Judge Voids Utah’s Antinuclear Laws

A federal judge has struck down a package of Utah laws designed to keep nuclear waste out of the state, saying it is a federal issue beyond the reach of state lawmakers.

U.S. District Judge Tena Campbell said state officials have unfairly hindered nuclear utilities that are seeking a federal permit to store used nuclear fuel on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation.

Her ruling, issued late Tuesday, prohibits the state from enforcing a series of laws that regulate nuclear waste and impose large fees on waste-storage businesses.

“Clearly, Utah may not prevent radiological waste from entering Utah because of safety concerns. Nor may Utah create a separate, state licensing process,” Campbell wrote. She said the group, Private Fuel Storage, has a right to seek a federal license without state interference.

A major decision on a federal license is expected later this year. The Atomic Safety and Licensing Board has gathered testimony on the plan and will advise the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on whether to grant a permit, which would allow as much as 40,000 tons of waste to stay in Utah for up to 40 years.

The site is barren desert, about 45 miles southwest of Salt Lake City, on the Goshute Reservation. The storage plan would bring the small impoverished tribe a fortune--possibly as much as $3 billion.

The state had challenged the contract between the tribe and Private Fuel Storage, saying it wasn’t properly approved by the Goshutes. Campbell ruled that the contract is a tribal matter and none of the state’s business.

The state’s antinuclear laws had also created obstacles in the licensing process.

One provision barred local governments from providing emergency services to such an operation. Another required consent from the governor and Legislature before state roads could be used in connection with the facility.

“This veto right builds the equivalent of a ‘moat’ around the proposed site,” Campbell wrote. That “moat” illegally infringed on the realm of nuclear regulation--where the federal government holds sway, she said.

Sue Martin, a spokeswoman for Private Fuel Storage, said Campbell’s ruling could help clear away any doubts regulators may have.

“Having this ruling I think makes it easier for them to rule,” she said. The decision also removes financial obstacles the state had tried to build, such as a $5-million license application fee and a requirement that Private Fuel Storage pay a “transaction fee” equal to 75% of the value of its contracts.

A spokeswoman for Gov. Mike Leavitt said the state would appeal the decision.

Private Fuel Storage, a group of eight nuclear utilities, has always considered the Skull Valley site a stopgap measure to deal with a looming waste-storage crisis, Martin said.

The federal government has pledged to take charge of all waste generated by nuclear utilities. A site in Yucca Mountain, Nev., has been selected as the permanent dump for the nation’s radioactive waste, but it won’t be built until at least 2010.

Some Private Fuel Storage utilities, such as Minnesota’s Xcel Energy, are almost out of on-site storage space for spent fuel and say they need a temporary dump while Yucca Mountain is developed.

Six of the eight utilities that make up Private Fuel Storage have said they won’t need to ship any waste to Skull Valley in Utah--as long as the Nevada site is built on time.

Meanwhile, a new study released in Washington says that a volcanic eruption at Yucca Mountain could do more damage than previously thought, possibly forcing radioactive waste from its burial site to the surface.

If long-dormant volcanoes near the prospective high-level nuclear waste dump sprang back to life, molten rock traveling at speeds up to 600 miles an hour could fill the repository deep beneath the Nevada desert within hours, said an article published in the July issue of Geophysical Research Letters, a publication of the American Geophysical Union.

Intense heat and pressure could cause some canisters of spent nuclear fuel that are to be buried at Yucca to rupture and allow radioactive material to flow toward the surface, the article said.

“It can potentially affect a large number of waste canisters,” wrote a team of English, Dutch and American scientists that developed computer models to assess the risk of a volcanic eruption.

Seven dead volcanoes are within 27 miles of the site, but the last eruption was 80,000 years ago. Yucca project scientists say that the chance of one occurring within the waste repository over the next 10,000 years is 1 in 70 million.