Waste Control Specialists on Tuesday requested a temporary suspension of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission review of the company’s license application for a consolidated interim spent nuclear fuel storage site in West Texas. The Dallas-based waste managment provider said it first wants to wrap up its sale to rival EnergySolutions.
The Justice Department in November sued to prevent the $367 million sale of Waste Control Specialists from current owner Valhi to EnergySolutions parent Rockwell Holdco, arguing the deal would harm consumers in the low-level radioactive waste disposal industry. The federal antitrust trial is scheduled to start next Monday and should end by May 5, WCS President and CEO Rod Baltzer said in a letter dated April 18 to the NRC.
The companies believe they will win their case and should complete the sale by the end of this summer, Baltzer stated. “WCS expects to go forward with this project at the earliest possible opportunity after completion of the sale,” he wrote. “However, due to the substantially increased application review and related costs, WCS must focus its limited financial resources on those expenditures necessary to safely run and maintain its currently licensed facilities, proceed through the trial set for April 24, and complete the sale to EnergySolutions.”
Waste Control Specialists in April 2016 filed its NRC license application for a facility at its Andrews County, Texas, waste storage complex designed to hold up to 40,000 metric tons of spent fuel now marooned at nuclear power plants around the country. The company had hoped that the site would open in 2021.
NRC has lately said its application evaluation would cost about $7.5 million, “which is significantly higher than we originally estimated,” Baltzer wrote. There are also expenses related to public participation and a possible adjudicatory hearing before the NRC Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, said Baltzer, also noting his company’s “significant operating losses” in recent years.
Along with request that the NRC halt all safety and environmental reviews of the license application, Baltzer also asked the NRC to suspend the process for requesting hearings on the proposal, as well as the deadlines for comments on the scope of the regulator’s environmental review.
