THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, February 29, 1996 TAG: 9602290276
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAVE MAYFIELD
LENGTH: Medium: 52 lines
The federal government's expensive and time-consuming search for a place to permanently store spent radioactive fuel from nuclear-power plants poses an ``economic threat to Virginia,'' according to a State Corporation Commission staff report issued this week.
But the SCC staff stopped short of recommending that the commission bar Virginia's electric utilities from continuing to collect fees from their customers to help pay for the waste-fund effort.
Virginia utility customers have contributed $361 million toward the U.S. Department of Energy fund and stand to pay another $400 million, the report noted.
Meanwhile, after spending $4.5 billion searching for a nuclear waste disposal site, the DOE's potential location at Yucca Mountain, Nev., will open in 2010 - at the earliest. That is 12 years later than required by a 1982 federal law. The DOE is supposed to take possession of spent nuclear fuel from reactors by 1998.
The staff recommended against any commission action on the waste-fund matter until, among other things, a lawsuit against DOE seeking to enforce the 1998 possession date is resolved. Seventeen states, 22 state utility commissionsand 11 utilities or utility associations brought that suit.
In the meantime, the staff recommended that Virginia utilities be required to submit reports once or twice yearly demonstrating their efforts to prod the DOE along.
In its report, the commission staff said if the utilities fail to prove in the reports they've been aggressive at prodding the DOE, the commission could use that as ammunition to stop the utilities from collecting nuclear-fund fees from customers. Such an action would force the utilities to dip into their shareholders' pockets instead to make payments to the fund.
The three members of the commission haven't indicated when or if they'll address the waste-fund matter themselves. The commission last July ordered the staff to prepare a report on the issue.
Virginia Power, which operates the state's only two nuclear plants, in Surry and North Anna, said it shares the commission staff's concerns about the waste fund. But the utility said it believes its customers should be required to continue to contribute to the fund.
``We believe those people who receive the benefits of low-cost nuclear generation should continue to bear those costs,'' said James Norvelle, a Virginia Power spokesman.
KEYWORDS: SCC STATE CORPORATION COMMISSION REPORT by CNB