A committee of the Savannah River Site Citizens Advisory Board (CAB) indicated this week it supports the Energy Department’s anticipated request to restrict airspace above agency facilities – a discussion sparked last summer after drone sightings over key areas of the South Carolina facility.
The Strategic and Legacy Management Committee – one of several sub-panels within CAB – had a lengthy discussion Wednesday about drone activity above SRS. The panel set aside a recommendation on the issue because multiple members want to hear a presentation from DOE before moving forward with formal action. Still, most of the members agree with the basic premise of the recommendation, which asks DOE to “continue investigating the drone sighting as allowed within its own agency regulations,” and to “continue to work with needed authorities to restrict the airspace over the SRS.”
From June 19 to July 22, 2016, SRS employees reported 12 drone sightings over sensitive areas of the site. These included: the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF), which is being constructed to convert 34 metric tons of nuclear weapon-usable plutonium into commercial nuclear fuel; H Area, where nuclear materials are processed; and E Area, where low-level waste and transuranic waste is stored.
Officials say the drone flights pose a security and safety concern because no one knows who is flying them, or what information that person might be trying to obtain.
While it tabled its recommendation to DOE, the committee submitted an informal request to the department for an update in the next few months on what the department is doing about the drones.
That request came after Gil Allensworth and other committee members expressed concern on the matter. Allensworth noted that FBI investigators last summer met with Tom Clements, director of SRS Watch, a nuclear watchdog group. Clements periodically receives permission to take aerial photos of the site, prompting the FBI to ask him if he knew anything about the drones. Clements did not.
“This is a big deal and I think we, as a CAB, need to say to DOE, ‘Hey, are you taking care of this?’” Allensworth said.
Michael Mikolanis, DOE SRS assistant manager for infrastructure and environmental stewardship, said the department would have safety and security personnel prepare a presentation, possibly in time for May’s full CAB meeting. “I think the discussion could benefit from the folks who do know about it,” he said.
In the middle of last year’s drone sightings, the Savannah River Site reported that DOE was seeking to restrict airspace above all of its “sensitive” sites. The department previously reported that this includes all Category 1 sites, which house 2 or more kilograms of plutonium or uranium-233, or 5 or more kilograms of uranium-235. The department did not specify which other sites house the different quantities of materials, or how many sites there are.
As of this week, a formal request has not been submitted, according to the FAA. DOE’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) did not respond by deadline to requests regarding what steps have been taken to date on the airspace plan and when a formal request to restrict airspace would be submitted.
The FAA says it could need 20 months to several years to approve an airspace restriction, “depending on environmental and aeronautical analysis that is required.” There are no regulations that prohibit flying above SRS, but the FAA does strongly advise pilots to avoid airspace near “critical infrastructure and other sensitive locations,” including nuclear power plants.
The SRS CAB is one of several boards under the broader DOE Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board (EMSSAB), which allows stakeholders to offer recommendations to the Department of Energy on behalf of the communities they represent.
