Welcome to the CSG Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee Update. Below are links and summaries of several important happenings from the last few weeks. Please don't hesitate to contact Lisa (920/458-5910) or Sarah (630/925-1922) with any questions or concerns about any of these issues.

Spring Meeting Update

The spring committee meeting details are falling into place. Highlights of the meeting include:

• a discussion with OCRWM on the national transportation plan, the national route selection process and recent legislative proposals
• updates from the Yucca Mountain Task Force, the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance, and Exelon Generation, a Midwestern utility company
• a state roundtable and discussion on state shipment fees
• a program update on DOE's proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) and discussion of potential impacts on the Midwest.

The committee will also go on an optional tour of the Missouri State Capitol. Briefing materials will be sent to committee members prior to the meeting.

Click here to register and click here to email Sarah if you're interested in carpooling from St. Louis.

Click here for an updated agenda, preliminary participant list and other information.

Legislative Update

Committee member Rep. Phil Montgomery testified before the Wisconsin Joint Legislative Council on the future of nuclear power in the state. Wisconsin has a moratorium on the construction of new plants until a federal repository is available for the disposal of spent fuel, and until the construction of a plant has been proven to be economically advantageous to the public. The Wisconsin Joint Legislative Council set up a special committee to discuss the issue during the 2006 interim session. Through its cooperative agreement with DOE, CSG sponsored a tour of Yucca Mountain for the committee. This spring, the special committee drafted legislation that would repeal the moratorium. This legislation now awaits sponsorship and consideration by the legislature. During the process, Rep. Montgomery also wrote letters to the Wisconsin Congressional delegation encouraging them to expedite the construction and operation of Yucca Mountain.

Click here for the draft legislation, testimony and other documents from the Wisconsin Joint Legislative Council Special Committee on Nuclear Power.

Click here for Rep. Montgomery's letters to the WI Congressional delegation and their responses.

In related news, Sen. Pete Domenici and Sen. Larry Craig, along with 9 other senators, introduced the Nuclear Waste Access to Yucca Act (NU-WAY) as Senate Bill 37. The bill aims to move along the repository program by enacting:

• an expedited licensing process
• land withdrawal for the repository and the rail line
• the construction of on-site, interim receipt and storage facilities
• and a repeal of the statutory 70,000 metric ton capacity limit, among other provisions

The text of this legislation is not yet available; however, the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources press release indicates that the bill will be similar, if not identical, to the bill introduced with the same name last fall. The text of that bill is available here. In last year's bill, there were no transportation-related provisions similar to Section 7 of DOE's proposed Nuclear Fuel Management and Disposal Act.

The text and updated status of other state and federal legislative initiatives can be found on our website

Routing Group Gets Under Way - Again

The national route selection process is finally getting underway again after a hiatus of four months. After finishing our own Route Identification Project in 2005, Midwestern committee members joined the newly formed TEC Working Group Routing Topic Group last fall. DOE originally planned to finish the preliminary national route selection process by the end of the 2007 calendar year. The Midwest submitted comments and revisions to the original task plan, including our proposed approach to the national route selection process. A copy of those comments and revisions is available here. After getting off to a slow start with its own process, DOE has decided to change its approach. The new plan will involve working through the Routing Topic Group but also seeking input directly from the public through the Federal Register. The goal is to identify criteria for national route selection by the end of 2008. The new task plan for the Routing Topic Group is available here. The Midwest and others will discuss these changes via conference call and at the July TEC meeting in Kansas City. Committee members will receive a full briefing on DOE's new approach at the meeting in Jefferson City.

In other routing news, the Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) and the Common Sense at the Nuclear Crossroads Campaign released a report on potential rail, highway, and barge routes from commercial nuclear reactors to the Savannah River Site (SRS) in South Carolina. These routes, according to the group, are likely candidates for transport if SRS becomes the site of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) reprocessing facility. SRS is one of 11 sites being considered for GNEP facilities, as are the GE facility in Morris, IL, the Piketon facility in Portsmouth, OH, and the Paducah facility in Paducah, KY. Common Sense at the Nuclear Crossroads is an Asheville, NC based, grassroots group that focuses on radioactive waste transportation in the South. NIRS is a nuclear opposition group based in Maryland and is perhaps best known for coining the catchy if misleading term "Mobile Chernobyl" to describe the planned shipments to Yucca Mountain. The report might generate interest within the Midwest because, despite the Carolinas being the focus, it looks at routes in Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio, including barge routes throughout the Great Lakes system. Also, of the 41 groups that coordinated in the release of the report, a dozen are from the Midwest.

The maps and a copy of the report are available here.

The press release for the report is available here.

Click here for more information about GNEP.

Thanks for reading! Look for the next issue in two weeks!

Sincerely,
Lisa Janairo and Sarah Wochos
Committee Staff