U.S.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Inspector General’s Office said in a new report the agency has an opportunity to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of its low-level radioactive waste (LLRW) oversight program through centralizing regulatory guidance documents.
Guidance documents aid NRC licensees and applicants in implementing specific regulations, NRC staff techniques for evaluating specific problems or postulated accidents involving the material, and data staff requests for application reviews. LLRW includes items that have been contaminated by radioactive materials or have become radioactive through exposure to neutron radiation, according to the NRC guidance, which divides the waste into three categories: A, B, and C.
The IG submitted a report to NRC on Oct. 3, stating it had found that NRC LLRW oversight provides “adequate oversight through inspection activities” to ensure safe and effective disposal and waste blending processes at disposal sites. Because of that the IG did not make any recommendations, but rather told NRC there was room for improvement.
According to the report, which was made public Tuesday, LLRW guidance documents can be difficult to find, as they are numerous and scattered on multiple web pages.
“As both external and internal stakeholders can have difficulty locating LLRW guidance, some have taken it upon themselves to create their own caches,” the report states. “Some Agreement States maintain their own libraries with LLRW guidance as NRC currently does not have a centralized location where it is housed.”
The IG report suggests centralizing access to the LLRW guidance documents in a single, online location.
“Despite the availability of guidance in ADAMS, according to many stakeholders, the system is difficult to use, ‘cumbersome,’ and ‘unless you know what you are looking for, you may not be aware it [a guidance document] even exists,’” the report states.
NRC staff has identified a task to update and consolidate LLRW guidance, which will be discussed in a future agency paper, according to the IG’s report.
INTERNATIONAL
Twenty-eight canisters of vitrified highly active waste arrived in Cherbourg, France, on Monday as the shipment makes its way from the U.K. to Switzerland, French nuclear specialist AREVA announced Wednesday.
The waste is the byproduct of reprocessing and recycling activity at the U.K.’s Sellafield site, where fuel from Swiss nuclear reactors was sent. The shipment falls under the vitrified residue return program, which is the U.K. Nuclear Decommissioning Authority’s (NDA) approach to repatriating highly active waste from the United Kingdom. This is the second of two planned shipments to Switzerland. The first shipment, completed in September 2015, also involved 28 containers.
Under the program Sellafield Ltd. collaborates with NDA subsidiary International Nuclear Services (INS), which has contracted AREVA to manage overland transport for the material. Sellafield spokesman Matt Legg said the NDA does not release exact details on arrivals for security reasons. He also declined to discuss specifics regarding the cost of the shipment, citing commercial confidentiality reasons.
“Costs incurred in repatriating waste are paid for by the customer under the terms of our reprocessing contracts,” Legg said by email Wednesday.
The vessel shuttling the waste departed from the port of Barrow-in-Furness on Oct. 7. The flasks will now be unloaded in Cherbourg for rail shipment to Switzerland.
The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission has extended the deadline for feedback on public comments received for a discussion paper meant to improve CNSC’s regulatory framework for radioactive waste management and decommissioning.
The comment period ran from May 13 until Sept. 12, and CNSC has extended the deadline for feedback until Nov. 2. The comments are posted here. According to the agency, all comments received during the consultation will be reviewed and summarized in a “What We Heard Report,” which will document how CNSC plans to move forward.
The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) on Friday said a former tritium gas processing facility in Peterborough, Ontario, poses no threat to the public or the environment.
Shield Source Inc. operated its Nuclear Processing Facility from 1986 to March 2014 under license from the commission. The plant used tritium gas to manufacture gaseous tritium light sources that could be incorporated into radiation devices, according to a CNSC announcement.
After announcing in March 2013 that it would close the facility, Shield Source contracted the radiation cleanup firm RadSafe Canada to remediate and decontaminate the structure for public use. Concurrently, CNSC conducted a host of environmental sampling activities in 2013, 2014, and 2015, including air, water, and soil testing. The intent was to verify that the cleanup work met all regulatory demands and that the site would no longer require regulatory oversight.
The commission in March 2014 released a license for abandonment of the facility.
“The Independent Environmental Monitoring Program (IEMP) results for 2013, 2014 and 2015 confirm that the public and the environment around the SSI facility are safe and that there are no health impacts,” the commission said Friday.
