DOE unveils plan for aboveground nuclear waste storage

[struggle4progress]

Today: January 28, 2005 at 15:07:30 PST
ASSOCIATED PRESS

LAS VEGAS (AP) - The Energy Department unveiled plans Friday for an aboveground site to receive highly radioactive waste destined for storage at a national nuclear waste dump in southern Nevada.

Plans call for a 500-by-500-foot facility the department dubbed an "aging pad" that could hold up to 46.3 million pounds, or about one-third of the highly radioactive waste on its way to underground storage at the Yucca Mountain repository.

The department scaled back plans for building a facility to hold almost twice as much waste, Energy Department repository systems engineer Paul Harrington said at a nuclear waste issues conference in Washington, D.C.

The pad could be surrounded by a 300-foot barrier. Harrington declined Friday to provide details about security at the site, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. <snip>

http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/nevada/2005/jan/28/012810401.html