Cite as: 505 U. S. 144 (1992)
Opinion of White, J.
York State Energy Office testified before Congress that "New York State supports the efforts of Mr. Udall and the members of this Subcommittee to resolve the current impasse over Congressional consent to the proposed LLRW compacts and provide interim access for states and regions without sites. New York State has been participating with the National Governors' Association and the other large states and compact commissions in an effort to further refine the recommended approach in HR 1083 and reach a consensus between all groups." See Low-Level Waste Legislation: Hearings on H. R. 862, H. R. 1046, H. R. 1083, and H. R. 1267 before the Subcommittee on Energy and the Environment of the House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, 99th Cong., 1st Sess., 197 (1985) (testimony of Charles Guinn) (emphasis added).
Based on the assumption that "other states will [not] continue indefinitely to provide access to facilities adequate for the permanent disposal of low-level radioactive waste generated in New York," 1986 N. Y. Laws, ch. 673, § 2, the state legislature enacted a law providing for a waste disposal facility to be sited in the State. Ibid. This measure comported with the 1985 Act's proviso that States which did not join a regional compact by July 1, 1986, would have to establish an in-state waste disposal facility. See 42 U. S. C. § 2021e (e)(1)(A). New York also complied with another provision of the 1985 Act, § 2021e(e)(1)(B), which provided that by January 1, 1988, each compact or independent State would identify a facility location and develop a siting plan, or contract with a sited compact for access to that region's facility. By 1988, New York had identified five potential sites in Cortland and Allegany Counties, but public opposition there caused the State to reconsider where to locate its waste disposal facility. See Office of Environmental Restoration and Waste Management, U. S. Dept. of Energy, Report to Congress in Response to Public Law 99-240: 1990 Annual Report on Low-Level Radioactive Waste Management Progress 32-35
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