There has been no apparent movement by the Trump administration over the last year to fill vacant and expired terms on the federal Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board (NWTRB).
The only change to the board in that time was the departure last May of another member, Linda Nozick, a civil and environmental engineering professor at Cornell University in New York state.
That leaves two vacant positions and all but one of the remaining nine board members serving past the end of their four-year terms.
The NWTRB is an independent agency with up to 11 part-time board members – scientists and engineers – and a roughly equal number of professional staff. On a steady annual budget of $3.6 million, it provides technical and scientific peer review regarding management and disposal operations at the Department of Energy for high-level radioactive waste and used nuclear fuel.
The National Academy of Sciences recommends candidates for the board to the White House, which makes the final decisions. The non-political posts do not require Senate approval.
Candidates were submitted to the White House in 2017, National Academy of Sciences spokeswoman Megan Lowry confirmed on Wednesday. She said she could not provide their names.
At deadline Thursday for Weapons Complex Morning Briefing, the White House had not provided any information regarding potential selections.
The sole board member not serving on an expired term is Tissa Illangasekare, a civil and environmental engineer from the Colorado School of Mines. He was appointed on Jan. 18, 2017, by then-President Barack Obama.
The board conducts several meetings each year on different topics. Its spring 2020 session, scheduled for April 29 in Chicago, will address Energy Department research and development on direct disposal of used nuclear fuel in dual-purpose canisters.
In January, the NWTRB issued a report on the value of underground laboratories for research and development of geologic disposal of nuclear waste.
