LLRWPAA of 1985

The Low-Level Radioactive Waste Policy Amendments Act of 1985 imposes liabilities upon the states for failure to take actions mandated by the federal government. The states are commanded and regulated as citizens rather than treated as sovereigns. However, the states obtain substantial privileges and benefits from this legislation, including incentives to form interstate compacts to provide new disposal capacity on a regional basis. The major such incentive is the authority of compact members to exclude waste generated from non-member states. Because this incentive would be ineffective if states that were not compact members could also exclude waste, attempts by non-member states to exercise exclusionary authority should be found unconstitutional. The structure whereby each state is liable for the disposal of the waste generated within that state provides direct political accountability for the decision to generate the waste, forces consideration of the environmental consequences of that decision, and increases the likelihood of distributional equity in the siting of new facilities