Nuclear Regulatory Commission member Jeff Baran on Wednesday took some heat at his reappointment hearing on Capitol Hill for dissenting against plans to take further steps, and spend more money, in the licensing process for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nevada.
In June, Baran was the lone opponent among the three sitting commissioners to plans to spend $110,000 of the NRC’s remaining Nuclear Waste Fund on “information-gathering activities” ahead of the potential resumption of adjudication of the Energy Department’s license application for the underground storage facility for high-level radioactive waste and spent nuclear reactor fuel.
Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman John Barrasso (R-Wy.) noted the 2013 federal court ruling that directed the NRC to resume the Yucca licensing process after the Obama administration had cut off funding for the project.
“The NRC voted to spend funds on activities related to the licensing of Yucca Mountain. You were the lone person to dissent. I just find your rationale troubling,” Barrasso said. “The court has ordered the NRC to resume the licensing process. Why are you using a discredited rationale and uncertainty about appropriation as an excuse not to follow the law?”
Baran noted that the NRC has only $600,000 to $700,000 remaining of the over $13 million that was available from the Nuclear Waste Fund at the time of the ruling from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. The remaining funding has been spent on projects including a safety evaluation report on Yucca Mountain and completing a supplement to the site environmental impact statement.
“Does it make sense in [fiscal 2017] to use those remaining funds to move toward adjudication? My view is that it didn’t make sense to expend what little we have left until we knew whether or not Congress was going to appropriate funds for adjudication in [fiscal 2018],” Baran said.
The EPW Committee as of Wednesday had not scheduled a vote on Baran’s nomination.
