The Senate Appropriations energy and water development subcommittee is again trying to jump-start a pilot program for consolidated, temporary storage of spent fuel stranded at U.S. nuclear reactors.
The panel spent less than an hour Tuesday on the markup and approval of its $43.8 billion funding measure for fiscal 2019, covering the Department of Energy, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Army Corps of Engineers, and other agencies. The document has not been made public ahead of being reviewed by the full Appropriations Committee on Thursday.
The legislation “takes important steps towards solving our country’s stalemate over what to do with used nuclear fuel,” subcommittee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said in his opening remarks to the markup. “Our legislation includes a pilot program … for consolidated nuclear waste storage, which has been included in the Senate energy and water appropriations bill for the past six years.”
The bill also provides financial support for DOE to support storing radioactive waste at private sites, Alexander added without elaborating.
There was no mention during the hearing of Yucca Mountain in Nevada, the Trump administration’s preferred location to build a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste.
Additional details regarding the bill’s radioactive waste language was not immediately available. A Senate aide said the legislation would be released following the Thursday morning committee meeting.
The 2018 version of the Senate energy appropriations bill authorized a pilot DOE program for licensing, construction, and operation of at least one facility for consolidated storage of radioactive waste. That measure was not featured in the omnibus spending bill signed into law in March.
Holtec International is seeking an NRC license for consolidated interim storage in New Mexico. A partnership of Waste Control Specialists (WCS) and Orano is expected to soon ask the regulator to revive a frozen WCS application for a similar facility in West Texas.
