history according to the arab spring issue. i've heard from strategists on the right, opinions that perhaps this could be interpreted as obama abandoning strong american allies, particularly in tunisia and egypt and that the recent elections of islamic-based political parties in those two countries, in the representative bodies, may, in fact, lead to anti-american policies in the region and abroad. do you think that romney will attempt to make that argument? and if so, do you think it will resonate with the american public? >> excellent question from a former student. obviously learned a lot. so, i think on the mubarak issue, which i think what you're talking about, i think those americans who feel that united states can somehow impose its

will and get the desired effect it wants on every international issue might find that argument to be, to resonate. those folks are probably voting for romney already. if we're talking about swing voters, i think there's a recognition, what really were we possibly supposed to do? were we going to support egyptian tanks rolling in to cairo to suppress popular unarmed protesters? i think that really is preposterous. so if somebody's going to try to start making that argument that we somehow abandoned mubarak, and then at the same time making an argument that somehow we should be more active to get rid of assad in syria, of course, assad is not an ally and mubarak was. but nonetheless, it doesn't all hold together. that said, i think the question

of islamism and what direction the arab world is going to take and fear in some regard that, you know, when these countries gain democracy and are able to vote, they're going to bring in governments that want to have a -- a government that is more governed by islamic principles than previous ones. and the question is going to be, well, what does that mean? and obama in some ways is taking a risk and a chance and believing, again, what he could do otherwise is not entirely clear to me, but saying, okay, we're going to see what happens in this election, and what we want to do is take the islamists in egypt at their word, that they're going to be committed to demock

democracy, democracy with a more islamic favor and hope they start looking more like turkey than iran. iran is shia, and egypt is sunni. but putting that aside, we don't want these countries to devolve into these autocratic, theocr theocratic anti-western entities where there is no true democracy and very harsh version of islam is being pursued. we would like to see more of a turkish model which is a commitment to democratic principles and if people want to be governed by laws that are more in accord with islamic practices, so be it. it's their country. that's what democracy is. we just don't which way it's going to tilt, whether it's in egypt or tunisia or countries that are going to undergo democratic transitions, and there will be more of them, obviously libya. so i think the position, you know, the government should be taking is let's see where it

goes. let's do what we can to support these governments and encourage them to head down a democratic path to liberalize their economies and to be supportive. and then if they head off in the other direction to, you know, use coercive kind of measures to try to influence them. but in the end, this is really about the people who live in these countries and our ability to shape this outcome to one that would be perfect and make -- and be totally in the united states' interest is actually extremely limited. so how that plays out in the campaign, i'm not sure, but i don't think governor romney's probably going to go there because there aren't really any good answers. thank you for excellent questions and a great session this evening. i really enjoyed it. thank you. >> thank you, david. [ applause ]

thank you, professor, for an excellent presentation. remember, folks, we have three more of our election series coming up. june 27th, discussing civility, incivility and public discourse. july 11th, talking about gender issues in the elections. and on july 25th, we'll have daniel talking about network politics. thanks again for all of you for coming. for flyleaf books for hosting the event and for c-span. have a wonderful evening. thank you. coming up here on c-span3 at 3:00 p.m. eastern, general keith alexander, director of the national security aswrensy, will deliver the keynote address at an american enterprise institute event looking at cyber security threats. that will be live at 3:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span3. and at 5:00, live to capitol hill where the house rules

committee will hold a meeting on repealing president obama's health care reform law. republican house majority leader eric cantor introduced legislation to repeal the health care law with a vote set for wednesday, july 11th. last month the supreme court in a 5-4 vote upheld the health care law. we'll have that rules committee meeting beginning at 5:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span3. the life of a sailor includes scrubbing the deck in the morning, working on the sails, climbing aloft. whatever the duties assigned. gun drill practice. but by the end of the day, you're ready for some rest. you don't get a full eight hours of sleep. aboard a ship like "constitution" it's four hours on, four hours off. >> this weekend on "american history tv" the life of an enlisted man aboard the "u.s.s. constitution." during the war of 1812. >> the sailor lived in fear of the possibility of being whipped that was carried by a petty

officer in a bag. the thing a sailor never wanted to see was a petty officer getting ready for a flogging. it's a phrase we still use today. don't let the cat out of the bag. you don't want to see the cat of nine tales coming out of the bag for a flogging. >> that's today at 7:00 p.m. eastern and pacific. also this weekend, more from "the contenders." our series on key political figures who ran for president and lost but changed political history. today, 1928 democratic presidential candidate, former new york governor al smith. that's at 7:30 p.m. eastern and pacific. this is c-span3, with politics and public affairs programming throughout the week and every weekend 48 hours of people and events telling the american story on "american history tv." get our schedules and see past programs at our websites. and you can join in the conversation on social media sites. the senate environment and public works subcommittee on clean air and nuclear safety

recently held a hearing on nuclear waste management. the hearing focuses on the report and recommendations of the president's blue ribbon commission on america's nuclear future. the 15-member commission was created in 2010 and tasked with reviewing federal policies, managing the united states nuclear fuel cycle. in testimony, the commission's co-chairman, brent scowcroft, said nuclear waste storage is an area far too important for congress not to address. he added that the status quo is no longer acceptable and reforming policies is in our national interest. senator tom harper is chairman of the subcommittee and senator john baraso is the ranking member. this is just over two hours. >> one of my heroes and mentors from my time in the house. i appreciate that. today's hearing is really one of several that we hope to hold on the work of the blue ribbon

commission on america's nuclear future as our committee starts to deliberate on how we move forward on what i think -- i think what we all believe is a very important issue of nuclear waste disposal in this country and really in the world. specifically today, we'll be focusing on the consent-based side and recommendations made by the commission. our senators will have five minutes for their opening statements and we'll recognize our first panel of witnesses. two members of the blue ribbon commission, itself. general scowcroft and dr. peterson will have five minutes each to offer their statements to our committee. if you go a little bit over that, that's okay, but not too far over that. following the first panel's statements, we'll have one round of questions. somewhere during this we'll probably start some votes. i think we have one vote today at 10:30. we'll deal with that and start back up. maybe if we're lucky we'll be

able to continue in session. i'd like to try that. then our second panel of witnesses will come forward and their testimony will be followed, again, by another round of questions. so that's sort of the game plan. we'll see how it works out. across this country, you all know we have 104 currently operating nuclear power reactors. they're providing this nation with clean, reliable power. they provide roughly 20% of the electricity to the people of this country. unlike a fossil fuel power plants, these nuclear power plants do not emit nitrogen oxide, do not emit mercury, do not emit carbon dioxide, all of which harm our health and our environment. currently, our nuclear reactors are storing their spent nuclear fuel on site in a safe and reliable manner. i've been told that the technology we have to store spent nuclear fuel called dry cast storage can be safe for

another 50 to as many as 100 years, perhaps even longer. however, our nuclear reactors were not designed to keep their spent fuel on site forever. and as our reactors aged and are decommissioned, we must find an ultimate resting place for our nuclear spent fuel. unfortunately, our country has been on a path to finding a place for nuclear spent fuel for decades. it was over 30 years ago when the congress realized the importance of finding a permanent solution for disposal of our spent fuel and high-level waste. in response, congress passed the nuclear waste policy act of 1982, moving this country forward toward deep mine geological nuclear waste repositories. after years of study and debate, we find ourselves 30 years later in what's really a dead end. we have no functioning nuclear waste repository and none in the foreseeable future.

i applaud president obama for realizing that we need to forge a new pathway to dealing with our nuclear waste by forming this blue ribbon committee which is represented here today. i want to thank general scowcroft. i want to thank congressman lee hamilton, commissioner peterson. the other commissioners for what i'm told is very good work on this effort. i believe the commission did a thorough job reaching out literally to thousands of americans and folks all over the world in searching for the best way to move forward in this front. the blue ribbon commission recommendation provides us i think with an excellent roadmap to enable us not just to find a new path but to go in the right direction. before we start running full speed ahead, i believe we need to make sure we fully learn from our past mistakes and not repeat those missteps. if not, our country may well

find ourselves 30 years from now in another dead end situation, the kind we face today. i believe one of the biggest mistakes that we made is that we were unable to get consent from all parties on the location of disposal. somehow we've learned to -- communities, really states across the country to compete with one another for the siting of prisons in their states as opposed to other states. we haven't learned how to get communities compete for our disposal sites for spent fuel. some of my colleagues who've heard me discuss in the past, and delaware, state site prisons is not easy thing to do. very dense population. we find there are a number of other states around the country who figured out part of their economic development plan would be a host, to build prisons and host prisoners from other states. you know, if we can sort of get states to thdo that, we ought t

be able to let them figure out who would like to do -- do what they're doing over in france in providing good paying jobs, high-tech facilities for spent fuel. that's why i believe out of all the commission's recommendations, the recommendation, consent-based siting, is the most important, and that's why we're having our hearing today on this important issue. as a former two-term governor, and i know senator alexander is a former two-term governor knows this as well, so do our other colleagues. i know any consent-based approach must include a meaningful partnership between federal, local, and state leaders and we also have to have open communications with the people who live and work in and around those communities. only with open communications will we be able to reestablish the public trust and confidence that are needed to solve our nuclear waste disposal issues once and for all. closing, i'm looking forward to today's discussion. especially interested in

hearing, as we learn from our mistakes and what we can do different as we examine our consent-based siting might work here in the usa. with that, let me turn to my partner in crime, senator barrasso. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to thank you in joining the witnesses who agreed to be here to testify, including the two blue ribbon commissioners. most especially, i want to welcome lieutenant general brent scowcroft, the co-chair of the blue ribbon commission. so thank you for your service to our country and for agreeing to testify today. thank you, both. mr. chairman, the issue of the storage of nuclear waste is vital to maintaining and expanding affordable nuclear power in the united states. all of us here know that congress took action 30 years ago to begin addressing the problem of the buildup of nuclear waste stored in nuclear plants throughout the united states. the nuclear waste policy act passed by congress laid out a

process that looked at three possible long term storage sites. yucca mountain was deemed the best by the department of energy after a thorough technical analysis. congress has voted a number of times to retain yucca mountain as the national site and $15 billion has been spent on the project. $19 billion is the estimated taxpayer liability to be paid out of the judgment funds to utilities because the d.o.e. has not yet removed the nuclear waste as promised. $30 billion is the total amount of ious. it must eventually be paid back by the taxpayers because congress spent the money on the other programs. unknown is the cost of creating another federal agency to manage nuclear waste as recommended by the commission. the yucca mountain project goes back three decades. it seems like we're nowhere near today, yet, a long-term solution. the question we have to ask is

how do we know if we adopt the recommendations laid out in the commission's report that we won't be back here again three decades from now having spent billions more without a long term storage solution? can this plan be a bridge that will result in long-term solution, or will this kind of be a bridge back to square one? so that is what i hope to find out and what i hope will be a series of hearings on this important subject. the barriers to establishing a long term storage facility for nuclear waste are the same barriers that interim storage facilities will face. so whether it's the cost of shipping the waste and building the storage facilities, whether it's the siting of the facilities, whether it's the transportation routes for the shipment of the waste, or the environmental i want packmpact g and storing the waste, or the bureaucratic red tape of the project across multiple governmental agencies. none of these issues have gone away. advocating a consent-based approach to siting the waste, which we'll explore today, the

commission, itself, admits in their report that, quote, the crux of the challenge derives from a federal, state, tribal and local rights dilemma that is far from unique to the nuclear waste issue and no simple formula exists for solving it. so the commission is attempting to solve this problem and offer solutions to this siting and storage of waste. examples in new mexico, finland, france, sweden, where there have been possible templates for us to follow. i look forward to exploring these examples and see if we have found something new here that can work. we must not lose sight of the ultimate goal here, which is where is the long-term st. lool, are we getting there any time soon? we must not forget nuclear power is a vital far of our energy mix. it's affordable, runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. it's an essential part of an all-of-the-above strategy. that means developing our

natural resources such as mining for domestic american uranium found in abundance, mr. chairman, in my home state of wyoming. it also mean expanding, expediting the siting and construction of new nuclear power plants across the country and providing for a long term storage facility for spent fuel. so i pledge to continue with work with my colleagues, with you, others on the committee and in the senate to achieve these things. again, thank you very much for this hearing this morning. i look forward to the testimony. >> thanks a lot more your statement. our next statement giver, and then senator alexander. >> i'll simply say that i appreciate your report very much. that this incredibly important challenge. and i look forward to your testimony. thank you. >> short but sweet. thank you. all right. senator alexander? >> thanks, mr. chairman. i know this is an issue of real interest to you and i'm delighted that you're part of this. >> thank you.

thank you for having the hearing and to you and senator barrasso. after you vote, i'll be back so i can hear what the witnesses have to say and hopefully ask questions. general scowcroft, professor peterson, thank you both for your hard work on all of this. my view on nuclear power is pretty well known, i think. to think about using windmills when we have nuclear reactors would be like general scowcroft going to war in sailboats when we had a nuclear navy available. but i won't get into all that day. as the chairman said and as senator barrasso said, we've had a stalemate here for 25 years as you have said in your report. and we in congress have caused some of that. and we need to break that stalemate. your report told us something we know or should have known.

it's the obvious that no policy or process involving nuclear waste can be successful unless it's consent-based along the way. so weave t've tried to break th stalemate. by me, i say senator binghamton, senator feinstein, who are the ranking members on energy and the energy appropriations committee, and senator murkowski and i who are the ranking republican members, we've decided we're going to work together, mr. chairman, with you and others to try to break the stalemate and address the issue and begin to implement the best ideas from this report. two things have happened this year which are moving us in that direction. first, we were able to include with the approval of the authorization committee leaders a provision in this year's energy and water appropriations bill that creates a pilot program for the department of energy to begin to find consolidation sites for used nuclear fuel.

that would be a consent-based process, and it would be a place where you would put nuclear fuel before it goes into the long-term repository. we thank you for the endorsement by the co-chairs of your commission of this idea. and dr. peterson's also commended the idea. that's a big help. whether one is for or against yucca mountain, we need to move ahead. we still need consolidation sites. we have some places around the country, on the 65 sites where we have used nuclear fuel, where there are no plants anymore. and those would be obvious places where we ought to move that used nuclear fuel to consolidation sites. and it's our responsible. senator barrasso said, i mean, under the law, it's our job to get the waste and take care of it. and we're not doing that and the government is liable for that. that's another reason to break the stalemate. another reason to break the

stalemate, even if yucca mountain were open today, we'd need a second repository quickly because the stuff we have would fill up yucca mountain if it were open. we need to move ahead. we need to break the stalemate. i'm appreciate if of senator carper and barrasso. i thank senator feinstein and murkowski for their leadership. we know fuel is safely stored. it can be stored there for a long time. maybe 100 years. that's not where it's supposed to be stored. we need to solve that problem. the second thing that's happening, senator binghamton, senator murkowski are creating a proposal to implement their recommendations your commission has made. senator feinstein and i hope to be co-sponsors of that. we've been meeting on it regularly. we hope that that bill can be introduced within the next two, three weeks. senator binghamton hopes to have a hearing on it soon. in other words, we want to get

moving. this is an area in washington where we've had a stalemate for 25 years. senators on both sides are taking advantage of an excellent report by the commission. whether or not you favor yucca mountain, we need to move ahead with consolidation sites, finding a second repository. we can argue about yucca mountain. 5i lo along the way. >> thank you for the ex-per teegs and passion you bring to this. good morning. >> good morning, senator carper. good to be here with you. >> good to have you. >> with senator barrasso. thank you for holding this hearing. first i'd like to thank our blue ribbon commissioners for coming and would also like to especially welcome two members of our -- two panelists on our next panel. jeff fettis formally worked with me in the new mexico attorney general's office during the siting process. his expertise is now very much

broader and he's very knowledgeable expert with a great spirit of public service. jeff, welcome. >> would you raise your hand, please? >> oh, he's -- >> thank you. >> thank you, senator carper, for doing that. and dr. andrew orell of the sandea national lab is our nation's best expert on the science and policy of the nuclear fuel cycle. thank you for making a long trip here from albuquerque to be with us. dr. orell has worked on yucca mountain and the science behind numerous international and potential nuclear waste solutions. sandea, dr. orell and his colleagues in los alamos national lab are very valuable assets for the entire country on the nuclear issue. as we consider nuclear issues, i encourage all of my colleagues to reach out to both sandea and los alamos for reliable information. the second, i want to emphasize this is an extremely important

hearing. the senate appropriations committee has already approved legislation on the interim nuclear waste storage. it is my understanding that that provision is within the jurisdiction of this subcommittee and this committee like many of the blue ribbon commission recommendations. we're trying to start over with a clean slate, so i think we should proceed with the regular order whenever possible. i know the senate energy committee also has a strong interest and i believe we should work cooperatively with them. nuclear waste policy has a poor history in congress, as evidenced by congress cutting short the site selection process and mandating yucca mountain over state objection. what goes around comes around. as new mexico's attorney general, i had a similar experience having to litigate against the department of energy over the waste isolation pilot project. we were not fighting over the

facility, itself, but d.o.e.'s go-it-alone process and congress' failure to provide appropriate authorization. eventually we were able to obtain state regulatory authority, independent epa oversight and hundreds of millions in state assistance. the facility was also firmly limited to defense only waste. high-level waste is specifically prohibited. these standards were eventually -- in the land withdrawal act. the state accepted. it's been safe ever since. vote commissioners have visited and are very familiar with it. both cases shed light on what, quote, consent-based siting should mean. our panel here today is very qualified to help us further understand these issues and i

look forward to the committee's work. and once again, let me say, senator carper, i very much appreciate your interest in this issue and asserting jurisdiction of this committee over this issue. i know that this is a big issue and i know that the subcommittee and our committee, the epw committee, have jurisdiction and we should assert that and push forward with this issue. thank you. >> you're welcome. you're in an assertive mood today, aren't you? this is good. this is good. all right. to our commissioners here, general scowcroft, you are a hero to many of us, republicans and democrats alike. having served our nation under several presidents. i think gerald ford, if i'm not mistaken, i think richard nixon and george bush -- george herbert walker bush. we're grateful for all the years you served and continue to

serve. dr. pierre peterson. has your first name ever been pronounced? every day? >> i must profess, i don't pronounce it correctly because i don't have a swedish accent. it happens every now and then. >> i come from new sweden. came to america. 375 years ago. it's now wilmington, delaware. so a special welcome. you're currently, as i understand, a professor of nuclear energineering at uc berkeley. general scowcroft said you're the brains in the operation. that's a high compliment. i know he's got plenty of brains, himself. so does congressman hamilton. the full content of your written statement will be included in the record. i'll ask you to go ahead and proceed. we'll probably start voting around