The Utah House of Representatives this week passed legislation that would reduce radioactive waste disposal fees paid by EnergySolutions by more than $1.7 million annually.
The bill from Rep. John Knotwell (R) would cut the flat fee paid by radioactive waste disposal facilities in the state by the amount they paid in taxes in the prior year. Following the 61-11 House vote Monday, the measure has been introduced in the state Senate.
For the 2019 and 2020 fiscal years, that bill would provide an annual $1,724,000 fee break for EnergySolutions, which operates the sole low-level radioactive waste (LLRW) disposal facility in Utah, near the unincorporated community of Clive. The company has in the last 16 years effectively paid an “existence tax” of $300 million in addition to property and other taxes, Knotwell told the Salt Lake Tribune. He said reducing the fee would increase EnergySolutions’ competitiveness in the marketplace for LLRW disposal.
“If HB169 passes it would reduce up to $1.7m in annual oversight fees which in no way impacts or reduces oversight of the disposal facility by the Utah Department of Environmental Quality,” EnergySolutions said in a statement Wednesday. “HB169 does not reduce annual taxes paid by EnergySolutions, which go directly to the Utah education fund. EnergySolutions is in an increasingly competitive marketplace and this fee reduction allows EnergySolutions to remain competitive and an industry leader.”
The nuclear services provider did not reply to a list of questions on the legislation, and Knotwell’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
EnergySolutions in 2017 contributed the most of any one entity to state lawmakers in Utah, the Tribune reported. That $67,700 total encompassed $6,000 for Knotwell.
The company operates two of the four low-level radioactive waste disposal facilities licensed by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Along with EnergySolutions’ sites in Clive and Barnwell, S.C., Waste Control Specialists offers LLRW disposal at its waste complex in West Texas and US Ecology operates a disposal facility at the Energy Department’s Hanford Site in Washington state.
The state of Texas over the last year has also moved to reduce disposal fees charged by Waste Control Specialists in hopes of boosting its business. Holding company Valhi Inc. in January sold the Dallas-based business to private equity firm J.F. Lehman.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has completed the first of five planned on-site inspections to evaluate Entergy’s progress in carrying out its operations improvement plan at the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts.
Four NRC officials were on-site from Dec. 4 to Dec. 8, according to a Feb. 1 letter from the agency to Entergy, posted Feb. 2 on the NRC website. The remaining four visits will be spread throughout 2018, according to Entergy spokesman Patrick O’Brien.
The nuclear industry regulator in early 2017 wrapped up a special inspection of Pilgrim, two years after giving the Cape Cod power plant the lowest safety rating allowed for a live nuclear reactor following a number of operational failures and unplanned shutdowns. Entergy developed a 156-item comprehensive recovery plan, which was cemented in an August 2017 confirmatory action letter from the NRC.
In the December inspection, the regulator reviewed 20 of the items cited in the recovery plan. The team determined Pilgrim had completed 17 corrective actions and closed those items. Three remain open, and will likely be revisited at the NRC’s next visit, O’Brien said.
Inspectors will examine all 156 corrective items over the five inspections, the spokesman added. The next is scheduled for March 19-23, followed by site visits in June, August, and December. The final inspection report would be expected in January 2019.
“We will look to close as many as we can each inspection,” O’Brien said.
Entergy plans to close the Pilgrim plant permanently on May 31, 2019. The company has pledged before then to address the operational problems identified in the confirmatory action letter.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is again seeking more information from the Department of Energy as it weighs whether to renew the license for storage of radioactive waste from the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant at the Idaho National Laboratory.
In March 2017, DOE applied for a 20-year renewal of the license for the independent spent fuel storage installation for Three Mile Island reactor Unit 2, from March 31, 2019, to March 19, 2039. The regulator last fall requested additional information in its environmental review of the application, and DOE submitted its responses in October and November.
On Jan. 29, the agency issued a request for additional information for the staff safety-related technical review of the application. The request encompasses 22 separate items in four topic areas: scoping evaluation, aging management review, aging management programs, and time-limited aging analyses.
“We request that you provide this information by September 30, 2018. Inform us at your earliest convenience, but no later than September 16, 2018, if you are not able to provide the information by that date,” Kristina Banovac, project manager for the Renewals and Materials Branch of the NRC’s Spent Fuel Management Division, wrote in the Jan. 29 letter to DOE Idaho Cleanup Project Deputy Manager Jack Zimmerman.
The letter was posted Tuesday to the NRC website. The Energy Department did not respond to a request for comment on its schedule for responding to the regulator’s request.
The NRC had as of last September anticipated ruling on the license extension by May of this year. The delay in issuing the request for additional information for the technical review, from November to January, has pushed the anticipated completion date back to March 2019, NRC spokesman Scott Burnell said by email.
“After DOE responds to the technical RAIs in September, the NRC will review the responses to determine if they’re adequate for the NRC to make its findings for the renewal,” according to Burnell. “If additional information is needed, the NRC will issue another RAI. If no additional information is needed, the NRC will document its environmental review and findings in an environmental assessment and its technical review and findings in a safety evaluation report.”
The Energy Department has said the license renewal would not lead to import of additional Three Mile Island waste to Idaho or expansion of the storage pad, which contains 341 canisters of spent nuclear fuel core debris left by the partial meltdown of the Pennsylvania reactor in March 1979.
The Three Mile Island plant is scheduled to shut down in 2019.
U.S. engineering and infrastructure company AECOM has been awarded a contract to evaluate potential locations for Australia’s National Radioactive Waste Management Facility, the federal Department of Industry, Innovation, and Science said on Feb. 2.
The agency did not cite the value or length of the contract in a press release. A spokesman for AECOM did not respond to a request for comment.
AECOM will provide the same services at three sites in contention in the state of South Australia, two in Kimba and one in Wallerberdina Station.
It will start by evaluating plant and animal life, geology, seismic activity, potential dangers, the environment of the area, and infrastructure in each area. That will then be used to develop a detailed business case encompassing site-specific design and cost projections for each location. A subsequent option would involve “preparation and development of submissions for licensing and approvals process,” the release says.
Five companies bid on the contract, with AECOM securing the award due to its background in engineering and radioactive waste management and its prior work in South Australia.
This work is part of the second phase of the site selection process for what is intended to be a 100-acre facility for permanent disposal of low-level radioactive waste and temporary storage of intermediate-level waste. The nation has about 4,250 cubic meters of low-level waste and 656 cubic meters of intermediate-level waste.
From The Wires
From the San Diego Union-Tribune: Southern California Edison has begun moving used fuel at the retired San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station from wet storage into a newly expanded dry storage pad.
