A case could be made for arranging the transport and temporary storage of U.S. commercial spent nuclear reactor fuel without involving the Department of Energy, according to a senior representative for the nuclear industry trade group.
However, key stakeholders aren’t tipping their hands yet regarding their positions on such an approach to resolving the decades-old dilemma on disposal of the radioactive waste.
Under the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the Energy Department is legally responsible for building a repository for the nation’s used fuel and high-level waste from defense operations. The deadline for DOE to begin accepting that material for disposal was Jan. 31, 1998, but it has not yet received a license or built a facility at the assigned site under Yucca Mountain, Nev. The federal government has already paid billions of dollars for failing to take the spent fuel from nuclear utilities.
Meanwhile, two commercial teams are pursuing licensing and development of facilities that could hold all the spent fuel for four decades or more, until the repository is ready. While the Energy Department legally is supposed to take title to that material from the generators, there is a sticking point in the 1982 law regarding doing so for temporary storage.
Per the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, this step in the proceeding would occur only “following commencement of operation of a repository.” The law does allow DOE to move forward with licensing and building a “monitored retrievable storage” facility, but ties its development tightly to authorization from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build the Yucca Mountain repository.
“The fundamental question here is about taking title to the fuel. Right now, DOE will tell you they’re not authorized to take title to the fuel unless Congress acts,” Rod McCullum, senior director for used fuel and decommissioning at the Nuclear Energy Institute, said on March 6.
In a panel discussion at the 2019 Waste Management Symposia in Phoenix, Ariz., McCullum posed the question of whether it would make sense for interim storage providers to take ownership of spent fuel for transport and storage directly from client utilities. That would fully bypass DOE, which otherwise would be the shipper and customer for interim storage.
Congress also has yet to provide the Energy Department with any funds yet for an interim storage program.
Senior executives from both consolidated interim storage facility projects spoke on the panel alongside McCullum, but skirted the question he raised. However, Holtec International, in a statement this week suggested support for the approach outlined at the conference: “Holtec is committed to fund the licensing effort. Once licensed by the U.S. NRC, construction could commence with funding from the DOE and/or utilities.”
In March 2017, the New Jersey-based energy technology company filed its application for a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license for storage of used fuel in southeastern New Mexico. The initial 40-year license would cover 8,680 metric tons of material, but the maximum capacity would be 173,000 metric tons and the license could be extended.
In June 2018, an Orano-Waste Control Specialists joint venture formally called Interim Storage Partners filed its license application with the NRC. The document updates the application previously filed in 2016 solely by Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists for interim storage on its West Texas property, which it suspended for more than a year as one acquisition deal was blocked by a federal judge in 2017 and another materialized the next year. The initial 40-year license would start with authorization for 5,000 metric tons of used fuel, but that could also be expanded up to 40,000 metric tons.
Each corporate team is expected to spend in the neighborhood of $7 million to reimburse the NRC for its licensing regulatory review.
“Will they be able to go forward without DOE, with them taking title to the fuel? Well, they’re buying plants, they’re already having titles to the fuel. Does it make financial sense for them to do that? Does creating a more efficient market create a business proposition that can actually go forward” McCullum asked.
Holtec International already plans in coming years to buy three retired or nearly retired nuclear plants: the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in New Jersey, the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts, and the Palisades Power Plant in Michigan. In each case, it would assume all responsibility for decommissioning and spent fuel management.
Waste Control Specialists is a disposal subcontractor for the decommissioning of the Vermont Yankee power plant, led by NorthStar Group Services with assistance from Orano. NorthStar and Orano have also created a joint venture, Accelerated Decommissioning Partners, to acquire and decommission nuclear sites.
McCullum used recent examples of waste burial demonstrations to illustrate the potential benefits of taking the Energy Department out of the interim storage equation.
In January, California-based startup Deep Isolation demonstrated its drill-hole approach for deep-underground disposal of radioactive waste. With “almost no muss, no fuss,” McCullum said. The system functioned as intended using a nonradioactive steel rod, in fill view of local community members near Austin, Texas.
McCullum contrasted that against the Department of Energy’s attempt to find a location for a test of a borehole system for nuclear waste disposal. A contract with Battelle Memorial Institute was canceled in 2016 in the face of intense opposition from residents near two planned locations in North Dakota. The Energy Department in 2017 terminated a second site selection process amid continued local concerns.
“Having DOE in your project comes with money, but it comes with something else too, and it also comes with a lot of uncertainty because you’re going to have to trust every Congress to keep funding it,” McCullum said.
The NRC anticipates completing its review of the Holtec International and Interim Storage Partners license applications by mid-2020. Assuming approval, they hope to begin taking waste within a couple years afterward. It is possible that, with DOE not involved, regulatory approval would sufficient for the sites to take title to spent fuel directly from utilities, McCullum said.
The Energy Department could still subsequently meet its legal directive to take title to the fuel when a disposal option is ready, he added, emphasizing that NEI supports both interim storage and permanent disposal of the waste.
