Sen. Lindsey Graham has won a vote to continue a $5.2 billion nuclear fuel program.

His amendment prohibits the Department of Energy from terminating the mixed oxide (MOX) fuel program at the Savannah River Site 30 minutes from Lexington County.

“We will have a $5.2 billion wasted investment that will become the most expensive deer stand in the history of the world,” he said.

MOX provides almost 5% of the new nuclear fuel used today. It is made from plutonium recovered from used reactor fuel, mixed with depleted uranium.

It provides a means of burning weapons-grade plutonium to produce electricity.

“In good faith, we took weapons-grade plutonium with an understanding of what would happen to it,” he said.

“Now that agreement is being broken by DOE. And in terminating the MOX program, we will be tearing up the world’s largest nonproliferation agreement.”

The full Senate Armed Services Committee approved the amendment. Senators will debate and vote on it in coming weeks.

If DOE terminates the MOX program, the U.S. will be stuck with weapons-grade plutonium that will take tens of thousands of years to degrade, Graham said.

SC Attorney General Alan Wilson has asked a federal court to stop DOE from shutting down the MOX project.