Staff Reports
WC Monitor
12/18/2015
The Department of Energy has determined there is no need for a new supplemental environmental impact statement (EIS) before a liquid form of highly enriched uranium is transported from Canada to the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C. Stakeholders, including nuclear watchdogs and congressmen, have called for an EIS before more than 6,000 gallons of the uranium are relocated from Atomic Energy of Canada’s Chalk River Laboratories in Ontario to SRS, where workers will reprocess the material at the H Canyon facility.
U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins (D–N.Y.) earlier this year introduced legislation calling for an EIS that would have required the Department of Homeland Security, Transportation Security Administration, and other agencies to conduct a terrorism threat assessment before shipping the uranium to SRS. The congressman expressed concern in May that the proposed route of the uranium would cross through a part of New York he represents. The shipment would go over the Peace Bridge and through western New York on its way south to South Carolina. Higgins said his bill would have given federal agencies the information they need to "develop policies that are informed by the terrorism threat picture."
The bill passed the House of Representatives but has not been taken up by the Senate. The Department of Energy continued playing down the need for another EIS in a new supplement analysis, titled "Foreign Research Reactor Spent Nuclear Fuel Acceptance Program: Highly Enriched Uranium Target Residue Material Transportation." The original EIS was completed in 1996 and an initial supplement analysis was conducted in 2013, according to SRS spokesman Jim Giusti. The 2015 supplement analysis, dated Dec. 2, determined that proposed changes in methods for transporting the material and any recent information related to potential impacts that could result from transporting the material would not be significantly different from the impacts reported in previous years.
The material will be shipped in sturdy containers specifically designed and fabricated for transporting liquid highly enriched uranium, Giusti said. The containers meet standards established by the International Atomic Energy Agency and were certified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in December 2014 and by its Canadian counterpart, the Nuclear Safety Commission, in July 2015. The containers undergo stringent analyses and tests that simulate hypothetical accidents during transport. These tests include free-drop testing from 9 meters onto an unyielding surface, puncture testing, water immersion testing, and thermal testing to assure they remain leak tight.
In addition, the outer cask that holds the containers has been in international use for more than 20 years and is certified by the NRC and other national authorities to carry a range of nuclear materials in a multitude of forms, Giusti said. "As determined in the EIS and the 2015 supplement analysis, DOE concluded that the activity is low risk because DOE will take appropriate precautions to ensure that the proposed transport of this nuclear material will be done in a safe and secure manner," Giusti added.
Before shipments begin, DOE will complete facility modifications necessary to receive the material and prepare the procedures, facilities, and personnel for shipment/receipt and processing. The department will also conduct startup testing of the SRS facilities needed for reprocessing before authorizing shipment to the site. According to the current schedule, shipments from Canada to the Savannah River Site are scheduled to begin in summer 2016. The reprocessing of the material is projected to take one or two years to complete.
Giusti also reported that reduced work at H Canyon – a byproduct of the Savannah River Nuclear Solutions’ (SRNS) operational safety pause – would not impede the schedule of the uranium shipments or reprocessing. SRNS, the Savannah River Site’s management and operations contractor, self-induced a safety pause on all nonessential work on Sept. 11 after a plutonium sample headed to the Savannah River National Laboratory was improperly stored in a container that was not fit for transport. H Canyon exited the pause and last month entered a reduced work phase known as deliberate options. "The pause caused a slight delay in completion of construction and startup of SRS facility modifications but the overall schedule is well within the timeline established for the project at SRS," Giusti said.
