Bush Gives Go-Ahead To Yucca Mountain

Date: July 18, 2002

Source: News Room

President Bush has signed a resolution clearing the way for the burial of nuclear waste from across the nation in Nevada's Yucca Mountain. But Nevada lawmakers, citing the safety concerns of the region's 1.4 million people and the risk of terrorist attack, pledged to keep fighting the plan any way they can, both in court and in congress by slashing its funding. The resolution signed by Bush overrides Nevada's veto of the administration's plan to put the country's first permanent nuclear waste repository in the Nevada desert. The move clears the way for the U.S. Energy Department to apply to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to license the $58 billion project. The facility is scheduled to open in 2010 and hold 77,000 tons of radioactive material that must be isolated for 10,000 years.

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