Nuclear wastes: as they build up, so does the dispute over storing them

Congress has been unable to resolve the policy issues of high-level radioactive wastes sought by both the environmentalists and the nuclear industry. Defense programs continue to generate these wastes, which are stored at sites in South Carolina, Idaho, and Washington and at a former commercial reprocessing site in New York. Neither the House bill (HR 8378) which sought to include defense wastes in public policy nor the Senate bill (S 2189) which authorized Federally-built away from reactor vaults for commercial wastes proved acceptable. The accumulation of spent fuel is the major commercial disposal problem. States may form regional agreements to handle the disposal of low-level wastes. (DCK)