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Important Dates
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October 5:
Communications AHWG conference call - 12 pm Central
October 10:
NTSF Tribal Webinar - 2 pm Central
October 16:
Tour of WIPP for Midwestern Officials - Roswell, NM
October 23:
WGA WIPP TAG Fall 2018 Meeting - Portland, OR
October 31-November 1:
MRMTC Fall 2018 Meeting - Madison, WI
November 28-29: NE Task Force Fall 2018 Meeting - Providence, RI
December 4-5: WIEB Fall 2018 Meeting - San Diego, CA
December 12-13:
SSEB Transportation Committees Fall 2018 Meeting - Austin, TX
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Join Our List
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COMMITTEE HAPPENINGS
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Fall Committee Activities
Planning continues for the Committee's Fall meeting, which will be held on October 31 and November 1, 2018, at the Edgewater Hotel in Madison, WI. The tour of the University of Wisconsin research reactor that was being planned in conjunction with the meeting had to be cancelled due to unscheduled maintenance. The meeting will still commence at 3:30 pm Central on Wednesday, October 31. Committee members and others interested in attending the meeting can register through CSG's online member engagement system.
A new Committee co-chair will be elected at the fall meeting to serve in 2019 and 2020. Committee members that are interested in serving as co-chair should let Lisa know or reach out to fellow committee members for a nomination.
In other Committee news, the agreements through which Illinois and Iowa receive assistance in conjunction with WIPP shipments will be extended. Committee members from those states should expect paperwork to arrive by mail soon.
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NATIONAL TRANSPORTATION STAKEHOLDERS FORUM
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NTSF Updates
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The Rail/Routing Ad Hoc Working Group (AHWG) is resuming its work and the group held a web meeting last Tuesday. Mike Stead (IL) and Tony Leshinskie (VT) serve as co-chairs for the Rail/Routing AHWG and Jay Jones will be the DOE point person for this group in Erica Bickford's temporary absence. Group members are reminded to sign up via the Rail/Routing AHWG
wiki site. It was noted during the recent web meeting that DOE no longer considers its "dedicated train" decision to be in effect, because that policy decision was made specifically in the context of the now-defunct Yucca Mountain Project.
The Tribal Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee has organized a webinar on the Role and Authority of Tribal Governments in the Transportation of High-Level Waste and Spent Nuclear Fuel. The webinar, which will be held on Wednesday, October 10th at 2 pm Central, will provide participants with a deeper understanding of tribal perspectives on collaboration with local, state, and federal governments around transportation of radioactive materials. Register here.
The Communications AHWG will hold a conference call on Thursday, October 4, at 12 Central. Submissions for the NTSF newsletter are due on Friday, October 12.
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| FOCUS THIS MONTH |
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Utilities React to Vogtle Plant Cost Increase
After continued cost overruns jeopardized the future of two new nuclear units at Georgia's Vogtle plant, the plant's co-owners were able to reach an agreement that will allow construction to continue.
Ogelthorpe, which owns 30% of the project, had called for protection against future cost increases after it was announced this summer that the cost to construct the two units - years behind schedule - had increased by $2.3 billion. The cost increase triggered the need for a vote from the four plant owners on whether or not to continue construction.
The plant's other three co-owners - Georgia Power, which owns 45.7%, MEAG Power (22.7%) and Dalton Utilities (1.6%) - had already voted to let construction on the project move forward in spite of the fact that the plant has doubled in cost over the past decade.
The negotiations resulting from Ogelthorpe's concerns led to modifications to the Vogtle Joint Ownership Agreement. Under the revised agreement, each co-owner will pay its proportionate share of construction costs up to the current estimated cost at completion. If costs continue to exceed that estimate, Georgia Power will take on increasing shares of the additional construction costs. Cost overruns will no longer trigger a vote from the project owners to continue construction, and Georgia Power may cancel the project at its discretion at any time.
Spokespersons from the Nuclear Energy Institute and Department of Energy praised the decision to continue construction on Vogtle 3 and 4, which are the only new nuclear units currently under construction in the country. Currently unit 3 is expected to begin generating in November 2021 and unit 4 is expected to come into service by November 2022. Construction of the two Vogtle units was initially expected to cost $14 billion and be completed in 2013. The total project cost has now exceeded $30 billion and is nearly a decade behind schedule.
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NUCLEAR NEWS
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Nuclear Waste Cleanup Plan Announced for Missouri Landfill
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) last week announced a plan to address illegally dumped nuclear waste that is located at a Missouri landfill in close proximity to a smoldering underground fire. The nuclear waste, resulting from Manhattan Project activities, was dumped at the West Lake Landfill outside St. Louis in the 1970s. EPA has been working on a remediation strategy for the site since 2008, when it proposed capping and monitoring the site and there was strong opposition from many in the community.
The new EPA plan involves removing 70 percent of the landfill's radioactive waste by digging to depths of eight to 20 feet. That waste will be shipped to an undetermined out-of-state disposal facility and the remainder of the radioactive material in the landfill will have a cover placed over it. The project is expected to take about four years to complete and cost $205 million. The cost of the project will be shared by the site owner, DOE, and Exelon Corp. of Chicago, whose subsidiary once owned the uranium processor that generated the waste at Mallinckrodt Chemical Works in St. Louis.
Republic Services owns West Lake Landfill as well as the Bridgeton Landfill located a few hundred yards away, where an underground fire has been smoldering since 2010. Republic Services would prefer to cap and monitor the site, stating that excavation is riskier and more time consuming. EPA estimates that excavating all of the radioactive waste would cost $750 million and take 15 years, while capping the waste in the landfill would cost about $75 million.
To read coverage in the
Virginian-Pilot click
here.
Tour Highlights Opposition to Transport of Nuclear Waste
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's (NRC) decision in August to resume its review of the license application for a consolidated interim
storage facility in Texas has spurred opposition to the concept of transporting nuclear waste from around the country to a proposed site in Andrews, TX. The "Protect Texas from Radioactive Waste Tour," featuring a mock 16-foot railroad container meant to replicate the transportation cask that would be used to ship spent nuclear fuel, kicked off in Houston late last month.
The tour organizers, Coalition of Community Organizations, Nuclear Information and Resource Services, Beyond Nuclear, the Sustainable Energy and Economic Development Coalition and Public Citizen, believe that shipments from nuclear reactors around the country to a proposed facility in West Texas would pose significant risks to the communities along rail shipment routes. The groups cite the risk of a rail accident with "disastrous" consequences as well as the risk of sabotage as reasons to leave spent fuel on site at reactors until a permanent disposal facility is available.
Interim Storage Partners, a joint venture by Waste Control Specialists and Orano, USA (formerly Areva), has proposed a facility that would store up to 40,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel until a permanent repository becomes available. NRC review of the Interim Storage Partners application could be completed as early as 2020. According to Interim Storage Partners' website, spent fuel shipments have demonstrated a strong safety record over several decades, and robust transport casks and shipping containers are being specifically designed to protect the public.
Coverage in the Texas Tribune can be found
here
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DOE Report on Inventory of SNF and HLW
DOE's Office of Integrated Waste Management has released a new report detailing the inventory of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste in the United States. The inventory data includes commercial as well as government-managed and -owned material.
The inventory of commercial spent fuel is based on estimated quantities located at operating and shutdown nuclear reactors as of the end of calendar year 2017. Projections of commercial spent fuel inventories based on different scenarios of future commercial nuclear reactor operations are also provided. Select characteristics of the waste examined, such as packaging and heat generation rate, are included in the report.
The inventory report is intended to support DOE's analysis and planning for the eventual storage and transport of high-level waste and spent fuel.
To access the report
, click
here
.
Thanks to Erica Bickford for sharing this story!
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Thank you for reading. Watch for the next edition to come out on
November 1, 2018.
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Please do not reproduce or create new content from this material without the prior express written permission of CSG Midwest.
This material is based upon work supported by the Department of Energy under Award Numbers DE-NE0008604, DE-EM0004869, and DE-EM0005168.
This report was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor any agency thereof, nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial product, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation, or favoring by the United States Government or any agency thereof. The views and opinions of authors expressed herein do not necessarily state or reflect those of the United States Government or any agency thereof.
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