Publications: Nuclear Energy & Radwaste Monitor

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is taking public comment on its draft supplemental environmental impact statement for renewing the operating licenses of Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, the agency said in a press release. The environmental review is one of the steps the NRC has to complete before approving plant owner Pacific Gas and Electric’s (PG&E) […]

There would be no significant environmental impact from keeping long-stranded transuranic waste from the Los Alamos National Laboratory at Waste Control Specialists’ disposal facility in Texas for another two years, the There Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Tuesday. The commission published its formal finding of no significant impact in the Federal Register about five months after Waste Control Specialists […]

Residents of South Bruce, Ontario, Canada, on Monday voted to become a potential host site of a deep geologic repository for nuclear waste. The difference between consenting to the repository and not came down to fewer than 100 votes, according to official results dated Tuesday. Consent carried the day though, with 1,604 voters for the repository […]

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Orano-USA has started the property transfer and licensing process for its planned uranium enrichment plant at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Site, the site’s top federal cleanup official said here Wednesday. Orano-USA announced in September that Oak Ridge was its “preferred site” for its uranium enrichment plant that it would build using state […]

Centrus Energy Corp., Bethesda, Md., had a net loss in the third quarter, which the uranium broker and enrichment technology developer attributed in part to costs associated with a Department of Energy uranium contract. Centrus lost about $5 million, or $0.30 a share, in the third quarter, compared with earnings of about $8.2 million or […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s in-house legal advisors this month recommended tweaking the agency’s mission statement to clarify that regulation does not unnecessarily limit beneficial civilian use of nuclear energy. Separately, NRC’s Office of the Executive Director, helmed by the agency’s top civil servant, recommended a slightly different change to the mission statement. NRC’s Office of […]

Residents of South Bruce, Ontario, Canada, began voting this week about whether they wish to host a deep geologic repository for nuclear waste. Voting began Oct. 22 and was to run through Oct. 28, according to the municipality’s website. The seven-member South Bruce council decided this spring to let residents decide directly whether the municipality […]

An attempt to wrench back $260 million in aid from Holtec International effectively ended last week when New Jersey’s Supreme Court declined to hear a state appeal of the company’s successful lawsuit. In an order dated Oct. 15, filed Oct. 18 and distributed to media Tuesday, the highest court in New Jersey on said it […]

Briefings in a federal appeal of a ban on commercial interim storage of spent nuclear fuel may not be finished until January, according to the U.S. Supreme Court’s docket. The Supreme Court case consolidates two appeals of a 2023 ruling in which a lower court, responding to a lawsuit by the state of Texas, held […]

In a letter Monday, the House Energy and Commerce Committee asked the Government Accountability Office to investigate how the Department of Energy can displace imports of Russian isotopes. “[T]he United States still relies on obtaining several materials and commercially produced isotopes from other, sometimes adversarial countries, like Russia, on which it may not be expedient […]

“Funding needs to happen” for the International Atomic Energy Agency, the State Department’s undersecretary for arms control said Tuesday at a think-tank event about nuclear power. “People hear the word energy, I mean nuclear, and they kind of run. A lot of people run for the hills,” Bonnie Jenkins, the undersecretary of state for arms […]

NextEra Energy is still considering, but not committed to, restarting Iowa’s only nuclear power plant, which shut down in 2020, the head of the company told investors Tuesday. “We are currently evaluating the recommissioning of our Duane Arnold nuclear plant in Iowa,” John Ketchum, chief executive officer of NextEra Energy said Tuesday in prepared remarks during a […]

The Republican candidate for Nevada’s contested U.S. Senate Seat, Sam Brown, said the magic words again during a debate with incumbent Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.). “Yucca Mountain is dead.” Brown, who found himself on the wrong side of the politically charged issue earlier in his race, said in 2022 that developing Yucca could be a […]

Larry Cutlip, Centrus Energy Corp.’s senior vice president of field operations, last week said he would retire from the company in July, according to a Friday regulatory filing. Cutlip gave his notice on Oct. 16, according to a form 8-K Centrus, Bethesda, Md., filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Cutlip “will retire his position at […]

The Department of Energy’s $900-million solicitation for proposals to deploy small light-water reactors includes an “opportunity” for nuclear security aid that, the agency said, could make the reactors more exportable. DOE’s Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations dropped the long-expected solicitation on Thursday, offering domestic teams of power consumers, utilities, reactor designers and construction contractors a […]

Environmental groups want an appeals court to rehear a case that affirmed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s authority to license commercial consolidation and storage of spent nuclear fuel. The groups led by Beyond Nuclear last week filed for a rehearing en banc, or by all the members of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for Washington […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission could take until February to issue its final updated rule for decommissioning nuclear power plants, according to a document from the agency’s Inspector General. That would be about five months later than an estimate of August that an NRC spokesperson provided to the Monitor in February, after the final proposed rule went to […]

Internet search giant Google signed an agreement to purchase electricity from future small modular reactors made by Kairos Power, the company announced this week in a statement posted online. “The initial phase of work is intended to bring Kairos Power’s first SMR online quickly and safely by 2030, followed by additional reactor deployments through 2035. […]

Restarting the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station in Michigan will create some 33,000 cubic feet of solid, low-level radioactive waste, Holtec International said in a regulatory filing published this week. That would be a very small fraction, only 3% or so, of the roughly 1 million cubic feet of low-level waste that decommissioning the plant would […]

As part of a suit filed in April against New York, Holtec International this week asked a federal judge to void a state law that prohibits a company subsidiary from discharging irradiated water from the decommissioning of a nuclear-plant into the Hudson River. The company’s motion for summary judgment against New York, which Holtec said violated […]

Robert Lewis is the new deputy executive director for operations at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Craig Erlanger is the new director of the Office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response, the commission said Thursday.  The new appointments for the two long-time agency hands will be effective Oct. 20, NRC wrote in a Thursday press […]

The Department of Energy last week awarded six contracts for turning future stocks of government-owned, high-assay low-enriched uranium into forms suitable for use as nuclear reactor fuel. DOE made the awards a little less than a year after soliciting bids for the work. The six contracts combined are worth up to $800 million over 10 […]

As part of a review of its new responsibilities under a bill passed this year, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission might create a new branch focused on exports, or it might not, the agency’s head told media Tuesday. “We may do that, but that’s a discussion that we’re still taking a look at,” Christopher Hanson, chair […]

The city of Oak Ridge, Tenn., could delay development of a long-sought airport on remediated Department of Energy land after Orano-USA selected Oak Ridge as its preferred site for a new uranium enrichment plant. The September announcement by Orano means the city could pause development of the general aviation airstrip and reconsider the proposed location, according […]

The West Virginia legislature this week approved a bill that would let Charleston regulate nuclear materials in cooperation with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The final bill now awaits the signature of Gov. Jim Justice (R), who is also running for U.S. Senate and who media reported had a commanding lead in recent polls in the […]

A joint interim committee of the Wyoming legislature on Tuesday adopted a draft bill that would allow for the interim storage of spent nuclear fuel in the state. The state legislature’s joint interim Minerals, Business and Economic Development Committee voted 8-5, with one excused absence, to take up what had to that point been a […]