The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission in October spent $14,325 from its remaining Nuclear Waste Fund balance on federal court costs, according to its latest monthly update to Congress.
That represented the large majority of the $15,727 spent from the fund during the month and left the agency with an unspent, unobligated balance of $415,019 as of Oct. 31.
The NRC also spent $11,645 in September and $1,448 in August on federal court litigation. In August, Nevada filed a petition requesting that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit force NRC Commissioner David Wright recuse himself from any licensing adjudication for the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in the state. The court has not ruled on the recusal request, which the NRC opposes. “Agency attorneys have provided legal support in connection with this petition,” the NRC said in the document submitted to House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Greg Walden (R-Ore.) and seven other lawmakers.
The Nuclear Waste Fund is intended to pay for licensing, development, construction, and operation of a repository for spent fuel from commercial nuclear reactors and high-level radioactive waste from defense nuclear operations. Per congressional directive in 1987, that facility would be built under Yucca Mountain in Nye County, Nev., an outcome the state leadership vehemently opposes.
The Obama administration in 2010 suspended work on the Department of Energy’s Yucca Mountain license application before the NRC. A federal appeals court in August 2013 ordered the regulator to proceed with the licensing process. Since then, the agency has spent over $13.1 million of the $13.5 million from the fund it had on hand at the time of the ruling. Congress would have to approve replenishing the regulator’s fund balance.
In October, the NRC also spent $1,402 on follow-up costs from a February meeting of its Licensing Support Network Advisory Review Panel and information-gathering for possible locations in Nevada for adjudicatory hearings on the license application. The commission in October halted the hearing-location search until it becomes clearer whether a facility will be needed. Congress has so far rejected the Trump administration’s requests for funding at the NRC and DOE to resume licensing for the repository.
The Nuclear Waste Fund grew primarily from fees paid by nuclear utilities with the expectation that the Department of Energy will eventually meet its legal mandate to take the spent fuel off their hands. By the time the Obama administration halted collections in 2014, under federal court order, utilities had paid more than $40 billion into the fund.
From October 2010 to Sept. 30 of this year, DOE used carry-over from its remaining balance for ongoing management of the Nuclear Waste Fund, dealing with lawsuits, program shutdown during the Obama administration, and the Trump administration’s efforts tor revive funding for licensing, according to an independent audit of the Nuclear Waste Fund, released last week by the Energy Department’s Office of Inspector General.
The audit, performed by accounting company KPMG, covers the fund’s financial performance in fiscal years 2017 and 2018.
As of the end of fiscal 2018 on Sept. 30, the Nuclear Waste Fund held $39.2 billion worth of U.S. Treasuries, the audit says. That was up from $37.6 billion at the end of the prior budget year, resulting from investment income and net gains in maturing securities.
The federal government expects it will pay another $28.1 billion to settle its liabilities for failing to meet the terms of 68 Standard Contracts with nuclear utilities. Those contracts, in line with language in the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, required DOE to begin taking their spent nuclear fuel for disposal by Jan. 31, 1998. It has not taken any of that radioactive waste, and the federal judgment fund has already paid out $7.4 billion.
The federal government has also spent about $15 billion on developing Yucca Mountain.
