EnergySolutions hopes this year to receive a state license to finally begin accepting large amounts of depleted uranium at its radioactive waste disposal facility near Clive, Utah.
That would mark the end of a regulatory process that has stretched for more than a decade.
State legislation enacted in March 2018 set three requirements for the Salt Lake City-based nuclear services company to dispose of large volumes of depleted uranium at Clive, according to Vern Rogers, EnergySolutions director of regulatory affairs. Management has taken steps to address all three, he said during a June 9 session at the American Nuclear Society strictly virtual annual meeting.
The company has completed the performance assessment for the planned federal cell that would hold the waste, and responded to questions from the Utah Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), Rogers said. The state agency is reviewing the document.
The Department of Energy has agreed to take title to the federal cell and depleted uranium, as required by the law, Rogers said. “We have signed a document where the DOE had agreed to do that, so that one is completed as well.”
Finally, management in January of this year filed the preliminary review draft of the radioactive-material license application for its federal cell with the DEQ’s Division of Waste Management and Radiation Control.
“We’re hoping that, based on where we stand at this point and what they’re telling us, that the licensing actions for all of that will be completed this year, 2020,” Rogers said.
Executives have been optimistic before – In 2014, then-EnergySolutions Senior Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Dan Shrum said the company should be ready to begin depleted uranium disposal by the end of the following year.
Depleted uranium is a byproduct of uranium enrichment that becomes more radioactive over time. It is generally considered by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to be Class A low-level waste, the least hazardous form among the three classifications.
The 1-square-mile Clive facility, in Tooele County at the eastern side of the Great Salt Lake Desert, is already licensed for disposal of Class A, mixed, and other radioactive waste types.
In 2008, it received 5,408 drums of depleted uranium shipped from the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site in South Carolina. However, roughly another 700,000 metric tons of depleted uranium oxide is expected to be generated by DOE depleted uranium hexafluoride (DUF6) conversion plants at former uranium-enrichment sites in Kentucky and Ohio.
EnergySolutions in 2009 requested a license amendment from the Department of Environmental Quality for disposal of depleted uranium. The company in 2011 submitted the required performance assessment, a document intended to demonstrate it could hold the radioactive material without danger to the public. A state consultant prepared a safety evaluation report for the project, which is still being finalized. That proceeding was put on the backburner in 2016 during EnergySolutions’ abortive attempt to buy rival Waste Control Specialists, which was ultimately blocked by a federal judge, but ramped back up the following year, according to DEQ.
The parties are still going over some open issues with the performance assessment, agency spokesman Jared Mendenhall said Tuesday. There is no set schedule for completion of that process, he added.
“We’re just in it. We’re working with them,” Mendenhall said by telephone. “There’s a normal back and forth that’s natural to a process like this.”
The federal cell would be distinct from other facilities on the EnergySolutions property and would hold the depleted uranium slightly below ground level. The disposal space would be 968 feet wide by 1,425 feet long, enough to hold roughly 10.2 million cubic feet of material.
“A schedule for construction, placement of depleted uranium and eventual closure of the Federal Cell Facility is subject to receipt of a Radioactive Material License, execution of the prerequisite long-term stewardship agreements, successful construction, and rate of generation and shipment by DOE of depleted uranium,” the draft license application states.
A significant amount of excavation for the cell has been completed, the application says, with construction of the lining tentatively scheduled to begin this year. Disposal would begin with the 5,408 drums from Savannah River that are already held on-site.
In a June 5 Federal Register notice, the Energy Department’s Office of Environmental Management formalized its plans for disposal of depleted uranium oxide at EnergySolutions in Clive, Waste Control Specialists’ disposal complex in West Texas, and DOE’s Nevada National Security Site. “DOE will only ship to the selected commercial site(s) if the facility is authorized to receive DU oxide,” the agency said.
EnergySolutions estimates its federal cell would receive roughly half of the 700,000 metric tons of remaining depleted uranium over two decades. Management expects EnergySolutions would eventually request an amendment to the federal cell license to accept Class A waste to help fill out capacity, the application says. Waste disposal is anticipated to last 40 years.
Waste Control Specialists has been licensed since 2014 to take large amounts of depleted uranium at its Andrews County property.
“WCS is ready and available to accept converted DU from the DUF6 plants,” CEO and Chief Nuclear Officer Scott State said in a statement to RadWaste Monitor. “WCS has current licensed capacity to accept all of the converted DU cylinders in DOE inventory and all planned future conversions from the DUF6 plants.
ExchangeMonitor reported Wayne Barber contributed to this article.
