A flurry of amicus briefs from states, politicians, and special interest groups were filed with the U.S. Supreme Court this week, urging the court to uphold a 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that invalidated Interim Storage Partners' license for a consolidated interim storage facility for commercial spent nuclear fuel in Andrews County, Texas.
A recent Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists article cautions that uncertainty regarding the management of wastes generated by small and advanced reactors could drive up costs, making them uncompetitive with existing light water reactor technology.
The Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company (Svensk Kärnbränslehantering AB, or SKB) broke ground on its spent nuclear fuel repository near the Forsmark nuclear power plant on January 15. SKB, which is owned by Sweden’s nuclear power plants, expects the final repository will be ready for disposal in the 2030s, and will be fully extended in the 2080s.
Tim Tinsley
I’ve been reflecting on the recent American Nuclear Society Winter Conference and Expo, where I enjoyed the discussion on recycling used nuclear fuel to recover valuable minerals or products for future applications. I have spent more than 30 years focusing on dissolving and separating nuclear material, so it was refreshing to hear the case for new applications being made. However, I feel that these discussions could go further still.
Radiation is energy, something that our society seems to have an endless need for. A nuclear power station produces a lot of radiation that is mostly discarded. But once fuel has been used, it still produces significant levels of radiation and heat energy. The associated storage, processing, and eventual disposal of this used fuel requires careful management and investment to protect systems and people from the radiation. Should we really disregard—and discard—this energy source, along with all the valuable minerals in the used fuel, when we could instead use it to deliver significant value to society?
Nuclear energy produces about 9 percent of the world’s electricity and 19 percent of the electricity in the United States, which has 94 operating commercial nuclear reactors with a capacity of just under 97 gigawatts-electric. Each reactor replaces a portion of its nuclear fuel every 18 to 24 months. Once removed from the reactor, this spent (or used) nuclear fuel (SNF or UNF) is stored in a spent fuel pool (SFP) for a few years then transferred to dry storage.
The Department of Energy has agreed to hold a 30-day review and comment period on a draft environmental analysis associated with a proposed plan for retrieving, grouting, and transporting some of Hanford’s low-activity tank waste for out-of-state disposal.
The National Nuclear Security Administration’s strategy for managing nuclear waste from nuclear weapons maintenance and modernization activities is not comprehensive and does not fully address all statutory requirements, according to a report by the Government Accountability Office.
Lujan
Legislation that aims to leverage the best available science and technology of U.S. national laboratories to support the cleanup of legacy nuclear waste has been introduced in the Senate by Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D., N.M.).
The Combining Laboratory Expertise to Accelerate Novel Solutions for Minimizing Accumulated Radioactive Toxins (CLEAN SMART) Act, introduced on December 12, would codify and fund the Department of Energy to accelerate the development, demonstration, and deployment of breakthrough technologies and innovations for nuclear waste cleanup.
Legacy waste: Currently, the DOE’s Office of Environmental Management is responsible for the remediation of 15 legacy sites across the United States that hold nuclear waste from the Manhattan Project and the Cold War era. According to Luján, the cost to decommission these remaining sites continues to grow and is estimated to be nearly $700 billion, for a completion date near the end of the century.
The Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge Office of Environmental Management (OREM) and contractor United Cleanup Oak Ridge (UCOR) have finished fieldwork and have begun monitoring groundwater elevations for a study at the Environmental Management Disposal Facility (EMDF) project site in Tennessee.
Finland’s regulatory authority, the Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority (STUK), announced that it was further delaying issuing a statement on the safety case for the Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository until 2025, saying that Posiva’s license application material is not yet ready.
While the United States was celebrating Thanksgiving Day, Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) announced that it has selected a site in northwestern Ontario for a deep geologic repository to hold the country’s spent nuclear fuel
DeepGeo, a Rhode Island–based company seeking to develop multinational spent nuclear fuel repositories, and Denmark-based thorium reactor developer Copenhagen Atomics have signed a collaboration agreement that will see the companies work together on the management of nuclear fuels and waste streams associated with a thorium breeder reactor.
As of last week, crews with Department of Energy cleanup contractor Idaho Environmental Coalition (IEC) processed more than 142,000 gallons of radioactive sodium-bearing tank waste at Idaho’s Integrated Waste Treatment Unit (IWTU) this year.
The Department of Energy’s estimated overall liability for failing to dispose of the country’s commercial spent nuclear fuel jumped as much as 10 percent this year, from a range of $34.1 billion to $41 billion in 2023 to a range of $37.6 billion to $44.5 billion in 2024, according to a financial audit of the DOE’s Nuclear Waste Fund (NWF) for fiscal year 2024.
The Solid Waste Management Facility (SWMF) at the Savannah River Site saw a large reduction of transuranic (TRU) waste in fiscal year 2024, achieving the highest volume of TRU waste shipped out of state by the facility in the past 10 years, according to the Department of Energy.
TRU waste typically consists of protective clothing, tools, rags, equipment, and miscellaneous items contaminated with small amounts of plutonium and other heavy elements.
Katrina McMurrian
As the nation confronts increasing demand for clean, baseload energy, nuclear power today receives substantial bipartisan support, but nuclear waste remains a trusty arrow in the quiver of opponents. The U.S. should work to make nuclear waste a nonissue not only to support opportunities for nuclear power expansion but primarily to meet long--standing obligations. Federal government inaction to remove and dispose of commercial spent nuclear fuel (SNF) continues to negatively impact host communities in 36 states; electric customers in more than 40 states who paid billions of dollars into the Nuclear Waste Fund; and all U.S. taxpayers, who pay about $2 million per day for the government’s partial breach.
A five-year, $17.8 million contract has been awarded to Waste Control Specialists for the long-term management and storage of elemental mercury, the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management announced on November 21.
Orano completed the 13th and final rail shipment of vitrified high-level nuclear waste from France to Germany. The company announced that the four casks of vitrified HLW arrived at Germany’s intermediate storage facility at Philippsburg in the early evening of November 20.
Canada’s Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) announced that Wabigoon Lake Ojibway Nation has indicated its willingness to support moving forward to the next phase of the site selection process to host a deep geological repository for Canada’s spent nuclear fuel.
The Savannah River Site in South Carolina has processed more than 10 million gallons of liquid radioactive waste in its Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF), the Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management has announced.