Yucca Mountain was selected in 2002 as the Energy Department's spot to store nuclear waste. Some of the waste is currently held at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina, along with commercial reactors around the country. The Energy Department canceled the project in 2009. But, in June 2010, a separate panel, the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, said the agency lacked the authority to do that, since Congress originally set up the repository.

These actions prompted officials in Aiken County, South Carolina and three business leaders near Hanford, Washington, with the attorneys general of the two states, to file lawsuits that were later incorporated. They argued that terminating the site would leave millions of gallons of radioactive waste stranded in their states. They also said the Department of Energy did not have the authority to shut down the project and withdraw its license application from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

A three-judge panel, in a July order, said in a unanimous decision the original lawsuit by the states of Washington and South Carolina and others challenging the shutdown of the Yucca project was premature until the NRC takes final actions that could bring it to an end.

Writing the court's opinion, Chief Judge David Sentelle noted federal law gave the NRC three years to decide on a repository application. Some set that deadline at June 28, three years from the date when the Department of Energy submitted a license application in 2008. Others contend the clock started ticking on Sept. 15, 2008, when the NRC formally accepted the application for docketing.

"Should the commission fail to act within the deadline specified" by the federal nuclear waste law, "petitioners would have a new cause for action," Sentelle wrote. "We will not permit an agency to insulate itself from judicial review by refusing to act," he wrote.

However, nothing happened. Both the June and September deadline for Yucca Mountain's license passed without any action by the NRC. The lack of action prompted a new petition in September, which seeks a "writ of mandamus." In other words, the states and others want the district court to order the NRC to make a decision about Yucca Mountain's license.

A federal court on November 4, 2011, set the schedule for a new lawsuit that seeks to force the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to reopen its review of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site. Click here for a copy.

The deadline for final legal briefs in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia was set for February 13, 2012, with oral arguments to follow "on the first appropriate date."

At the end of October, Savannah River Nuclear Solutions (SRNS), the managing contractor for the Savannah River Site, unveiled a new organizational structure the contractor said is intended to achieve "improved business discipline and focused leadership" as Savannah River seeks new missions for the future. The new organization establishes an "executive team" consisting of senior vice presidents that head areas including Environmental Management and National Nuclear Security Administration operations, the Savannah River National Laboratory, Support Services, Corporate Services and Environment, Safety, Security and Health.  The new structure also includes several personnel changes in senior positions.

The reorganization calls for six SRNS executive team members to report to a three-person Office of the President, rather than the current plan in which 17 department heads report to the contractor's top two officers. The organizational change is an effort to improve the company's effectiveness and performance in accordance with the recently released Enterprise SRS vision.

In the new organization chart, which will take effect exactly one month after Dwayne Wilson took over as President and Chief Executive Officer of SRNS, six executive team members will report to Wilson, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Fred Dohse and Executive Vice President and Savannah River National Laboratory Director Terry Michalske.

Click here for a copy of the new organizational chart and memo discussing the change.