The New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) plans to rule by June 1 on a proposal from the U.S. Energy Department to modify the method used to calculate the volume of transuranic waste being disposed of at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP).
The Energy Department and site contractor Nuclear Waste Partnership filed the application Jan. 31 seeking to amend the state Hazardous Waste Facility Permit for the underground disposal site.
The New Mexico Environment Department normally has 90 days to rule upon such an application. But on April 27 the state agency announced a 30-day extension, with a new June 1 deadline.
Basically, the permit holders want to change the way waste volume is counted underground. With state approval, empty space between drums inside a standard waste container would no longer be counted as waste when volume is measured. Advocates say this would better measure actual waste deposited in the mine.
The Government Accountability Office last September said DOE lacks sufficient existing space at WIPP to dispose of all defense-related TRU waste from various sites around the nation. Under current DOE disposal plans, WIPP would fill the existing disposal space by 2026. The Energy Department could push that back by revising the current mathematical method for counting waste, according to the GAO report. Physically expanding WIPP’s disposal space will require a lengthy regulatory approval, the 2017 report said.
WIPP’s Land Withdrawal Act caps the amount of TRU waste allowed at WIPP at 175,565 cubic meters.
Under the current accounting method, the Energy Department has already empaneled roughly 90,000 cubic meters, more than half its limit. The requested modification would reduce that total to about 60,000 cubic meters, “meaning WIPP is only about one third full, instead of half full. This would free up more space for WIPP’s intended use,” NWP spokesman Donavan Mager said by email.
With DOE expected to reach its currently recognized volume limit by 2026, the GAO noted it could be forced to suspend shipments of TRU waste while it applies for state regulatory approval to physically expand the underground repository.
Nuclear Watch New Mexico opposes the proposed NMED revision. The advocacy group’s operations and research director, Scott Kovac, says this record-keeping tweak would effectively postpone the point at which WIPP reaches its limit under the Land Withdrawal Act.
The watchdog group fears this is part of a multipronged effort to expand the amount of waste deposited in the underground repository. “The public has opposed WIPP expansion for years and decades” on safety grounds, NukeWatch said in a recent “call to action” for state residents. The advocacy group said DOE is seeking this change through a Class 2 permit modification request, which is less stringent than a Class 3 request, which would require a public hearing.
While the GAO said the currently authorized 10 panels of underground space are not enough to dispose of the existing inventory of the nation’s defense-related TRU waste, there is already talk of shipping additional material to WIPP.
The Energy Department’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration has approved downblending, to a TRU waste form, 6 metric tons of non-pit plutonium stored at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The resulting TRU waste will eventually be deposited at WIPP.
The Energy Department is also seeking congressional approval to cancel its MOX project to convert 34 metric tons of plutonium into nuclear reactor fuel, and instead process 34 metric tons of the material for safe disposal at WIPP.
WIPP Nears 100 Waste Shipments for 2018
WIPP has received 96 shipments of transuranic waste so far in 2018.
Seventy-three shipments have been from the Idaho National Laboratory, 13 from Waste Control Specialists in Texas, and 10 from the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee.
The shipment total works out to roughly 6 shipments per week to the underground disposal site in the 16 weeks between Jan. 1 and April 25 — the latest date for which shipping data are publicly available. This would indicate WIPP has quickened the pace somewhat since reopening to outside shipments in April 2017 following a nearly three-year shutdown after a February 2014 underground radiation release.
Between April 7, 2017, and Dec. 31, 2017, WIPP took in 133 shipments, which averages out to 3.8 shipments per week over roughly 38 weeks.
