A Department of Energy fee that costs nuclear power utilities some $750 million a year should be suspended because a nuclear-waste program the fee is designed to pay for does not exist, opponents said in a new court filing.
The National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners and the Nuclear Energy Institute, a policy organization for the industry, urged a Washington DC appeals court to order the DOE to stop collecting the fee for the federally mandated Nuclear Waste Fund which grows by about $1 billion a year and is expected to total $28.3 billion by the end of fiscal 2012. Keep reading →