By John Stang
Staff at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has recommended that two environmental organizations be allowed to intervene in deliberations over Holtec International’s license application to build and operate a used reactor fuel storage site in southeastern New Mexico.
However, staff also determined several watchdog organizations and spent fuel storage container manufacturer NAC International should be considered as having no standing to challenge Holtec’s application, according to an Oct. 9 memo sent to the commission.
The Sierra Club and Beyond Nuclear “have established standing to intervene in this proceeding and have proffered at least one admissible contention,” according to the staff memo. Specifically, they have members living within a few miles of its planned facility in Lea County.
The Sierra Club submitted 25 contentions against the project, of which staff indicated only two should be admitted to the NRC review. One of those is largely similar to the contention from Beyond Nuclear: that there is a potential “inconsistency” between Holtec’s environmental report in its application and its safety analysis report “regarding the extent of the applicant’s intended reliance on a future contract” with the Department of Energy.
Under the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, DOE is directed to remove what is now about 80,000 metric tons of spent fuel from commercial power reactors. Interim storage of the type planned by Holtec, plus a separate Orano-Waste Control Specialists project in West Texas also up for NRC approval, could be an option for the agency to meet its legal mandate until it has a permanent repository for the waste. One question regarding these sites is whether DOE would be the customer or the companies that own the power plants.
Meanwhile, NRC staff said the other entities petitioning to intervene have failed to submit admissible contentions or prove geographic standing. That covers the Alliance for Environmental Strategies; a coalition of environmental groups led by Don’t Waste Michigan; and NAC International, which is working on the Orano-WCS spent fuel storage project.
“NAC has failed to allege a concrete and particularized injury that is fairly traceable to the proposed Holtec facility,” according to the staff memo. “Further, any harm alleged by NAC would not be redressable by a favorable decision here. As explained below, this is because the Holtec CISF—as currently proposed—would not authorize storage of NAC canisters.“
NAC International and Don’t Waste Michigan did not respond to requests for comment on the NRC staff’s recommendations.
Holtec had opposed all the requests to intervene, arguing the petitioners do not have legal standing.
Ultimately, the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board will decide if any of the petitioners have standing in this matter. The next step will likely be oral arguments to be scheduled by the safety board, according to an NRC spokesman. The safety board’s rulings can be appealed to commission.
Holtec hopes by 2022 to open the initially licensed part of used fuel facility with underground-storage capacity for 8,680 metric tons of used fuel between the cities of Hobbs and Carlsbad. It ultimately could increase licensed storage to about 173,000 metric tons under a 40-year license.
The Orano-Waste Control Specialists team, called Interim Storage Partners (ISP), hopes to obtain a 40-year NRC license in 2021 or 2022 for its site in West Texas, just across the border from the planned Holtec facility. It would begin with 5,000 metric tons of capacity, up to a total of 40,000 metric tons.
The NRC deadline for opponents to file petitions against ISP’s application to obtain an NRC license for its West Texas site is Oct 29. Agency staff will then have a few weeks to respond to those arguments.
Beyond Nuclear and a joint grouping of regional oil and gas entities Fasken Land and Minerals and Permian Basin Land and Royalty Owners (PBLRO) have separately filed for full dismissal of both license applications. One argument in both filings is that interim storage facilities would make DOE responsible for transport and storage of the spent fuel, which under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act is allowed only when a permanent repository is ready.
NRC staff dismissed a corresponding argument in the Sierra Club petition for intervention in the Holtec proceeding, suggesting it might not gain traction in the efforts to have the applications dismissed.
A federal appeals court has already ruled that the “NRC has the authority to license privately owned away-from-reactor spent nuclear fuel storage facilities pursuant to the [Atomic Energy Act], and that the NWPA neither repealed nor superseded that licensing authority,” according to the memo. “Therefore, the Sierra Club’s challenge to the NRC’s authority to license all away-from-reactor ISFSIs is outside the scope of the proceeding.”
In a related matter, NRC Commissioner David Wright is scheduled to tour Holtec ’s New Jersey campus on Tuesday. Another Oct. 9 NRC memo said: “This is a routine visit to obtain a general familiarity with the facility. The Commissioner will not engage in any substantive discussion during the visit about any of the issues that have been raised in the petitions and motions associated with Holtec’s license application for a consolidated interim storage facility.”
