South Carolina stakeholders for the Savannah River Site denounced Monday a potential plan to process 34 metric tons of plutonium and ship it to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M., for permanent storage.
That “dilute and dispose” option is the Department of Energy’s preferred approach for eliminating the plutonium, rather than continuing forward with construction and operation of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) at SRS. In its fiscal 2019 budget proposal, released Monday, DOE’s semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) requested $220 million to close down the MOX project and $59 million to advance dilute and dispose.
But skeptics that evening offered a number of reasons why WIPP should not be used to permanently hold the plutonium: lack of disposal space at the facility, unknown costs associated with the project, and a high number of safety protocols DOE would have to address before shipping and storing the material.
A handful of people representing different organizations spoke at a meeting in Columbia, S.C., of a National Academy of Sciences (NAS) committee of experts formed in December to study the issue. The panel, encompassing members ranging from DOE officials to college professors who specialize in applicable fields such as chemistry and environmental health, will eventually offer an opinion to Congress regarding WIPP’s suitability to house the downblended plutonium.
The federal government has already spent $5 billion on construction of the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility, which began in 2007. The plant would convert the plutonium into commercial reactor fuel, per the terms of a 2000 U.S.-Russian arms control deal. But the Energy Department believes the MOX project will in total cost $51 billion, versus $17 billion for downblending the plutonium, mixing it with a concrete-like grout, and shipping the resulting material to New Mexico. It has sought for years to cancel the facility, but has not persuaded Congress to accept the plan.
WIPP is the nation’s sole repository for permanent storage of transuranic waste from the DOE complex, including the Savannah River Site.
Rick Lee, chairman of the South Carolina Governor’s Nuclear Advisory Council (GNAC), told the NAS committee that disposing of the material at WIPP would be “extremely problematic” because it would require the Energy Department to expand the New Mexico facility – something that would take more money and time than he believes the federal government realizes. While DOE has an ongoing program to mine out space in the WIPP underground for storage of transuranic waste, Lee said expanding it to accommodate the downblended plutonium would be a much larger project.
In addition, Lee said, WIPP would need to be relicensed to account for the diluted plutonium stockpile, which would take even more time. The facility is currently licensed by the Environmental Protection Agency as a safe place for storage for up to 10,000 years. Lee believes it will need to be relicensed if the plutonium is sent to the facility.
“The DOE believes dilute and disposal would be less expensive. But this would be a big change and I don’t believe this is what was intended for WIPP,” Lee said.
A few other speakers took the podium Monday, including Jim Marra, a former scientist at the Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) and with DOE’s Office of Environmental Management. Marra is currently the executive director of Aiken-based Citizens for Nuclear Technology and Awareness (CNTA), an SRS and nuclear energy advocacy group that vows to offer an objective stance on SRS issues.
Though he didn’t outright suggest MOX over downblending, Marra said the MOX plant already has the necessary technology and licensing, not to mention the money that has already been invested in the program. Shipping 34 metric tons of downblended plutonium to WIPP means storage, transportation, and several other factors would need to be addressed, he said.
“It’s going to take some time to look at this option and decide if this truly the best pathway forward,” he told the committee. “I think dilute and disposal has some homework before it can be considered a viable option.”
Because they are still in they are still in their fact-finding phase, members of the NAS committee did not offer comment Monday. Prior to the meeting, the committee toured SRS, which is about 65 miles from Columbia. They visited the site’s K Area, where plutonium downblending is already taking place under a separate DOE mission, and E Area, where transuranic (TRU) waste intended for disposal at WIPP is being packaged and prepared for shipment. Panel members spoke with site employees and DOE and NNSA officials.
