File photo
Yucca Mountain is located about 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010 | 11:10 a.m.
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A Nuclear Regulatory Commission legal panel says the federal Department of Energy can't withdraw its application to build a national nuclear waste dump in Nevada.
The NRC's Atomic Safety and Licensing Board ruled Tuesday that Congress directed the DOE to file an application for the Yucca Mountain repository, and directed the NRC to consider it.
It says letting the department "single-handedly derail" the process would be "contrary to congressional intent."
The NRC legal panel held hearings on the issue earlier this month in Las Vegas.
Neither Nevada nor DOE officials have said yet whether they will appeal.
Nevada opposes the plan that's been studied since the 1980s to bury the nation's spent nuclear fuel 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
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