http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/bw-cong/2006/... WASHINGTON (AP) - A Senate committee chairman says the Bush administration's new timeline for opening the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump in Nevada in 2017 ignores the possibility of lawsuits and delays.
"Experience has shown that the schedule for Yucca is a slippery thing," Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., told the project's new director on Thursday.
"My concern is that the new timetable does not include any margin for any further project delays by the (Energy Department), its contractors, or legal action by the state of Nevada all of which would cause DOE to miss these new deadlines," Domenici said at a hearing of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee.
The dump originally was supposed to open in 1998. Last year, the department abandoned a 2010 deadline.
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