The Department of Energy is still preparing a report to Congress on “innovative options” for meeting its legal requirement to dispose of tens of thousands of tons of U.S. nuclear waste.
“The Department is currently working on the report, and we’ll follow up once it’s public,” a spokesperson said by email Monday.
The spokesperson did not provide additional detail about the timing of release or what it is in the report. There was no update on its status as of Thursday.
In an explanatory statement attached to one of two fiscal 2020 appropriations bills passed in December, Congress directed the Energy Department to within 90 days of enactment submit to the House and Senate Appropriations committees a report “on innovative options for disposition of high-level waste and spent nuclear fuel management.” The agency was told to focus on cost-effective approaches that could be established relatively quickly and involve “stakeholder engagement” in selecting potential waste sites.
President Donald Trump signed the spending bills on Dec. 20, leaving just a handful of days until the deadline. There was no word from the committees this week on the status of the report.
Under the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, DOE is responsible for disposal of what is now roughly 100,000 metric tons of high-level waste from defense nuclear operations and used fuel from commercial power plants. The agency still does not have a disposal site for the material. Its 2008 application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a repository under Yucca Mountain, Nev., has been on hold since the Obama administration defunded the proceeding a decade ago.
After unsuccessful requests in the past three budget cycles, the Trump administration for fiscal 2021 did not ask Congress to resume appropriations for licensing Yucca Mountain.
Instead, DOE requested $27.5 million for an Interim Storage and Nuclear Waste Fund Oversight program in the budget year beginning Oct. 1. That will include a request for proposals for basic design of an interim storage facility, Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Rita Baranwal told a House committee earlier this month. The procurement notice had not been issued at deadline Friday for RadWaste Monitor, and the Energy Department did not respond to a query regarding its status.
Consolidated interim storage is a potential means for removing used fuel from dozens of sites around the nation before a permanent repository is ready. Two radioactive waste management companies, Holtec International and Deep Isolation, have said they would be interested in bidding on the anticipated design project.
