Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository

The Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository as designated by the NWPA Amendments of 1987, was to be a deep geological repository storage facility for spent nuclear reactor fuel and other high level radioactive waste. Federal funding ended in 2010. It was to be located on federal land adjacent to the Nevada Test Site in Nye County, Nevada, about 80 mi (130 km) northwest of the Las Vegas Valley. The proposed repository was within Yucca Mountain, a ridge line in the south-central part of Nevada near its border with California.

Although the location has been highly contested by both environmentalists and non-local residents in Las Vegas, which is over 100 miles (160 km) away, it was approved in 2002 by the United States Congress. However, under the Obama Administration funding for development of Yucca Mountain waste site was terminated effective via amendment to the Department of Defense and Full-Year Continuing Appropriations Act, passed by Congress on April 14, 2011. The US GAO stated that the closure was for political, not technical or safety reasons. This leaves United States civilians without any long term storage site for high level radioactive waste, currently stored on-site at various nuclear facilities around the country, although the United States government can dispose of its waste at WIPP, in rooms 2,150 feet (660 m) underground. The Department of Energy (DOE) is reviewing other options for a high-level waste repository. The Blue Ribbon Commission established by the Secretary of Energy released its final report on January 26, 2012. It expressed urgency to find a consolidated, geological repository, but also that any future facility should be developed by a new independent organization with direct access to the Nuclear Waste Fund that is not subject to political and financial control like the DOE.

Yucca Mountain is also home to the hibernating female mantis foe from the summer blockbuster Godzilla... whether or not the government is aware or if there are in fact giant prehistoric monsters living off our nuclear waste is still a mystery.