A subcommittee of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards met Thursday to discuss the licensing progress for Northwest Medical Isotopes’ (NWMI) planned production facility.
Northwest is one of several U.S. companies aiming to provide a domestic supply of molybdenum-99, which decays into technetium-99m, an isotope used in a variety of forms in health care, including medical imaging and targeted cancer treatment. The Western Hemisphere risks being without a supplier of molybdenum-99 as of March 2018, when Canada’s National Research Universal reactor fully shuts down. Production in the U.S. was halted in 1989.
Northwest Medical Isotopes says it could provide half of needed molybdenum-99 supply, using proliferation-resistant low-enriched uranium.
The Corvallis, Ore.-based company in February 2015 submitted a construction license application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a radioisotope production facility to be built at the Discovery Ridge Research Park in Columbia, Mo. The NRC licensing process can take several years. The agency examines each section of the application and determines whether the company has provided enough information and included enough safeguards to receive a license.
In May, the NRC staff issued the final environmental impact statement for the facility, recommending the commission issue the facility’s construction permit, barring any discoveries in the safety review. The Thursday meeting focused on the anticipated 22-month safety review and a final statement from the NRC staff is expected by next month regarding potential approval of the safety portion of the construction permit application. If the safety review is positive, NWMI can begin construction.
Northwest’s $70 million, privately funded facility would produce low-enriched uranium (LEU) targets, which would be irradiated at partnering research reactors and then returned to the company’s facility for dissolution and recovery of molybdenum-99. The company would need a separate operating license to begin production in the finished facility. According to documentation released by the NRC, it expects that application soon.
The NRC last year also issued a construction permit to SHINE Medical Technologies, for its planned medical isotope production facility in Janesville, Wis. The permit was the first issued by the NRC for a non-utility reactor in the U.S. since 1985.
The company broke ground on its first building last month, a training and technology genesis facility called Building One, and selected the construction contractor for its production facility in early September. Construction of the production plant is expected to begin in 2018, according to the NRC, with the operations license application also due next year.
SHINE has announced two license amendment requests for technological changes to its forthcoming reactor, one sitting with the NRC and the other lying in wait. According to NRC documentation, however, questions about the prudency of the changes could nix the changes in accordance with the Atomic Energy Act of 1954. A public hearing has been set for Oct. 17.
The University of Missouri filed a license amendment request with the NRC in March to begin Mo-99 production through its University of Missouri Research Reactor, or MURR. The university has partnered with General Atomics and Nordion to produce the isotope.
