Nuclear services firm EnergySolutions said Tuesday it has completed physical decommissioning of the La Crosse Boiling Water Reactor (LACBWR) in Wisconsin.
That covers full remediation and extraction of radioactive materials in line with the license termination plan approved by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, according to a press release from the Salt Lake City-based company.
The nuclear power plant was built in 1967 and operated until 1987. Owner Dairyland Power Cooperative transferred the federal license for the facility to an EnergySolutions subsidiary for decommissioning, which began in June 2016. The license will now be transferred back to Dairyland.
“This is the second decommissioning project we have completed this year and it has been a great opportunity to showcase our talented workforce and abilities to safely decommission a nuclear power plant,” EnergySolutions President and CEO Ken Robuck said in the release. “I want to thank our customer, Dairyland Power, for the strong working relationship throughout the course of the project. As with every decommissioning project there are unique challenges and La Crosse was no different, but our best practices and lessons learned from other projects proved valuable in executing this project safely on schedule and budget.”
With NRC approval, the plant would be designated independent spent fuel storage installation-only. La Crosse’s used nuclear fuel will remain in dry storage on-site until an off-site storage or disposal facility is available.
In April, EnergySolutions finished decommissioning for the U.S. Energy Department of the Southwest Experimental Fast Oxide Reactor in Arkansas. It expects next spring to complete decommissioning of the Zion nuclear power plant in Illinois. The company is also gearing up to decommission the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in California, in partnership with AECOM, and has a contract with FirstEnergy Corp. to acquire reactor Unit 2 at the Three Mile Island power plant in Pennsylvania for decommissioning.
The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) has signed off on the latest iteration of the performance assessment for two radioactive waste disposal facilities operated by Waste Control Specialists (WCS).
The agency is the regulator for management of radioactive waste in the state, including the WCS complex in Andrews County.
Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists must update its performance assessment twice per decade. It addresses geology, surface water and groundwater, potential intrusions, and scenarios for the property’s use up to 1 million years to the future, according to a Nov. 8 WCS press release.
The performance assessment covers Waste Control Specialists’ Federal Waste Facility, which can take low-level radioactive waste and mixed low-level waste from the Department of Energy and other federal customers; and the Compact Waste Facility, used for disposal of low-level radioactive waste under the Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact. The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality approved the latest update on Oct. 30.
The Waste Control Specialists’ site is one of four commercial facilities in the United States licensed for permanent disposal of low-level waste.
“The TCEQ review and approval validates that not only are we the safest site for low-level radioactive waste disposal right now, but that the site’s unique characteristics will continue to protect the people and the surrounding environment well beyond the foreseeable future,” WCS President and Chief Operating Officer David Carlson said in the release.
Separately, Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday announced a new appointment to the Texas Low-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Compact Commission.
Personal injury lawyer Jeff Mundy’s appointment lasts through Sept. 1, 2025, according to a press release from Abbott’s office. There are eight other commissioners.
The commission manages disposal of low-level waste in the compact facility, which is owned by the state and managed by Waste Control Specialists. Texas and Vermont are the only members to the compact, but generators in other states can also ship their waste for disposal at higher costs.
European nations continue to struggle with establishing permanent disposal for tens of thousands of tons of radioactive spent nuclear fuel, and with determining how much it will cost, according to a new report published by the Berlin-based Heinrich Boell Foundation.
Sixteen European nations held 60,500 tons of used fuel as of the end of 2016, led by France with 13,990 tons, Germany with 8,485 tons, and the United Kingdom with 7,700 tons, the report says. Those numbers do not include Russia and Slovakia.
No nation has to date built a permanent repository for “this most dangerous type of nuclear waste,” the 2019 Nuclear Waste Management Report says. Finland is building its disposal facility, while Sweden and France have essentially selected their repository locations.
By law, spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste in the United States must be interred in a repository under Yucca Mountain, Nev. However, that repository remains unlicensed and unbuilt, and is strenuously opposed by state officials in Nevada.
European nations, again minus Russia and Slovakia, are also holding on to 2.5 million cubic meters of low- and intermediate-level waste. Decommissioning of nuclear power plants could produce another 1.4 million cubic meters, and storage capacity is growing tighter, the report says. As examples, the authors wrote that Finland’s storage capacity for spent fuel is down to 7%, while a Swedish site has just 20% of its space remaining.
National governments are also not accurately assessing the expenses for nuclear decommissioning and storage and disposal of radioactive waste, the report asserts.
“Many countries reviewed here such as France, Germany, and the US base their estimates on studies from the 1970s and 1980s, rather than on the few existing real-data cases,” it says. “Using outdated data, in most cases drawn up by operators, industry, or state agencies, likely leads to low-cost estimates and overly optimistic conclusions.”
This was the first edition of the report. It was supported by Heinrich Boell and other green groups in Europe.
From The Wires
From the Los Angeles Times: Climate change threatens radioactive waste storage facility on the Marshall Islands.
From the Albuquerque Journal: Prodded by the New Mexico Environment Department, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will assist in environmental remediation of disused uranium mines in the state.
From Industrial Career: Majority of voters in Kimba, South Australia, favor hosting a radioactive waste disposal facility.
From the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (via Phys.org): Scientists put the Summit supercomputer to work in modeling subsurface flow in research of nuclear waste cleanup.
From WKBW: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers offers update on cleanup of the Niagara Falls Storage Site under the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP).
