Yucca spent nuclear fuel waste repository license proposal date push back

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By Patty Henetz
The Salt Lake Tribune



The federal Energy Department has once again pushed back its expected date to file a license proposal for the Yucca Mountain spent nuclear fuel waste repository, a project increasingly in doubt as scientific and political problems multiply.
Officials now say they hope to complete the license application by the end of the calendar year and to push the opening of the repository past 2015.
That uncertainty, along with growing interest in storing spent fuel on or near nuclear reactor sites, in turn weigh on Private Fuel Storage's proposal for interim spent nuclear fuel storage on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation in Utah.
Utilities increasingly are turning to building dry cask storage facilities of their own on or near reactor sites because they no longer are confident Yucca will be built.
The ambitious Private Fuel Storage (PFS) plan to transport and store up to 44,000 tons of highly radioactive waste on a 100-acre parcel 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City would be attractive only if it were cheaper than storing spent fuel near the reactors, said Bob Loux, executive director of the anti-Yucca Nevada Nuclear Projects Agency.
"If you have the option of just leaving it at reactor sites, the has said as a rule that's as safe as a repository for the next 150 years," Loux said. It would be cheaper for utilities to store waste on site than send it to PFS because they wouldn't have to pay for transportation, he said.

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http://www.sltrib.com/utah/ci_2557795

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