People leave the south portal of Yucca Mountain during a congressional tour Saturday, July 14, 2018, near Mercury, Nev. Several members of Congress toured the proposed radioactive waste dump 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. (AP Photo/John Locher)
LAS VEGAS — A plan to restart a licensing process to store nuclear waste at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain site appears to be dormant for at least the next year.
The U.S. Senate this week cut $30 million in funding for the process from a compromise defense bill on Monday.
Nevada Republican Sen. Dean Heller says he asked Senate Armed Services Committee chairman John McCain to strip the funds for the project. Heller and most other Nevada politicians oppose restarting the mothballed project.
The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports Heller and Nevada Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto also blocked another $120 million that the House set aside for the project.
A bipartisan group of lawmakers from outside Nevada say the federal government needs to find a place store used fuel from commercial nuclear power plants that’s sitting idle in 39 states.