The California State Lands Commission on Friday voted unanimously to approve a resolution to support two pieces of federal legislation that would prioritize removing used reactor fuel from the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS).
None of the three commissioners commented on the resolution.
The bills are the Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act of 2019, introduced in May by Rep. Jerry McNerney (D-Calif.), and the Spent Fuel Prioritization Act of 2019, also introduced in May by Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.).
McNerney’s bill is an updated version of legislation spearheaded by Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) that passed out of the House in 2018 but never got a Senate vote. The bill focuses broadly on measures to advance consolidated interim storage and ultimately permanent disposal of used fuel from the nation’s nuclear power plants. But it prioritizes storage of waste from retired civilian facilities that are in seismically active areas near a large body of water.
Similarly, Levin’s bill would similarly prioritize centralized storage or disposal of spent fuel from plants that are decommissioned or undergoing commissioning; are in regions with the highest populations; and in areas the U.S. Geological Survey has found to have “the highest hazard of an earthquake.”
The language in both bills would apply to SONGS, the three-reactor power plant in San Diego County that was permanently retired in 2013.
The Levin measure “would put the wastes at SONGS first in line to be removed,” Nolan Fargo of the Surfrider Foundation told the commission.
In total, about 3.5 million pounds of spent fuel assemblies will be placed in dry storage at SONGS until an off-site location can be found.
