Richard Bryan

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Objection.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Will the majority leader yield for a question?

Mr. BRYAN. May the Senator from Nevada inquire as to the majority leader's intent? In light of the objection, does the majority leader intend to file a motion to proceed?

Mr. BRYAN. I thank the majority leader.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Madam President, I thank my colleague for yielding the floor. I wish we were in a position to be discussing how we can protect Social Security, I think that is something the American people are very much concerned about; how we could extend the solvency of Medicare and provide a prescription drug benefit; campaign finance reform; minimum wage. I think those are the things the American people would like to see this Congress act upon. I regret to say this legislation is pure, naked, special interest legislation, and I want to give some historical perspective, since my friend from Alaska recited some of the history itself. In 1982, the Congress of the United States passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. The original concept of that act was an attempt to deal with a difficult issue but in a fair and balanced way. In essence, what the act provided was that different geological formations in the country that might be suitable for waste--granite in the Northeast, salt domes in the Southeast, welded tuff in parts of the West--would be considered and studied; three sites would be referred to the President of the United States after the study, or, as the technical term is used, ``characterization'' is completed, and the President of the United States would select one of those. The concept was there would be some geographical balance as well. And that is important, it strikes me, for us to understand. That carefully crafted and I think somewhat thoughtful approach was corrupted almost immediately by the political process. No sooner had the bill gone into effect than there was an effort, politically, to exclude certain regions of the country. The Northeast with the granite formations made it very clear, the Department of Energy records reflect, that because of the opposition from that part of the country, the Department of Energy, in effect, withdrew or abandoned any serious efforts to look at that. That had absolutely nothing to do with science or logic or balance or fairness. Then, shortly thereafter, some of our colleagues from the Southeast raised concerns during the 1984 Presidential campaign, and lo and behold, assurances were given by the top levels of the then- administration that, indeed, the Southeast would be taken off the list. In the 1982 Act, the Environmental Protection Agency was charged with the responsibility of a permanent repository health and safety standard that would be promulgated by the Environmental Protection Agency, something that was of overarching importance because the high-level nuclear waste we are talking about is not just messy stuff, unpleasant stuff; it is deadly, lethal, for tens and tens of thousands of years. So this is a major public health and safety concern, and the Congress chose the Environmental Protection Agency, created during the Nixon administration, to be, in effect, the agency to set that standard. My friend from Alaska posed the question, rhetorically: Why Yucca Mountain? Let me respond to that, if I may. In 1987, an infamous piece of legislation known throughout my State as the ``Screw Nevada Bill'' was passed in the Congress. Unlike the 1982 Act, which said we will look across the country and develop three sites and have the President judge--in 1987 the ``Screw Nevada Act'' said we will look only at Yucca Mountain, no other place. That was not science. That was not logic. That was not fairness. That was not balance. That is the sheer force and impact of naked political power inflicted upon a State with a sparse population and a small congressional representation in the Nation's Capitol. But even in 1987, at the request of the nuclear utility industry, which drives this debate, there was no attempt to change the health and safety standards. Then, 1992 comes along, the energy bill. There was nothing debated in committee or in the floor amendments--but in conference. As my colleagues fully understand, but our friends who are listening to this at home may not, a conference report cannot be amended. In the conference report there was an attempt--it succeeded--to place a provision that sought to somehow weaken those public health and safety standards, and the National Academy of Sciences was introduced for the first time. They were to look at the public health and safety standards, make some recommendations, and the Environmental Protection Agency would have to conform its decision within the range of standards proposed by the National Academy of Sciences. Make no mistake, the primary intent of doing that was to weaken health and safety standards. The proposal originated within the highest corporate board rooms in the nuclear power industry in America. I objected, as some of my colleagues did. Nevertheless, it became law. That brings us to a somewhat contemporary point in time. I am not going to discuss the flaws of the interim storage proposal. When Congress passed this legislation back in 1982, they fully understood if an interim storage was located that would, in fact, become de facto the permanent nuclear waste dump. It makes no sense then. It made no sense when it was proposed in the last Congress. That is why the President of the United States very appropriately and responsibly said: I will veto that if it ever gets to my desk. I have some sympathy for my friend from Alaska. He, as his predecessors, as chairman of the Energy Committee, has a responsibility to accommodate the requests of the nuclear power industry. My friend began the debate by saying, in effect: Look, we have a decision in which we have a decline in the industry. The industry is struggling. We are out of capacity. What are we going to do with all of this? Long before this Senator from Nevada arrived in the Chamber, those very words were heard by the then-chairman of the Senate Energy Committee, in 1981, when there was a proposal to develop what was then known as an away-from-reactor proposal; that is, move the waste away from the reactor site. Then, in 1981, it was stated that nuclear plants would have to close down, there would be electrical brownouts in America. That was 18 years ago. No nuclear utility in America has closed down. No brownout has occurred because of the absence of storage issue. There is an answer, and it is the same that those who were our adversaries proposed for us in Nevada; and that is dry cask storage onsite, and many utilities have done that. It is suggested in the course of this debate there is some need to take urgent action. We have to do something. Let me say, I do not like the idea that Nevada got the shaft in the 1987 legislation. But the current law, if nothing occurs with respect to nuclear waste in this Congress, is that Yucca Mountain is going to be studied. And ultimately, if a determination is made as to suitability--and that determination has not yet been made; let me emphasize, no determination has been made that Yucca Mountain is suitable and there are a host of problems with that site. I will not get into extended comment on that today to keep my remarks somewhat abbreviated--but that process goes forward. So, what is the circumstance? The circumstance today is that nuclear energy is an energy dinosaur. There have been no new reactors ordered in America for more than two decades, and I suspect that even the most persuasive and articulate Members of this Chamber would have a very difficult time trying to persuade their community, look, what we need--I see the distinguished occupant of the Chair, perhaps a new city in her State--is a nuclear reactor right next door. It is not going to happen. Why is it not going to happen? Because people, understandably, are very apprehensive and scared because they have seen some circumstances that have occurred around the world, and they are very much troubled by this. This is a move by the nuclear utility industry that, in effect, has several flawed provisions I want to discuss ever so briefly. With respect to the concern raised by my friend from Alaska that the tax ratepayers paid into this nuclear waste trust fund and that, indeed, the 1998 deadlines have not been met, the Senator from Alaska makes a fair point. They have not been met. There are many who say the nuclear utilities in 1982 forced upon the Department of Energy an unrealistic timeframe. Indeed, that has been the history of these various deadlines contained in some of the oversight by the Department of Energy over the intervening years. I recognize the utilities have incurred additional expense because a permanent repository was not available in 1998 and will not be for some years ahead, even assuming Yucca Mountain. That is a red herring. That is not the issue. This Senator from Nevada and my colleague offered legislation as far back as 1990 saying: Yes, we have to compensate the utilities because there is no site available in that they are going to have to construct, in some instances, onsite storage in dry cast. That cost the ratepayers. We recognize it is fair to reimburse the utility for that expense. The utilities would have no part of that because that is not their concern, that is not the agenda. They have something much different in mind, and they would like to shift the entire responsibility of this program, in effect, to the American taxpayer and not to the ratepayer. This legislation proposes to compensate the nuclear utilities. I do not have a problem with that. It proposes the Federal Government take over the title. Whether that is good or bad is an issue on which I do not care to comment. What it does that violates every sense of public health and safety and fairness and public policy is it moves the public health and safety goalposts in midcourse. Let me point this out. The Environmental Protection Agency did, in fact, come with its recommendations as to what is an appropriate public health and safety standard. That is not just for Nevadans, but that is for Americans because although my friend from Alaska points out, yes, some nuclear waste has been transported across the country and there have been no major catastrophes, let us go back more than 20 years ago. The nuclear industry in America could say there has been no serious accident with respect to nuclear reactors in this country. But guess what. Three Mile Island occurred. Nobody can make that contention today. I suppose the old politburo in the Soviet Union could have said at one point a bit more than 10, 15 years ago: Look, we have never had a serious nuclear reactor accident in the Soviet Union. But that was before Chernobyl, one of the biggest environmental disasters of our time. Radiation contaminated vast areas around the nuclear reactor site. Yes, my friend from Alaska suggests reprocessing and mixing this stuff is somehow a new elixir of life. I suppose the Ministry of Energy in Japan might have said a few months ago: We have never had a problem with that. They cannot say that anymore after the very serious accident which occurred in Tokyo and, indeed, tragically--I hope this is not the case--we are likely to see several fatalities as a result of that because of lethal doses. ``It has never happened, it is plenty safe, and do not worry about all this.'' We are talking about tens of thousands of shipments, 77,000 metric tons. My friend from Nevada, my senior colleague, wants to speak in a moment as well. Should the majority leader bring this up for debate, I assure my colleagues we will have extended debate for a week, if not longer, in which we will explore each of these things in some detail. That would be unfortunate because it would make it impossible for us to consider a whole host of legislation that is pending that many people in the Chamber, myself included, believe has a far greater priority than a special interest piece of legislation in which only the utilities are interested. Public health and safety ought to be of concern whether you are for nuclear energy, against nuclear energy, or ambivalent. Here is what is involved: The Environmental Protection Agency proposes to establish a 15-millirem-per-year standard. That is the State rate of exposure on an annual basis--15 millirems. That, we are told, is outrageous, as if somehow the standard is if we cannot build it, then let's reduce health and safety standards. That is fairly outrageous. We are talking about something that kills people. It is deadly, lethal. I would think everybody would say: Look, I have never agreed with you before on some of these things, but when they are trying to screw around with health and safety standards, that affects every American. This is the EPA proposal. You will recall I talked about how the nuclear utilities thought they were going to game the system with the 1992 Energy bill. They got the National Academy of Sciences involved. The National Academy of Sciences looked at it and said: We recommend the millirem standard--that is the rate of exposure per year--be between 2 millirems and 20 millirems. The EPA standard is right in the middle. The NRC standard--and we know they are friendly with the industry--recommends 25 millirems. The legislation that may be considered goes to 30. That would double it. Why are they doing that? They are trying to game the system. Remember, if nothing passes, Yucca Mountain continues to be studied and may, indeed, prove to be suitable. I hope not. I think not. But nevertheless, that process is in place. Let me point out what we are dealing with with other EPA public health and safety standards. Some years ago, when I first came to the Senate, we were debating the WIPP facility, the waste isolation project. We set standards for them that dealt with lifetime cancer risk per 10,000 individuals. That standard was set at 3. That is what the EPA essentially is proposing for us as well. Look what S. 1287, the bill the Energy Committee has processed, would do. It would be more than triple what we did for WIPP, taking it to 10 lifetime cancer risk per 10,000--a serious erosion of public health and safety. What possible reason or why would anyone want to suggest that the good folks in Nevada, whether it is your favorite State or not, would not be entitled to the same health and safety protections provided to the good citizens of New Mexico? Why do we do that? It simply makes no sense at all. One can look at Superfund standards, hazardous air pollutants--all of those are within this range, which is within the National Academy of Sciences' findings. Look how far S. 1287 is outside the envelope or protection that the National Academy of Sciences recommended. Remember, the nuclear industry fully expected the National Academy of Sciences would have come up with a standard much more favorable to their point of view which, frankly, is minimal health and safety standards. Whatever it takes to get that site built, they could care less, in effect, about the public health and safety of folks who could be impacted by this. Pretty outrageous: 10 versus about 3--pretty outrageous. So when we are talking about some of the fatal flaws in this legislation, I simply take the time this afternoon in joining my friend from Alaska in debate to point out something about which every American ought to be concerned. This is nuclear waste. What industry comes to the Congress next year and says, we can't meet the standard that is set for public health and safety? You all, last year, did something for the nuclear power industry. Can you do something for us? In effect, what we would establish is a public policy precedent that would unravel public health and safety standards if the industries that are regulated do not like those standards. That is extraordinarily dangerous. I say to my colleagues: Don't get stampeded on this piece of legislation. If nothing occurs, the characterization of study of Yucca Mountain--much to my dismay, but it is the law--will continue. This legislation is dangerous. It is enormously bad public policy. It is an incredibly bad precedent. And it is unneeded. To bring it up at this late hour in this session, when we are trying to wrap things up in the next couple of weeks, it seems to me, says something about our priorities here in the Congress. I hope the distinguished majority leader does not bring this up. But I can assure him--and I do so with great respect--that it will be the only issue we will be discussing for some extended period of time because for Nevada this is a life or death proposition. I yield the floor. Mr. REID addressed the Chair.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, I would like to accommodate the distinguished Senator from Arizona, the chairman. The Senator from Nevada would like to use 2 minutes of his time at this point and reserve the remainder. I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by our distinguished colleague from Virginia. I do so because the effect of his amendment would leave us with the perimeter rule unchanged. Very briefly, the perimeter rule is a rule enacted by statute by the Congress of the United States which prohibits flights originating from Washington National to travel more than 1,250 miles and prohibits any flights originating more than 1,250 miles from Washington National from landing here. The General Accounting Office has looked at this and has found that it is anticompetitive. It tends to discriminate against new entrants into the marketplace, and it cannot be justified by any rational standard. As is so often the case, a page of history is more instructive than a volume of logic. The history of this dates back to 1986 when there was difficulty in getting long-haul carriers to move to Washington Dulles. At that point in time, the perimeter rule, which was then something like 750 miles, was put into effect to force air service for long-haul carriers out of Dulles. As we all know, that is no longer the case. Dulles has gone to a multibillion-dollar expansion and the original basis for the rule no longer exists. The effect, unfortunately, of the amendment offered by the distinguished Senator from Virginia is to leave that perimeter rule in place unchanged. The Senator from Arizona has recommended a compromise. He and I would prefer to abolish the rule in its entirety. Yielding to the reality of the circumstances, he has provided a compromise to provide for 24 additional slots: 12 to be made available for carriers that would serve outside of the perimeter; that is, beyond the 1,250 miles, and 12 within the 1,250 miles. This is a very important piece of legislation, and I urge my colleagues to defeat it on the basis that it is anticompetitive, unnecessary, and no longer serves any useful purpose. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, it is tempting to engage my colleagues in debate, both of whom are good friends, but I shall refrain from doing so, knowing the merits of this will result in the rejection of this amendment; therefore, I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Earlier, the majority leader made inquiry about the position on the nuclear waste bill. I want to put the majority leader on notice the Senators from Nevada are not prepared to surrender any of the procedural rights on this issue. This, as you know, is an issue----

Mr. BRYAN. I am happy to.

Mr. BRYAN. The Senator from Mississippi, with his characteristic insight, has hit the nail right on the head.

Mr. BRYAN. I thank the majority leader.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. The Senator from Nevada asks unanimous consent that following Senator Kyl and following Senator Roberts, the Senator from Nevada have 20 minutes to speak.

Mr. BRYAN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. BRYAN. May I ask my colleague to yield for a unanimous consent request?

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, in what has become one of the more unpleasant annual rituals here in the Senate, the majority leader has once again put the Senate on notice that we may soon consider legislation related to the disposal of high-level nuclear waste at the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada. Since the Senate last considered this subject, the sponsors of this legislation have realized that the Senators from Nevada, and the Clinton administration, will never yield to the outrageous and dangerous--in my view very dangerous--demands of the nuclear power industry. This year, it appears that the industry and its advocates here in the Senate have finally conceded defeat, and dropped their misguided attempts to require ``interim'' storage of high-level nuclear waste in Nevada. We have been fighting the ``interim'' storage proposal since 1995, and its demise is a major victory not only for Nevadans, but for millions of other citizens, and taxpayers across the country. Some of what remains in the current nuclear waste proposal, S. 1287, is reasonable. In particular, I have long supported providing financial relief to utilities, and their ratepayers, who are financially damaged by the Federal Government's failure to begin removing waste from reactor sites in 1998. Under the leadership of Secretary Richardson, the administration has offered to work with the utilities to provide such financial relief, and several of the provisions of this legislation are intended to give the Secretary the legal authority he needs to carry out this proposal. If financial relief for the utilities was all we were talking about, I believe we could pass a bill today. Other provisions of the bill, will, I expect, continue to draw a veto threat from the White House. Should the Senate actually attempt to move to the bill in the coming months, I will have a lot more to say about the unsafe and irresponsible changes this legislation would make to the Federal high- level waste program, but today I want to focus briefly on one particular provision that in my view is threatening and dangerous and that is the attempt to lower the radiation protection standard to be applied to a potential repository site at Yucca Mountain. The starting point for any fair evaluation of a potential repository is a fair and protective radiation release standard. Since it is against this standard that the predicted performance of a repository is measured, the health and safety of the public depend on a strict and comprehensive standard. The legislation reported by the Senate Energy Committee, if enacted, would emasculate current law and the Environmental Protection Agency's effort to establish a fair Yucca Mountain standard by shifting the responsibility for setting the standard to the NRC, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and establish, by legislative fiat, a standard far less protective of the public and the environment. Since its creation by President Nixon nearly 3 decades ago, the Environmental Protection Agency has been the Federal agency charged with developing radiation release standards. The EPA was created for a sound reason, which still holds true today: to consolidate the Federal Government's effort to protect the environment in one Federal agency. As the lead Federal Agency for environmental protection, the EPA has, for many years, set standards for a wide variety of pollutants, including radiation, to be applied by a wide variety of Federal agencies and regulatory bodies. In addition to its general authority to set radiation standards, the EPA was specifically charged, by statute, with setting standards for high-level waste disposal by the original Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982. Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the EPA is charged with setting the standard, the NRC is charged with implementing the standard, and the DOE is charged with characterizing and building a repository. When the Nuclear Waste Policy Act was amended in 1987, numerous changes were made, but the EPA's role as the standard setting agency was left untouched. In 1992, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act was amended once again, and over my objections, this time the statute relating to the standard was changed. In an effort by the nuclear power industry to influence the outcome of the EPA's work, the National Academy of Sciences was instructed to make recommendations to the EPA regarding the standard, and the EPA standard was required to be consistent with the NAS recommendations. In 1992, Congress nevertheless was still unwilling to set the dangerous precedent of taking the standard setting authority away from the EPA. To the disappointment of the nuclear industry and its supporters, however, this attempt in 1992 to have legislative changes to modify the law in an attempt to prejudice the EPA's work backfired--the industry was unhappy with the NAS's 1995 study, and renewed its effort to jerryrig a legislative standard that gutted the EPA provisions in the original Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Recently, after years of work, and numerous delays, the EPA issued a proposed radiation release standard for Yucca Mountain. The EPA is currently accepting comments on the proposed standard, and will continue to work with all parties interested in developing a final standard in the next few years. But supporters of the industry's efforts to target nuclear waste for Nevada do not want a fair standard. They want a standard so low that Yucca Mountain, or any other site, simply could not fail. The industry wants a standard that will provide a path around the many failings of the site, irrespective of the effects on public health and safety. Although the radiation release standards are technical in nature, and quite complicated, the major issues of contention between the EPA, the NRC, and industry, however, are not. First, what is the maximum increase in exposure to radiation Nevadans should be expected to bear due to the operation of the repository? And the second question is, should we protect a major aquifer that lies underneath the proposed repository site? On the first subject--the level of protection--the report prepared by the National Academy of Sciences provides some helpful guidance. This exhibit, as reflected in the chart, reflects that range. The white brackets here indicate the standard range from 2 to 20. The NRC standard, as one can see, in S. 1287, the current legislation, is far beyond the parameters of what the NAS, the National Academy of Sciences, has recommended. The EPA standard, on the other hand, set at 15 millirems, is well within those standards. So that is consistent with what the 1992 legislative changes mandated. The exposure levels suggested by the NAS and the EPA were not simply plucked out of thin air. Both agencies relied heavily on similar standards established in the United States and by other countries. As this chart indicates, again, at the top is S. 1287, 30 millirems, which is far beyond the standard of most other countries; EPA at 15, the United Kingdom at 2; Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, and Finland at 10. Once again, the EPA standard lies well within the midrange of standard practices around the world, while the standard included in S. 1287, as I indicated, lies at the extreme upper end of the range of existing practice. More technical, but just as important, is the issue of what population the standard is measured against. For the EPA proposal, the standard will be applied to the group of people most likely to be harmed--using reasonable assumptions regarding distance from the repository, and average eating and other personal habits, the EPA standard protects the ``maximally exposed individual.'' S. 1287 would apply the standard to an ``average'' member of what could be a very large group of individuals--leading to the possibility of very large exposures to members of the group who are at greater than ``average'' risk from the repository. Proponents of gutting the radiation release standard, and of taking the EPA out of the process, claim that Nevadan's concerns are meaningless, and that natural variations in background radiation between regions render our concerns with an increased millirems a year meaningless. That argument shows a blatant disregard for the health and safety of the people of Nevada. We all live with whatever background radiation we may be exposed to; there is nothing we can do about that. What we can do, as a matter of sound public health policy, is limit the amount of radiation exposure we add to background from manmade sources. An ordinary chest x-ray--something we all subject ourselves to when necessary, but certainly don't consider a desirable event to occur on a regular basis--results in an exposure of about 5 millirems. Under the legislation reported by the Energy Committee, Nevadans would be subjected to the equivalent of at least 6 additional, and unnecessary, chest x-rays each and every year. We don't really know what the full health related effects of this type of exposure can result in, but I doubt that any member of the Senate would volunteer to subject his or her state, or family, to that type of risk. Even under the EPA's proposed standard, individuals could expect to be subjected to future exposures equivalent to three chest x-rays a year--a proposal which, while more suitable than the alternatives offered by the nuclear power industry over the years, provides little comfort to Nevadans. The second major issue which has raised such outrage by the nuclear power industry, the NRC, and their supporters here in Congress is the EPA's insistence upon requiring compliance with a separate groundwater standard. Under the EPA's proposed standard, the repository would need to be in compliance with the goals of the Safe Drinking Water Act, which, in effect, limits radiological contamination of the groundwater to 4 mrems. The proposed Yucca Mountain site lies over a major, if largely untapped, aquifer. Water from the aquifer is currently a source of drinking water for several small communities in the vicinity of Yucca Mountain; it could, in the future, provide a drinking water source for several hundred thousand people. While it is clearly not now a cost-effective source of drinking water on a large scale, it is incomprehensible to someone from the desert Southwest to intentionally contaminate such a large potential source of drinking water. The EPA has been charged with protecting our nation's drinking water sources, and it takes that responsibility very seriously. It has established standards to protect drinking water sources in a wide variety of regulatory programs, including those related to hazardous-waste disposal, municipal-waste disposal, underground injection control, generic spent nuclear fuel, high level waste, and transuranic radioactive waste disposal, and uranium mill tailings disposal. All of these, and other, EPA standards and programs work together to protect groundwater resources throughout the nation, and the Yucca Mountain standard is merely another piece of this important regulatory framework. The bottom line is simple: the groundwater under Yucca Mountain needs to be protected. The standard proposed earlier this year by the NRC, and the standard included in S. 1287, encourage the intentional contamination of a potentially important aquifer running under the proposed repository site. The EPA is duty bound to protect this aquifer, and has done so in its proposed standard. It would be unconscionable for Congress to step in and reverse course on what has been a nearly 30 year effort by the EPA, and numerous other federal, state, and local governmental agencies, to protect and preserve our valuable natural resources. While the Yucca Mountain standard is controversial, this is not the first time the federal government has gone through the exercise of setting radiation release standards. Most recently, the EPA established standards for the Waste Isolation Pilot Project in New Mexico. Like the proposed Yucca Mountain standard, the EPA's WIPP standard provides a maximum exposure of 15 millirems/year, and includes a separate 4 millirems groundwater standard. It is not unreasonable for Nevadans to expect the same level of protection offered the citizens of New Mexico--and that is exactly what the EPA has proposed. Fair treatment of Nevadans, of course, is not something that appears on the nuclear power industry's list of priorities. Unfortunately for Nevadans, the nuclear power industry does not care much about the justification behind the EPA proposed standard. For the industry and its supporters, the EPA is nothing more than an impediment to their ultimate plan to ship high-level nuclear waste to Nevada, no matter what the cost. For the nuclear power industry, the test of whether or not a standard will be acceptable is not how protective it may be of the public health and safety, it is whether or not it allows a repository to be licensed. Instead of focusing its attention on whether or not the Yucca Mountain site can meet a fair radiation release standard, the nuclear power industry is attempting to rig the standard to comport to what is being found at Yucca Mountain. This cynical approach to public health and safety has led the industry along a strategy that seeks to undo decades of federal environmental protection policy, and to ask Congress to establish a very dangerous precedent of ``forum shopping'' for environmental protection standards and regulation. Mr. President, Nevadans have the most at stake with the development of the Yucca Mountain standard. The health and safety of future generations of Nevadans depend on a fair, protective standard. There are, however, broader issues at stake here as well. The integrity of our system of federal environmental protection is at risk. The fundamental reason the EPA was created was to consolidate and coordinate federal environmental protection in a single agency. Reassigning important standard setting authority to a more sympathetic agency on the whim of a particular industry could well mark the unraveling of decades of progress in protecting our environment. Should the nuclear power industry have its way with Congress, and succeed in its efforts to undermine the EPA's long standing authority to set standards, who is next? Should we start down a path of returning to the days before 1970, when environmental protection was a hit or miss proposition for the federal government, leading to events such as 1969 fire near Cleveland, where sparks from a passing train actually ignited the polluted Cuyahoga river? I hope not. Some in Congress continue to claim that Nevadans' concerns are foolish, that the shipment and burial of 80,000 metric tons of high- level nuclear waste are nothing to worry about. Anyone subscribing to that line of reasoning should talk to some of the downwinders suffering genetic and cancer effects from our atmospheric nuclear testing; or the thousands of children suffering thyroid and other problems due to the 1986 Chernyobl accident; or the thousands of DOE workers at the Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Paducah, Kentucky, now agonizing over the effects of 40 years of mismanagement and coverup. As Secretary Richardson has said about the situation in Paducah ``we weren't always straight with them in the past.''. Mr. President, the Senate has plenty of work to do this fall. Only one Appropriations bill has been signed into law, and the fiscal year ends this week. Inportant measures that most of us agree need to pass, such as the Bankruptcy bill, or the FAA reauthorization, sit on the calendar awaiting action. The nuclear waste bill reported by the Energy Committee is an environmental travesty which stands no chance of being enacted, and I hope the Majority leader will come to the conclusion that we should not waste any more of the Senate's time on this irresponsible special interest legislation.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. BRYAN. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about two important components of the legislation before us today that would severely impact the state of public housing both in my home state of Nevada and throughout our nation. The distinguished chairman and ranking member of the subcommittee have undoubtedly worked hard to provide the needed funding for a number of critical programs in the VA-HUD appropriations bill. I commend them for their efforts. Nevertheless, I am forced to say that I am disappointed that this bill falls far short in continuing our commitment to provide affordable, quality housing to low and moderate income families. Of particular concern, Mr. President, is the lack of funding for any new section 8 housing vouchers despite the considerable demand and need for such assistance in communities throughout the nation. The section 8 program provides vital assistance to American families. In 1998, 1.4 million Americans were receiving assistance under this program and countless more have been on waiting lists for months and sometimes years for this needed assistance. Who receives assistance under the Section 8 program? According to CRS, recipients of section 8 vouchers are typically single-parent households with children under the age of 18. Most participants have income well below the poverty level, and the average household income of a recipient is well below $10,000. Mr. President, we are all aware that the American economy has been roaring for the last few years, and we are all delighted that inflation and unemployment numbers are at record lows and job growth and housing starts are at record highs. But lost in this economic expansion and prosperity are millions of Americans who continue to struggle to make ends meet and adequately provide for their families. The section 8 program has historically served as a lifeline to low income households, providing needed assistance to those American families seeking to raise their children in quality, affordable homes in safe, livable communities. Last year we were successful in providing almost 100,000 new section 8 vouchers to address the substantial shortage in affordable housing, the first new vouchers in five years. As my colleagues will recall, the authorizing legislation passed by the Senate last year authorized 100,000 new section 8 housing vouchers for the upcoming fiscal year. And yet the legislation before us provides no new vouchers despite the growing gap between the public housing assistance needed and assistance available. As an example of how disconcerting this issue has become in my own state of Nevada, low and moderate income families in Las Vegas, Reno and numerous other communities currently have to wait for a period of over 8 months for public housing--8 months, Mr. President. The wait for section 8 vouchers in Nevada is even worse. That delay is over 50 months, Mr. President. Over four years for a section 8 voucher. And yet the legislation before inexplicably does not provide any additional funding for section 8 housing vouchers despite this substantial increase in demand. It is my understanding that there will be an amendment to this bill to provide additional vouchers along the lines of the administration's request and I look forward to supporting that effort. Let me address another issue that I believe was inadequately addressed in the bill and that I regret to say in my view is a setback. I was also disappointed to learn that the underlying legislation before us today seeks to zero-out HUD's highly effective Community Builders Program. Let me say parenthetically that during the recently concluded August recess my staff and I had the chance to visit with some of the community builders to learn about their effectiveness, and in the very short time that this program has been in existence I have heard considerable feedback from local officials, community leaders, and others throughout our State in praise of the Community Builders Program. By way of example, the eight community builders working in HUD's Las Vegas regional office have been able to bring HUD officials and community leaders together to solve local problems by developing strategies that draw resources from a multitude of Federal programs. All who are familiar with the Federal bureaucracy know it can be very difficult to bring together all the various programs with all of their intricacies and requirements and to meld those together to develop an effective program for the housing needs of our communities. During the brief existence of this program, we have witnessed a number of success stories in both the southern and northern parts of Nevada. Let me share some recent accomplishments of the program in the Las Vegas area. Community builders in Las Vegas have partnered with southern Nevada's local office of the Bureau of Land Management to facilitate the conveyance of a large tract of vacant BLM land to the city of Las Vegas for the development of affordable housing for low- income and moderate-income residents. Community builders are working with several housing partners to develop two to four units of single-family detached housing using technologically advanced materials and building processes to show how technology can reduce the cost and improve the quality of single-family housing. Community builders are undertaking the first phase of development of a new 400-unit mobile home park in Pahrump, NV. Pahrump, NV, is located in my county and one of the 10 fastest growing counties in the entire country. This is being done at the same time by streamlining housing code compliance to ensure safety and yet also to reduce the cost. Community builders in Las Vegas are working to develop a lender certification program designed to assist in the extension of mortgage programs and products to an increased number of low- and moderate- income families and individuals. These success stories in the southern part of our State have also been mirrored in northern Nevada. For example, when BHP Copper Mine in Ely shut down mining operations, more than 400 individuals representing 12 percent of the area's workforce were laid off, dealing a devastating blow to a struggling community. The community builders in Reno immediately went to work, joining with local officials in organizing a community partnership forum with community leaders and representatives from many Federal, State, and nonprofit agencies. This effort resulted in the development of an action plan that identified solutions and opportunities for mitigating the adverse economic and housing effects caused by these massive layoffs. This initiative is being held up as a model throughout rural Nevada for rural communities to develop comprehensive local strategies responsive to economic downturns in the mining industry and the longer-term need for greater economic diversification. I might add as an aside, we learned from two of our counties, Humboldt and Lander Counties, two counties I visited and spent time in with their county commissioner and citizens in August, those counties have also been affected as a result of a series of layoffs in the mining industry. They, too, are buffeted by worsening economic conditions. Once again, the community builders are being called into action to assist community leaders in finding ways to stabilize rural economies and housing markets in the face of falling gold prices in the global market. In sum, the Community Builders Program strikes me as a smart and cost-effective way to do business. By breaking down the old bureaucratic hurdles that often hinder customer service and working at the grassroot levels with communities ranging from the sprawl of Las Vegas to a rather small community such as Ely, NV, the Community Builders Program has proven highly effective in finding solutions to critical challenges facing our urban and rural communities. It is my hope that before this legislation is passed by the Senate, these two critically important and highly successful programs are addressed in a way that will allow the Federal Government to continue its commitment to providing affordable housing to the millions of Americans who depend upon such assistance and to allow the Community Builders Program to continue its work in building successful partnerships within our communities to solve local problems. I yield the floor.

Mr. BRYAN

Mr. BRYAN. Will the Senator from Washington yield for a question on that point?

Mr. BRYAN. Do I understand the thrust of the Senator's argument is not to advocate some new standards for CAFE but simply to permit those who are charged with that responsibility to make a basic inquiry as to whether or not there is room, based upon science, safety, and other considerations, to consider an increase in fuel economy standards?

Mr. BRYAN. I thank the Senator.

Mr. BRYAN. It strikes the Senator from Nevada that the argument the Senator is making is a win-win. It is a win for the consumer, for the environment, and in terms of the trade imbalance we currently face in this country. Would the Senator not agree with the proposition that everybody comes out a winner if the Senator's resolution would simply ask that an inquiry be made into the practicality of increasing fuel efficiency standards?

Mr. BRYAN. I enjoyed the Senator's reference to the steam engine in the 19th century. The younger members of my staff say they are not familiar with this reference, but as the Senator from Washington will recall, the Industrial Revolution was born in Great Britain. Just as then, seemingly now, there are those fearful of progress. The first manifestation of the Industrial Revolution was when we changed the textile production from a cottage industry to the floors of the factory, and machinery and technology made that possible. I know the Senator from Washington State, who is in my generation, will recall this reference. But a group of people called Luddites went about the country breaking up the machines, trying to prevent progress, fearful of the consequences. It seems to me--perhaps the Senator might want to comment--that in a very modern-day sense, we have neo-Luddites who are fearful of the consequences of what new technology might make possible, and in my view, the improvement of technology throughout the vast expanse of history has improved a lot for mankind. Does the Senator agree with that observation?

Mr. BRYAN. The Senator from Nevada is always pleased to yield to the senior Senator from California.