The challenge, filed with the U.S. Appellate Court for the District of Columbia Circuit, contends that the NRC did not do an analysis of the environmental impacts.
New Jersey's request to join the suit comes as conditions at disabled nuclear power plants in Japan continue to worsen.
But New Jersey's timing had nothing to do with events across the Pacific, said State Department of Environmental Protection spokesman Larry Ragonese. It was simply a matter of meeting a Wednesday legal deadline.
"The failure of the NRC to conduct an adequate environmental impact statement is troubling," DEP Commissioner Bob Martin said in a news release. "The federal government has an obligation to develop a permanent plan for nuclear waste storage, and cannot avoid an answer by extending the time that radioactive waste is allowed to remain on sites in New Jersey and across the nation. That is not acceptable."
Federal officials long ago proposed to build a national storage facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, but last year that plan was abandoned.
In addition to Oyster Creek, New Jersey has three other reactors that would be affected by the new rule - one unit at Hope Creek and two units at the Salem Nuclear Generating Station, all in Lower Alloways Creek, Salem County.
Ragonese said officials had no specific environmental or public health doubts related to the 60-year rule. Rather, it was the lack of scientific studies from the NRC.
"This is nuclear waste. It's radioactive," Ragonese said. "If you're going to let it be stored on sites for six decades after closure, you need to explain to us that this is safe."
Now that the Yucca Mountain plan is defunct, "we see this as an open-ended situation, and we think the federal government has an obligation to come up with a solution," Ragonese said.
