Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has extended to April 28 the public comment period on the scope of an environmental impact statement (EIS) for a planned nuclear waste storage site in West Texas. However, the commission has not yet ruled on requests from nearly two dozen organizations for more time to request hearings or intervene in the license application with the NRC.
The NRC had been scheduled through Monday to take public comment on the scope of the EIS for Waste Control Specialists’ proposed facility for storing 40,000 metric tons of spent reactor fuel now stored on-site at nuclear plants around the country. It expects to issue a formal notice of the extension Thursday in the Federal Register, NRC spokeswoman Maureen Conley said by email Tuesday. In the interim comments are being accepted at Regulations.gov.
The Nuclear Information and Resource Service and 19 other groups requested in a March 9 letter to the NRC a 90-day extension to the comment deadline, and another 120 days beyond the March 31 deadline for submission of requests for adjudicatory hearings, contentions, and petitions to intervene in the WCS license application.
“We believe these extensions are justified because the application will trigger the largest transport campaign of highly radioactive ‘spent’ fuel in history, anywhere in the world, impacting railroads, roadways and waterways across our homeland,” the groups said.
Conley said the commission would decide on the intervention extension, and that staff would respond to an earlier Sierra Club filing also seeking more time on the matter. “As the deadline is currently March 31, we still have some time,” she stated.
Separately, three attorneys with the Washington, D.C., office of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius on Monday formally filed their notice of appearance with the NRC on behalf of Waste Control Specialists in the consolidated interim spent fuel storage license application.
