Nuclear Regulatory Commissioner William Ostendorff said Tuesday that he’s disappointed the U.S. still does not have a permanent repository for nuclear waste.
While speaking at the NRC’s annual Nuclear Regulatory Information Conference in Bethesda, Md., Ostendorff was asked whether he thinks he’s leaving behind any unfinished business. A commissioner since 2010, Ostendorff announced in February that he will not be seeking reappointment this summer, as he has accepted a teaching position with his alma mater, the United States Naval Academy.
“I think that’s a significant shortcoming of government,” Ostendorff said of the stalled Yucca Mountain repository project. “I don’t think it’s been handled, quite frankly, with enough urgency.”
The Obama administration in 2011 ceased funding for the Yucca Mountain repository planned in Nevada and established a blue-ribbon panel that two years later recommended a consent-based strategy for storing American nuclear waste. NRC estimates that it needs about $330 million to finish the licensing process.
When asked whether the NRC would seek that funding, Ostendorff pointed to the NRC fiscal 2017 budget request, which does not include any amount for Yucca licensing. Personally, he said, he has supported resuming funding in past votes.
Commissioner Kristine Svinicki was asked Tuesday whether potential NRC approval of interim storage sites for nuclear waste will be contingent on approval of the Yucca Mountain repository. NRC is expecting two license applications this year from companies seeking to build interim storage facilities: Waste Control Specialists in Texas and Holtec International in New Mexico.
From the NRC standpoint, Svinicki said there isn’t any “existing regulatory nexus” between interim storage and disposal.
Commissioner Jeff Baran addressed Yucca Mountain during the conference on Wednesday, stating that he has not supported completing the Yucca Mountain license review in the past because the applicant, Department of Energy, is not willing to defend the application. DOE withdrew the license application in 2010, with then-Secretary Steven Chu calling it an unworkable option for long-term disposal.
“Typically with an adjudicatory proceeding you have an applicant that will want the license and who is going to engage very seriously in what is really an adversarial trial,” Baran said. “In my opinion we don’t have that here right now, and in the absence of that I don’t think it makes any sense to move forward with that process.”
