Allowing utility Entergy to apply part of its trust fund for decommisioning of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant to operations involving irradiated fuel at the site would create no significant environmental effect, according to a draft finding last week from Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff.
The NRC in June 2015 approved Entergy’s request to use the funds for “irradiated fuel management activities, not associated with radiological decontamination,” and to forgo the directive to notify the regulator ahead of time of such disbursements, according to a March 8 notice in the Federal Register. However, in November of that year the state of Vermont, the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Corp., and the Green Mountain Power Corp. submitted a petition with the NRC arguing that agency staff had failed to prepare an analysis on Entergy’s exemption request that would be compliant with the National Environmental Policy Act. The NRC then directed staff to study possible environmental impacts from the exemptions, the Federal Register notice says.
“[T]he NRC concludes that the exemptions did not, and will not, have significant effects on the quality of the human environment,” the regulator reported. “Accordingly, the NRC has decided not to prepare an environmental impact statement for the action.”
Public comments on the draft environmental assessment are being accepted through April 7.
Vermont Yankee closed in 2014, and Entergy intends to sell the site to decommissioning specialist NorthStar Group Services. The deal would encompass the plant’s $600 million decommissioning trust fund. The Vermont Attorney General’s Office sued the NRC in 2015 for allowing Entergy to use $225 million from the trust fund for spent fuel management. A federal appeals court dismissed the lawsuit in February 2016, directing the state to take its case first directly to the NRC.
