Nevada fighting Yucca Mountain...still

Even though the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste disposal site has been approved by Congress and the President, Nevada is still trying to fight it:

Opposition has come from every level of Nevada government: Local utility managers turned off the federal project's water supply. Gov. Kenny Guinn issued a veto of the project. Atty. Gen. Brian Sandoval has tied up the project in the courts. Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman threatened to arrest anybody carrying out the plan on his turf.

But the most prominent symbol of the state's growing power is Sen. Harry Reid, selected late last year as Senate minority leader and an ardent opponent of the dump. Reid has impressed even his critics with political maneuvers that have eviscerated the Energy Department's budget for Yucca Mountain.

"The Department of Energy has no credibility here in the state of Nevada," Reid said in a recent interview.

In late November, Reid engineered the appointment of Greg Jaczko to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is in charge of licensing the nuclear dump. To broker the deal on Jaczko, a physicist on Reid's staff, the senator held up a number of Bush administration nominations.

"We have thrown up everything humanly possible to block Yucca Mountain, but Harry Reid is going to be the difference now," said Billy Vassiliadis, a top political operative in Nevada who has produced the advertising for the state's tourism and gaming industry.

If Nevadans are successful in blocking Yucca Mountain, it will mean that nuclear waste will continue to be stored along our coastline in San Onofre and Diablo Canyon.