The Senate Appropriations Committee wants additional cost information before Congress provides any more funding for the Department of Energy’s planned new landfill at the Oak Ridge Site in Tennessee.
“The Committee is disappointed in the lack of progress in issuing the Record of Decision for the new landfill and recommends no funding to continue the preliminary design until agreement is reached on the Record of Decision,” the panel said in the 180-page report that accompanies its energy and water development funding bill for fiscal 2020, released on Sept. 12.
The report also directs DOE’s Office of Environmental Management to provide the appropriations committees in both the Senate and the House of Representatives with an evaluation of the cost of on-site disposal at Oak Ridge compared to off-site disposal. The study would be due within 90 days of passage of the funding bill.
The draft ROD for the proposed 2.2-million-cubic yard landfill is scheduled for release Monday. Officials with the DOE cleanup office, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the state of Tennessee recently agreed to push publication back a month, from the end of August, while they seek agreement on regulating landfill wastewater effluents containing radionuclides.
The record of decision will lay out detailed plans for the new Environmental Management Disposal Facility at Oak Ridge that would replace the nearly full Environmental Management Waste Management Facility. The document is also expected to address concerns raised by the city of Oak Ridge and other stakeholders regarding public health and safety.
The Energy Department has previously said building another on-site landfill for low-level radioactive and mixed waste from Oak Ridge cleanup would be far less expensive than trucking the material across the country to Nevada or another disposal site. The DOE has not yet issued a final cost estimate.
With the clock ticking toward the Sept. 30 end of the current fiscal year, the House of Representatives last week passed a continuing resolution to keep the federal government open until Nov. 21 while appropriations wrangling continues. The Senate approved a companion measure on Thursday, which President Donald Trump is expected to sign by Monday.
The full Senate has also yet to vote on the committee’s energy and water bill.
