Environmental services provider US Ecology on Thursday reported year-over-year dips in both revenue and net income for the first quarter of 2017.
Company-wide revenue for the three-month period ending March 31 slipped from $113.3 million in 2016 to $110.2 million this year, according to a company press release. US Ecology recorded $5.2 million in net income for the latest quarter, $0.24 per diluted share, down from $7.5 million, $0.35 per diluted share, in the same period last year.
Based in Boise, Idaho, US Ecology provides waste management services to commercial and government entities, including treatment, disposal, and recycling of hazardous and radioactive waste, as well as field and industrial services.
Revenue varied across its business segments, according to the press release. Environmental Services revenue barely changed, at $81.3 million in first-quarter 2017 compared to $81.5 million last year. Field and Industrial Services revenue dropped 9% year over year, from $31.8 million to $28.9 million, due to the expiration and nonrenewal of a contract and “softer overall market conditions,” the company said. It did not identify the contract in question.
Adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) landed at $23.5 million for the quarter, a 10 percent fall from $26.1 million in 2016. Pro-forma EBITDA, which does not include business development costs, also dropped from $26.2 million to $23.5 million.
“First quarter operating results and adjusted EBITDA were consistent with our expectations as we cycled some completed event projects as well as a Field and Industrial Services contract that was not renewed,” US Ecology Chairman and CEO Jeff Feeler said in the release. “Base Business for the Environmental Services segment continued its positive momentum with a 3% increase over what was a strong first quarter of 2016. As expected, Event Business for the Environmental Services segment was down 9% in the first quarter due to the strength of our Event Business in the first quarter of 2016.”
The company in April also completed a $500 million debt refinancing that is anticipated to produce roughly $15 million in cash interest savings over five years. Management also plans to write off about $5.4 million in unamortized deferred financing expenses associated with payments on the company’s prior credit facility. That will appear as an interest expense in the next-quarter earnings, the press release says.
“Overall, business conditions remain in-line with our expectations,” Feeler stated. “Our underlying Base Business remains strong and we continue to bid on and secure Event Business opportunities, further supporting our view of sequentially stronger quarterly financial performance as we progress through the year.”
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said this week it would begin its technical review of the Energy Department’s application for a 20-year extension of its license to store Three Mile Island nuclear power plant debris in Idaho.
Renewal would push back the expiration date for the Three Mile Island Unit 2 (TMI-2) Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI) license to March 19, 2039.
“The NRC staff has completed its acceptance review of the application to determine if it contains sufficient information to allow the staff to complete the detailed technical review. This e-mail acknowledges acceptance of your application for a detailed technical review,” Kristina Banovac, a project manager in the NRC’s Spent Fuel Management Division, wrote in an April 26 email to Scott Ferrara, DOE facility director and license manager in Idaho for NRC-licensed facilities.
Banovac said she will at a later date send a formal acceptance letter with the NRC staff schedule for the application evaluation.
Three Mile Island Unit 2 partially melted down in March 1979, and material from the reactor core is held in 30 dry storage casks at the ISFSI at the Idaho Nuclear Technology and Engineering Center at DOE’s Idaho National Laboratory. That includes the remains of 177 fuel assemblies, 61 control rods, and various canisters to hold that material.
Holtec International said last week it is moving into the second phase of its application for a Nuclear Regulatory Commission license to build and operate a spent nuclear fuel storage facility in southeastern New Mexico.
The first phase wrapped up March 31 with the submission of the application. The NRC is now conducting a 60-day acceptance review to determine whether the document has the sufficient data to support the agency’s full technical evaluation, which would take about three years.
In an April 20 press release, the New Jersey-based company said in its second phase of the application it would file a number of amendment requests to allow its planned HI-STORE facility to store canisters that encompass the breadth of dry storage systems in use at U.S. nuclear plants. The initial submittal covered just one canister type supplied by AREVA.
Holtec plans a facility with capacity to store 120,000 metric tons of nuclear waste. The current stockpile of spent fuel stranded on-site at nuclear plants stands at about 75,000 metric tons and is growing by 2,000 tons annually. The outline of the Trump administration’s budget request for fiscal 2018, released ahead of the full version anticipated next month, indicates that some portion of $120 million would be used for ongoing preparations to consolidate that used fuel in interim storage (the rest would go toward the moribund Yucca Mountain waste repository in Nevada).
“Our goal is to provide to the industry and DOE a unified consolidated interim storage solution to store all of America’s used fuel canisters at the HI-STORE CIS. HI-STORM UMAX was engineered well over a decade ago with the goal of providing a universal canister storage facility that is suitable for the post-9/11 age. Now we are implementing our vision. We are committed to providing access to the licensed HI-STORE CIS to every nuclear plant owner who chooses to engage with us regardless of the identity of the original canister supplier,” Holtec Senior Vice President and Chief Nuclear Officer Pierre Oneid said in the release.
Last week, Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists asked the NRC to temporarily suspend review of its license application for a planned spent fuel facility in West Texas.
From The Wires:
From the Alamogordo Daily News: Otero County, N.M., Public Land Use Advisory Committee comes down against Department of Energy test borehole for nuclear waste storage.
From The San Diego Union-Tribune: The California Public Utilities Commission again refuses to release emails between CPUC President Michael Picker and Gov. Jerry Brown regarding closure of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station.
