Washington, DC – Today, U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), a member of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, questioned President-elect Trump’s Energy Secretary nominee Governor Rick Perry on the issue of Yucca Mountain. Senator Cortez Masto, who met one-on-one with Perry yesterday in her office, highlighted Nevada’s strong opposition to turning Yucca Mountain into a nuclear waste repository and Republican Governor Brian Sandoval’s reiterated promise to fight any proposal to revive Yucca Mountain “with relentless opposition and maximum resources.”
Watch video of the first exchange here.
In a second round of questioning, Cortez Masto pressed Perry further on Yucca Mountain, and also asked him about his support for continuing clean-up of the Nevada National Security Site and for geothermal energy research.
Watch video of the second exchange here.
Outgoing Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz recently said that Yucca Mountain is doomed to fail because the project lacks support from elected officials in Nevada. Last week, Cortez Masto joined with Republican Senator Dean Heller to introduce the Nuclear Waste Informed Consent Act, which would permit the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to authorize construction of a nuclear waste repository only if the Secretary of Energy has secured written consent from the governor of the host state, affected units of local government, and affected Indian tribes.