The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has scheduled a May 2 conference with Energy Northwest to give the utility an opportunity to explain an incident in which it allegedly shipped low-level radioactive waste from the Columbia Generating Station in Washington state to a nearby disposal facility, where it was rejected for under-reported radiation levels.
The NRC is considering penalizing the company for a violation that has been preliminarily characterized as “white,” which represents a low to moderate safety issue.
In November 2016, workers at the nuclear plant near the city of Richland sent a single package of radioactive filters and other “low specific activity” material to a US Ecology disposal facility 10 miles away. The recepient facility found that the radiation levels for the package were more than seven times higher than documented in the shipping manifest. The material was subsequently sent back to the plant for continued storage, and the Washington state Department of Health then suspended Energy Northwest’s disposal permit privileges for shipments to US Ecology until the matter was resolved.
The NRC has scheduled a regulatory conference for May 2.
“The conference is an opportunity for you and your staff to provide your perspective on this matter including your views and facts that the NRC should consider in determining the final significance of the apparent violation, and information related to the completed and or planned corrective actions,” the NRC wrote in a notice issued Monday.
While the regulator has not issued a notice of violation while it prepares its final determination in the case, additional evaluation could lead to a revised characterization of the seeming license breach, NRC Reactor Safety Division Director Anton Vegel wrote in the letter to Energy Northwest CEO Mark Reddemann.
