With a handful of dissenting votes, a legislative panel has advanced a draft measure that proponents say merely provides the opportunity to discuss changing Wyoming statutes to enable temporary storage of high-level radioactive fuel waste from nuclear power plants.
The Minerals, Business and Economic Development Committee on Tuesday voted in favor of the draft bill Used nuclear fuel storage-amendments, which means the committee will sponsor the measure when the full Legislature convenes in January.
Committee Co-chairman Rep. Donald Burkhart Jr. (R-Rawlins), a longtime proponent of bringing nuclear fuel waste into the state, first rolled out the potential for new legislation regarding the matter in July, but neither he nor the committee shared a draft of the proposed legislation until weeks before the October meeting. The bill draft would amend past legislation mostly to align existing state statute with updated language regarding commercial nuclear waste storage with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy, Burkhart said.
“This is not a discussion of why or why not to have this,” Burkhart said at the onset of the discussion, adding that the committee took up the issue at the request of the Legislature’s Regulatory Reduction Task Force. “This is simply to amend the current statute.”
Burkhart was clear in July when he notified his fellow committee members of the pending proposal in draft form — which he shared with them, but not with the public — that nuclear storage held financial promise. The outlook for Wyoming’s fossil fuel-dependent budget is trending downward, and the state could reap more than $4 billion a year from nuclear waste storage, “just to let us keep it here in Wyoming,” he said then.
Also in July, Burkhart said he’d recently visited with a private landowner in Fremont County who, as in the past, is interested in selling land for such a storage facility. The land purchase would cost an estimated $2 million, Burkhart had said, and it would cost about $400 million to build the facility. “None of which would come from the state,” he said. “It would all come from private enterprise.”
Burkhart didn’t discuss such details on Tuesday and said “current statutes in Wyoming conflict with the [Nuclear Regulatory Commission] regulations, and we need to bring them in line.”
The desire to open Wyoming to the nation’s spent nuclear power plant fuel, however, is nothing new. Then-Gov. Mike Sullivan, after months of statewide debate, vetoed a measure in 1992 that would have opened the state to storing the waste. Though the Legislature has since updated statutes to accommodate spent nuclear fuel waste from nuclear power plants in the state, there remains a statute prohibiting a commercial high-level radioactive waste facility unless the federal government establishes a permanent repository.
The draft measure would not change that statute, yet opponents said it opens the door to an unpopular idea that Wyoming — as well as Texas, Nevada and other states — have rejected many times.
“We’re a bit alarmed at the speed at which this issue, in particular, has come about,” Wyoming Outdoor Council Executive Director Carl Fisher told the committee. “One of our concerns about this legislation is the lack of public engagement where we’re kind of looking to federal agencies to convene [discussion on] this, but [Wyoming is] not convening local public processes around impacts on communities.
“This means our communities, the tourism we’re reliant upon, our wildlife, our water, our wildlands, will be subjected to a toxic legacy that stems from a rush decision,” Fisher added.
Jill Morrison, who lobbied against similar measures in the past, noted that the draft bill requires only 30 days’ notice to the public before commencement of construction for such a facility.
“Dealing with high-level radioactive waste is not a simple matter,” Morrison told the committee. “And it’s been rejected by the state of Wyoming — by the public — three times. I think the people of this state [should] get an opportunity to weigh in on something like this.”
Earlier in the day, the committee heard testimony from Nuclear Regulatory Commission permitting officials who said they fully vet such facilities, including multiple opportunities for public input as well as a chance to protest a storage site proposal. Sen. Ed Cooper (R-Ten Sleep) said the NRC’s assurance should ensure a full environmental review and public input process.
“I think just saying that we absolutely don’t want used fuel storage in Wyoming — to just say that is very close-minded,” Cooper said. “I’m not sure that we do want it in Wyoming, and that’s not what this bill is doing. It’s simply allowing the discussion to move forward with the definitions meeting the NRC and the [Department of Energy] language.”
Former Senate President Eli Bebout, a longtime proponent of storing spent nuclear fuel waste in Wyoming, also spoke in favor of the measure “so we can really look at this thing in depth,” he said.
“Nuclear power has made a huge comeback,” said Bebout, who lives in Fremont County. “I’ve been a proponent of nuclear power for 25 or 30 years. It’s one of the last things left, I think, to really help this situation we have in America.”
Federal efforts to establish a permanent storage facility for high-level radioactive waste are currently led by the Department of Energy through its consent-based siting program — a process for communities to establish broad local support for hosting such a facility.
“There is no permanent repository and really no movement towards one,” NRC spokesman David McIntyre told WyoFile in July.
Let the states who want nuclear energy store their own waste. Let those states who want wind energy bury their own windmill blades. Wyoming wants neither.
Everything has a waste. Some worse than others. But this is direct result of closing down coal fire plants. Evan solar and wind has end of life waste to deal with. No one stops and thinks entire issue thru to end. Enjoy your nuke fuel waste oh green energy anti coal folks.
Basically everyone below has spoken my worry, anger and concern. But, “Hey, nobody lives in Wyoming. We can send all our toxic waste out there. Not that many will be sickened or die. Sure, it’s a pretty state with some pretty nice parks, but the land, minus all the humans and critters, will still be there.”
Let me see if I have this right: the party that constantly screams about federal over-reach, insists we are over-regulated by the feds and never misses a chance to tell us we can’t trust the federal government, is now telling us we should trust the feds to regulate nuclear waste garbage dumps that could poison the entire state for tens of thousands of years (half-lifes as high as 24,000 years). On the other hand it could open a whole new tourist industry for foreign and domestic terrorists. Did I get it?
I worked for Westinghouse in Idaho monitoring the pools. High level nuclear waste is very dangerous and as far as I know there are no long term storage facilities in the US for high level nuclear waste. Most of the waste is stored on site at the nuclear facilities. I do know that the DOE’s storage site in Hanford, WA leaked into the ground water, which is really bad.
Finland is the worlds only deep repository for their nuclear waste and it is constructed in billion year old bedrock. Also, Finnish people trust their lawmakers to preserve their enviornment.
Nuclear waste storage has always been the 800lb gorilla and I’m not sure Wyoming is ready for it. Probably not.
Now Wyoming is going to produce waste at Kemmerer so it (we) should be open to storing at least as much as we’re proposing to make and what about mining? It is an example of circular reasoning so why not circular responsibility? Maybe we could even be guided by the whole impact when we look at the “impacts” of each piece? Whoops, but what that might mean is starting with deciding if we should be electrified in the first place or if we should allow our populations to increase to the point of placing strain on our resources, or, or, or. My point is that in order to get what you pay for, you have to be willing to “pay” (store waste, risk nuclear meltdown) for what you get which can be as simple or as complicated as light to see by. As the poet once said, “life gits tejous(sic), don’t it” But maybe it is too late to stop the train let’s just be sure the wreck don’t happen in our own backyard?
As many of our state lawmakers are salivating over the prospect of $4 billion per year “just to let us keep it here in Wyoming”, perhaps they should also ask themselves why, repeatedly, our fair state as well as other western states have wanted no part of this scheme.
As Governor Sullivan stated in his 1992 veto letter, “I simply do not endorse the wisdom of the policy adopted by the federal government nor do I trust the federal government or the nuclear industry to assure our interests as a state are protected.”
Please, folks, let’s walk away from our boom mentality! Economic diversification and protection of our amazing landscape is what will see us into the next century and beyond.
Governor Sullivan’s letter is a good read– thoughtful, insightful and educational. Here’s the link:
https://wyofile.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Gov.-Sullivan_letter_declining_MRS.pdf
Meanwhile: https://www.texastribune.org/2024/10/09/us-supreme-court-west-texas-nuclear-waste-plan/?utm_medium=email “The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to take up a yearslong dispute over a plan to ship highly radioactive nuclear waste to rural West Texas, a case that could have sweeping implications for how the nation deals with a growing stockpile of waste generated by nuclear power plants. A company called Interim Storage Partners has long pursued the plan to move “high-level” nuclear waste from power plants across the nation to an existing nuclear waste storage facility in Andrews County, on the Texas-New Mexico border. Last year, in a Texas-led lawsuit, a federal court blocked the plan and threw out Interim Storage Partners’s federal license to handle the waste. A federal appeals court upheld the decision earlier this year, but the company and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission urged the Supreme Court to reconsider the ruling.” Local control? Not if the nuclear industry and NRC have anything to say about it.
Nuclear waste storage can be done right. Finland has a model facility that is quite ingenious.
Let’s hope Wyoming is smart as the Fins regarding the design of its facility.
Sure. Let the states with nuclear energy store their own waste with the Finnish model.
This is a bad idei for wyoming. Seems like we are reaching for things to poison our great state. We should be looking for things to keep our oil and gas and coal going. They have let the government kill the lumber and now the rest is coming !
Remember when Eli Bebout tried to ‘take’ federal land and give it to the state. It didn’t go well for him, but we all have to have our eyes on these people.
This story from the Texas Tribune may have some bearing on the latest proposal to dump nuclear waste into Wyoming: https://www.texastribune.org/2024/10/09/us-supreme-court-west-texas-nuclear-waste-plan/.
Nuclear waste in Wyoming. Next thing republicans will want is empty rail cars coming back to Wyoming after delivering coal and trona loaded up with garbage and bring back for disposal. This is typical republican thinking. Nothing new, nothing original.
Seems like this is a relay from my youth.
Well considering the rich wildlife presence I’d give a no vote. You have to consider the worse case scenario, and the effects there of. Economics is going to far. And dictating too much. If economics was a company,it would be considered a monopoly! Too much at stake I think,my opinion
Nuclear waste is fine, but the film industry is not.
Wyoming should not be a dump waste for nuclear plants.
I remember the 1992 protests, at Jackson Lake Lodge, where Gov. Mike read the crowd correctly that even opening the door to a study of nuclear waste storage was highly undesirable. Let’s see… 32 years ago…if Texas and Nevada don’t want it, why would Wyoming??? One more ugly label.
Wyoming insanity marches on…elect idiots, expect idiocy.
Per Burkhart, The land purchase would cost an estimated $2 million, and … about $400 million to build the facility. “None of which would come from the state,” he said. “It would all come from private enterprise.”
Sure, $400M to build it and $400M to clean up contaminated soil and groundwater if the facility fails. Wyoming citizens always get stuck with the dirty side. We pay to remediate abandoned “enterprises” when companies go belly up and their bonds don’t fully cover the cost. That’s why Wyoming has a statute addressing abandoned and orphan wells, plus other problematic property left behind when “private enterprises” take their proceeds and leave.
Since they think this is such a great idea, let Burkhart and Bebout pay for bonds to fully cover the cost of clean-up – – from their “private enterprise” pockets. If you’re willing to place a risk on Wyoming, then cowboy up and protect our state against a future disaster.
It was a crappy idea in 1992 and it’s a crappy idea today.
No wonder it would go to Fremont County. Eli and his partners have huge investment scheme that has taken 20 years to push forward. Next again it is no surprise Representative Burkit of Carbon County shame also be interested for the Red desert. What a shame selling off Wyoming and the people lose the most.
Nuclear power is much needed then you have the waist which nobody wants. I don’t recall a nuclear waste facility having problems always the nuclear reactor overheating, and failing. Seems to me if a rancher is OK with it being on his ranch Wyoming being a low populated state. I’m sure the facility would be built properly and not by low bid. The stuff has to go somewhere. I think it should be OK.
Why would one even waste time money energy thinking about doing this? Absolutely NUTS!!
Beware, these Reps are concocting a plan to ruin Wyoming. Consider why no other state wants it. Don’t allow it.
On the left hand, $4Billion $$$
On the right hand, Nuclear Waste
Dollars? Waste? Dollars? Waste? Dollars? Waste?
New motto for our license plates: “Wyoming: the Radioactive State.”
Sorry, New Mexico beat you to that state motto.