Legislation filed Friday in the Texas House of Representatives would reserve capacity for low-level radioactive waste from the state and Vermont in the facility managed under their shared disposal agreement.
Texas and Vermont are the sole members of the Texas Low Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact. Privately operated Waste Control Specialists manages the compact disposal facility at its property in Andrews County, but the Texas state government owns the facility.
For higher fees than those paid by Texas and Vermont, other states can ship their low-level waste to the compact facility.
The bill from state Rep. Brooks Landgraf (R), who represents Andrews County, would add two sections to the section of the Texas health and safety code on radioactive materials and amend existing language in the code.
If passed, the added language would set aside exclusive disposal capacity for the two states the greater of either: 3 million cubic feet, or the volume set by the Texas Low Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission in a capacity study the commission must perform at least every four years; and 2 million curies, or the curie capacity identified in the quadrennial studies.
Within the set-aside volume and curie levels, 80 percent would be for waste generated in Texas and the remaining for waste from “nonhost party states” – which, in this case, presently means Vermont.
In the latest disposal report, covering June 1 to Aug. 31 of last year, the WCS facility recorded 1,877.28 cubic feet and 380.97 curies of material disposed of from in-compact sources; out-of-compact sources represented 5,227.18 cubic feet and 66,308.2 curies of material.
