The increase in prices to bury low-level radioactive waste at disposal sites across the country should affect nuclear power plant operators’ decommissioning cost estimates, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said in a recent report.
NRC’s report, published Tuesday on the Federal Register, serves as the agency’s annual update to low-level waste (LLRW) disposal cost projections at each of the nation’s four LLRW disposal facilities. That information is used by nuclear plant operators to provide NRC with a mandated yearly decommissioning cost estimate.
The report found that fluctuations in LLRW charge pricing at each of the nation’s four disposal facilities will “likely reflect moderate to more substantial increases” in decommissioning cost estimates “when compared to those previously reported by licensees in 2021,” NRC said.
According to the report, EnergySolutions’ Barnwell, S.C., disposal site — which accepts waste from the Atlantic Compact states of South Carolina, New Jersey and Connecticut — increased its LLRW disposal rates for material from both boiling-water reactors (BWRs) and pressurized-water reactors (PWRs) by roughly 18% in 2022. That represents a “significant increase” in disposal charges at the Barnwell site, NRC said.
Prices at the other three disposal facilities in Texas, Utah and Washington also changed this year, according to the report. Rates at EnergySolutions’ Clive, Utah site increased, while prices went down slightly at US Ecology’s Washington facility and the Waste Control Specialists site in Texas.
Those variations, when considered alongside increases in labor and energy rates for nuclear plants, should also push up decommissioning cost estimates, NRC said.
The agency is accepting public comments on its update to LLRW disposal costs until Dec. 29, NRC said in its Federal Register notice.
Meanwhile, the commission is working on a rules update that is aimed at streamlining LLRW disposal for its licensees. The proposed rulemaking, started in 2015, would allow plant operators to ship Greater-Than-Class-C (GTCC) waste, a type of low-level radioactive material, to near-surface repositories.
The proposed rulemaking has been the subject of controversy among NRC staff, with some arguing that GTCC waste disposal is the federal government’s sole responsibility.
