GROUP PETITIONS NRC OVER THREAT OF REACTOR POOL FIRE FALLOUT

A group made up of 34 organizations is petitioning the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to halt all reviews of new licenses and license renewals due to new findings the NRC Staff reported in its Expedited Spent Fuel Transfer Proceeding that said a small nuclear reactor pool fire could render 9,400 square miles uninhabitable and displace 4.1 million Americans on a long-term basis, according to the petition filed this week. The Commission is currently considering the expedited transfer of spent fuel pools to dry cask storage as part of its lessons learned analysis of the Fukushima disaster in 2011. “This information is “new” because no EIS for reactor licensing, GEIS for reactor re-licensing, or EA for standardized design certification has specified the size of the area that could be contaminated or the number of people who could be displaced for an extended period of time by a high-density spent fuel pool fire,” the petition said. “The information is “significant” because it undermines the NRC’s conclusion in environmental studies for reactor licensing and re-licensing that the impacts of spent fuel storage during reactor operation are insignificant. Such widespread contamination and long-term displacement of people could have enormous socioeconomic impacts, as witnessed by the effects of the Fukushima accident.” The group is requesting that the NRC re-do the environmental impact study on high-density spent fuel storage, as well as asking for the stopping of any license renewal until that EIS is updated “to ensure compliance with NEPA.”