LAS VEGAS – Nevada and the federal government have struck a deal allowing the burial of radioactive material from Tennessee at a former nuclear weapons proving ground north of Las Vegas.
Gov. Brian Sandoval and Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz announced Tuesday that more than a year of talks yielded the agreement.
A jointly appointed oversight panel will track deliveries of uranium waste from a World War II-era plant in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, to the Nevada National Security Site about 65 miles from Las Vegas.
The deal avoids possible National Environmental Policy Act and court battles that might have blocked up to 100 shipments of what the Energy Department classifies as low-level nuclear waste ranging from contaminated worker uniforms to machine parts.
Energy Department spokesman Darwin Morgan says the shipments could begin within months.
