, or nearly full.
Aware that time is running out, Yucca Mountain was the only site left. The mountain sits inside the Nevada Test Site about 80 miles of Las Vegas. A huge earth boring machine is digging a tunnel 25 feet wide into the mountain. Two miles of tunnel have already been excavated and three more miles remain till completion. The Nevada state government is against putting the depository in the Mountain.