A U.S. nuclear industry group on Aug. 17 highlighted the sector’s track record of safety in pushing back against New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s (D) recent criticism of plans for temporary storage facilities for spent nuclear fuel in her state and neighboring Texas.
The Nuclear Industry Council responded to Lujan Grisham’s July 28 letter to President Donald Trump with its own letter to the White House.
The “U.S. nuclear industry operates over seventy-three separate interim storage facilities, and has transported nuclear materials, including spent nuclear fuel, safely across the U.S. and internationally for decades,” wrote Bud Albright, a former undersecretary of energy and current president and CEO at the Nuclear Industry Council. “For example, the U.S. Navy has completed some 850 spent nuclear fuel shipments totaling over 1.6 million miles of transport. Since the early 1960’s, there have been over 1,300 safe shipments of commercial spent nuclear fuel in the United States.”
Albright also noted that close to 12,000 shipments of Department of Energy-owned transuranic waste have been transported safely since 1999 to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico. His letter does not mention the February 2014 release of radiation from a container shipped from the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which closed WIPP for nearly three years.
Globally, there were over 25,000 safe shipments of spent nuclear fuel from 1962 to 2016, Albright stated, citing a study prepared for the Energy Department.
“These transport shipments have been made without any injuries or deaths resulting from a release of radiation,” the letter says. “Any objective evaluation of the history of handling and transportation of nuclear material demonstrates a sterling record of safety.”
Holtec International has applied for a 40-year license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for storage of up to 8,680 metric tons of used fuel in Lea County, N.M. Interim Storage Partners, meanwhile, wants a 40-year license covering 5,000 metric tons for Andrews County, Texas. With further NRC approvals, both facilities could operate for up to 120 years and hold tens of thousands of tons of radioactive material.
The facilities could provide a centralized home to more than 80,000 metric tons of spent fuel now stored on-site at nuclear power plants around the country. The Department of Energy is required under a 1982 law to dispose of that radioactive material, but still does not have anywhere to put it.
In her letter to Trump, Lujan Grisham emphasized potential dangers to New Mexico’s agricultural and oil and gas industries if the storage facilities are built. The governor also noted the continued absence of a federal geologic repository for the spent fuel, which she said creates the danger that the interim storage sites might become permanent. She urged the president to oppose the plans.
Based in Washington, D.C., the Nuclear Industry Council represents dozens of companies and organizations with stakes in the sector.
Albright emphasized the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s technical reviews of both license applications, which include studies of environmental and safety issues. Staff at the agency have issued draft environmental impact statements on the two projects, recommending licensing for both. The final impact statements are expected to be completed next spring, with licensing decisions from the NRC likely shortly afterward.
“It is important to note that the NRC’s draft generic environmental impact statement (GEIS) findings concerning these sites conclude that the proposed facility in New Mexico poses minimum risk to the surrounding population and to the environment,” according to Albright. “Such findings are important both to the people of New Mexico and Texas, and also to ensuring the integrity of the established process for completing a final study that either validates or otherwise makes determinations on these initial findings. Delay serves no purpose at this point other than to frustrate the process of expert evaluation of the projects.”
