International efforts to develop strategies for disposing of nuclear waste have made strides recently, the U.N.’s nuclear energy organization said in a report published last week.
“It is evident that significant progress has been made globally in formulating national policies and strategies and in implementing legal and regulatory systems that define responsibilities for the ongoing safe management of spent fuel and radioactive waste,” the International Nuclear Energy Agency (IAEA) said in its report made public in a Friday press release.
Summarizing the report’s findings, the press release said that more than 80% of the world’s solid radioactive waste volume is now in disposal. Funding mechanisms for nuclear waste disposal in most countries are also “well established,” the release said.
Public engagement on repository site selection has also been “steady” over recent years, IAEA said.
The report also highlighted some international progress in spent fuel storage.
Finland is expected to start operating a deep geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel by the mid-2020s, the release said. Licensing activities for storage sites are also moving along in Canada, France, Sweden and Switzerland.
Despite those positive movements, the current global lack of permanent disposal options for nuclear waste is creating a need for additional interim storage capacity, IAEA said.
In the U.S., neither a permanent repository nor an interim storage site for the nation’s spent nuclear fuel is currently operating. Nevada’s Yucca Mountain site — the only location Congress has authorized to permanently store spent fuel — has remained unbuilt since 2010 when the Barack Obama administration pulled the project’s license application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Yucca remains on ice under the Joe Biden administration, which has already not committed to open the government’s purse in 2022 for anything other than guarding the unfinished repository.
The Department of Energy has only recently started taking its first steps toward siting a federal interim storage facility. An agency spokesperson told Exchange Monitor last week that a possible competitive funding opportunity could be coming this year for would-be host communities to explore interim storage options. That news comes as DOE in November released a request for information (RFI) seeking public input on how the agency could site an interim storage facility using a consent-based approach. Responses to that RFI are due March 4.
A private company has come the closest out of anyone so far to building a facility that would consolidate some of the 80,000 tons or so of spent fuel currently stranded at reactor sites across the U.S.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in September licensed Interim Storage Partners (ISP), a joint venture between Orano USA and Waste Control Specialists, to build a proposed commercial interim storage site in west Texas. Another company, New Jersey-based Holtec International, has its own application under review with NRC for a similar site in New Mexico.
