Deep Isolation this week praised President Donald Trump’s recent executive actions expediting nuclear energy deployment and even opening the door to potential spent fuel recycling. .
The Berkeley, Calif. based nuclear disposal company said the orders set out a clear directive to develop policy addressing spent fuel and evaluating the potential of recycling and reprocessing it.
It also applauded the Trump administration for tasking the secretary of energy to work in coordination with other agencies to recommend near-term spent nuclear fuel disposal, according to the company’s Tuesday press release.
The May 23 order “Reinvigorating the Nuclear Industrial Base” calls for efforts to manage spent nuclear fuel and development of a long-term solution.
The 1982 the Nuclear Waste Policy Act called for use of deep geologic repositories for nuclear waste. But President Barack Obama cancelled the Yucca Mountain project in Nevada during 2010. The United States does not have a permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel to date.
The administration of President Joe Biden supported consent-based siting of interim storage sites for spent fuel. During Trump’s first term the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy chief Rita Baranwal talked up the idea of the United States resuming its domestic recycling of spent nuclear fuel.
Recycling of spent fuel to repower nuclear reactors ended during the Jimmy Carter administration.
“For decades, America’s inability to dispose of its nuclear waste has remained an unresolved challenge,” Deep Isolation CEO Rod Baltzer said in the press release. “We welcome the administration’s commitment to resolving it.”
