Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
10/30/2015
The Department of Energy anticipates publication of the final environmental impact statement for its not-yet-known preferred alternative for the disposal of Greater Than Class C waste and GTCC-like waste by the end of next quarter, a senior DOE official said this week during a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Environment and the Economy Subcommittee. DOE needs to complete the EIS before it can begin disposing of GTCC waste, but the process has taken longer than initially expected. In 2011, the department issued a draft environmental impact statement, which estimated the total national inventory of GTCC waste at approximately 1,100 cubic meters, with an additional 175 cubic meters expected to be generated annually from DOE and commercial activities over the next 60 years. Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management Mark Whitney said Wednesday the final version of the report should be completed by, at the latest, March 2016. “DOE anticipates publication of the final environmental impact statement within the next quarter, contingent on formal review by the department,” Whitney told House lawmakers.
While DOE may finally complete the much-anticipated report, panel members did not miss the opportunity to knock the department for the need for the document in the first place. “In 2005, Congress directed DOE to examine disposal options for GTCC waste and make recommendations to Congress,” subcommittee Chairman John Shimkus (R-Ill.) said. “Congress has not yet received any GTCC recommendation. However, DOE walked away from the most practical disposal pathway for GTCC waste when President Obama quit work on the Yucca Mountain project. The longer DOE puts off its recommendation, the longer this material must remain on-site in temporary storage, instead of in permanent disposal.” In 2010, the Obama administration shuttered the Yucca Mountain project, after deeming the site “unworkable” due to a lack of public consent in the state of Nevada.
Once the final EIS is completed, DOE must then submit a report to Congress on the alternatives under consideration and wait for a final selection by lawmakers before moving forward with establishing a disposal destination.
The draft EIS evaluated a number of sites under consideration for GTCC disposal, including Hanford in Washington state; the Idaho National Laboratory; the Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico; the Nevada National Security Site; the Savannah River Site in South Carolina; and a “generic” commercial disposal site. According to Whitney’s prepared opening statement, “Each disposal alternative assumes that the total waste inventory would be disposed of at a single disposal site. Depending on the selected option for disposal, DOE could decide to dispose of the waste at more than one location. The final greater-than-class C environmental impact statement is structured so that decisions on disposal method(s) or site(s) can be made by waste type.”
Whitney also indicated in his opening statement for the record that the final EIS would include a document that would respond to comments collected through the draft EIS process. “In developing the final environmental impact statement, DOE will have considered public comments on the draft greater-than-class C environmental impact statement, human health risks, disposal methods and waste types,” Whitney said. “The final environmental impact statement will also include a Comment Response Document that will respond to nearly four thousand individual comments received by DOE on the draft environmental impact statement.”
NRC GTCC Licensing Decision Almost Complete
Michael Weber, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s deputy executive director of operations for materials, waste, research, state, tribal, and compliance programs, said during the hearing that “some” commissioners have submitted their votes on allowing Texas to license GTCC disposal at the Waste Control Specialists site in West Texas. “We have offered several options for the commission’s consideration, but until the commission makes it decision, we do not have a final position,” Weber told lawmakers. He later added, “Some of the commissioners have voted, but until they all vote, there will not be a decision from the NRC. They try to do it as expeditiously as they see fit.”
Waste Control Specialists last year petitioned the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality to allow for the near-surface disposal of the waste stream at its West Texas facility, but currently, only the NRC can license a facility to take GTCC waste. However, because Texas has agreement state status with the NRC, TCEQ wrote to the commission for clarification on its potential ability to license a facility to house the waste. In response, NRC staff wrote a position paper that recommended the commission authorize Texas to license and regulate the disposal of GTCC waste due to its familiarity with the site.
Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) called on the NRC to support the licensing effort in Texas to ensure that all goes smoothly. “I just hope that the NRC would work with our Texas Commission, because if this is the first location in the country that would be able to accept this GTCC waste, it could be a prototype, I would hope,” Green said. “The rest of the country needs to develop its own waste sites because West Texas is a big place, but I don’t know if it’s that big.”
