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Yucca Mountain is the Department of Energy's (DOE) potential geological repository designed to accept spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. If approved, the site would be the nation's first geological repository for permanent disposal of this type ....

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.... above, and water being pushed up from an aquifer 300 feet below by an earthquake. He says there is crystalline evidence in the rocks at the repository level that indicates hot geothermal water from below has been there before and, therefore, could return. DOE mining engineers says those crystalline forms are more likely the result of minute amounts of water migrating from above over thousands of years. The issue was raised by a former DOE employee turned whistle-blower, Jerry Szymanski, who reported evidence of past geothermal activity for Yucca Mountain and that the area goes through periods with three times as much moisture. DOE maintained for many ....