Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with. The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The amendment is as follows: On page 22 of the substitute, line 5, after `(3)(B)' insert the Secretary has made a determination that personnel in all State, local, and tribal jurisdictions on primary and alternative shipping routes have met acceptable standards of training for emergency responses to accidents involving spent nuclear fuel and high-level nuclear waste, as established by the Secretary, and'. Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, let me start out by giving some context to this amendment. I feel strongly that the Federal Government should live up to its obligation to take possession of nuclear waste. That is my framework. I am with this amendment not operating outside of that framework. I also add that Minnesotans and other customers of nuclear power have been paying into a nuclear waste fund over the years, and the reason was and the understanding is that the Federal Government would make this commitment and live up to this commitment. That part of this legislation, that premise, I fully support. Mr. President, I have been concerned in the past--and still am although I don't have an amendment today that deals with this--about what happens when the Federal Government actually takes title under this bill because I do think that over the years you are going to have a huge taxpayer liability. So while I want the Federal Government to be responsible and live up to its national commitment to do something about it, I worry about the transfer of over 10,000 years all of a sudden to the taxpayers. The GAO has estimated that the taxpayers' future burden could be about $77 billion. This is assuming a 100-year program. But we are talking about a program of nuclear waste that is over thousands of years. Mr. President, concerns about this legislation. First of all, the legislation still attempts to skirt some of the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act. There is a reason for that piece of legislation, and I do think, when you are talking about the transport of highly radioactive nuclear waste material, this is a time, if there ever was a time, when you want to have full environmental review, when you want to be absolutely certain that you are talking about the transportation of this kind of material taking into full account the health and safety and protection of families all across the country. My esteemed colleagues from Nevada have discussed some of the risks and problems associated with transporting highly radioactive nuclear waste in their struggle against this bill. They also feel that Nevada has been unfairly singled out, and I respect them for that. My framework is a little different. But I do want to point out there are going to be some 16,000 shipments on our highways and our railways over the coming years. We are talking about some significant distance traveled. There are legitimate concerns that people have about the transportation of this highly radioactive nuclear waste material; people are going to be concerned about it, and in addition there is some debate about whether or not the containers themselves are safe. We already transport hazardous materials, but I want to argue there is a significant difference when we are talking about nuclear waste material, especially highly radioactive nuclear waste. Consider it this way. If you have an accident involving nuclear waste as opposed to many hazardous wastes, you can have a dramatically different outcome. Radiation, without doubt, kills people, and it is a different scale we are talking about. God forbid--worst case scenario--we have an accident. We have to do everything we can to guard against that accident. We could be talking about something catastrophic. We cannot afford to have such an accident in our country which results in this kind of radiation leak that could have such dire consequences for people, such dire consequences for our families, and therefore I think we have to do everything possible to assure safety. That is what this amendment is about. Now, this bill calls for a transportation planning process, and I note--and I thank the distinguished Senator from Alaska--that part of the amendment I proposed last week calling for more public participation has been incorporated. That is to say, there is some language about public comment when it comes to these plans. But in Minnesota we currently have 641 metric tons of high-level nuclear waste and spent nuclear fuel. That is a conservative estimate. And by the year 2014 we expect there will be around 987 metric tons, all of which will travel the roads and rails of Minnesota and States between us and Nevada, if this bill succeeds. So I think we have to do everything possible to ensure the safety and security of these shipments, and I would add that I think to talk about public comment really does not go far enough. Initially, our amendment said that in the actual planning process, as you chart out the routes, those citizens who are affected by the transportation of this material ought to be able to be involved in the planning process, as should local officials. They should at least be consulted. I did not say they would have a veto because I know that would not work. But I did talk about consultation. I did talk about involving citizens who will be affected, who are going to be worried about themselves and their families, and local officials who are going to be worried, I talked about involving them in a more integral and real and substantive way in the planning process. I wish that amendment had been accepted. My friends from Alaska, Mr. Murkowski, and from Oregon, Mr. Wyden, have made sure that this legislation really does take some steps forward from the last bill. Grants can be provided for training, and in addition there are going to be training standards which are going to be set. I still think, again, that we have to do everything possible to ensure the safety of these shipments. We have to do everything possible, leave no stone unturned, in making sure that we prevent the worst case scenario, which could be a nightmare scenario for our country. If we do not do that, we are going to be asking ourselves, when such an accident takes place, did we do everything possible when we transported this poisonous waste all across America. The brave men and women who are likely to be first on the scene when an accident occurs, local firefighters, do not support this bill because they believe it inadequately provides for their needs such as the training, funding, and technical assistance. I ask unanimous consent that a letter from the International Association of Firefighters be printed in the Record. There being no objection, the letter was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows: INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION of Fire Fighters, Washington, DC, April 14, 1997. Hon. Paul Wellstone, U.S . Senate, Washington, DC. [Page: S3079] Dear Senator Wellstone: On behalf of the nation's more than 225,000 professional fire fighters, I wish to express our enthusiastic support for your amendment to S.104 which would ensure that emergency response personnel along the proposed shipping routes are adequately trained to respond to an emergency incident. Currently, only a fraction of all emergency responders have adequate training and equipment to respond to an incident involving radiological material. Indeed, more than 40% of the fire departments along the proposed routes do not even meet minimum training requirements for basic hazardous materials response. The training needed for radiological materials is far more complex. Put quite simply, America's emergency responders are currently not equipped to deal with an incident along the routes to the Yucca Mountain facility. If an incident were to occur, whether it be an accident or a terrorist act, lives would be unnecessarily lost because the local emergency response personnel lack the necessary training and equipment to effectively respond. We are indebted to you, Senator, for your leadership on this vital public safety issue. Please feel free to call on us if we can be of any assistance to you. Sincerely, Alfred K. Whitehead, General President. Mr. WELLSTONE. I thank the Chair. Mr. President, what the firefighters are saying is, look, you are going to have $150,000 which is going to be offered by each State that is to be affected by this along this transportation route but the question we are asking, says the firefighters, is how do we know that in 2 years or 5 years we are going to be ready? We want to make sure there is enough funding for our training, and we want to make sure we are adequately prepared for this because it is our responsibility to protect the citizens in our communities. I am told that the International Association of Firefighters, which represents 95 percent of professional firefighters in the United States, did a survey of departments along a potential test shipping route in Ohio, and they found that 40 percent of the departments along the route were not prepared, according to current standards, to deal with hazardous material accidents. Let us face it. When it comes to hazardous material and when it comes to highly radioactive nuclear waste, we are going to try, whether it be by rail or road, to go in the less populated of our rural areas. And by the way, all too often, people in rural America are familiar with the saying let's go where fewer people live, but they say there may be fewer of us but we count as much as anybody living in any metropolitan area. We are also hearing from a lot of communities: We are worried that we are not going to be trained; we don't feel we are even ready when it comes to the transportation of hazardous materials. So, Mr. President, let us assume the grants have been made and a State takes advantage of these funds. Two years pass and shipments of nuclear waste begin to pass through the State. What guarantee do we have that local fire departments are fully trained and equipped and that if the worst thing possible happens, they can respond in such a way as to minimize disaster. What this amendment says is that the Department of Energy must determine--in other words, we talked about training. We have talked about some grants, but nowhere in this piece of legislation do we have the fail-safe, ironclad guarantee that as a matter of fact these local fire departments, these local emergency response personnel will have received adequate training. This amendment proposes that the Department of Energy must determine that emergency response personnel along the routes where over 16,000 shipments of highly radioactive waste will pass have met an acceptable standard of training before these shipments begin. That is all this amendment says. Again, what we want to do is to verify that these brave men and women--they are asking this. They are going to be on the frontline, the first line of response to an accident, people who are going to be putting their lives on the line--in fact have received the training they need. This amendment says that no shipments will occur until the Department of Energy has determined that the emergency response personnel in all jurisdictions along a given shipping route will have met an acceptable level of training. It seems to me that is very reasonable. I think this is a logical extension of the Wyden amendment in committee. Yes, we have some funding, although we do not know whether it is going to be enough. Most communities do not think it is. Yes, we have some training standards. But what we are saying is we have to make sure, above and beyond some funding and some standards for acceptable levels of training, that level of training is met before any deadly cargo under this bill hits the road. In other words, no training, no shipments. That is a pretty reasonable amendment. This bill in its current form calls for training standards to be established by the Department of Transportation, but I am concerned that the bill is ambiguous at best about who is really responsible for making sure these standards are met. That is what this amendment speaks to. By requiring the Secretary of the Department of Energy to determine that every jurisdiction has met the standards, this amendment holds the processor of the waste responsible for making sure all safety precautions have been taken. If requiring a determination by the DOE just simply adds one additional signoff to this process, then I say this makes all the sense in the world. One more time. What we have is a situation where we are going to be talking about the shipment of highly radioactive nuclear waste. This is of a different order than hazardous material. We have the firefighters and other people who are concerned about this living in the local communities saying we are worried about whether or not we are going to receive adequate funding for training and whether or not we are in fact going to be trained. There is some funding. I do not think it is going to be enough. We do not want this to become an unfunded mandate. And there is some setting of the level of standards by the Department of Transportation but nowhere in this legislation do we have a clear line of accountability that as a matter of fact firefighters and other local safety personnel will be trained to deal with a crisis if they have to do so. It seems to me that the very least we can do is to make sure that happens. Let me simply conclude by quoting the last part of this letter from the International Association of Firefighters: [Page: S3080] Put quite simply, America's emergency responders are not equipped to deal with an incident along the routes to the Yucca Mountain facility. If an incident were to occur, whether it is an accident or terrorist act, lives would be unnecessarily lost because the local emergency response personnel lack the necessary training and equipment to effectively respond. All this amendment does is say let us make sure, Department of Energy, you are accountable; you have to make a determination that before we ship this waste, the local fire departments, the local safety personnel have, in fact, received the training and they are equipped to deal with, if, God forbid, there is, a serious accident. I believe this amendment should be accepted. It is imminently reasonable, and it seems to me we ought to take every step necessary to make sure we guarantee the safety and security of people in our communities.