Publications: Nuclear Energy & Radwaste Monitor

RW Monitor 5/23/2014 IN CONGRESS House Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) handily won this week the Republican primary for the Idaho House 2nd District, an election that had gained national attention due to a strong challenge by a Tea Party-backed candidate. “I’m grateful for the tremendous outpouring of support by the […]

IN THE INDUSTRY Uranium enrichment firm URENCO USA has appointed David Sexton as its new president and CEO, the company announced this week. Sexton will take over for Gregory OD Smith, who has been named the chairman of the URENCO UK Board and chief cultural officer for the URENCO Group starting Feb. 1. Sexton has […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 The Texas Compact Commission rule review experienced a delay this month after a meeting with stakeholders to discuss possible changes was pushed back due to scheduling conflicts, according to Compact Chairman Bob Wilson during the Commission’s public meeting last week.  Wilson had previously said that this meeting—originally scheduled for […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Inspector General determined that the Commission’s process for addressing bankruptcy of NRC materials licensees needs improvement, according to a report released this week. The report concluded that the NRC’s initial efforts to learn of bankrupt licensees could be more effective and more efficient. “NRC’s methods […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 The Sierra Club will continue its challenge against the Barnwell low-level waste disposal facility license renewal early next month in the South Carolina Court of Appeals. The Sierra Club initially loss its challenge in the Administrative Law Court, which upheld the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control’s […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 The United Kingdom’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority has concluded that reusing its separated plutonium stock as fuel for potential new reactor technology remains the preferred disposition option, according to a position paper released by the NDA this week. The position paper stressed that MOX fuel remains the preferred option for […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 Waste Control Specialists received approval from the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality this week to begin offering customers extended bulk disposal services for low-level Class A waste in its RCRA hazardous waste landfill. The new service comes after WCS aligned its license amendment for exempted waste from the TCEQ […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/24/2014 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Waste Confidence final ruling should occur no later than Oct. 3, the NRC said this week. Originally, the schedule had called for the release of the final ruling in September of 2014, but the government shutdown last year caused delays in the public meeting schedule […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 EnergySolutions and Waste Control Specialists each remain on track to receive new Type-B casks— capable of shipping Class B and C low-level radioactive waste—in the first quarter of this year, spokesmen for both companies said this week.  EnergySolutions, which owns and operates the four Type-B casks that currently service […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 Lawmakers unveiled this week an omnibus spending bill for the remainder of Fiscal Year 2014 that would largely match the Army Corps of Engineers’ budget request for the Formerly Utilized Sites Remedial Action Program (FUSRAP). Under the bill, FUSRAP would receive $103.49 million, a $501,000 cut from the Corps […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 The Fiscal Year 2014 omnibus spending bill released this week includes language that would stipulate the Nuclear Regulatory Commission revert its sensitive document policy towards Congressional requests for information back to its 2011 version of the Commission policy. The provision would cancel the much-maligned sensitive document policy update that […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 AREVA TN announced this week that it has entered into an agreement with Waste Control Specialists to provide support services for its TN RAM Cask. The agreement opens up a new disposal pathway for utilities to dispose of waste in the WCS facility, which accepts Class A, B, and […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 As an aging fleet of nuclear reactors begin to cease their operations,  an increasing amount of public stakeholders are taking an active interest in the decommissioning of the reactors, according to a panel held this week at the 29th Annual Institute of Nuclear Materials Management’s Spent Fuel Management Seminar. […]

Kenneth R. Fletcher RW Monitor 1/17/2014 While the spending bill released by Congress this week includes $62 million for a program supporting USEC’s American Centrifuge project, it also makes another $56.65 million in funding contingent on a Department of Energy cost-benefit analysis of potential domestic enrichment technologies for national security needs. The Department is supporting […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 The Bipartisan Policy Center, a Washington, D.C-based think tank, is launching a new project on nuclear waste issues, announcing last week that to lead the effort, it has tapped Tim Frazier, the former designated federal officer for the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future. BPC’s new project, “America’s […]

Politics and Funding Dominate INMM’s Seminar Discussions on Yucca Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission expects to complete and release the Safety Evaluation Reports for the Yucca Mountain repository by January 2015, NRC Deputy Director of Operations Michael Weber said this week at the 29th Annual Institute of Nuclear Materials Management’s […]

Kenneth Fletcher RW Monitor 1/17/2014 Taking the time pressure off talks with the state of Nevada over disposal of a controversial batch of uranium-233, the Department of Energy last week unloaded material from shipping casks it had planned to send to the Nevada National Security Site for disposal. The shipping containers were due for recertification […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/17/2014 A majority of the commissioners on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have voted to reduce the proposed standard for the time of compliance in its revision of the NRC’s 10 CFR Part 61 waste classification system, RW Monitor has learned. The new revision would reduce the initial time of compliance […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 The Tokyo Electric Power Company has announced it will form a new internal company responsible for the decommissioning of the Units 5 and 6 of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. The main objectives of creating the new organization, which will begin operations in April 2014, is to better […]

Kenneth Fletcher RW Monitor 1/10/2014 USEC’s American Centrifuge Project late last month successfully passed a “station blackout” test, a significant step given that a cutoff to power supply in 2011 raised questions about the technology. The Dec. 18 test occurred under a Department of Energy research, development and deployment program supporting the technology, and involved […]

Kenneth Fletcher RW Monitor 1/10/2014 The U.K.’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority is set to launch next month a four-year research effort on waste treatment technologies with Sellafield Limited, the National Nuclear Laboratory, numerous U.K. universities and other partners, the NDA announced this week. The program is expected to cost £8-£9 million ($13.2 million to $14.8 million) […]

Mike Nartker RW Monitor 1/10/2014 EnergySolutions is starting off the new year with a set of senior management changes. As part of a new “consolidation” of the company’s management team, Mark Morant and Alan Parker have been named to oversee Projects; and Products, Projects and Technology, according to EnergySolutions spokesman Mark Walker. “Mark Morant is […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 The Bi-partisan Policy Center announced this week that it is undertaking a new campaign, headed by Tim Frazier, former executive director of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future, aimed at finding a workable implementation strategy to dealing with the nation’s nuclear waste. The campaign will conduct events, […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 Vermont and Entergy have come to an agreement after months of back and forth on a timeline for the decommissioning of the Vermont Yankee Power Station in Vernon, Vt. The agreement stipulates that Entergy will place the plant in SAFESTOR only until its decommissioning fund collects enough money to […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 Kurion has entered into an agreement with the United Kingdom’s National Nuclear Laboratory to provide bulk vitrification waste treatment at the NNL’s Central Laboratory at the Sellafield site, according to a joint release issued by the NNL and Kurion this week. The joint project will use Kurion’s GeoMelt waste […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 With a change in the works for the head of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, industry officials have begun to speculate what a new Committee Chair could mean for nuclear waste issues. Although not yet official, there is heavy expectation Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), who has been […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 The Department of Energy has begun efforts to satisfy requirements set forth by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission concerning the license review of the Yucca Mountain geological repository, according to a letter Assistant Energy Secretary for Nuclear Energy Peter Lyons sent to House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2013 A majority of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission voiced support, or indicated through their questioning, that expedited transfer of spent fuel pools to dry cask storage is not needed during a briefing held this week to discuss the NRC’s staff’s findings on the subject. The NRC’s draft study on spent […]

Jeremy L. Dillon RW Monitor 1/10/2014 The Department of Energy filed for a re-hearing en banc late last week in the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit concerning the court’s decision to reduce the Nuclear Waste Fund fee to zero. DOE argued that the three-judge panel’s unanimous ruling places it in a “damned if […]