Bill would block nuclear waste storage in Utah

[NVMojo]

SALT LAKE CITY -- U.S. Rep. Rob Bishop announced Thursday he would resurrect a bill designating 100,000 acres of Utah's West Desert as wilderness, which would preempt a plan to store spent nuclear fuel 50 miles west of Salt Lake City.

Bishop, R-Utah, was joined by Reps. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, and Chris Cannon, R-Utah, Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman and representatives from environmental groups in announcing he would reintroduce the twice-defeated measure.

The legislation says nothing about a plan by the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes to store nuclear waste on its reservation near the proposed wilderness, but the designation would mean the tribe couldn't use a rail spur running through the land to transport waste to the site.

It also could help protect the Utah Test and Training Range. Combined with nearby Dugway Proving Ground, the range provides 3.2 million acres of restricted air space for military training and is the only place in the country to test cruise missiles.

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http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2005/Apr-01-Fri-2005/news/26198198.html

[seemslikeadream]

1. In Utah, a nuclear scrap

Posted on Sun, Mar. 27, 2005

An Indian tribe is fighting to build the largest radioactive waste storage site in the U.S.

By Kirk Johnson
New York Times News Service

SKULL VALLEY, Utah - The Goshute Indians are not mighty in number, financial capital or political clout. With only about 120 members, their tribe has mostly been a footnote in the saga of Anglo-Indian relations in the West.

Their reservation, just slightly bigger than Manhattan, is mostly empty - a windswept land of sage and scrub 50 miles southwest of Salt Lake City.

But over the last eight years the Goshutes have outlasted, outwitted and outplayed powerful forces arrayed against them, as they have sought to build what would be the nation's biggest bunker for the storage of highly radioactive waste.

Some tribal members say such a facility would give them an economic boost in an area of the state where Indians have had few environmentally friendly options.


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