Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
3/21/2014
The Department of Energy’s Fiscal Year 2015 budget request includes $30 million to support DOE’s nuclear waste management program, of which $24 million would come from the Nuclear Waste Fund, according to detailed budget documents released late last week. The Obama Administration is seeking to access the funds in the Nuclear Waste Fund to help off-set some off the costs of implementing pilot interim waste storage facilities. The request includes a proposal to ‘reform’ how the fund is used as a way to tap into the NWF’s resources. The fund currently stands at approximately $36 billion, but can only be used for activities related to the construction of a repository at Yucca Mountain, as outlined in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. “In FY 2015 Department is requesting $30 million, including $24 million from the Nuclear Waste Fund, to support preliminary generic process development and other non-R&D activities related to storage, transportation, disposal, and consent-based siting,” the justification said. “Mandatory appropriations in addition to the discretionary funding are proposed to be provided annually beginning in 2018 to fund the balance of the annual program costs.”
DOE’s efforts to implement some of the major strategies outlined in its ‘Strategy for the Management and Disposal of Used Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Waste’ are limited due to the NWPA’s strict adherence to only allowing movement towards Yucca Mountain. In an effort to circumvent these restrictions, DOE’s FY15 waste management plans under the $30 million request include “continue developing plans for a consent-based siting process; maintain and expand the unified and integrated UNF database and analysis system to characterize the input to the waste management system; prepare for large-scale transportation of UNF and high-level radioactive waste to a pilot interim storage facility with focus on UNF at shutdown reactor sites; evaluate integrated approaches to storage, transportation, and disposal in the waste management system with an emphasis on providing flexibility, including evaluation of standardization of dry cask storage and transportation systems; and evaluate expanded generic operational and conceptual design alternatives for the expanded interim storage facility including development of more detailed cost and schedule data,” the budget document said, among other smaller activities.
Used Fuel R&D Activities
DOE is also seeking $79 million in FY 2015 for “research and development to identify alternatives and conduct scientific research and technology development to enable storage, transportation, and disposal of used nuclear fuel and wastes generated by existing and future nuclear fuel cycles,” the document said. This marks a $19 million increase from the $60 million enacted in FY14. Part of the increase includes $9 million to support studies of long-term storage of high burnup fuels while other increase will aid in demonstrations and implementation of field tests for deep boreholes repository science for disposal of heat generating waste. According to the justification, this should be the peak funding year for the high burnup fuel demonstrations.
The Used Nuclear Fuel Disposition request also includes work to “continue long-term R&D and international collaborations on alternative disposal environments, including field tests ,” the budget document said. This would involve continued evaluation of three main geologic rock formations (crystalline, clay/shale, and salt) that DOE is currently looking at as suitable potential geologic repository media.
