This vote moved forward a bill that would store the nation's nuclear waste beneath Yucca Mountain, in the Nevada desert. The Yucca Mountain site had been considered for the storage site for twenty years, and studied as the only candidate for fifteen. Reid (DNV) and Senate Progressives were opponents of the storage plan, which they said was likely to contaminate groundwater and risked a major catastrophe during transport. This was a vote to move to consideration of the bill, so Progressives stood in opposition to it. The motion passed, 60-39, and the bill itself was later passed on a voice (unrecorded) vote.