RICHLAND, Wash. (AP) — U.S. Congressmen Doc Hastings and Jay Inslee plan to talk about nuclear waste storage Friday while visiting the Northwest’s lone nuclear plant.
Energy Northwest, operator of Columbia Generating Station, has built storage to safely hold its used nuclear fuel. But the utility recently won $56.9 million in damages from the Energy Department for failing to begin accepting its spent fuel at a national repository.
The Energy Department wants to withdraw its application to build the Yucca Mountain repository 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is considering the proposal.
Washington is among those suing to prevent the government from killing the project. Waste from the highly contaminated Hanford nuclear reservation also has been long planned to go there.
