Jeremy L. Dillon
RW Monitor
3/6/2015
Senate Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee Chair Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) said funding for a pilot interim storage facility would be included in the Senate’s upcoming Fiscal Year 2016 appropriation bill, during remarks made this week at a Nuclear Regulatory Commission budget hearing. Both he and subcommittee Ranking Member Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.) voiced support for a pilot storage interim facility to get spent nuclear fuel away from commercial reactors. Alexander also said he plans to reintroduce later this year legislation that would better define the nation’s spent nuclear fuel policy. “Later this year, I will reintroduce bipartisan legislation with Senators Feinstein, Murkowski and perhaps others, to create both temporary and permanent storage sites for nuclear waste,” Alexander said in his opening remarks. “Also, Senator Feinstein and I plan to include a pilot program for nuclear waste storage in the Energy and Water appropriations bill, as we have for the past three years.”
In Congress’ last session, Alexander co-sponsored a bill along with Feinstein and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) that would form a new independent agency to handle the nation’s high-level radioactive waste. The Nuclear Waste Administration Act, as the first bill was called, would also create a consent-based siting approach for interim storage. Those goals drew from some of the recommendations of the Administration’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future, formed after the 2010 shutdown of the Yucca Mountain project.
During this week’s hearing, Feinstein charged the nuclear industry to better support the bill’s effort to drive the nation’s nuclear waste policy forward. “The difficult part for me is that it has taken so long to generate activity, and candidly, I don’t believe the nuclear industry itself has been as supportive of it as it should be,” she said, referring to the bill. “For me, this is a real test of that industry because if nuclear power is in fact to continue to be a part of our nation’s energy mix, for me, this situation is unsustainable.”
Yucca Still Part of Equation, Alexander Says
Alexander, though, maintained Yucca Mountain would be included in any new nuclear waste policy. “But let me be clear: Yucca Mountain can and should be part of the solution. Federal law designates Yucca Mountain as the nation’s repository for used nuclear fuel,” he said. Alexander also pressed the NRC on why it did not include additional funding to finish the Yucca Mountain licensing review in its FY 2016 budget request. “The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has a balance of unspent funding that you are supposed to use to continue the licensing process. But more resources will be required, so I think it’s fair to ask the question: Knowing that there are additional steps and they will cost money, why would you not request additional funds in your budget?” he said.
Momentum for breaking the Congressional impasse on nuclear waste policy appears to be gaining since the year began. House Republicans, led by Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.), said they planned to also introduce legislation soon that would incentivize Nevada into hosting a repository, mainly through infrastructure and economic boosts. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, meanwhile, released the Safety Evaluation Report on Yucca Mountain, which found the repository design meets most regulatory safety requirements.
Estimated $330 Million Needed to Complete License Review, NRC Chair Says
NRC Chair Steven Burns said it would cost an estimated $330 million to finish the licensing review, but when asked after the hearing why the NRC had not requested additional funding, Burns said the lack of a willing applicant motivated the Commission to exclude additional funding in its request. “What we don’t have, and we’ve come to a point where we’ve done the steps needed to do before initiating the adjudication, or continuing the adjudication, where you have these contentions that need to be heard and resolved by the licensing board, but we don’t have an applicant because we don’t have the Department of Energy,” Burns told reporters after the hearing.
Burns has previously said that the Commission will complete the supplemental Environmental Impact Statement needed for the Yucca Mountain licensing review in DOE’s stead, after the Department chose to only provide the technical details instead of completing the report. With the NRC’s approximately $4 million in Nuclear Waste Fund appropriations that are still unspent following the completion of the Yucca Safety Evaluation Report, the Commission should have enough funding to complete the report. Once the EIS is complete, the next step in the licensing review would be to complete the adjudication process. There are still close to 300 contentions filed by Nevada and other parties challenging the repository that need adjudication before a construction authorization permit could be issued, according to the NRC. While the NRC should have enough carry-over funding to finish the EIS, it will not have enough funding to complete the adjudication process. The Commission, though, did not request additional funding in its Fiscal Year 2016 budget request to complete the Yucca licensing review.
