Pam Schuller, the agency employee who is processing the comments, said she has seen an increase in comments recently. Meanwhile, U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch and the Salt Lake Area Chamber of Commerce have stepped up their public campaign to generate more comments before the BLM ends its comment period on May 8.
Hatch, the chamber and other opponents of the Skull Valley waste storage, have made a point of reminding Utahns about the deadline and what they say is the last best chance to derail the waste project.
"Wherever he goes, he talks about it," said Heather Barney, a spokeswoman for Hatch. "This is a very important opportunity that Utahns have been given to influence the outcome of this situation."
Private Fuel Storage, a consortium of utility companies that have nuclear plants, received a license to build the Skull Valley site last fall from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. If built as planned on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation, the site would be a kind of long-term parking lot for steel and concrete containers of used but highly radioactive reactor rods, up to 44,000 tons of them.
Six of the eight PFS members said last fall that they do not need the temporary storage and plan to dispatch their waste directly to Yucca Mountain, the long-stalled underground repository being proposed by the U.S. Energy Department.
But PFS is pushing forward with its plans. And it needs approval from the BLM for a right of way to build a transfer station on the north side of Interstate 80. Another pending request, for a 32-mile rail spur, was PFS's first option but appears to be dead because of wilderness legislation Congress passed last year.
In a recent opinion article, Hatch once again urged Utahns to weigh in the BLM, even giving out Schuller's contact information and e-mail address.
"This is a threat to our security in Utah," he said.
"We have a solid case, but we need to make it - repeatedly and resoundingly."
Although PFS is a Chamber of Commerce member, chamber leaders issued a position statement earlier this month denouncing the waste-storage plan.
"The chamber also urges all businesses, community, civic, and religious leaders, and local, state, and federal elected and appointed officials to likewise oppose the siting on or storage of, temporary or otherwise, PFS nuclear waste upon or through BLM land [ . . . and urges them . . . ] to contact the BLM immediately and express their opposition directly and in plain terms," the policy statement said.
Sue Martin, PFS spokeswoman, noted that some Utahns have contacted her to note they will be submitting comments to BLM in support of the storage project. She said chamber leaders had not requested a presentation on the project.
"We do encourage people to send comments one way or the other," she added.
The BLM's Schuller noted that her agency will be looking at six specific criteria to determine whether the application should be granted. The criteria include such questions as whether the request is compatible with BLM laws, regulations and the public interest.
"There's just an awful lot to be considered," said Glenn Carpenter, BLM's Salt Lake City office manager.
fahys@sltrib.com
