Publications: Nuclear Energy & Radwaste Monitor

The Legacy Mine Cleanup Bill, co-sponsored by Sens. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) and Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), passed the Senate this week in a voice vote. The legislation would make permanent a special Western office with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to help coordinate reclamation of abandoned hardrock mines, including legacy uranium sites, according to online data […]

Sen. Shelley Capito (R-W.Va.) brought a list of old grievances to NRC Chair Christopher Hanson’s renomination hearing on Wednesday, setting the stage for a contentious process with time running short. Hanson’s term runs through June 30, and his quickest road to renomination, unanimous consent on the Senate floor, might prove impassable if Capito and all […]

A Canadian municipality this week planned another step towards letting its citizens choose whether to host a deep geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel. On Tuesday, the seven-member Council of the Corporation of the Municipality of South Bruce heard a staff report about the last procedural step needed to include a ballot question about the […]

Kathryn Huff will leave the Department of Energy on May 3, only days before what would have concluded her third year at the top of the Office of Nuclear Energy. Huff shared the news in an email, which the Exchange Monitor saw on Monday. Her departure was first reported by Politico. Mike Goff, Huff’s deputy, will become acting […]

Party-line divisions about future spent nuclear fuel policies emerged in a Wednesday House hearing, during which one lawmaker said work on the issue could stretch into the next Congress. “I’m not for interim storage,” Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) said during the hearing of the House Energy climate, and grid security subcommittee, which he chairs. “I […]

The Nuclear Regulatory commission planned a public meeting in Michigan to discuss Holtec International’s planned restart of the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant in Covert County, Mich. The commission published the meeting notice online. In March, the Department of Energy conditionally agreed to loan Holtec $1.5 billion to restart the plant, something the company believes it […]

Sam Randazzo, the disgraced former chair of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio, is dead, media in Ohio reported this week. Multiple reports said that Randazzo’s body was found late Tuesday morning in a Columbia warehouse that he owned. The Franklin County Coroners Office, which confirmed the death, said the case is a suspected suicide, […]

The governors of Arizona and New Mexico wrote the White House Council on Environmental Quality this week urging the federal government to prioritize cleanup of old uranium mines in the Southwest, and appoint a regional coordinator. There are 650 abandoned uranium mines spread across the two states. Many date to the 1950s, before implementation of […]

The company that was to decommission the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant in Michigan inappropriately withdrew more than $160 million from the plant’s decommissioning trust fund and did not pay it back, environmental and anti-nuclear activists said Wednesday in a meeting with NRC staff. The activists said Wednesday that they had identified in public reports filed […]

The centerpiece of a federal neutron research complex in Maryland will use highly enriched uranium fuel until at least 2030, according to a recent regulatory filing. That’s because the Department of Energy and its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration have yet to develop a fuel the National Bureau of Standards Reactor (NBSR) can use, according […]

A federal bailout of Diablo Canyon Power Plant should be paused because the government did not properly review the environmental effects of keeping the plant open, environmentalists said in a lawsuit filed this week. The bailout came from the Department of Energy’s Civilian Nuclear Credits Program and was contingent on DOE completing an environmental impact […]

A federal court late last week vacated Holtec International’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission license to store spent nuclear fuel in New Mexico. Holtec’s license, granted in May 2023, got caught up in a decision by the U.S Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission may not license storage of commercial spent […]

Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Katherine Huff was scheduled to give a keynote address at a data center conference scheduled for April 15 in Washington. Huff was to give a talk titled “Energizing Tomorrow: The Role of Nuclear in the Clean Energy Revolution” at the Association for Computer Operations Management’s Data Center World Show. The […]

By John Stang A high-ranking Ohio official already indicted for corruption related to struggling nuclear reactors was involved in similar schemes in the Buckeye State, according to court documents filed Friday by the offices of Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost and Summit County Prosecutor Elliot Kolkovich. Sam Randazzo, the already-indicted former head of the  Public Utilities […]

A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee plans a hearing next week on spent fuel management for the U.S. nuclear power plants. The hearing, dubbed “American Nuclear Energy Expansion: Spent Fuel Policy and Innovation,” is set for Wednesday April 10 at 10:30 a.m. at the Rayburn House Office Building, according to a press release. The session was […]

Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff need a little less than a year to review a request for a license amendment Holtec needs to restart Michigan’s Palisades Nuclear Generating Station, according to a letter published Tuesday. “With respect to your requested completion schedule of March 15, 2025, the NRC staff believes that it will complete the safety […]

The White House last week nominated incumbent chairman Christopher Hansen to serve another term as a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. If confirmed by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, which had not scheduled a hearing on the renomination at deadline, Hanson would remain at the NRC through June 29, 2029. Hanson’s current […]

President Joe Biden (D) on Saturday signed a package of appropriations bills that fund the Department of Defense and other agencies through Sept. 30 and extended a key federal nuclear indemnity program. The bill extended Price-Anderson protections for Department of Energy contractors and commercial nuclear companies to Dec. 31, 2065 from Dec. 31, 2025 and […]

Michigan state Rep. Graham Filler (R) last week unveiled a bill to promote development of advanced nuclear reactors in the state.  The measure has 24 co-sponsors and would change Michigan law to adapt the federal definition of advanced nuclear reactors into the state’s laws and legally define the phrase “advanced nuclear reactor technologies” as any […]

Holtec will receive a $1.52 billion loan from the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office to restart the shuttered Palisades Nuclear Generating Station in Michigan, the agency announced this week. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm announced the conditional commitment on Wednesday ahead of a tour of the Holtec Palisades Training Center in Covert, Mich. Granholm […]

The San Luis Obispo County Board on Wednesday passed a resolution supporting a life extension for the local Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant by a vote of 3-2. Voting yes were Supervisors Dawn Ortiz-Legg (District 3), Debbie Arnold, the chair, (District 5) and John Peschong (District 1). Voting no were Supervisors Bruce Gibson (District 2) […]

The Department of Energy will “move with alacrity” to jumpstart a new civilian uranium refining industry once Congress bans imports of Russian uranium to unlock billions in funding, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm told lawmakers today. “[H]opefully we can get that ban in place,” Granholm said during the first DOE budget hearing of the year […]

The Department of Energy’s final budget for fiscal year 2024 does not contain a federal ban on commercial interim storage sites to which states have not consented. A version of DOE’s 2024 budget bill that passed the House last year specified that none of the agency’s appropriations for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1 could be […]

Michael Moulin-Ramsden, a former Veolia Nuclear Solutions manager, joined Alpha Safety last month as its director of business development for the United Kingdom and Continental Europe, according to a LinkedIn post. Moulin-Ramsden, who spent about eight years with Veolia in business development roles, is also a founding director of a consulting firm, Haslam Advisory Ltd. […]

Kasgro Rail, New Castle, Pa., started building part of a prototype heavy-duty rail car to transport spent nuclear fuel, the Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy announced Monday. Fabrication of deck components for the prototype, eight-axle Fortis railcar began “recently,” according to the office’s press release. Fortis is one of two rail cars DOE is […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will have to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court if it wants another chance to prove that it can legally license commercial interim storage of spent nuclear fuel. According to an order dated March 14, judges of the Fifth Circuit voted 9-7, with one recused, not to rehear the NRC’s argument […]