U.S. Denies Request to Block NV Nuclear Waste Railroad

A request by the State of Nevada to reject a U.S. Departement of Energy application to build and operate a railroad for the delivery of radioactive nuclear waste to the proposed Yucca Mountain national nuclear waste repository has been denied by the U.S. Surface Transportation Board.

To be known as the Caliente Line, the 300-mile railroad would connect the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage facility to an existing line near Caliente, Nevada. According to the DOE application, the railroad would carry spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste to Yucca Mountain. The proposed Caliente Line would run through or near the Nevada towns of Tonopah, Goldfield, Beatty and Amargosa Valley.

After 20-years of environmental and engineering study, spiked by almost constant protest, the Department of Energy officially submitted its application for a license to construct the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage facility to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on June 3, 2008.

More on Yucca Mountain:
Yucca Mountain Background (1998)
Road to Yucca Mountain Enters Final Turn
Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Safe for 1 Million Years, EPA Claims
USGS May Have Falsified Yucca Mountain Research