area. historically, some programs have treated transportation as an afterthought. no successful programs have done so. seventh is support for advances in nuclear energy technology and workforce development. advances in nuclear energy technology have the potential to deliver an array of benefits across a wide range of energy policy goals. the commission believes these benefits in light of environmental and energy security challenges the united states and the world will confront in this century justifies sustained public and private sector support for rdnd on both existing light water reactor technology and advanced reactor and fuel cycle technologies. the eighth recommendation relates to the key conflict of active u.s. leadership in international efforts to address safety, nonproliferation and security concerns. as more nations consider putting nuclear energy or expanding -- consider pursuing nuclear energy or expanding their nuclear programs, u.s. leadership is urgently needed on issues of safety, nonproliferation, and security and counterterrorism.

from the u.s. perspective, two points are particularly important. first, with so many players in the international nuclear technology and policy arena, the united states will increasingly have to lead by engagement and by example. second, the united states cannot exercise effective leadership on issues related to the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle so long as our own program is in complete disarray. effective domestic policies are needed to support america's international agenda. in conclusion, the problem of nuclear waste may be unique in the sense that there is a wide agreement about the outlines of a solution. simply put, we know what we have to do. we know we have to do it and we even know how to do it. we believe the conditions for progress are arguably more promising than they have been in some time, but we will only know -- we will only know if we start which is what we urge the administration and congress to do without further delay. thank you for having us here today and we look forward to your questions. thank you very much. >> i want to thank you both for that joint testimony. we're going to recess here for a

brief period of time. we should be back in about ten minutes and we'll start right back up. thanks. and we'll get right into questions. >> thank you. >> we are having a lot of fun while we're gone. i hate to bring that to a close. finishing up the vote.

and our colleagues are making their way back over here in the next couple of minutes. let me start with the first question. this is really a question for both of you. feel free to take turns answering it or whatever you're comfortable with. it's my understanding previous mechanisms for finding voluntary sites for nuclear waste facilities have been successful in this country. one of those is in new mexico. i think it's called the waste isolation pilot plant. however, there was a different type of facility than the one we're talking about here, not for high-level waste as i understand it. i believe the new mexico facility takes mid-level defense waste and, in fact, it's my understanding the state and the community there agreed to a facility with the understanding that it would not accept high-level waste in the future. can you all provide any takeaways from the new mexico

experience on what we can replicate in a consent-based approach for a high-level repositories? or any cautions on what cannot be replicated? really, what can be exported from that experience in new mexico, our experience in new mexico, and what cannot? >> thank you, senator carper. there's -- we've found a number of very important lessons in examining the success of the development of the wipp facility. i can list just a couple. one was that the federal government in the end was willing to negotiate legally binding agreements with the state government that clearly defined a set of regulatory authorities that the state held. and in essence gave state leadership hands on a steering wheel, or at least ability to put their foot on a brake.

and i think that that was a key element of creating confidence that the facility -- that the facility could be operated safely and they could assure the citizens that, indeed, it would be operated safely. >> so instead of a my way or the highway federal government calling the shots, you've got the state in the car -- >> yep. >> in one of the front seats of the car. >> that's correct. >> and with the ability to put a foot on the brake. it's almost like in driver's ed when i was in high school, you'd have, like, the student driver on the one side then the instructor on the other side, both with a steering wheel and the pedals and everything. >> i believe the next panel, jeff and others are likely to comment on the value of this. it does mean that whatever new entity is created by amendment to the nuclear policy act that it will be very important that it have the authority to negotiate and enter into these sorts of agreements on behalf of the federal government. another key thing that was done

was that the federal government funded an independent scientific and technical evaluation group called the environment evaluation group in new mexico. i think the state government made a tremendous decision by locating that scientific review panel within their university system so that it was given in essence the type of independence that one associates with an academic institution. but to have it separate from the federal government t. was another key ingredient. another key element was that this was licensed to a safety standard that was established in

advance of the siting of the repository, not during or after the selection of the repository and this relates to the commission's recommendation that a new site independent safety standard be developed by epa and the nrc. i think the final element that was critical in my judgment was the fact that, that this program had assured funding in the sense that the senator -- the senior senator from the state of new mexico served on both the appropriate and authorizing committees. that gave some assurance that

adequate funding would be available to operate the facility safely after it had been built. we can't rely on that good luck happening again because the statistical probability of that happening is low. this is a key reason why the commission has recommended that we need to change at a minimum the way that we classify the fee receipts in such a way that when they're propered they don't have to compete against other discretionary spending priority. and the situation in terms of spending those moneys looks more like how we fund the nuclear regulatory commission. the fees offset appropriations and congress is not faced with the dilemma of needing to cut other programs in order to fund something that's being paid for by fees. this is really critical because i think that the community really wants to have confidence that the facility will receive adequate funding. the final element was that the office in its 30 year history never had a single director who served for more than two years. in other words, there was a lack of continuity of leadership that if you think about the process to have the leader of an organization go into local

community and them knowing that that person is not likely to be around, say, in 18 months also would be a really serious problem. so this is another reason why we think some type of new organization does need to be created to take on these responsibilities to have the continuity of leadership that can give confidence to local communities that the federal government ultimately will live up to its obligations. >> okay. those are very helpful answers. thank you very much. let me yield to senator udall. a jr. senator for now but not for long. soon to be senior senator from new mexico. i sad that sadly. we love our jeff bingham. >> we sure do. we're going to miss him very much and miss that ability as professor peterson has pointed out how he was serving on

several committees that were really key. >> we also know the interest of new mexico will be very well served. >> you're very kind. let me say to professor peterson you pulled out some good lessons on the waste isolation pilot project. i wanted to explore more of that with both of you. should the state as a whole have the right to accept or reject a nuclear waste site in its borders and how should that authority work? that's a very hard question for us to answer. >> that's why i ask it. you were given a lot of time to think about that one. >> well, we looked a lot at the differences between new mexico

and the upper mountain. and i think you put your finger on the principal difference. in new mexico, there's a general ak question acqu ichiesce that is good for the state, good for the country. that is completely lacking in nevada. where look, local communities are by and large very supportive. the state communities are very opposed. and i think that it's been described a number of the detail.

but whipp is what gives me the optimistic confidence that we can move ahead. because i think the attitude that we found down there, that we found down there, i'm not an expert, was immensely reassure ing adaptive approach if really taken seriously by both sides that this consent can work. >> now, general, you still didn't answer. the question was very pointed here. should a state as a whole have the right to accept or reject a nuclear waste sites in its borders and how should the authority work? you're comparing nevada and new mexico, as you know, and i think the history you're talking about what happened in nevada was the high net level nuclear waste policy act which had a very scientific process, broad selection of sites was shortened by congress. and congress basically said it's going to nevada. and forced it down nevada's throat.

i think at the time the governor and local officials, there was a lot of objection. in new mexico, it was different. the governor and local officials and i believe the leadership in the congress all had a very accepting attitude. so they came together and talked about what should this agreement be? as one of the parts of the agreement, as i mentioned in my opening statement, was the idea that no high level waste was going to come to new mexico. that this was going to be a trans generic waste site. that's why i ask this question to you. it's one i know i think you've tried to finesse in your report. i'm trying to get to the real heart here of what, you know, should a state as a whole have the right to accept or reject a nuclear waste site in its borders and how should that authority work? and, you know, i realize it's a tough question, but that's why

we hired you to do this. >> well, i guess -- and i'm speaking now more as an individual because we didn't resolve that in detail. >> yes. please. but as an individual, you sat through all of this, you've seen the experiences. tell us what you think. >> i think to be successful we need to have state and local communities together. if they are not together, it's not going to work. and so i think part of the whole consent process is working with the communities as a whole, state, local, tribal, whatever they are, to make it work. >> yes. dr. peterson, your thoughts on that question? >> i think that in our report we essentially recognize that this is the major issue and so the final report does address it

more specifically in the sense that it points out that in the end the ability to opt out and what the conditions would be and whether it -- how long should it be unconditional is left to be a matter of negotiation between the federal government and the states because, for example, if you're going to enter into a mortgage to purchase a house, there's points in time where you make decisions and such. but in this case, by having that be one of the most important but key elements of negotiation, you can preserve an unconditional opt out and then, of koirs, if any safety issues arise associated with the site, there should be an immediate ability to put a brake on the whole thing until things are fixed. but this is something that, in the phase adaptive approach,

needs to be worked out as part of a negotiation. >> and i think, senator karper, he's pointed out an issue here that is very important when you look at final legislation and many of the issues that arise along the way. what happened in the waste isolation pilot project was local people and state people were very worried about the safety issues and they were worried about highways, they were worried about emergency preparedness and many dollars, hundreds of millions of dollars were put towards that to alleviate the fears, to improve the roads, to get emergency preparedness in place, number one. and then the issues that you've both talked about were -- came together around, should we have the site, how we should have it, and the state was very worried

about the science. the state was saying, well, you know, we know the big federal government has a lot of signs. we know about the national laboratories. but as a state we want to have some oversight. and as part of a negotiation, you both pointed out in your report, the environmental group was created. these were independent and walked every step along the way and i think the doctor will talk about this when he hits the testimony here. so there were some important lessons that i think were learned. i've gone on way too long but i really -- and i only ask one question and you see how hard it is to get to the bottom of that crucial question and i hope senator alexander will focus in on this, too. he wants to protect tennessee, i know, from having unilateral action of getting a nuclear

site -- >> it may have only been one question but it was a pretty good one. senator, kind of thinking out loud here about the role that the senator played as an authorizer and pete as a former colleague for many years may have seen -- and to use the words of albert einstein. potential for adversity is an economic opportunity for new mexico if they figure out and play their cards right and i think ardently they have done that pretty well. senator alexander? >> thanks, chairman. as i said in my opening remarks, whether you're for yucca mountain or your against, you said 25 years is long enough just to be sitting there and we need to get on with it.

and am i not correct, you said even if -- that as far as a repository needed, even if yucca mountain were needed, we would soon need a second repository. is that correct? and you didn't define what you meant by consent-based. was that deliberate? you didn't say the state legislature needs to pass a law. >> no, we didn't. consent-based but also adaptive. it depends on the circumstances and it may be different in different areas. >> did you envision that there would be incentives to local governments to induce -- >> yes. yes, we did. and i think we talked about some of those. research laboratory, all kinds of things that can make such a facility attractive to the community. >> basically, whatever it took to create an attractive environment so the people would

want to compete for this. is that correct? >> that's part of the consent basis. >> and in my experience -- and i don't want to prejudge this and this may not be a part of the bill. but i would think that the federal government would if i were the governor i would want the congress to pass a law approving it. i would want the next president or the next governor to undo it. my guess is what we mean by consent based will work itself out because communities who compete for the research laboratory or whatever this opportunity turns out to be will try to put together the most attractive package that they can. and then from the whoever the federal administrator is will look at it and say new mexico has a a history, b, their governor and legislature said yes, city council said yes or tennessee said yes. that would be part of an

attractive proposal to the federal government, would it not, to let it know you had that kind of backing in law rather than just some statement by a governor who might not be there next year. >> absolutely. that's essential. in our federal system it's much more complicated than it is in other countries where we've looked like sweden, finland and so on where they don't have a federal system. they've actually had communities bidding against each other. >> i would hope that would happen here. >> but it's more complicated here because of the nature of our structure. >> yes, but still i think senator carper i've mentioned this, i had the same experience with prisons when we game governor. we couldn't locate one. i announced we would only have one and pretty soon we had three proposals. we can make it attractive and should.

i think your consent based religious just clears the air. it doesn't resolve yucca mountain for now. whether or not one is for the mountain as i am or whether one is against it as senator reid is, that doesn't really matter in terms of whether we need a second repository or a consolidated site. let me ask about these consolidated sites. the nuclear waste policy act allows consolidated storage only after a permanent repository has been licensed. in the legislation that senator feinstein and i have in the appropriations committee, we separate these consolidated sites. we don't call them interim sites because there might always be something there on its way to a permanent site. but can you discuss why you and your recommendation separated the consolidation site from the search for the permanent repository and whether or not you think it's a wise idea for us to move ahead as the appropriations language says with identifying one or more pilot consolidation sites. although in the end, if any site

were chosen it would have to be approved by an act of congress. >> that's an excellent question. i think that we found that the benefits of developing consolidated storage are so large in terms of taxpayer liability of being able to collect material into smaller number of locations and return unused sites to more productive uses, and to gain experience with transportation at smaller scale so that we can build that capability, that it makes sense to move forward with consolidated storage in parallel with not after the development of a geological repository. this does take amendment to the policy act. it's one of several areas where we made recommendations. you also mentioned the importance of incentives and we reviewed the current structure of incentives in the nuclear

waste policy act and found they probably would not work as well as they should. the report provides recommendations for ways to improve the incentive basis. >> did i state it correctly, your recommendation and support for the idea of moving ahead identifying consolidation sites does not decide the question of yucca mountain one way or the other. whether we're for yucca mountain -- am i accurate to say if we're for it or against it we need to move ahead with consolidation sites and we need to move ahead as soon as the legislation is passed to begin to identify a second repository. >> absolutely. clearly the question of what needs to be done with yucca mountain is quite controversial. i think if our commission had been required to answer that question, we would have had a difficult time reaching a consensus.

but what we found is that the things that we recommended that we do move forward on developing new repository. developing consolidated storage creating a new entity these are things we need to do as the commission said regardless of whether we were to retain, discard place into deep freeze or whatever ends up being what happens to yucca. these are other things that really are important for us to move forward on as promptly as we can. >> mr. chairman, may i ask one more quick question. >> let us discuss this. go ahead. >> thank you, mr. chairman. sometimes the simple lest

solution is the best solution. the simplest solution for used nuclearer fuel is to leave it where it is. you've got security. you don't have to transport it, which is hard to do and sometimes risky. and a consolidation site takes time. takes a lot of money. requires transportation which could be risky. did you weigh those two things and still come down on the side of the immediate for consolidation sites? >> yes, we certainly did. we looked at all it be different possibility and we concluded that even though it means more sites you have to locate and so on that on balance it was well worth it. the transportation is certainly a problem. it has worked well regarding the whip thing. we think that with certain precautions which we suggest in our recommendation to have the state and local authorities aware of possible crises that transportation is not that big a problem. >> thanks, mr. chairman.

senator grosso. >> great question. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. to both of you in the testimony we discussed examples of where consent based approach has worked. you visited about the disposal facilities sitting for new mexico. are there positive outcomes, spain, finland, sweden. could you tell a little bit about what the key common elements are that made those projects successful? >> the key comment elements are that the prospects were made to look positive in the eyes of the local communities. and they were an asset to the communities. as i say, that's why there has actually been in some cases active bidding to hold the site. i think that's the key to it.

to make it not a penalty that's being forced on you. but an opportunity for the community. and that will differ for different communities what they find attractive. but it seems to be working very well in all the other countries that with we visit. as i say, none of them have the particular complications we do in our federal system. but given that, we're optimistic. >> talk about some of the particular complications in the federal system. in the written testimony you had mentioned in terms of the epa working with a nuclear regulatory commission and you said they should begin working together to define an appropriate process for developing a generic disposal facility safety standard and associated implements of regulations. was there a similar process in terms of developing that safety

standard what came of yucca mountain. was that there? it seemed that the process took a long, long time. what are your thoughts there? >> for yucca mountain the -- there were difficulties in demonstrating compliance with the existing safety standards. so congress did direct the national academies to study the question and issue a report upon which a new safety standard could be issued and this occurred after the site had been selected. so in my professional judgment i think that the standard that was developed is reasonably protective. but to do this after you've picked the site and then to change the safety standard that