Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee (MRMTC) Newsletter

May 2022 | The Council of State Governments | Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee

Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee Newsletter

Committee Happenings

33. Not only is that the number of innings played in the longest professional baseball game in history. It is also how many days are left until the Midwestern Radioactive Materials Transportation Committee (MRMTC) Spring 2022 Meeting on June 7, in Philadelphia, PA! With so few days left before the big meeting, now is the perfect time for MRMTC members to register and make their hotel reservations. Committee members can use a special code during registration to avoid paying the $100 registration fee. Please contact Mitch Arvidson to receive this code.

CSG Midwest staff are busy putting the final touches on the meeting agenda but you can look forward to a jam-packed afternoon! Attendees can expect to hear updates from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Nuclear Energy (NE), DOE Office of Packaging and Transportation (OPT), DOE Carlsbad Field Office (CBFO), and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). There will also be opportunities to hear from one another about member states' activities, MRMTC working group activities, and National Transportation Stakeholders Forum (NTSF) ad hoc working group (AHWG) activities. Finally, we will take a look ahead to the MRMTC Fall 2022 Meeting and discuss project ideas for FY23. So, please consider registering for and attending the MRMTC Spring 2022 Meeting and let Mitch Arvidson know if you have any questions.

In other MRMTC news, the committee has added an alternate member from the great state of Ohio! Tad Rumas has been attending MRMTC meetings for several years and has been active in both MRMTC and NTSF groups. Now, he is officially a committee member. Tad is a Hazardous Materials (HM) Specialist with the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO). Mr. Rumas currently supervises HM Specialists responsible for conducting investigations of motor carriers and other entities that offer and/or transport HM on Ohio's public highways. He is a State Level VI instructor, a Transportation Emergency Preparedness Program (TEPP) Modular Emergency Response Radiological Transportation Training (MERRTT) instructor, and hazmat technician. Prior to joining PUCO, Tad served as a Nuclear, Biological, Chemical Warfare Instructor in the U.S. Marine Corps. Welcome to the MRMTC Tad!

National Transportation Stakeholders Forum

As you are probably aware, the MRMTC Spring 2022 Meeting is in reality just one part of the larger 2022 Annual Meeting of the NTSF. Being held at the Philadelphia Marriott Downtown Hotel on June 6 - 9, the meeting will focus on DOE's planning and execution efforts for the safe transport of radioactive materials. For those interested in the agenda, please click here. Consider joining your colleagues after the closing session for an optional tour of the Holtec International Inc. facility in Camden, NJ. All travel expenses for MRMTC members attending the 2022 Annual Meeting of the NTSF will be covered by the committee.

At the Annual Meeting, several NTSF AHWGs will be starting and restarting after a bit of a lull in the last few months. The Spent Nuclear Fuel (SNF) Rail/Routing and TEPP Training AHWGs will be meeting once again. Edward Engle (Iowa), Tom Forbes (Ohio), Kelly Horn and Brian Vercruysse (Illinois), Jamie Reyes (Nebraska), and Waylon Sanford (Michigan) are all Midwestern members of the SNF Rail/Routing AHWG. Christopher Boswell (Iowa), Greg Gothard (Michigan), and Mr. Rumas (Ohio) serve on the TEPP Training AHWG.

In addition to these preexisting AHWGs, two new groups will be stood up at the Annual Meeting. Thank you to Mr. Gothard, Swapan Saha (Kansas), and Ryan Seabaugh (Missouri) who have already volunteered to serve on the Section 180(c) AHWG. We are still seeking volunteers for the new Spent Fuel Transportation Materials AHWG. This group will help DOE effectively and accurately communicate about DOE SNF transportation and associated SNF management activities, including federal interim storage. If you are interested in serving on this NTSF AHWG, please let Mitch Arvidson know.

Finally, the NTSF Planning Committee continues its work in the final days of preparation before the 2022 Annual Meeting. It last met on May 3 to discuss the upcoming meeting as well as hear an update on the early planning stages of the 2023 Annual Meeting, which the Midwest will host.

Focus This Month

President's FY23 Budget Request for DOE

In late March, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden revealed its FY23 budget request. For this Focus this Month, we will break down DOE's budget request. More specifically, the budget requests for the DOE-NE Office of Integrated Waste Management (IWM) and the DOE-Office of Environmental Management (EM).

Starting in FY21, Congress appropriated funds for "Nuclear Waste Disposal" outside of DOE-NE. For the past two years, some of those funds were specifically directed toward legal services and other support for managing the Nuclear Waste Fund, administering the Standard Contract, and maintaining security at the Yucca Mountain site ($7.5M in prior years, this year the request is $10.2M). The remaining $20 of the funds appropriated in this area in FY21 and FY22 were moved into DOE-IWM to support interim storage and consent-based siting.

The FY23 request shows DOE-IWM funding request at $53M, and depicts this as a $35M increase. However, in real terms it is more like a $15M increase above the combined prior Integrated Waste Management System (IWMS) funding of $18M and the $20M of Nuclear Waste Disposal funds that were moved into DOE-IWM. As in FY22, the President's Budget request is attempting to get Congress to appropriate funds for interim storage under the IWM program. It is not yet clear if Congress will do that this year, or keep it where it is. Special thanks to Erica Bickford for her help breaking down the DOE-IWM FY23 budget request.

Click here for the specific details of the IWMS budget request.

Meanwhile, DOE-EM has requested a FY23 budget of $7.64B. Here is how that $7.64B would be distributed:

Radioactive Tank Waste: $2.67B / 35%
Facility Decontamination & Decommissioning (D&D): $1.51B / 20%
Site Services: $1.44B / 18%
Transuranic (TRU) & Solid Waste: $986M / 13%
Soil & Groundwater: $535M / 7%
Special Nuclear Materials & SNF: $498M / 7%

According to this DOE-EM newsletter, the budget will build on past investments such as infrastructure improvements at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico and work on the Direct-Feed Low-Activity Waste (DFLAW) liquid waste treatment system at the Hanford Site in Washington. In addition to these past investments, new programs would be started to build a talent pipeline and support underrepresented communities near DOE-EM sites.

Nuclear News

Preempting Advanced Nuclear Reactor Wastes

The Biden administration has made the development and launching of advanced nuclear reactors a key part of its push to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the fight against climate change. This time around, the government is looking for ways to deal with advanced reactors' radioactive waste at the same time that the reactors themselves are being developed. Advance reactors are projected to produce less waste but that the radioactivity will be more concentrated. In March, DOE announced they had awarded a total of $36M to 11 projects trying to accelerate technologies that would tackle the advanced reactors' waste.

The projects will be administered through the DOE Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy's (ARPA-E) Optimizing Nuclear Waste and Advanced Reactor Disposal Systems (ONWARDS) program. TerraPower will receive more than $8.5M to work on recovering uranium from SNF that handles chloride salt volatility at high temperatures. Other projects will look into metal fuel recycling, turning waste into a dense cement, and burying waste in deep boreholes.

Read more about this program and the funded projects in Reuters and World Nuclear News.

Palisades Updates

In last month's newsletter, we let you know that Mr. Gothard has been serving on the Palisades Community Advisory Panel (PCAP). The purpose of this panel is to provide for open communication, public involvement, and education on issues related to the Palisades Nuclear Power Plant shutdown and decommissioning. Now, you can watch all of PCAP's past meetings on the panel's YouTube page.

As Palisades gets closer to its scheduled May 31 closing date, Consumers Energy is figuring out how to plug the future hole in its energy portfolio. Consumers, which buys power from the Entergy-owned Palisades plant, plans to buy four natural gas plants to replace its recently lost coal and nuclear energy. In 2025, the company's energy production will be 40% natural gas and 35% renewable. By 2040, the company hopes that a planned addition of 8,000 MW of solar power will increase the renewable energy share to 60%.

Check out the Holland Sentinel for more on Consumers Energy's plans.

Meanwhile, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer is hoping that DOE's $6 billion civil nuclear credit program will help keep Palisades running. Gov. Whitmer said the state will back an application for funding Palisades. In the first round of funding, DOE will prioritize plants that have already filed to shut down like Palisades and Diablo Canyon in California. However, Entergy has said it is focused on safely shutting down the plant and that they could not operate the plant beyond May because no new fuel has been ordered and employees are already making plans to move on from the plant. Entergy did say they will continue talking with other owners or operators who may be interested in buying the plant, which is licensed to operate until 2031.

Reuters and the Bradenton Herald has more coverage.

DOE-EM Site in Ohio Receives Special Guests

In a possible preview of some MRMTC Spring 2022 Meeting content (keep your eyes peeled for the final agenda), DOE-EM Senior Advisor William "Ike" White recently toured the Portsmouth Site in Pike County, Ohio. Starting in the late 1950s, the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion (GDP) Plant enriched uranium for nuclear weapons. In the 1960s, the plant changed to producing fuel for commercial nuclear power plants. Environmental cleanup efforts began in the late 1980s and the site began deactivation and decommissioning in 2011. Mr. White and other DOE officials reviewed teardown activities of the half-mile-long X-326 process building. Once all excavation activities are complete, up to 1,000 acres will be available for other uses.

DOE-EM's newsletter has more details on the tour.

Portsmouth Site in Pike County, Ohio (photo courtesy of DOE)

Thank you for reading. Watch for the next edition to come out on

June 2, 2022.

Missed a newsletter? Past issues are archived on the committee's webpage.

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-NE0009117, 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.