N-Waste Initiative Deserves A ‘No’ Vote From All Idahoans

The nuclear waste initiative presents us with a valuable opportunity. From now until Election Day, we will work to inform voters of the benefits of our court-enforceable settlement with the federal government. Once voters learn the facts surrounding the agreement and the dangers posed by the initiative, we are confident they will vote “no” on the initiative.

During the course of our negotiations with the federal government, we received hundreds of calls and letters from citizens concerned about shipments of nuclear waste to Idaho. We spoke to groups of citizens all around the state.

Like most Idahoans, we oppose additional nuclear waste shipments to Idaho. If a state law, like the “stop the shipments” initiative, could actually stop shipments and require the removal of nuclear waste currently at the Idaho Nuclear Engineering Laboratory, we already would have supported the passage of such legislation.

Unfortunately, the initiative does not and cannot stop the federal government from shipping nuclear waste into Idaho. Nor can the initiative require the federal government to remove waste already in our state.

There are only three ways to place any legal limits or conditions on nuclear shipments to Idaho: a federal court order, an agreement with the Department of Energy or an act of Congress.

Even if Idaho had continued to succeed in attacking the adequacy of DOE’s environmental impact statement in federal court, the temporary ban on shipments to Idaho would have lasted only until the statement was corrected. This would have delayed shipments only for a short while. It could never have stopped them.

Without our settlement and court order, the federal government could assert its constitutionally granted powers to require Idaho to accept nuclear waste shipments - regardless of whether Idaho welcomed them.

Instead of a Band-Aid approach, Idaho now has a court order that directly limits the number of shipments to Idaho and requires their removal by a date certain.

Of critical importance, the agreement prohibits the United States from shipping spent fuel from commercial utilities to Idaho. No other state has been able to obtain such a concession. Two weeks ago, a federal court of appeals ruled that DOE must begin accepting spent nuclear fuel - an estimated 92,000 shipments - from commercial utilities by Jan. 31, 1998. Before our agreement, INEL was one of three DOE sites identified for storage of this waste. Our agreement forces DOE to look elsewhere.

In fact, Idaho’s agreement is the envy of other states, such as South Carolina and Nevada. These states face accepting unlimited shipments of nuclear waste without any enforceable commitments for future removal.

In addition, we believe the initiative has some significant legal defects, as evidenced by the attorney general’s March opinion. Even if the initiative were found to be constitutional, however, its implementation would leave Idaho powerless to stop shipments into our state and to require removal of the considerable amount of waste already at the INEL.

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The following fields overflowed: BYLINE = Gov. Phil Batt and Attorney General Al Lance Special to Roundtable