It is a step that Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch and Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. had been seeking for months, hoping to create new barriers for the nuclear storage facility proposed by Private Fuel Storage, a group of electric utilities.
However, the assessment is meant to gather information on the infrastructure needed at the proposed site, rather than to try to measure the threat of a terrorist attack, as Hatch and others wanted.
"We'll meet with appropriate representatives from state and local government and the tribe to take a look at the local infrastructures, protective measures, what the local response capabilities are . . . and what the proper site tie-in to other federal security measures might be," said Bill Flynn, director of Homeland Security's Protective Security Division.
The Homeland Security team plans to arrive next week at the Skull Valley Goshute Indian reservation, some 50 miles west of Salt Lake City, where PFS proposes storing 44,000 tons of the nuclear waste.
They will submit their findings to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff in a report expected to be classified as "secret," and it will be up to the secretary to decide what action or additional studies might be needed.
Similar analyses have been done on the infrastructure near commercial nuclear power plants, chemical plants and other facilities around the country.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is in the final stages of considering the PFS license application and could reach its decision by the end of the summer.
It has consistently ruled against the Utah's challenges, including the state's argument that the terrorist threat to the site should preclude it from being licensed.
The state has vowed to go to court to try to block the facility if the NRC approves it.
Last month, Hatch tried to add language to the Energy Bill that would have required the Department of Homeland Security to study the terrorist vulnerability of the PFS plan before the NRC could license the facility, but Nevada Sen. Harry Reid blocked the effort.
The department's analysis won't go as far as Hatch wanted, at least initially, but he called the announcement "a step in the right direction."
He said the site - adjacent to the Air Force's Utah Test and Training Range, minutes from Salt Lake International Airport and near a fast-growing population - warrants scrutiny.
PFS spokeswoman Sue Martin said the consortium's chairman, John Parkyn, has spoken with the department about its plans to visit the reservation.
"His understanding is that this is part of their taking a look at all of the nuclear storage facilities around the country and we're just a piece of that effort, so the fact that they're coming is fine with us," she said.
Huntsman's spokeswoman, Tammy Kikuchi, said the governor is pleased with the department's announcement.
"The original plans to build the above-ground casks was pre-9/11," she said. "There has always been the danger of the fighter jets that fly at low altitude directly over the casks. Now you have these other considerations that these would invite mischief and . . . are a visible target for terrorists."
After meeting with Chertoff in April, Huntsman said the secretary had committed to study the risks associated with the facility, but the department downplayed the commitment.
The Homeland Security team will be accompanied by at least one representative of the NRC.
