Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) came out against allowing the nuclear industry to tap into power plant decommissioning trust funds to pay for major equipment replacements during a plant’s lifetime.
The reliably tough-on-nuclear Markey took his stand Wednesday during a hearing of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. He told the five members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission who testified at the hearing that allowing trust fund withdrawals for replacements of major radioactive components allowed companies “to protect their profits” and shouldn’t be allowed.
The NRC has declined to do a rulemaking about using decommissioning trust funds for major equipment replacements, but the agency does plan to publish draft guidelines for doing so, using exceptions to existing rules, in May.
If a power plant ever generates electricity using nuclear fusion, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will rely on its authority to regulate nuclear byproducts to make rules for the plant.
Commission staff detailed the decision in a letter dated April 13 to Daniel Dorman, NRC’s executive director of operations, from Brooke Clark, the NRC secretary. No one today generates, or plans to generate, electricity from nuclear fusion.
Holtec International last week said it will delay plans to discharge irradiated wastewater from the shuttered Indian Point Nuclear Energy Center in Buchanan, N.Y., into the Hudson River.
The is taking a “voluntary pause” with its plans, a spokesperson told media including the New York Times. Holtec has also delayed plans to discharge wastewater from the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant in Massachusetts into Cape Cod Bay. In both instances, local opposition to such discharges, routine and legal in the nuclear power industry, stopped the company’s plans.
A bill is working its way through the North Carolina state Senate that would designate nuclear energy as a clean source of power.
An amended version of North Carolina Senate Bill 678 this week cleared the chamber’s Agriculture, Energy, and Environment Committee. The measure clear the Rules and Operations Committee before it is eligible for a floor vote. The legislature was scheduled to adjourn on Aug. 31.
