Monday’s settlement to move nuclear waste away from the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in California put potential punctuation on a nearly two-year lawsuit, but one potential recipient is already refusing to accept the material.
The agreement between SONGS owner Southern California Edison and Citizens Oversight cites the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station near Tonopah, Ariz., as one possible site to accept spent fuel from the facility rather than keeping it at an oceanside storage pad.
The Arizona Public Service Co. (APS), though, quickly said it would not take waste shipments from San Onofre. APS owns about 29 percent of Palo Verde; Southern California Edison (SCE), primary owner and operator of SONGS, holds a roughly 15 percent stake in the Arizona facility.
“We safely and securely store Palo Verde’s used fuel. The bottom line is we are not licensed to store used fuel from any other facility. There is no initiative that makes sense to start the licensing process,” APS spokeswoman Jill Hanks said Tuesday.
Ray Lutz of Citizens Oversight, the lead plaintiff in the 2015 lawsuit against the California Coastal Commission’s approval of expanding SONGS’ independent spent fuel storage installation to hold waste now kept in wet storage, took issue with APS’ position.
“I think it is improper for them to sell power while generating waste themselves without even talking to their co-owner Edison about moving the waste from San Onofre,” said Ray Lutz of Citizens’ Oversight.
“I don’t think they have to get licensing to take the spent fuel, they are co-owners,” Lutz said. “They are already licensed to handle and store that material.”
The agreement allows SCE to move the spent fuel into dry storage on-site while it seeks options for relocating it off-site. Other options will be examined by an expert team that is scheduled to be established in coming months. The agreement gave SCE five months to accept proposals and assemble the expert team to plan a path for the SONGS waste.
