NRC Chair Won’t Meet With Oil Company Protesting Texas Interim Storage

An oil company opposing the licensing of an interim storage facility for spent nuclear fuel in west Texas won’t get a private meeting with the chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the agency said last week.

Since Fasken Oil and Ranch, Ltd. is involved in ongoing commission proceedings, it would sacrifice the agency’s impartiality for chair Christopher Hanson to meet with company executives, commission secretary Annette Vietti-Cook said in a letter dated April 1. A lobbyist representing Fasken requested the meeting in a March 30 letter.

Fasken Oil and Ranch, alongside mineral rights holding company Fasken Land and Minerals, is currently embroiled in a months-long dispute with NRC over Waste Control Specialists’ proposed consolidated interim storage facility (CISF) in Andrews County, Texas. The commission is currently reviewing an appeal to its December decision to toss the company’s objections to the site’s licensing. The agency had yet to make a final call on that appeal by deadline Tuesday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing.

Meanwhile, the proposed CISF is still under federal environmental review. The commission’s environmental impact statement, necessary for licensing, won’t be ready until the summer, the agency has said.