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United States of America Congressional Record PROCEEDINGS AND DEBATES OF THE 100th CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION WASHINGTON, THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 1987 No. 186 Senate NUCLEAR WASTE TRANSPORTATION ? Mr. HECHT. Mr. President, before the 100th Congress adjourns, we will need to deal with the nuclear waste transportation issue. We are making significant changes in the Nation's nuclear waste management program this year, and we must also make necessary changes with regard to the transportation of this waste. Whether we have a repository, or a monitored retrievable storage facility, or a reprocessing facility, nuclear waste will be passing through most of the States of this country, and therefore the transportation issue should concern every Senator. When Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, little attention was given to the transportation issue. We now realize that the transportation aspect of the nuclear waste issue may actually hold the greatest potential risk to the public health and safety. It would not be wise for us to sit back and wait until a monitored retrievable storage facility is built, or a repository site has been chosen. The Department of Energy is already exploring designs for waste containers. If we don't act now, we will have lost a significant opportunity. When S. 1668 was marked up in the Senate Energy Committee, I successfully attached five important transportation-related amendments to improve the bill. As a result, the bill contains provisions to improve the safety of the packages used to carry nuclear waste. It provides for improved standards and testing for the casks that will carry nuclear waste. It requires the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to see if the packages used by other countries are superior to the designs being considered for use in our country. The bill now directs that tests of cask design involve actual tests on prototype casks, not computer simulations, tests with scale models, or mathematical analyses. Public health, and public confidence, require us to carry out full-scale tests on these waste containers. If we wish to assure our citizens that these containers are safe, we need to be able to "kick the tires." My transportation amendments to the bill also mandate a more significant role for local governments in nuclear waste transportation. It provides for the training of local public safety officials so they can effectively deal with any incidents that might take place involving nuclear waste transportation. The bill also enhances the ability of local governments to stay informed about the timing of nuclear waste shipments. State and local governments bear the greatest responsibility for the health and safety of their citizens. There is no excuse for keeping them in the dark. They have a need, and indeed a right, to know what's going on within their borders. Last week here on the floor, I attached another transportation-related amendment to the bill. That amendment authorizes Federal funds to be spent for transportation improvements in a State where a repository is located. If we ever do open up a repository in this country, and let me reiterate here and now that I do not think deep geologic disposal of spent fuel makes any sense, we ought to reprocess it instead, but if we ever do open up a repository, then high-level nuclear waste from all around the country is going to be converging on that repository area. For instance, if a repository were some day to be located in Nevada, the amendment would allow Federal funds to be spent to pay for construction of a new rail line which would start outside of Las Vegas and go straight to the repository, thereby avoiding Las Vegas. While my amendments which are now incorporated into S. 1668 do go a long way toward improving the way this Nation plans to transport high-level nuclear waste, there is still much that needs to be done. We need to reassert States' rights over the transportation of high-level nuclear waste. Finally, we need to give all our popula-. tion centers a stronger hand in dealing with the Federal Government on the selection of transportation routes. Too often in the past, Mr. President, States and local governments have been anxious and frustrated with the Federal Government over whether or