Karl Herchenroeder
RW Monitor
1/15/2016
A Nuclear Regulatory Official said this week that if the agency receives the two quality applications it expects for consent-based siting for spent nuclear fuel in Texas and New Mexico, and there are zero contentions with the filings, the NRC could complete application its review in three years.
NRC DIrector of New Reactors Glenn Tracy made the comments Monday during the Institute of Nuclear Materials Management’s Spent Fuel Seminar in Washington, D.C. Representatives for the anticipated applicants, Waste Control Specilaists (WCS) and Holtec International, appeared on Wednesday to discuss the sites their companies hope to have in operation by 2020.
The NRC expects WCS’ application in April and Holtec’s in June, with both companies applying for a 40-year license to store spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. WCS is exploring a location in Andrews, Texas, while Holtec is surveying a site in southeast New Mexico, between Carlsbad and Hobbs.
Mark Lombard, acting deputy director for the NRC’s Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards, said the agency is aligning itself to review the applications in New Mexico and Texas, even though the 2016 budget does not include line items for those reviews. Lombard said the NRC has looked at “realigning resources” in 2016 and beyond and making the reviews a “high priority.”
“It’s something we’ve communicated publicly in forums like this, to our commissioners,” Lombard said. “We told the commissioners that we didn’t have budget for this work in FY16, and we had agreed to our test work, which is getting some vendors nervous because we’re talking about not doing reviews of storage systems and transportation packages that only have non-U.S. users because we know that that’s something important to them going forward.”
The reality is, he said, is that the NRC will have fewer resources in the current budget but it will force his office “to take a better look” at workload and prioritization. Items not in the current legislative discussion, he said, will move to the bottom of the list.
WCS Vice President of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs Scott Kirk said the company’s 14,000-acre site would store 80 percent of spent nuclear fuel and greater-than-class-C waste from Blue Ribbon Commission “stranded sites.” Joy Russell, Holtec’s vice president of corporate business development, said the New Mexico site would have a 4,000-canister capacity.
Discussion of consent-based siting was a common theme at the seminar, with Department of Energy and other industry experts sharing perspective in light of the DOE’s announcement last month that it is formally seeking locations for the program. Acting Assistant Energy Secretary for Nuclear Energy John. Kotek said Monday the department will be in listening mode for the next six to eight months as it gathers public comment for its draft siting process.
Kotek said DOE is encouraged by the emergence of the private endeavors in Texas and New Mexico, even before the agency has had the chance to solicit interested parties. After a year of testimony, DOE is expected to release a report that will outline key themes and an overall agency takeaway based on public feedback, he said, adding that the report will allow the DOE to develop a draft siting process.
“That’s what I think we’ll be doing over the rest of this year to the point where we’ve got a drafted process,” said Kotek, whose appointment expires at the end of 2016.
Plans for consent-based siting were initiated in 2011, after the Obama administration halted the underground geologic repository planned at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. A study from the Blue Ribbon Commission for America’s Nuclear Future followed in 2012, emphasizing a need for consent-based siting in which states enter into legally binding agreements.
Kotek said the administration and the BRC both wisely declined to define the term “consent,” which also remains the DOE stance. He noted that the Blue Ribbon Commission regarded consent as the “willingness of host states to enter into legally binding agreements that protect interest of citizens.”
In 2013 the administration released an official strategy for management and disposal of used nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said in March 2015 that the department is planning a facility for defense waste separate from storage of spent commercial fuel.
Before New Mexico and Texas can move forward with any potential siting, the DOE plans to unveil a pilot interim location that would hold spent fuel from shuttered nuclear reactors. The strategy is to then move forward with consent-based, long-term siting and eventually one or more permanent repositories.
The department will host a series of public meetings around the country in 2016 regarding the nuclear waste program. The first meeting is scheduled for Jan. 20 between 1 and 4 p.m. at the Renaissance Washington, D.C. Downtown Hotel.
