Category Archives: Yucca Mountain

The Blue Ribbon Commission’s final report

Posted on February 6, 2012 by pbowersox| 5 Comments

By Jim Hopf

Soon after declaring that it would end the Yucca Mountain repository project, the Obama administration created the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future to reevaluate the nation’s nuclear waste program and policies. The commission was asked to recommend improvements to the waste program and the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA), and to make general recommendations on the path forward. The commission was specifically instructed to not address the Yucca Mountain project, or any specific project or site. The commission’s final report was released this month.

Primary recommendations

The main recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission (BRC) are as follows:

• A repository (or long-term storage facility) should be sited using a “consent-based” approach, as opposed to having the federal government select a site and then impose it on the state and/or local community. The government would offer incentives to a large number of communities, whose locations are potentially suitable as a repository site, and let communities (and states) come forward voluntarily. (In essence, this implies that Yucca Mountain should be abandoned and the process should start over.)

• Responsibility for siting, licensing, building, and operating repositories and/or centralized storage facilities should be shifted from the Department of Energy to a new, independent single-purpose organization (most likely a federal corporation). Most experts agree that such an organization would offer more focus, stability, and credibility than the DOE, which has lost credibility with many stakeholders.

• The waste program must have full access to the nuclear waste fund that has been paid for by the 0.1 cent/kW-hr fee levied on nuclear-generated electricity. In the short term, the administration should amend the DOE’s standard contract so that only the money appropriated (i.e., spent) that year is transferred from the waste fund to the federal government. Remaining funds would be placed in a trust account that is managed by an independent organization. Over the longer term, legislation should be passed that transfers the entire balance of the nuclear waste fund to the new waste management organization.

• A prompt effort to develop a geologic disposal facility is necessary. There is scientific consensus that deep geologic disposal is the best option for final disposal of nuclear waste, and that a geologic repository will be necessary for any type of fuel cycle. The BRC did recommend further research and development of advanced fuel cycles and reactor designs, but stated that committing to a specific fuel cycle option or technology at this point in time would be premature.

• There should be a prompt effort to develop one or more consolidated used fuel storage facilities. This would allow the government to meet its contractual obligation to take the used fuel from utilities much sooner than if it waited for a final repository to be developed. It may also reduce the (small) risks associated with fuel storage somewhat, by reducing the number of sites where fuel is stored. Removing the fuel from decommissioned nuclear sites would free those sites up for other uses.

• Preparations for the eventual shipment of large amounts of used fuel should begin soon. A large number of stakeholders should be involved in the planning of the waste transportation program.

• The government should support research and development into advanced reactors and fuel cycles, as well as nuclear workforce development programs. The BRC stated that the general direction of the DOE’s current R&D is appropriate.

• The United States should maintain its leadership role in the international community in the area of nuclear technology. It should provide aid, advice, and technical and regulatory assistance to other countries, particularly those who are starting new nuclear programs.

NWPA changes

The BRC’s recommended path forward involves specific changes to the NWPA:

• The NWPA currently specifies Yucca Mountain as the sole site to be evaluated as a repository. The law would have to be changed to allow other sites to be evaluated.

• The NWPA currently allows only one centralized used fuel storage facility with limited capacity, and this storage facility may only be developed after a repository is licensed. The NWPA would have to be amended to allow multiple centralized storage facilities, and to remove any linkage with repository licensing.

• The NWPA would be amended to broaden the number of jurisdictions that could receive funding and technical assistance in support of the fuel transportation campaign.

• The NWPA would have to be amended to create the independent waste management organization discussed earlier, and to shift the DOE’s current responsibilities (for siting, licensing, building and operating repositories and/or centralized storage facilities) to that organization.

• The NWPA would also have to be amended to remove the nuclear waste fund from the congressional appropriations process, and to allow the independent nuclear waste management organization to have full access to the fund.

• Some NWPA changes may be required in order to allow the United States to provide a broader range of support to other nations in the area of nuclear waste management.

ANS response

The American Nuclear Society has responded to the BRC’s final report. ANS concurs with the BRC’s recommendation to create a new, independent agency to manage the nation’s nuclear waste in the future. ANS also agrees with the recommendation to create one or more centralized used fuel storage facilities, to accommodate much of the nation’s used fuel until a final repository is finally sited, licensed, and constructed. ANS also supports the BRC’s call for continued R&D on advanced (closed) fuel cycles.

One area of disagreement between ANS and the BRC, however, concerns the Yucca Mountain repository. While ANS acknowledged that the BRC was explicitly instructed not to address Yucca Mountain, it reiterated its position that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission should conclude the licensing process for the repository (at a minimum).

My perspective

I largely concur with ANS’s point of view on the BRC recommendations. Almost everyone believes that having an independent organization, as opposed to the DOE, manage the waste program would be helpful. Allowing full access to the nuclear waste fund (for its intended purpose) is absolutely essential, given the history of Congress in hijacking the waste funds for other uses or for political reasons. Right now, the fund is little more than a (punitive) 0.1 cent/kW-hr tax on nuclear electricity.

I also agree that R&D into advanced fuel cycles and reactors is important. The BRC stated that they do not believe that fuel cycle technology that would significantly alter the nuclear waste situation is anywhere on the horizon. ANS thought that this was overly pessimistic, and I’m inclined to agree. Fuel cycle technologies such as “UREX+” are a few decades away at most. Such fuel cycles have the potential to significantly reduce the bulk and heat generation level for the final waste stream, which should greatly reduce the number of final repositories required (to one, probably). This is enormously important.

I also agree with ANS on the subject of Yucca Mountain. It is imperative that the NRC complete the evaluation and licensing process, and formally rule on whether the Yucca Mountain repository would have been acceptable from a scientific and technical perspective. (Virtually all observers believe that NRC staff had concluded that the repository met the requirements.) This should be demanded as part of any “compromise”, in exchange for accepting the BRC’s recommendation that we start the repository siting, evaluation, and licensing process all over again (largely wasting the ~$15 billion that has been spent).

I believe that the single largest drawback of starting the repository program over, and delaying final resolution of the waste issue by decades, is that it will result in a large fraction of the public continuing to believe—falsely—that there is no technical solution to the nuclear waste problem. This in turn will measurably increase public resistance to nuclear power, which will result in greater fossil fuel use in the future. The public health risks and negative environmental impacts of this increased fossil fuel use will utterly dwarf any risks and/or impacts associated with any nuclear waste repository.

Although it wouldn’t be as good (or effective) as having an actual repository in place, having the NRC formally rule that the Yucca Mountain repository met all of the (impeccable) requirements would go a long way toward convincing the public that we do have acceptable scientific/technical solutions to the nuclear waste problem.

I would go on to insist that the government make sure that NRC’s ruling is highly publicized. The government should inform the public that an adequate technical solution to the waste problem has been found, but that we are electing to wait awhile to see if “even better” solutions can be found. Waiting is justifiable and prudent, given the very small risks and economic costs of storing nuclear waste. Those “better” solutions may include the use of advanced fuel cycles that result in a smaller, colder, or shorter-lived waste stream, or simply a final repository that has a greater level of political support from the surrounding state and local communities.

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Hopf

Jim Hopf is a senior nuclear engineer with more than 20 years of experience in shielding and criticality analysis and design for spent fuel dry storage and transportation systems. He has been involved in nuclear advocacy for 10+ years, and is a member of the ANS Public Information Committee. He is a regular contributor to the ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, Education, Environmental Benefits of Nuclear, knowledge transfer, licensing, National Laboratories, News, Nuclear Energy Narrative, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, position statements, Radwaste Solutions, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

ANS statement on BRC’s final report

Posted on January 27, 2012 by pbowersox| Comments Off

The Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future released its final report on Thursday, January 26. The report contains recommendations for a comprehensive U.S. strategy for managing spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste.

Please click here for the American Nuclear Society‘s statement on the report.

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Posted in American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, News, position statements, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

“Waste Management” in Nuclear News

Posted on November 15, 2011 by rmichal| Comments Off

The November issue of Nuclear News magazine, which contains a special section on waste management, is available in hard copy and electronically for American Nuclear Society members (must enter ANS user name and password in Member Center). The special section contains the following stories:

What will we do with it all? by Ed Batts
Coupling repositories with fuel cycles, by Charles Forsberg
What does 1 million years mean to a regulator? by Edward D. Blandford, Robert J. Budnitz, and Rodney C. Ewing
Robert Sindelar: Extended spent fuel storage, interview by Rick Michal

The issue also contains a feature article on the inaugural ANS “live” webinar, with Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory Jaczko as guest; and a report on the International Atomic Energy Agency’s 55th General Conference.

Other news in the November issue: A Government Accountability Office report states that United States has limited ability to secure nuclear material overseas; the world’s largest open-air nuclear storage pool moves toward decommissioning; a site is chosen for Finland’s seventh power reactor; startup testing for Argentina’s Atucha-2 power reactor. is launched; Vietnam awards contract for power reactor feasibility study to Japan Atomic Power Company; Fluor, GE Hitachi sign memorandum of understanding for proposed power reactors in Poland; Cameco signs mining, milling deal; Areva’s Eagle Rock enrichment plant receives NRC license; the Department of Energy gives grants for nuclear-related university research and development, infrastructure.; Areva launches “learning tour” for partner and customer company employees; NRC commissioners conduct mandatory hearing for Vogtle-3 and -4; spent fuel pool instrumentation, Mark II containment venting added to NRC staff’s near-term post-Fukushima actions; NRC finds no vital quake damage at North Anna, but shutdown continues; public support for nuclear power lower than before Fukushima, but a majority still in favor; foreign control contention added to South Texas-3 and -4 hearing process; and more.

Past issues of Nuclear News are available here.

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Posted in accident, American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, Earthquake, Education, Fukushima, India, knowledge transfer, National Laboratories, News, Nuclear News, Radwaste Solutions, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

Roadblock in Congress for SMR Development

Posted on October 25, 2011 by lscheele| 6 Comments

By Jim Hopf

As discussed in my June 20 post, small modular reactors (SMRs) have many potential advantages, and could very well represent nuclear’s best prospect for the future. The industry has run into trouble, however, in getting government support for getting SMRs off the ground.

The Obama administration has made a multi-year, $450 million request for SMR development, including $67 million this year to support SMR licensing. The U.S. House of Representatives has included the $67 million in its 2012 budget bill. That funding got removed from the U.S. Senate budget bill, however, by the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee, due primarily to opposition from Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein (D., Cal.).

Feinstein cited the fact that SMRs would create additional nuclear waste, for which there is still no permanent disposal site, as a reason for her opposition. She also said that federal nuclear R&D money should be spent on safety, as opposed to new reactor development, in light of the Fukushima disaster.

Improving Safety

I don’t agree with the Senator’s logic on the safety issue that she raised. I, for one, think that one of the best ways to improve nuclear safety is to develop and deploy much safer reactor designs, which are not vulnerable to the issues that caused the meltdowns at Fukushima. In turn, one of the best ways for the federal government to help improve nuclear safety is to support the development and deployment of such designs.

SMRs (such as designs from NuScale and Hyperion) are passively cooled, and are more able to reject heat to the environment (due to their small size). Large reactors, like Fukushima, require active cooling at all times, and fuel damage would occur almost immediately after the loss of all power. In stark contrast, the Hyperion module can go two weeks without any power (i.e., active cooling), and the NuScale module can go indefinitely without power (or active cooling). This is a critical difference, given that the Fukushima release occurred as a result of the loss of power, which was needed to provide continuous active cooling.

It’s true that SMR development does nothing to improve safety at existing reactors, and perhaps that’s where Feinstein is coming from. But the issue of implementing needed safety upgrades at existing reactors is being addressed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and will be implemented by the industry itself, on its own dime. It’s not clear how much government research would help, in terms of improving existing reactor safety, and it’s not clear that the government should be paying (directly or indirectly) for necessary safety upgrades at existing plants.

Waste

As for the nuclear waste argument, well, that’s an old, familiar issue. The fact is that most experts, and scientific studies, have concluded that the public health risks and environmental impacts associated with nuclear power are much lower than those associated with fossil fuels, despite the nuclear waste issue.

Unlike fossil fuels, nuclear’s wastes are safely stored and are not released into the environment. And we are confident that a final solution to the nuclear waste problem will be developed and/or agreed upon at some point, with the final result being no release of wastes into the environment, ever. Given this, opposing increased use of nuclear power because it generates nuclear waste is hard to justify, since the result of not using more nuclear is (still) primarily the use of more fossil fuels, which have an infinitely worse “waste problem”.

Finally, it’s difficult to argue that we have not found a solution to the nuclear waste problem, at least from a technical perspective. It seems clear, at this point, that Yucca Mountain was a valid permanent solution to the nuclear waste problem, from a scientific and technical perspective. NRC staff had completed its review of the Yucca Mountain repository, and most observers believe that the repository would have passed the review, and been licensed, had the review not been halted for political reasons.

It is also true that some of the SMR designs are fast reactors, which have the potential to be part of a closed fuel cycle that would reduce the volume and longevity of our nuclear waste stockpile.

One Bright Spot

If there’s a bright spot in all this, it could be that some or all of the SMR developers may proceed without such R&D aid from the federal government. Both NuScale and B&W (with its mPower module) say that they are proceeding with license applications to the NRC. And the Tennessee Valley Authority is making plans to deploy mPower modules at its Clinch River site.

NRC Issues More Important?

As many have observed, the main barrier to the deployment of SMRs may not be a lack of government financial or R&D support, but instead the enormous amount of time and money required to get new reactor designs licensed by the NRC. Reactor licensing processes have been taking many years and costing more than a $100 million dollars. Even approving an exact copy of an already-licensed reactor design (for a new site) is projected to take more than two years.

Even SMRs that deploy conventional light-water technology (such as NuScale or mPower) can expect a long (~ 5 year) licensing process (starting in late 2012 or 2013). For non-conventional technologies like Hyperion, who knows how long it will take? The NRC has stated that non-conventional SMRs like Hyperion are not on its priority list right now, and that it will only consider such an application when a serious customer has been found (thus setting up a chicken-egg problem).

Other issues that may hold back SMRs include security and emergency planning/evacuation requirements, and per-reactor NRC fees. If the NRC is not willing to consider the SMRs’ lower potential radioactivity release, as well as the lower probability of such release, in setting these requirements, as well as scaling fees with reactor capacity, it may destroy SMRs’ economic viability.

Perhaps a more effective way for the government to support SMRs is for it to do something to reduce the licensing-related barriers discussed above, as opposed to outright financial support of SMR development. Possible options include making sure the NRC has sufficient resources to handle the entire volume of incoming license applications, somehow limiting the scope of review, or requiring the NRC to complete reviews within some fixed, reasonable time period.

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Hopf

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Posted in accident, DC Perspective, Environmental Benefits of Nuclear, Fukushima, nuclear opponents, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, reactor designs, Small modular reactors, spent fuel, U.S. Congress, Yucca Mountain

ANS webinar with NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko a success

Posted on October 6, 2011 by dyurman| 3 Comments

A collaborative effort between the American Nuclear Society and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission resulted in a successful 90-minute webinar on nuclear safety issues on October 4.

NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko (right) talks to ANS moderator Dan Yurman (left) at the Oct 4 webinar. Photo: Clark Communications

More than 60 people signed on to the webinar session when it started at 11 a.m. (Eastern time), and more than 40 were still with it when the event ended 90 minutes later. According to the NRC, another 15 people listened in through a toll-free 800 telephone number.

NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko took questions during the live, unscripted session on a wide range of topics including Yucca mountain, new reactor design reviews, and the NRC’s response to the Fukushima crisis.

Laura Scheele, ANS manager of Policy & Communication, noted that this was a first-of-a-kind effort by the two organizations. The project began last summer when NRC Public Affairs Chief Eliot Brenner approached ANS about the webinar idea.

“The ANS elected officers green-lighted the webinar as an opportunity for ANS to provide a virtual forum for ANS members and other nuclear professionals to ask NRC Chairman Jackzo about important nuclear energy issues,” said Scheele.

Webinar challenges

As the project took shape, the NRC agreed with Scheele that two separate sessions were needed—one for pro-nuclear bloggers and one for anti-nuclear organizations. Scheele also insisted, and the NRC agreed, that the moderator could ask follow-up questions. About a third of the questions asked were of the follow-up type.

While webinars are well-understood mechanisms in the high-tech industry, this was the NRC’s first experience with the process. There were a fair number of questions facing the organizations sponsoring the event. For instance, would nuclear bloggers agree to send in questions ahead of time? Would enough people sign up for the webinar to make it worthwhile?

The NRC chairman has been a lightning rod for controversy over his actions regarding Yucca Mountain. It was thought that some people who disagreed with the chairman’s actions might ask questions that went beyond the boundaries of civil discourse.

In the end, the print-out of questions submitted in advance was more than five pages long. Several overlapping questions were combined to make effective use of limited time.

While many of the questions were asked, and answered, many others—some highly technical—will be answered on the NRC blog. In addition, the NRC has posted a podcast of the webinar, a video, and a complete transcript (see links below).

Jaczko was pleasant, conversational, and well prepared for the session. He invested a lot of time in the event both before it and during the a 90-minute live, unscripted session. The result “exceeded all expectations,” the NRC’s Eliot Brenner told the New York Times.

Question highlights

In particular, Jaczko was asked about his congressional testimony on March 16 that Fukushima’s spent fuel pool at reactor #4 had lost much of its water and was a major source of high levels of radiation being released into the environment.

In response, he said, “The lesson we take from this is that we need adequate instrumentation to monitor the pools.”

In response to another series of questions about management of spent fuel, he said that dry cask storage is good for at least 60 years. He dismissed the idea of creating a single interim storage site for spent fuel, saying that it was safe to continue to store at reactor sites until a permanent solution could be found. Asked if the NRC could license a spent fuel processing facility today, Jaczko said technically that the NRC isn’t ready to review that kind of application.

On the subject of small modular reactors, Jaczko said that the NRC is comfortable reviewing designs based on conventional light water reactor technology.

Asked what keeps him awake at night, Jaczko said the fear is that there is some unknown factor that is being missed in the agency’s safety analysis of a situation at a reactor or in a license application.

The webinar questions were moderated by Dan Yurman, a nuclear energy blogger. He is a member of ANS and serves on the ANS Public Information Committee.

Links to NRC Video, Audio, and Transcript

Transcript – large PDF file
Audio – MP3 file format
Video – MPEG4 file format

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Posted in accident, American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, Earthquake, Fukushima, general media, lessons learned, News, nuclear opponents, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Small modular reactors, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

NRC terminates Yucca Mountain proceeding

Posted on September 15, 2011 by pbowersox| 4 Comments

Next stop, federal court!

By Cornelius Milmoe

In June 2010, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) determined that the Department of Energy’s attempted “withdrawal” of the Yucca Mountain license application could not relieve the NRC of its duty to make a decision approving or disapproving the application. A year after the ASLB decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in the Aiken County case that the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA) requires the NRC to review and act on the Yucca application, and that the court would order the NRC to make a decision if it refused to do its duty.

Despite the ASLB and court rulings, the NRC has suspended all agency action on the application and refused to release the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) prepared by NRC staff. The decision to suspend work and close out the license process was made unilaterally by Chairman Gregory Jaczko, not by the full commission.

On Friday, September 9—the NWPA due date for the NRC final decision, and 14 months after the ASLB decision—the NRC issued a two-part order in the licensing proceeding. First the order stated “the Commission finds itself evenly divided on whether to take the affirmative action of overturning or upholding the Board’s decision.” It would seem that with the divided vote, the ASLB decision denying the motion to withdraw would stand. But, the second part of the order stated, “we hereby exercise our inherent supervisory authority to direct the Board to, by the close of the current fiscal year [September 30], complete all necessary and appropriate case management activities, including disposal of all matters currently pending before it and comprehensively documenting the full history of the adjudicatory proceeding.”

The order is difficult to parse. On one hand, it indicates that there were not enough votes to terminate the case as the DOE requested, but on the other hand, it appears to direct the ASLB to terminate the case by the end of this month because of “budgetary limitations”. What is clear is that the NRC has thrown down the gauntlet to the court of appeals.

In its Aiken County opinion last July, the court deferred review of the NRC’s action in the Yucca Mountain proceeding until there was a final NRC decision. The court flatly stated that “the NWPA requires the Commission to issue a final decision approving or disapproving the issuance” of a license within three years of the application. It warned the NRC that it would issue an order compelling action if the NRC decision was “unreasonably delayed” or if the court found a “transparent violation of a clear duty to act”.

Judge Janice Rogers Brown wrote a separate concurring opinion that referenced Jaczko’s plan to provide no money for licensing activities and closing out review of the license application so that “unresolved legal questions, … would stay unresolved legal questions.” Even last June, Brown wrote, “It is arguable the NRC has abdicated its statutory responsibility under the NWPA.” Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s opinion recognized that President Obama has decided not to use Yucca Mountain, but concluded that the president does not have the final word about whether to terminate the Yucca Mountain project. Kavanaugh said, “[T]he ball in this case rests … with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.”

The petitioners in the Aiken County case have filed a new motion for an order requiring the NRC to proceed with the licensing process as required by the NWPA. They argue that the NRC had the DOE appeal of the ASLB decision under consideration for 10 times longer than the 45 days it gave the ASLB to get briefs, hold hearings, and make the original decision. The petitioners also pointed to evidence in congressional testimony and a report by the NRC’s inspector general that Jaczko acted unilaterally, without a commission majority, to stop staff work on the license, withhold the staff SER, and delay the commission’s decision on the DOE motion. With that evidence, and the NRC’s failure to meet the NWPA deadline for its final decision, it seems likely that the court will conclude that the NRC is guilty of unreasonable delay and that it may be a transparent violation of a clear duty to act.

In any event, the court has given the NRC its chance to do its duty on the Yucca Mountain application, and the NRC has declined. The next episode will be in the court of appeals, as the NRC tries to defend its failure to act on the license application.

Note: A detailed analysis by C.J. Milmoe of the NRC actions is available via Nuclear Townhall.

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Milmoe

C.J. Milmoe has been involved in waste management and nuclear power development for more than 30 years, both in government and in the private sector. He is active in ANS and in nuclear industry advocacy groups.

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Posted in Department of Energy, Education, lawsuit, Natural disasters, nuclear opponents, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, spent fuel, U.S. Congress, Yucca Mountain

Blue Ribbon Commission report focuses on process

Posted on September 12, 2011 by pbowersox| 4 Comments

By Steve Skutnik

Last month, the Blue Ribbon Commission (BRC) on America’s Nuclear Energy Future released its long-awaited full draft report to Secretary Chu, based upon the findings of each of its subcommittees. Several nuclear bloggers offered their thoughts on the draft summary of the BRC recommendations when they were posted back in May. Since that time, the release of the full draft report expands upon earlier BRC recommendations, which largely focused upon centralized interim storage for spent nuclear fuel until a new permanent geological repository can be sited.

While centralized interim storage remains at the heart of its recommendations, a major focus of the full report has been on the process of nuclear waste management policy, including issues of site selection, regulations, and access to funding. Concerns over spent fuel in light of Fukushima also permeate the full report, underscoring the need for an integrated fuel management strategy.

Some Background

The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 laid the foundation for nuclear waste management policy in the United States, making it the official policy of the U.S. to develop two permanent geologic repositories along with a additional sites for monitored retrievable storage (MRS) of used nuclear fuel. To pay for the cost of disposal, nuclear electricity operators were assessed a 1-mil ($0.001) per kilowatt-hour tax on production, held in the Nuclear Waste Fund (NWF). In 1987, Congress amended the NWPA, eliminating the requirement for a second repository and an MRS site while designating Yucca Mountain as the sole geologic repository of the United States.

Pushing the “Reset Button”

Some of the most withering criticisms in the BRC report pertain to the site selection process that resulted in Yucca Mountain being the sole geologic repository for the United States. Of particular emphasis is a consent-based repository siting process, compared to the top-down approach which has been employed to date. To this end, the Commission draws heavily on the examples of community-supported projects such as the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in Carlsbad, New Mexico and the SKB repository in Forsmark, Sweden.

In addition, recommendations included the need for site-neutral performance requirements in the regulation, drafted before site selection as to avoid the appearance of regulations being drafted to fit the repository site (rather than the reverse). Overall, the Commission emphasizes a staged, flexible, and open process for waste management, one capable of responding to changing events, scientific knowledge, and technological options. Specifically, the report is harshly critical of the current process, which they describe as inflexible and overly prescriptive, with the process following the 1987 amendments to the NWPA lacking any contingencies should Yucca Mountain prove untenable.

Ultimately, regardless of potential waste management options such as advanced reactor systems and reprocessing to recover usable materials from spent fuel, the BRC’s recommendations rest upon the resumed search for a permanent geologic repository (necessary for the long-term isolation of radioactive wastes, even with reprocessing) along with a centralized interim storage site for used nuclear fuel. In order to avoid the inevitable contention that any interim storage site becomes a de facto permanent repository, the report emphasizes the necessary coupling between any consolidated storage site with a credible process for establishing a permanent repository.

In as much, the BRC’s recommendations essentially amount to pushing the “reset button” on the waste management process prior to the 1987 amendments to the NWPA, restarting the process of locating a repository while taking some of the lessons from the past thirty years into mind.

Under New Management

Perhaps the most radical of the BRC’s suggestions is in the implementation of waste management under the direction of a federally-chartered corporation, similar to the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA). Such a move is designed to produce a single-focus organization for the task of waste management which can act with a relatively greater degree of political independence while still operating under Congressional oversight.

An additional problem identified by the BRC is access to funds in the NWF. Despite its original intent, appropriations from the NWF are subject to yearly Congressional appropriations – essentially making funding for waste management subject to the vagaries of yearly budget politics. The BRC’s recommendations include placing such funds into a trust under Congressional oversight, such that funds can be used as necessary to support waste management operations.

Hedging Bets on Waste Disposal Options

One key point of contention for nuclear advocates in the report’s recommendations is its relative lack of ambition; despite evaluating several fuel cycle scenarios (including conventional and advanced light water reactors, along with partial or full recycle of long-lived actinides), the BRC specifically eschewed endorsing any advanced reprocessing or fuel cycle technologies as an alternative to direct disposal, preferring to keep its options open.

Also left unsaid is any evaluation of the viability of Yucca Mountain as a geologic repository; such a topic was specifically identified as “beyond the scope” of the Commission’s analysis.

In particular, the emphasis upon consolidated interim storage indicates the BRC prefers to hedge its bets on technology, taking a “wait-and-see” approach afforded by such an approach while leaving geologic disposal in place as the default final solution, stressing the need for flexibility and cautioning against “irreversible” spent fuel management choices.

In many ways the Commission appears to be waiting for a technological intervention to solve their problem for them, either through more advances in more economical spent fuel reprocessing or in radical breakthroughs in reactor technology.

Looking Forward

So where does this leave us? While much of the report contains useful insights about the process of establishing a geologic repository, it provides little in the way of direct solutions for the current impasse. Its proposal for centralized interim storage for spent fuel is admittedly a temporary solution designed to buy some breathing room for the federal government, but in no way does it represent a permanent solution. In essence, the recommendations leave us back where we started nearly 30 years ago – perhaps wiser for the journey, but little closer to a permanent solution.

Steve Skutnik recently obtained his Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from North Carolina State University. He blogs at The Neutron Economy.

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Posted in Nuclear Fuel Cycle, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

ANS urges NRC to take action on Yucca Mountain

Posted on August 29, 2011 by dyurman| 7 Comments

ANS President Eric Loewen sends letter to Chairman Jaczko and NRC commissioners to stress the importance and obligation to complete licensing application

Eric Loewen, president, American Nuclear Society

The American Nuclear Society has delivered an August 22 letter to Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairman Gregory Jaczko and the NRC commissioners to urge the agency to complete the consideration of the licensing application for the Yucca Mountain used fuel repository, ANS President Eric P. Loewen announced.

“As a professional and scientific society, ANS has chosen not to take a position on the suitability of Yucca Mountain as a repository site,” he said. “However, we have become increasingly concerned that NRC has not defined a clear pathway to complete the licensing process. Failure of the NRC to judge the Yucca application on its merits would be a triumph of shortsighted politics over science. That’s why ANS has come off the sidelines.”

The letter noted that the NRC’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board has determined that the motion to “withdraw” the license application by the Department of Energy does not relieve the commission of its duty to review the application and make a determination on its technical merits.

Loewen added that the United States Court of Appeals, as recently as July 1, 2011, ruled that the NRC is required by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act to review the application. Nevertheless, the letter continues, “the NRC, without an open formal decision of its own, has suspended . . . review of the application and . . . refused to release . . . the Safety Evaluation Report.”

Loewen stated, “Our members are concerned that if the commission does not act, the court will order it to do so, thereby inflicting indelible harm to the commission’s reputation for scientific professionalism and independence. We urge the commission to protect its traditions of openness, objectivity, and excellence by completing the scientific review of this matter.”

The Las Vegas Review Journal has coverage of the ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals on July 1, 2011.

Click here for the text of the letter from Loewen to the NRC.

Newsweek interviews Loewen

Loewen was interviewed by the online edition of Newsweek magazine (The Daily Beast) this week about the letter. In the interview, Loewen pointed out that the DOE had studied Yucca since the late 1970s before handing it off to the NRC in 2008. When the funding from Washington ended, the NRC ended its review of the site.

ANS officers, many of them former industry leaders and academics, argue that the licensing process should be finished regardless of the project’s prospect of actually operating.

“We try to stay out of the politics and argue from a technical standpoint, but we’re just so frustrated as a technical community we want to come off the sidelines,” said Loewen.

Yet, the decision to shutter Yucca has long been considered political in nature. President Obama ordered the action under pressure from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.).

All five commissioners, including Jaczko, declined to discuss the ANS letter and the NRC’s stalled progress on Yucca with the Daily Beast. But some have taken public stances against Jaczko’s decision to halt the project. William Ostendorff, who sits on the commission until 2016, told Congress last fall that he agreed that the NRC still had an obligation to investigate Yucca and other potential repository sites.

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Posted in American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, News, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Yucca Mountain

Nuclear News’ 17th annual vendor/contractor issue

Posted on August 15, 2011 by rmichal| Comments Off

The August issue of Nuclear News is available in hard copy and electronically for American Nuclear Society members (click here—log-in required).

The issue contains a 122-page special section containing advertisements and “advertorial” information about products and services provided by various companies serving the nuclear industry.

In addition, the August issue contains the following feature articles:

The Advanced Test Reactor National Scientific User Facility
2011 ATR Users Week—Meeting the Needs of the Nuclear Community
A report on the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Ministerial Conference on Nuclear Safety
A perspective by former Sen. George Voinovich on enabling nuclear energy and the prospects for new nuclear

Additional news items of note in the August issue: Appeals court rejects lawsuit to stop the Department of Energy from ending the Yucca Mountain project, but leaves the door open; Xcel Energy and the federal government settle on used fuel lawsuits; tests show that commercial off-the-shelf computer components can withstand the space environment; the Interior Secretary withdraws 1 million acres of federal land near the Grand Canyon from new uranium mining claims; universities and national laboratories to collaborate on nuclear security; the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office tests new technology at Belmont Stakes; major concrete repair extends Crystal River-3′s outage to 2014; the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approves license renewal for Prairie Island and Salem-1 and -2; poll shows that residents living near nuclear plants continue to favor nuclear power; the Jordan Atomic Energy Commission receives three bids to build first nuclear power plant; referendum ends plans to reintroduce nuclear power in Italy; and much more.

Past issues of Nuclear News are available here.

This post first appeared on the ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, Education, IAEA, lawsuit, National Laboratories, News, Nuclear News, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Space Applications, spent fuel, Spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, Yucca Mountain

ANS issues report on spent fuel

Posted on August 9, 2011 by dyurman| 1 Comment

The American Nuclear Society issues a comprehensive spent fuel report

by Dan Yurman

One day ahead of the Blue Ribbon Commission’s draft recommendations for managing spent nuclear fuel and nuclear waste, the American Nuclear Society on July 28 issued its own review of spent fuel management options.

The Blue Ribbon Commission report recommends interim storage and a renewed hunt for a permanent geologic repository. This will raise the profile of salt as an option, which will bring the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, in New Mexico, back into the equation as a possible host site.

Critics of the expected recommendations from the Blue Ribbon Commission say that reprocessing is a viable option and that the commission’s dour outlook on fast breeder reactors is not justified by current efforts in China, Russia, and India.

Proponents say that the commission’s recommendations represent a consensus political judgment that works in an off election year. It won’t make Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) mad, which keeps him in the traces for President Obama’s heavy lifting in the Senate.

In the meantime, ANS notes that the study will help citizens, thought and opinion leaders, and elected officials have a rational dialog about the facts of managing spent fuel.

Here’s the text of ANS’s press release

La Grange Park, IL – July 28 – The Report of the American Nuclear Society (ANS) President’s Special Committee on Used Nuclear Fuel Management was issued today, ANS President Eric P. Loewen, PhD, announced. “This report demonstrates the vitality and relevance of the Society to the continuing discussion about the future of nuclear energy,” Loewen said.

In early 2010, then ANS President Tom Sanders recognized the importance of the question of what to do with used nuclear fuel and formed the President’s Special Committee on Used Nuclear Fuel Management. Eleven members of ANS worked to prepare the 64 page report which describes feasible used nuclear fuel management options and explores the advantages and disadvantages of each.

Professor Audeen Fentiman, professor of nuclear engineering at Purdue University and Chair of the Special Committee said in describing the report, “members of the Committee worked long hours in order to create this document and we believe that it will be of considerable value in shaping the debate about the management of used nuclear fuel.”

When asked about the report, former ANS President Tom Sanders noted, “I was concerned that too much of the conversation about used nuclear fuel was based on unsound scientific and engineering principles, and I firmly believed that the role of ANS is to provide unbiased reporting so that citizens and policy makers are able to make informed judgments about nuclear issues. Our hope is that our work would also be useful input to the report of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future.”

Concluded Loewen, “The Report will serve as the chief source of information about this issue; the painstaking care and thoughtfulness with which the committee members acted is ample evidence of what the Society does best: solid research, unblemished by an agenda other than the search for truth. They all deserve our thanks and respect.”

For more information about the American Nuclear Society, visit www.ans.org.
To view the report, follow the link.

Established in 1954, ANS is a professional organization of engineers and scientists devoted to the peaceful applications of nuclear science and technology. Its 11,500 members come from diverse technical backgrounds covering the full range of engineering disciplines as well as the physical and biological sciences. They are advancing the application of these technologies to improve the lives of the world community through national and international enterprise within government, academia, research laboratories and private industry.

__________________

Yurman

Dan Yurman publishes Idaho Samizdat, a blog on nuclear energy. He is a frequent contributor to ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in American Nuclear Society, News, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, spent fuel, Spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, Yucca Mountain

Nuclear Waste Policy Recommendations from Blue Ribbon Commission

Posted on May 18, 2011 by ansnuclearcafe| 7 Comments

By Jim Hopf

On May 13, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future released its draft conclusions and recommendations. Despite its more general sounding title, the commission’s work mostly concerned the nuclear waste issue. It was created by President Obama’s administration primarily to investigate alternatives to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository, after the administration moved to shut that program down. While the commission did release some recommendations on other issues such as advanced reactors and Fukishima, this post will focus on its recommendations concerning nuclear waste policy.

Blue Ribbon Commission’s recommendations

A summary of the key conclusions and recommendations is as follows:

One or more geologic repositories must be sited and developed at some point.

No foreseeable future reactor and/or fuel cycle technology will avoid the need for at least one final repository.
There is scientific consensus that deep geologic disposal is the best option for final nuclear waste disposition.
The process for siting and developing the repository should be objective and scientific.
The performance standards for any repository should be set by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency (as they are now).
Repository siting should be consent-based, with all levels of government (federal, state, and local) involved in all parts of the process, from the very beginning.

One or more centralized interim storage sites for used fuel should be developed.

The fuel would be stored at these sites for up to ~100 years.
Such facilities should be developed and licensed using the same standards and methods used to develop a repository.
Decommissioned plants should be first in line to have their used fuel taken to a centralized storage facility.
There are, however, no technical or safety reasons why used fuel can not be stored at the plant sites, for a similar period.

There should be a sustained, federally supported R&D effort to develop advanced reactors and fuel cycles.

While not eliminating the need for at least one repository, such technology development can increase safety, reduce costs, improve resource utilization, and minimize proliferation risks.

A new, independent organization should be created to site and develop the repository and centralized storage facilities, along with any waste storage and transportation infrastructure.

The new organization would be more independent of the government (i.e., the Department of Energy).
It would have more institutional and programmatic stability.
The organization would have assured, steady access to the Nuclear Waste Fund to perform the necessary activities.

Any real answers–or just stalling?

All in all, there is not much in the way of new insights here. The recommendation for long-term used fuel storage (to allow the repository issue to be kicked down the road) was expected from the very beginning. They say that siting of repositories or centralized storage facilities should be consent based, but do not offer much new in terms of solving the (so far) intractable problem of getting such consent. The commission also doesn’t explain how or why it will be significantly less difficult to site centralized storage facilities than it was (or will be) to site a repository. History suggests that it won’t.

Yucca Mountain, north crest

Experience shows that problems with siting always occur at the state level. Many may be surprised to learn that such projects generally have support at the local level (from both the people and the government). As with nuclear power plants, Yucca Mountain enjoyed support in the local, rural communities. The reason for this is that the benefits to the local area, in terms of jobs and tax base, etc., are significant. On the state level, such benefits are much more diluted, but since there is only one repository in the United States, the state still feels singled out and put upon, and has fears of being stigmatized.

My understanding is that in Scandinavia—the one place where consent appears to have been obtained to build repositories—there is no “state” government, just federal and local. Is that a coincidence? I think not.

The one thing the commission recommends that tries to take a stab at the consent problem is the suggestion that the waste be handled by a new “objective” and “independent” organization. Over the years, some distrust has developed between some populations and the DOE (mainly in the West, due to weapons testing, etc.). Getting the DOE out of the picture could help somewhat, but I don’t see it fundamentally altering the situation described above.

The commission also does not do much to clarify any significant benefits of setting up centralized storage facilities, as opposed to just leaving the used fuel in storage at the plant sites. In addition to the significant cost of siting and developing the central storage facilities and moving the fuel there, the waste transport involved will generate significant political resistance. Why would anyone decide to spend a large amount of political capital to do this? As the commission itself states, the risks—and costs—of just keeping the fuel in dry storage at the plant sites is very low.

It appears (to me) that the main impetus behind the centralized storage idea is to appear to be “doing something” about the waste issue, now that the repository has been delayed by decades. My personal view is that this will not happen (due to the lack of any real justification), and the used fuel will remain stored at the plant sites.

Yucca Mountain

The fact that Yucca Mountain was not even considered by the Blue Ribbon Commission is unfortunate. In a highly critical recently released report, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) concludes that the administration’s shutdown of the Yucca program was for purely political (as opposed to scientific or technical) reasons. The GAO also concludes that the Yucca decision will put us back to square one in terms of siting and developing a repository, which will result in decades of delay, as well as wasting most of the money spent so far on the program. It will also result in larger amounts of fuel being stored at plant sites, for much longer periods. For the above reasons, the GAO report recommended that the administration consider restarting the Yucca program.

Many other parties are also bitterly opposed to the abrupt and political termination of the Yucca program. Many assert that the DOE did not have the authority (under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act) to withdraw the Yucca license application, and that the NRC does not have the authority to stop the licensing review. Lawsuits have already been filed. Also, congressional investigations of the NRC and the DOE have started. There is a good chance that the DOE will be ordered to restart the program, or that the NRC will be ordered to finish the licensing process.

In addition to the issues identified by the GAO report, one of the main (if not THE main) impact of starting over on the repository is that it will allow one of the most potent arguments against nuclear energy to live on for decades. A large fraction of the public believes that the nuclear waste problem is intractable, and that there is no technological solution. This is not true. The Blue Ribbon Commission concurred (with the GAO) that the main obstacles to repository siting are political, as opposed to scientific. Despite scientific opinion, until a repository is sited and licensed, many people will continue to believe that there is no solution, which will result in significantly more opposition to new nuclear power plants, and more use of (truly damaging) fossil fuels in the future.

A possible compromise?

The concern raised above has me thinking about a possible compromise on Yucca that could be of some value. While I believe that proceeding with Yucca is the best option, another option (that would be far better than nothing) would be to have the NRC complete the licensing process (and approve the repository, presumably). The administration would then state that although Yucca has been shown to be an acceptable long-term solution, they believe that there are (even) better solutions (e.g., reprocessing) that should be pursued instead. To that end, the fuel will be stored for a few more decades while those other options are explored. If nothing pans out, there is always the (acceptable) Yucca option.

Such an approach would let Nevada get its way in terms of avoiding (or at least greatly delaying) the Yucca repository, but it may go a long way toward alleviating public concerns over the “intractable” nuclear waste problem. It’s possible that this could eliminate most of the opposition to nuclear that is due to waste concerns. Many would argue that Nevada would never go for such a deal, since NRC approval would carry too much political weight in terms of restarting the program. On the other hand, as I discussed earlier, the courts and/or congressional pressure/investigations may end up forcing the NRC to complete the licensing review anyway.

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Hopf

Jim Hopf is a senior nuclear engineer at EnergySolutions, with more than 20 years of experience in shielding and criticality analysis and design for spent fuel dry storage and transportation systems. He has been involved in nuclear advocacy for 10+ years, and is a member of the ANS Public Information Committee. He is a regular contributor to the ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in DC Perspective, Department of Energy, News, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, spent fuel, Spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, Yucca Mountain

Promising developments in Yucca Mountain lawsuit

Posted on May 5, 2011 by ansnuclearcafe| 10 Comments

By Robert L. Ferguson

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments on March 22, 2011, for the lawsuit brought by three private citizens of Washington State challenging the president’s authority to cancel the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

The north portal at Yucca Mountain

The three-judge panel listened to Washington State assistant attorney general Andrew Fitz and attorney Barry Hartman for the private citizen petitioners Bob Ferguson, Bill Lampson, and Gary Petersen, as they attempted to lay out the merits of their cases. But less than a minute into Fitz’s presentation, Chief Judge David Sentelle interrupted to remind the parties that the court has an obligation to consider cases only if they stem from “final” agency action and are “ripe” for review, referring to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s still pending decision on the Department of Energy’s request to withdraw the Yucca Mountain license application.

Circuit Judge Janice Rogers Brown noted that the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB), the NRC’s own judicial panel, ruled that the DOE lacked the authority to withdraw the license. Circuit Judge Brett Kavanaugh concurred that it is not yet known whether the NRC will reject considering the Yucca license application.

Jaczko

The ASLB rejected the DOE’s request to withdraw its Yucca Mountain license application on June 29, 2010. The court and petitioners have waited more than 8 months for the NRC’s final decision, which hangs on NRC chairman Gregory Jaczko’s refusal to submit his vote.

Judge Kavanaugh suggested that if the petitioners believe the NRC is stalling, they could file a mandamus action—a prerogative writ that can be issued by a superior court to compel a government officer to perform ministerial duties correctly. Judge Brown added that if the NRC fails to act, this inaction could trigger final agency action.

The government’s attorney—Ellen Durkee from Department of Justice—responded that the NRC’s length of time to consider the ASLB decision had not been that unreasonable. Judge Brown reiterated that petitioners could bring a new action if NRC fails to act.

Judge Brown noted that there is a three-year deadline in the Nuclear Waste Protection Act (NWPA) for the NRC to issue a license for Yucca Mountain, and that the deadline will arrive in either June or September of this year.

Kavanaugh

Judge Kavanaugh asked attorney Durkee whether or not the DOE would comply if the NRC says it lacks the authority to withdraw the license. Durkee responded that they would seek an appeal, but after some additional aggressive probing from Judges Brown and Kavanaugh, she finally said yes, the DOE will comply with a non-appealable decision from the NRC by restarting the licensing process.

Judge Kavanaugh asked Durkee when the NRC will act. She said that the NRC’s general counsel would not tell her about the timetable and that she didn’t know.

Judge Brown criticized the Obama administration for not waiting for the NRC to act before “dismantling” the Yucca project. Durkee said that the DOE was proceeding only with a plan to abandon Yucca, which provoked Judge Kavanaugh to say that what is going on with the Yucca termination is a lot more than just a plan.

At the end of Durkee’s argument, Judge Kavanaugh remarked that “it does seem that the DOE has made a considered decision not to comply with the law passed by Congress,” acknowledging that the DOE’s decision to abandon Yucca Mountain is not in compliance with the NWPA.

Sentelle

Attorneys Fitz and Hartman reminded the court that the private citizens’ petition did not include the NRC, but was aimed at stopping the president and energy secretary from dismantling Yucca, stressing that their actions thus far involved substantially more than withdrawing the license application. Fitz said that the NRC could not compel the DOE to reconstruct the Yucca Mountain Project. In response, Judge Kavanaugh noted that attorney Durkee had said that the DOE would comply with the NRC. Fitz told Kavanaugh that the NRC chairman had instructed his staff to stop work on the Yucca license review, to which Judge Sentelle asked for the authorities to support this conclusion.

Fitz summed up his oral arguments by stating that the license application is only one small part of the overall case. Notwithstanding the NRC’s action or inaction on the license application, the petitioners had a right under section 119 of the NWPA to challenge the final decision of the Obama administration to cancel the Yucca Mountain Project.

Fitz reminded the judges that a final decision was made by President Obama and Energy Secretary Chu on January 29, 2010, at a press conference, where they rejected Yucca Mountain and declared it “off the table” as the site for the nation’s only high-level nuclear waste repository.

Judge Sentelle questioned whether a press release could constitute final agency action.

Obama

Fitz argued that the press release issued by President Obama and Secretary Chu stating their decision to abandon Yucca Mountain could be considered a final action that permitted the court to review the merits, citing that the case of CropLife America v. Environmental Protection Agency as on-point in establishing the precedent that a press release could be viewed as a final agency action. In that case, the D.C. Court of Appeals determined that a directive issued by the EPA in a press release was a binding regulation.

Two Important New Developments

McKenna

Events since the March 22 oral arguments provided the petitioners with the authorities requested by Chief Judge Sentelle to satisfy the ripeness argument regarding the NRC’s “final agency action.” The petitioners submitted the following supplemental authorities through a letter to the court sent by the attorney general of Washington State, Rob McKenna.

First, the testimony of NRC chairman Gregory Jaczko, given on Thursday, March 31, 2011, before the Energy and Water Development Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee, provided an answer to the court’s question of whether matters before the NRC rendered the DOE’s decision non-final or unripe. In his testimony, Chairman Jaczko stated:

“It is not the responsibility of this body [the NRC] to require the DOE to move forward or not move forward with a particular program or a program direction. Our job is licensing. That is the function and responsibility of this body. And no more than you would expect the fire marshal to go in and tell a developer to continue developing a building so that they can conduct their fire inspections should we be expected to be in a position of demanding or requiring the Department of Energy to move forward with a program.”

The chairman has thus admitted that the NRC has no authority to compel the DOE to comply with the NWPA. That authority lies with the Washington, D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. By the NRC’s own admission, there is no decision for the NRC to make regarding the two issues pending before the court; that is, whether the DOE may reject Yucca Mountain and abandon all efforts to develop it, and whether the DOE may specifically abandon the licensing process. The DOE’s decision is final and ripe. Respondents’ representations in litigation do not change this finality.

Second, on April 1, 2011, another precedent was set by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in a decision rendered by Chief Judge Sentelle regarding CSI Aviation Services v. the U.S. Department of Transportation, using the CropLife America case as precedent.

The court may reach a decision as early as the end of May.

Help from Congress…Finally

Chu

Another welcome development in the battle for Yucca Mountain is the announcement on March 31 that the House of Representatives’ Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Environment and the Economy is launching an investigation into the Obama administration’s efforts to shut down and dismantle the Yucca Mountain Project.

Upton

The Subcommittee notified Secretary Chu and Chairman Jaczko that it is investigating the decision-making process to terminate the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

After reviewing available evidence indicating that there was no scientific or technical basis for the DOE’s request to withdraw the Yucca Mountain license application, Energy and Commerce

Shimkus

Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R., Mich.) and Environment and the Economy Chairman John Shimkus (R., Ill.) are representing Congress in a demand for answers about the administration’s decision to halt development of the only U.S. site designated by Congress for permanent disposal of high-level nuclear waste from nuclear weapons production and retrievable storage of spent nuclear fuel.

Upton and Shimkus stated that Japan’s nuclear crisis has underscored for them the urgent need for the United States to pursue a coherent nuclear policy, stating:

“Despite the scientific community’s seal of approval, extensive bipartisan collaboration, as well as nearly three decades and billions of taxpayer dollars spent, this administration has recklessly sought to pull the plug on the Yucca repository without even the sensibility of offering a viable alternative.”

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Ferguson

Bob Ferguson, a former Department of Energy deputy assistant secretary for nuclear energy, still believes in nuclear energy’s potential to power the United States. His career in nuclear energy spans more than 50 years, from the Atomic Energy Commission to the DOE, and then private nuclear industry. He also believes that the nuclear waste issue must be resolved before the United States can embrace a nuclear energy renaissance. Therefore, on February 25, 2010, Ferguson and his two colleagues filed a lawsuit against President Barack Obama and Secretary of Energy Steven Chu challenging their authority to abandon and dismantle the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

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Posted in Department of Energy, lawsuit, News, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, spent fuel, Yucca Mountain

Why I’m suing over Yucca Mountain

Posted on March 29, 2011 by ansnuclearcafe| 1 Comment

The court will decide Yucca Mountain’s future, not the president

By Robert Ferguson

Note: This entry was originally scheduled for publication on March 16.

In February 2010, my colleagues and I, as private citizens, filed a lawsuit against President Barack Obama and Energy Secretary Steven Chu when the president directed the secretary to violate the provisions of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 (NWPA).

A tour group enters the north portal of Yucca Mountain

The NWPA’s 1987 amendment designated Yucca Mountain, by law, as the only site approved for consideration as the nation’s nuclear waste repository, and we assert that only Congress has the authority to change the law. The act also requires that the licensing process for Yucca be completed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission before any decision can be made concerning its fate.

The president and secretary have ignored this law and attempted to withdraw the application from the NRC before it can deliver its final report.

President Obama’s actions also have betrayed his commitment to scientific integrity. His executive memorandum of March 9, 2009, stated, “The public must be able to trust the science and scientific process informing public policy decisions. Political officials should not suppress or alter scientific or technological findings and conclusions . . . .”

The Department of Energy’s license application is based on 30-plus years of scientific studies. The NRC’s independent review would answer once and for all whether the site is scientifically suitable to store nuclear waste, yet President Obama and Secretary Chu want to withdraw this application and suppress the results of the review.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit consolidated our lawsuit with the lawsuits also filed by the states of Washington and South Carolina, and by Aiken County in South Carolina, against the DOE, Secretary

North end of Yucca Mountain crest (photo from 1993)

Chu, and the NRC to stop them from closing Yucca Mountain. If Yucca is terminated, these states will be forced to continue to store millions of gallons of high-level radioactive waste near major rivers. There are 37 other states that also store commercial used fuel and defense high-level waste facing the same uncertain fate.

The 111^th Congress should have stepped in to stop the president from usurping its authority in this matter, but it did not; therefore, the D.C. Court of Appeals will decide whether the president and energy secretary have the authority to terminate the Yucca licensing process. Oral arguments took place March 22, 2011.

Ferguson

Robert Ferguson’s career in nuclear energy spans more than 50 years, beginning at General Electric, training and working on the Hanford Site’s nuclear reactors. He was responsible for building the Fast Flux Test Facility for the Atomic Energy Commission and then served as director of nuclear projects for the Energy Research and Development Agency. After that, he was appointed the Department of Energy’s Deputy assistant secretary for nuclear energy. Ferguson entered the commercial nuclear industry as chief executive officer for the Washington Public Power Supply System and built the Columbia nuclear power plant, still in operation in eastern Washington State. Ferguson is an ANS member.

On February 25, 2010, Ferguson and his colleagues, Bill Lampson, CEO of Lampson International, and Gary Petersen, president of Hanford Programs at the Tri-Cities Industrial Development Council in Kennewick, Wash., filed a lawsuit against President Barack Obama and Secretary of Energy Steven Chu.

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Posted in Department of Energy, News, Nuclear Fuel Cycle, Yucca Mountain