[House Hearing, 112 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
REVIEW OF THE BLUE RIBBON
COMMISSION ON AMERICA'S NUCLEAR FUTURE
DRAFT RECOMMENDATIONS
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON INVESTIGATIONS AND
OVERSIGHT
JOINT WITH THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT
COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2011
__________
Serial No. 112-47
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Science, Space, and Technology
Available via the World Wide Web: http://science.house.gov
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COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, SPACE, AND TECHNOLOGY
HON. RALPH M. HALL, Texas, Chair
F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
Wisconsin JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois
LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California
DANA ROHRABACHER, California ZOE LOFGREN, California
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland BRAD MILLER, North Carolina
FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois GABRIELLE GIFFORDS, Arizona
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri DONNA F. EDWARDS, Maryland
RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas MARCIA L. FUDGE, Ohio
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas BEN R. LUJAN, New Mexico
PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia PAUL D. TONKO, New York
SANDY ADAMS, Florida JERRY McNERNEY, California
BENJAMIN QUAYLE, Arizona JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland
CHARLES J. ``CHUCK'' FLEISCHMANN, TERRI A. SEWELL, Alabama
Tennessee FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida
E. SCOTT RIGELL, Virginia HANSEN CLARKE, Michigan
STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi VACANCY
MO BROOKS, Alabama
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois
CHIP CRAVAACK, Minnesota
LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana
DAN BENISHEK, Michigan
VACANCY
------
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
HON. PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia, Chair
F. JAMES SENSENBRENNER, JR., PAUL TONKO, New York
Wisconsin ZOE LOFGREN, California
SANDY ADAMS, Florida BRAD MILLER, North Carolina
RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois JERRY McNERNEY, California
LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana
DAN BENISHEK, Michigan
VACANCY
RALPH M. HALL, Texas EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
------
Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
HON. ANDY HARRIS, Maryland, Chair
DANA ROHRABACHER, California BRAD MILLER, North Carolina
ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California
FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma BEN R. LUJAN, New Mexico
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois PAUL D. TONKO, New York
W. TODD AKIN, Missouri ZOE LOFGREN, California
RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas JERRY McNERNEY, California
PAUL C. BROUN, Georgia
CHARLES J. ``CHUCK'' FLEISCHMANN,
Tennessee
RALPH M. HALL, Texas EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
C O N T E N T S
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Page
Witness List..................................................... 2
Hearing Charter.................................................. 3
Opening Statements
Statement by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman, Subcommittee
on Investigations and Oversight, Committee on Science, Space,
and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives.................. 22
Written Statement............................................ 24
Statement by Representative Paul Tonko, Ranking Minority Member,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, Committee on
Science, Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives.. 25
Written Statement............................................ 27
Statement by Representative Andy Harris, Chairman, Subcommittee
on Energy and Environment, Committee on Science, Space, and
Technology, U.S. House of Representatives...................... 28
Written Statement............................................ 29
Statement by Representative Brad Miller, Ranking Minority Member,
Subcommittee on Energy and Environment, Committee on Science,
Space, and Technology, U.S. House of Representatives........... 30
Written Statement............................................ 32
Witnesses:
Mr. Jack Spencer, Research Fellow, Nuclear Energy Policy,
Heritage Foundation
Oral Statement............................................... 34
Written Statement............................................ 36
Dr. Peter Swift, Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff,
Sandia National Laboratory
Oral Statement............................................... 43
Written Statement............................................ 44
Dr. Roger Kasperson, Professor and Distinguished Scientist, Clark
University
Oral Statement............................................... 46
Written Statement............................................ 48
Mr. Gary Hollis, Chairman, Nye County Board of County
Commissioners
Oral Statement............................................... 62
Written Statement............................................ 63
Mr. Rick McLeod, Executive Director, Savannah River Site
Community Reuse Organization
Oral Statement............................................... 65
Written Statement............................................ 66
Dr. Mark Peters, Deputy Laboratory Director for Programs, Argonne
National Laboratory
Oral Statement............................................... 69
Written Statement............................................ 71
Discussion
............................................................... 80
Appendix: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Mr. Jack Spencer, Research Fellow, Nuclear Energy Policy,
Heritage Foundation............................................ 94
Dr. Peter Swift, Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff,
Sandia National Laboratory..................................... 99
.................................................................
r. Roger Kasperson, Professor and Distinguished Scientist,
Clark University............................................. 109
Mr. Gary Hollis, Chairman, Nye County Board of County
Commissioners.................................................. 110
Mr. Rick McLeod, Executive Director, Savannah River Site
Community Reuse Organization................................... 113
Dr. Mark Peters, Deputy Laboratory Director for Programs, Argonne
National Laboratory............................................ 118
Appendix 2: Additional Material for the Record
Report by the Majority Staff of the House Science, Space, and
Technology Committee: Yucca Mountain: The Administration's
Impact on U.S. Nuclear Waste Management Policy, June 2011...... 122
Documentation from Nye County.................................... 167
What's Next for Nuclear Waste? A New Strategy for the CSRA....... 179
Letter from the Department of Energy Pertaining to Yucca Mountain
Repository License Application................................. 208
Federal Report: ``Nuclear Waste: Can Nevada Keep America's
Sizzling Nuclear Waste Out of Its Backyard?'' Governing
Magazine, April 1990........................................... 213
Testimony of Martin G. Malsch, Special Deputy Attorney General
for the State of Nevada........................................ 220
``Nuclear Waste Program Faces Political Burial,'' Science, 22
August 1986.................................................... 232
REVIEW OF THE BLUE RIBBON
COMMISSION ON AMERICA'S NUCLEAR FUTURE
DRAFT RECOMMENDATIONS
----------
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 27, 2011
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight,
joint with the
Subcommittee on Energy and Environment,
Committee on Science, Space, and Technology,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittees met, pursuant to call, at 10:05 a.m., in
Room 2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Paul Broun
[Chairman of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight]
presiding.
Chairman Broun. The Subcommittee on Investigations and
Oversight as well as the Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
will come to order.
Good morning. Welcome to today's hearing entitled ``Review
of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future Draft
Recommendations.'' In front of you are packets containing the
written testimony, biographies and Truth in Testimony
disclosures for today's witness panel. Before we get started,
since this is a joint hearing involving two Subcommittees, I
want to explain how we will operate procedurally so that all
Members understand how the question-and-answer period will be
handled. As always, we will alternate between the majority and
minority Members, and allow all Members an opportunity for
questioning before recognizing a Member for a second round of
questions if we have time for those second rounds. We will
recognize those Members of either Subcommittee present at the
gavel in order of seniority on full Committee and those that
come in after the gavel will be recognized in order of their
arrival. I now recognize myself for five minutes for an opening
statement.
On January 29, 2010, the President directed the Secretary
of Energy to establish a Blue Ribbon Commission to ``conduct a
comprehensive review of policies for managing the back of the
nuclear fuel cycle, including all alternatives for the storage,
processing and disposal of civilian and defense use nuclear
fuel and nuclear waste.''
Over the last year and a half, the Commission held numerous
meetings and site visits around the country in a transparent
and open manner, to hear a wide array of stakeholder input. I
was pleased that the Commission recognized the importance of
this issue in my community and came down to Georgia and South
Carolina last winter and listened to the concerns held by a
variety of organizations. On July 29th, the Commission released
its draft recommendations, announced it will seek comments on
that draft until October 31, and indicated that it will meet
its deadline to deliver a final report by January 29, 2012.
That is a novel idea, meeting a deadline. This hearing allows
the Committee to hear expert opinions on the Commission's draft
report and weigh in accordingly.
At the same time the Administration formed the BRC, the
Department of Energy announced its intention to withdraw the
Yucca Mountain license application before the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission. Shortly thereafter, Secretary Chu
promised that the BRC would have the authority to explore a
``full range of scientific and technical options.''
Unfortunately it appears that promise was broken. Co-Chair Lee
Hamilton said Secretary Chu made it ``quite clear that nuclear
waste storage at Yucca Mountain is not an option, and that the
Blue Ribbon Commission will be looking at better
alternatives.''
While the BRC charter does not expressly prohibit the
consideration of Yucca Mountain, it is not surprising that the
BRC draft recommendations ignore the 900-pound gorilla in the
room. That 900-pound gorilla, not 800-pound but 900-pound
gorilla, or more appropriately the $15 billion gorilla, was
actually recommended by Secretary Chu months before he joined
this recommendation. He made the recommendation of Yucca
Mountain. Given the longstanding acknowledgement of the need
for a permanent deep geological repository, it should come as
no surprise that the BRC still called for a geological
repository to be expeditiously developed.
Many of the Commission's other recommendations, such as the
development of a quasi-governmental organization and the manner
in which the Nuclear Waste Fund, which finances activities to
store spent nuclear fuel, is administered are very interesting.
I look forward to working with the Commission and the
Administration on these recommendations, particularly the
research, development and demonstration provisions that fall
within this Committee's jurisdiction.
Ensuring a sustained, viable and safe nuclear sector is an
important part of a balanced energy portfolio, and that is
enabled by responsible public and private investments in
research and development. In Georgia alone, almost a quarter,
24.7 percent, of its electricity generation comes from nuclear
energy. Two power stations, Hatch and Vogtle, have the capacity
to generate over 4,000 megawatts of emissions-free energy.
That nuclear power production also produces spent fuel.
There is already a significant amount, 2,410 metric tons, of
commercial spent fuel currently stored in Georgia awaiting
disposition, fuel that the people of Georgia have already paid
over $700 million to dispose of. On top of the fees paid by
ratepayers, the American taxpayers are on the hook for $12
billion in liabilities, due to the Federal Government's
inability to meet their legal obligation to accept spent
nuclear fuel. This liability is likely to skyrocket in future
years in the absence of federal action.
In addition to the fuel stored at Georgia's nuclear
reactors, the Savannah River Site also houses a great deal of
radioactive material as a result of its contributions to our
Nation's nuclear weapons program. I am concerned that the BRC
interim storage recommendations will be used to make the
Savannah River Site a de facto repository without any of the
scientific study that Yucca Mountain has undergone. This
concern has long been recognized and was the reason why in 1987
Congress prohibited the construction of such a facility prior
to a license being issued for a permanent geological
repository.
This distrust brings me to another point. This
Administration has long claimed that it makes its decisions
based on science. In 2008, the President stated that he would
``restore the basic principle that government decisions should
be based on the best available, scientifically valid evidence,
not on the ideological predispositions of agency officials or
political appointees.'' Also, just last year, the President's
Press Secretary stated this: ``I think what has taken Yucca
Mountain off the table in terms of a long-term solution for a
repository for our nuclear waste is the science. The science
ought to make these decisions.''
After reviewing the NRC's evaluation of whether Yucca
Mountain meets regulatory standards, I have trouble reconciling
those two statements.
At this point, I would like to enter into the record a
majority staff report titled Yucca Mountain: The
Administration's Impact on U.S. Nuclear Waste Management
Policy. Without objection, so ordered.
[The information may be found in Appendix 2.]
Chairman Broun. The report pointedly highlights the NRC's
independent evaluation of Yucca Mountain determined the
proposed repository meets all applicable safety requirements,
including those related to human health and groundwater
protection, and the scientific performance goals set forth by
the regulatory agencies.
While I believe the Commission's draft recommendations
offer an opportunity to explore innovative policy options, the
fact that the Commission was precluded from addressing Yucca
Mountain limits the usefulness of the report. Any serious
review of spent fuel management has to recognize the decades of
research and billions of dollars, taxpayers' dollars, in
investment to ready Yucca Mountain to accept spent nuclear
fuel. Let us also not forget that Yucca Mountain is designated
by law as the Nation's spent fuel repository. I hope that the
Commission members take this into consideration as they prepare
their final report.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Broun follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
On January 29, 2010, The President directed the Secretary of Energy
to establish a Blue Ribbon Commission to ``conduct a comprehensive
review of policies for managing the back of the nuclear fuel cycle,
including all alternatives for the storage, processing, and disposal of
civilian and defense used nuclear fuel and nuclear waste.''
Over the last year and a half, the Commission held numerous
meetings and site visits around the country in a transparent and open
manner, to hear a wide array of stakeholder input. I was pleased that
the Commission recognized the importance of this issue in my community
and came down to Georgia and South Carolina last winter and listened to
the concerns held by a variety of organizations. On July 29, the
Commission released its draft recommendations, announced it will seek
comments on that draft until October 31, and indicated that it will
meet its deadline to deliver a final report by January 29, 2012. This
hearing allows the Committee to hear expert opinions on the
Commission's Draft Report and weigh in accordingly.
At the same time the Administration formed the BRC, the Department
of Energy announced that its intention to withdraw the Yucca Mountain
license application before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Shortly
thereafter, Secretary Chu promised that the BRC would have the
authority to explore a ``full range of scientific and technical
options.'' Unfortunately it appears that promise was broken. Co-Chair
Lee Hamilton said Secretary Chu made it ``quite clear that nuclear
waste storage at Yucca Mountain is not an option, and that the Blue
Ribbon Commission will be looking at better alternatives.'' While the
BRC charter does not expressly prohibited the consideration of Yucca
Mountain, it is not surprising that the BRC draft recommendations
ignore the 900-pound gorilla in the room. That 900-pound gorilla, or
more appropriately the $15 billion gorilla, was actually recommended by
Secretary Chu months before he joined the Administration. Given the
long-standing acknowledgement of the need for a permanent deep
geological repository, it should come as no surprise that the BRC still
called for a geological repository to be expeditiously developed.
Many of the Commission's other recommendations, such as the
development of a quasi-governmental organization and the manner in
which the Nuclear Waste Fund, which finances activities to store spent
nuclear fuel, is administered are very interesting. I look forward to
working with the Commission and the Administration on these
recommendations, particularly the Research, Development, and
Demonstration provisions that fall within this Committee's
jurisdiction. Ensuring a sustained, viable, and safe nuclear sector is
an important part of a balanced energy portfolio, and that is enabled
by responsible public and private investments in research and
development. In Georgia alone, almost a quarter (24.7%) of its
electricity generation comes from nuclear energy. Two power stations--
Hatch and Vogtle--have the capacity to generate over 4,000 megawatts of
emission-free energy.
That nuclear power production also produces spent fuel. There is
already a significant amount (2,410 metric tons) of commercial spent
fuel currently stored in Georgia awaiting disposition--fuel that the
people of Georgia have already paid over $700 million to dispose of. On
top of the fees paid by ratepayers, the American taxpayers are on the
hook for $12 billion in liabilities, due to the Federal Government's
inability to meet their legal obligation to accept spent nuclear fuel.
This liability is likely to skyrocket in future years in the absence of
federal action.
In addition to the fuel stored at Georgia's nuclear reactors, the
Savannah River Site also houses a great deal of radioactive material as
a result of its contributions to our Nation's nuclear weapons program.
I am concerned that the BRC interim storage recommendations will be
used to make the Savannah River Site a de facto repository without any
of the scientific study that Yucca Mountain has undergone. This concern
has long been recognized and was the reason why in 1987 Congress
prohibited the construction of such a facility prior to a license being
issued for a permanent geological repository.
This distrust brings me to another point. This Administration has
long claimed that it makes its decisions based on science. In 2008, the
President stated that he would ``restore the basic principle that
government decisions should be based on the best-available,
scientifically valid evidence and not on the ideological
predispositions of agency officials or political appointees.'' Also,
just last year, the President's Press Secretary stated, ``I think what
has taken Yucca Mountain off the table in terms of a long-term solution
for a repository for our nuclear waste is the science. The science
ought to make these decisions.'' After reviewing the NRC's evaluation
of whether Yucca Mountain meets regulatory standards, I have trouble
reconciling those two statements. At this point, I would like to enter
into the record a majority staff report titled Yucca Mountain: The
Administration's Impact on U.S. Nuclear Waste Management Policy. The
report pointedly highlights the NRC's independent evaluation of Yucca
Mountain that determined the proposed repository meets all applicable
safety requirements, including those related to human health and
groundwater protection, and the specific performance goals set forth by
the regulatory agencies.
While I believe the Commission's draft recommendations offer an
opportunity to explore innovative policy options, the fact that the
Commission was precluded from addressing Yucca Mountain limits the
usefulness of the report. Any serious review of spent fuel management
has to recognize the decades of research and billions of dollars in
investment to ready Yucca Mountain to accept spent nuclear fuel. Let's
also not forget that Yucca Mountain is designated by law as the
Nation's spent fuel repository.
I hope that the Commission Members take this into consideration as
they prepare their final report.
Chairman Broun. With that, now I will recognize--and I
welcome our new Ranking Member, Mr. Tonko, and I recognize you,
my friend, for five minutes. I look forward to working with you
on this Committee.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman. I appreciate the
trust shown by the Democrats of the Committee to have me serve
as their Ranking Minority Member for the Subcommittee on
Investigations and Oversight, and I do look forward to a
productive working relationship.
On November 4, 2008, the citizens of this country chose
then-Senator Barack Obama to serve as President of these United
States. He received 53 percent of the popular vote and the
largest absolute number of votes of any candidate in our
country's history.
As a candidate, he had promised very clearly that Yucca
Mountain would not be used as a nuclear waste repository. After
taking office he took steps to keep that promise. That is
politics, but that is the kind of politics that lies at the
heart of a functioning democracy. Apparently, President Obama's
position on Yucca will not be reversed even in the unlikely
event that Congressman Paul or Governor Romney or Governor
Perry wins the 2012 Presidential election. In the Republican
candidates' debate in Nevada last week, all three of them said
that they would not open Yucca either.
The decision to close Yucca Mountain was not driven by
science, and it is a fiction to pretend that it was. The change
that this--the charge, rather, that this is an example of a
lack of scientific integrity only stands as an argument one
way, if you can sell the idea that somehow the decision-making
on Yucca always hinged on science, and that the new
Administration abandoned that path or somehow skewed the
science to support a favored outcome.
The truth is that the actual decision process surrounding
Yucca has always been political. The Administration's decision
to close Yucca was a position advocated by a Presidential
candidate and then supported by a majority of American voters.
In the United States democratic system, we also call that a
mandate for change.
How was Yucca selected to become the Nation's permanent
nuclear waste repository in the first place? You can look at
the entire body of the majority's report, almost 40 pages long,
but one critical term is missing. It was popularly referred to
in more colloquial terms but we might otherwise call it the
``Forget Nevada'' amendment. The majority's report does not
mention this Amendment that came back from a House-Senate
Conference Committee in 1987.
In 1987, two of the leading alternative sites had powerful
political patrons. Texas had a site in Speaker Wright's
district. Washington State had a site in Majority Leader
Foley's district. It may not be too much of a shock to learn
that those sites were pulled out of the competition by
Congress, thereby leaving Yucca Mountain as the only
alternative. At the time, Harry Reid, a former member of the
I&O Subcommittee, was in his first year as a Senator from
Nevada. Two decades later, the situation has changed in
remarkable ways, but with predictable consequences.
Let me be clear: it was not science that led Yucca to be
selected, but rather political muscle exercised by highly
influential Members of this House and the Senate. However, none
of this is in the Majority Staff's report.
After the 1987 Amendments to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act,
the only site that DOE was authorized to characterize and
develop was Yucca Mountain. Politicians told scientists where
they could look. The State of Nevada, aside from a very small
number of people, never accepted this imposition by Washington,
DC. The State has always felt it was unfair to the people of
Nevada. In the face of a claim of injustice, questions about
science seem small.
Candidate Obama recognized the procedural failings in
trying to force a waste repository on the State. His statement
on Yucca speaks of science, but the core of his position was
about fairness, justice and equity. His statement reads, in
relevant part, ``States should not be unfairly burdened with
waste from other States.''
The Majority Staff report does not quote this portion of
Mr. Obama's position. By ignoring this foundational claim, the
Majority Staff report distorts a key problem with Yucca: that
49 States ganged up on one State. In such a situation, the most
important quality of the site is not its geology and it is not
its hydrology, but the fairness of how the site was selected in
the first place. In other words, this is a partially--this is
partially a States' rights issue.
Science can provide facts about a changing world, but
making policy is about weighing the anticipated consequences of
policy options against a complex set of values and interests.
To try to claim that Yucca is solely about science defaces the
history of that site, the motives of President Obama, and even
the positions of leading Republican Presidential candidates
such as Governor Romney, Governor Perry and Congressman Paul.
Nevada has successfully pushed back and now has a political
weight that they lacked back in 1987. I don't want to say that
Yucca will never be used as a repository for waste, but if it
is opened, it should be because Nevadans are willing to take
the waste, not because 49 States have forced it on them.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Tonko follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Paul Tonko,
Ranking Minority Member,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your welcome, and I look forward to a
productive working relationship.
On November 4, 2008, the citizens of the United States chose Barack
Obama to serve as our President. He received 53% of the popular vote
and the largest absolute number of votes of any candidate in the
country's history.
As a candidate he had promised, very clearly, that Yucca Mountain
would not be used as a nuclear waste repository. After taking office he
took steps to keep that promise. That is politics, but that is the kind
of politics that lies at the heart of a functioning democracy.
Apparently, Mr. Obama's position on Yucca will not be reversed even
in the unlikely event that Mr. Paul or Mr. Romney or Mr. Perry wins the
2012 Presidential election. In the Republican candidates' debate in
Nevada last week, all three of them said that they would not open Yucca
either.
The decision to close Yucca Mountain was not driven by science, and
it is a fiction to pretend that it was. The charge that this is an
example of a lack of scientific integrity only stands as an argument
one way--if you can sell the idea that somehow the decision making on
Yucca always hinged on science, and that the new Administration
abandoned that path or somehow skewed the science to support a favored
outcome.
The truth is that the actual decision process surrounding Yucca has
always been political. The Administration's decision to close Yucca was
a position advocated by a Presidential candidate and then supported by
a majority of American voters. We might otherwise call that a mandate
for change.
How was Yucca selected to become the Nation's permanent nuclear
waste repository in the first place? You can look at the entire body of
the Majority's report--almost 40 pages long--but one critical term is
missing. Please excuse the colloquial nature of my comment, but the
Majority's report does not even mention the ``Screw Nevada'' amendment,
as it was popularly known, that came back from a House-Senate
Conference Committee in 1987.
In 1987, two of the leading alternative sites had powerful
political patrons. Texas had a site in Speaker Wright's district.
Washington had a site in Majority Leader Foley's district. It may not
be too much of a shock to learn that those sites were pulled out of the
competition by Congress, thereby leaving Yucca Mountain as the only
alternative. At the time, Harry Reid, a former Member of this I&O
Subcommittee, was in his first year as a Senator from Nevada. Two
decades later, the situation has changed in remarkable ways, but with
predictable consequences.
Let me be clear, it was not science that led Yucca to be selected,
but political muscle exercised by highly influential Members of the
House and the Senate. However, none of this is in the Majority Staff's
report.
After the 1987 Amendments to the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the only
site that DOE was authorized to characterize and develop was Yucca
Mountain. Politicians told scientists where they could look.
The State of Nevada, aside from a very small number of people,
never accepted this imposition by Washington, DC. The State has always
felt it was unfair to the people of Nevada. In the face of a claim of
injustice, questions about science seem small. Candidate Obama
recognized the procedural failings in trying to force a waste
repository on the State. His statement on Yucca speaks of science, but
the core of his position was about fairness, justice and equity. His
statement reads, in relevant part, ``States should not be unfairly
burdened with waste from other states.''
The Majority staff report does not quote this portion of Mr.
Obama's position. By ignoring this foundational claim, the Majority
staff report distorts a key problem with Yucca: that 49 States ganged
up on one State. In such a situation, the most important quality of the
site is not its geology or hydrology, but the fairness of how the site
was selected in the first place.
In other words, this is a States' rights issue.
Science can provide facts about a changing world, but making policy
is about weighing the anticipated consequences of policy options
against a complex set of values and interests. To try to claim that
Yucca is solely about science defaces the history of the site, the
motives of President Obama and even the positions of leading Republican
Presidential candidates such as Mr. Romney, Mr. Perry and Mr. Paul.
Procedural justice represents one of those qualities that
distinguishes democracy from despotism. When you ignore fairness,
people push back, as the representatives of the people of Nevada have
done.
Nevada has successfully pushed back and now has a political weight
that they lacked in 1987. I don't want to say that Yucca will never be
used as a repository for waste, but if it is opened, it should be
because Nevadans are willing to take the waste, not because 49 States
have forced it on them.
With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Tonko.
I would like to ask unanimous consent that the gentleman
from California, Mr. Garamendi, be allowed to sit on the dais
with the Committee and participate in the hearings. Hearing no
objection, so ordered.
Now I recognize Dr. Harris for his opening statement.
Doctor, you are recognized for five minutes.
Mr. Harris. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I first want to thank our witnesses for being here this
morning as the Subcommittees review the draft recommendations
of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
Nuclear energy is an integral component of America's energy
portfolio. One hundred four currently operating commercial
nuclear reactors deliver a clean, affordable and reliable
energy source that supplies 20 percent of America's
electricity. That electricity generation, along with America's
nuclear weapons programs, produces radioactive waste that the
Federal Government has a longstanding statutory responsibility
to accept and permanently dispose of.
It is important to recognize how we arrived at this point.
For more than 30 years, Yucca Mountain, Nevada, has been
extensively studied to determine if a permanent, geologic
repository for high-level radioactive waste can safely be
constructed and operated. Taxpayers spent approximately $15
billion on this effort, and in 2008, the Department of Energy
submitted an 8,600-page application to the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission proposing that it could indeed be done safely. NRC
scientific and technical staff reviewed this application in
equally excruciating detail, and agreed with the Department of
Energy.
Yet, despite this investment and decades of scientific
work, the DOE has sought to withdraw its application on
political, not technical grounds, asserting only that Yucca
Mountain ``isn't a workable option'' and the NRC Chairman has
halted all work on the application review and refused to allow
for finalization of the technical review.
Now, the argument that campaign promises and politics
should always trump sound policy is belied by Guantanamo Bay,
for instance. This is the Science Committee, not the Politics
Committee, and this hearing is not only justified but owed to
the American public who longs for solutions not beholden to
politics.
President Obama's unilateral decision to discard decades of
the scientific community's hard work and ignore the current law
on the books has thrown United States nuclear waste management
policy into disarray.
This brings us to the Blue Ribbon Commission, established
by President Obama in concurrence with his dismantling of
existing nuclear waste management structure. The BRC is
specifically tasked to review policies associated with managing
the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle and related issues of
storage, processing and disposal of both civilian and defense
nuclear waste.
In July, the BRC issued its draft report to the Secretary
of Energy and will release its final report by the end of
January 2012. I would first like to recognize the good work put
in by the members of the Commission in drafting this report. It
contains valuable ideas that Congress should consider and work
to be a thoughtful partner in advancing.
For example, I support the BRC's interest in long-term
support for research, development and demonstration of advanced
reactor and fuel cycle technologies that could reduce the
amount of high-level radioactive waste produced and change how
that waste is managed.
The potential contributions of the BRC, however, appear to
be limited by politics. Upon initiating the panel's work,
Commission Co-Chair Lee Hamilton said that Secretary of Energy
Chu ``made it quite clear that nuclear waste storage at Yucca
Mountain is not an option, and that the Blue Ribbon Commission
should be looking at better alternatives.'' This action by the
Administration is striking not only in its audacity; it is also
simply irrational to suggest a ``better alternative'' can be
identified without a direct comparison to the current plan for
which an alternative is being sought.
To its credit, the Commission calls for expeditious
development of a permanent geologic repository, but turning a
blind eye to the elephant in the room that is Yucca Mountain
will render all its efforts fundamentally flawed. Unless and
until the Federal Government honors its legal obligation to
proceed in good faith with disposal of high-level radioactive
waste, the long-term viability of nuclear energy to meet
growing electricity demands remains in doubt.
The Blue Ribbon Commission still has an opportunity to
impact this future direction, and I hope today's hearing
provides it with informative and useful guidance toward that
end.
Today I welcome hearing evaluations of and recommendations
on the Commission's draft report, and Mr. Chairman, I yield
back the balance of my time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Harris follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Andy Harris, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
I want to thank our witnesses for being here this morning as the
Subcommittees review the draft recommendations of the Blue Ribbon
Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
Nuclear energy is an integral component of America's energy
portfolio. One hundred four currently operating commercial nuclear
reactors deliver a clean, affordable, and reliable energy source that
supplies 20 percent of America's electricity. That electricity
generation, along with America's nuclear weapons programs, produces
radioactive waste that the Federal Government has a longstanding
statutory responsibility to accept and permanently dispose of.
It is important to recognize how we arrived at this point. For more
than 30 years, Yucca Mountain, Nevada, has been extensively studied to
determine if a permanent, geologic repository for high-level
radioactive waste can safely be constructed and operated. Taxpayers
spent approximately $15 billion on this effort, and in 2008 the
Department of Energy submitted an 8,600 page application to the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission proposing that it could indeed be done safely.
NRC scientific and technical staff reviewed this application in equally
excruciating detail, and agreed with DOE.
Yet, despite this investment and decades of scientific work, the
DOE has sought to withdraw its application on political, not technical
grounds--asserting only that Yucca Mountain ``isn't a workable
option''--and the NRC Chairman has halted all work on the application
review and refused to allow for finalization of the technical review.
These actions come from political appointees of a President who entered
office touting his commitment to ``restore the basic principle that
government decisions should be based on the best-available,
scientifically valid evidence and not on the ideological
predispositions of agency officials or political appointees.''
President Obama's unilateral decision to discard decades of the
scientific community's hard work and ignore the current law on the
books has thrown United States nuclear waste management policy into
disarray.
This brings us to the Blue Ribbon Commission, established by
President Obama in concurrence with his dismantling of existing nuclear
waste management structure. The BRC is specifically tasked to review
policies associated with managing the back end of the nuclear fuel
cycle and related issues of storage, processing, and disposal of
civilian and defense nuclear waste.
In July, the BRC issued its Draft Report to the Secretary of Energy
and will release its final report by the end of January 2012. I would
like to recognize the good work the Members of the Commission put into
drafting this report. It contains valuable ideas that Congress should
consider and work to be a thoughtful partner in advancing.
For example, I support the BRC's interest in long-term support for
research, development, and demonstration on advanced reactor and fuel
cycle technologies that could reduce the amount of high-level
radioactive waste produced and change how that waste is managed.
The potential contributions of the BRC, however, appear to be
limited by politics. Upon initiating the panel's work, Commission Co-
Chair Lee Hamilton said that Secretary of Energy Chu ``made it quite
clear that nuclear waste storage at Yucca Mountain is not an option,
and that the Blue Ribbon Commission will be looking at better
alternatives.''
The action by the Administration is striking not only in its
audacity; it is also simply irrational to suggest a ``better
alternative'' can be identified without a direct comparison to the
current plan for which an alternative is being sought. To its credit,
the Commission calls for expeditious development of a permanent
geologic repository, but turning a blind eye to the elephant in the
room that is Yucca Mountain will render its efforts fundamentally
flawed.
Unless and until the Federal Government honors its legal obligation
to proceed with disposal of high-level radioactive waste, the long-term
viability of nuclear energy to meet growing electricity demands remains
in doubt. The Blue Ribbon Commission still has an opportunity to impact
this future direction, and I hope today's hearing provides it with
informative and useful guidance toward that end.
I welcome the witnesses' evaluation and recommendations on the
Commission's draft report and I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Dr. Harris.
The Chairman now recognizes Mr. Miller, the Ranking Member
of the Energy and Environment Subcommittee from North Carolina
for your statement.
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This is a very odd hearing. We are considering the draft
report of a Blue Ribbon Commission with no witnesses from the
Commission to explain their tentative findings. They are, to
their credit, seeking comments, presumably some from
scientists. To their credit, apparently they want to consider
those findings before they issue a final report, and it
certainly would be useful for this Committee to hear those
comments too, again, many presumably from scientists.
It is very likely, as the Chairs have said, that we will
need to rely more on nuclear power in the future. It is kind of
hard to imagine an energy future in the next couple generations
that does not include more nuclear power. But it is still far
more expensive. It is not affordable compared to natural gas,
for instance. It is far more expensive than other forms of
energy, even with the massive subsidies that it does get from
the Federal Government, and with the construction of more
nuclear power plants requiring the capital investment of many
billions of dollars, which investors have been understandably
reluctant to put down, it is not at all clear why we could not
wait until the end of January to see the final report of the
Commission, comments and all.
And there are still many reasons to be concerned, despite
the fact that we obviously are going to have to rely upon
nuclear power more in the future, there are many reasons for
caution. The experience in Fukushima should underscore that
pretty dramatically.
And undoubtedly, one of the unresolved issues is what to do
with high-level nuclear waste. We already have 80,000 tons of
it, and that figure is growing, that nuclear power plants will
continue to produce, and it has to be stored safely somewhere
for 10,000 years. That is a long time. But even more important,
it doesn't just appear magically at the storage site. We have
to get it there. We have to transport it from all over the
country, and while it is true, I know, that there is a witness
from Nye County who would welcome the economic activity of
storing the waste at Yucca Mountain, the people of the nearby
town/city of Las Vegas, who know that the bulk of the nuclear
waste, high-level nuclear waste, will come through or very near
Las Vegas, whether it is transported by rail or by truck, are
adamantly opposed to it. The opposition of the people of Nevada
is pretty well shown by the adamant opposition of their
Congressional delegation, by President Obama's opposition, by
the opposition of, as Mr. Tonko has said, three of the leading
Republican candidates for President when they were asked in
Nevada about it. It is good to be an early primary State and a
State that in a general election is now a swing State. You do
get a lot of attention as a result. People in national politics
care what you think.
And it is also understandable that the people of Nevada are
more than a little skeptical about the supposed science that
supports this. That has not been the history of the decision to
site a high-level nuclear repository in Yucca Mountain. As Mr.
Tonko has already said, 25 years ago there were three sites
proposed: one in the district of the Speaker of the House, one
in the district of the Majority Leader of the House, and then
Yucca Mountain. Senator Reid now has a great deal of political
influence, but at the time he was in his first year in the
Senate. And as Mr. Tonko has said, actually he said the phase,
the colloquial phrase at the time was ``forget Nevada.'' We all
know what that really was. It wasn't ``forget.'' I had a
somewhat more sanitized version in my materials, which was
``screw Nevada,'' but it was not a real scientifically pristine
decision. It was always a decision that was filled with
politics.
So yes, we do need to have more science and less politics
in this decision. I hope we will get some of that in our
Committee's deliberations on this issue, but there is little to
suggest it in today's hearing, which seems to be taking place
at a very odd time for a decision that will really consider
closely the science behind this decision.
I yield back the balance of my time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Miller follows:]
Prepared Statement of Representative Brad Miller,
Ranking Member, Subcommittee on Energy and Environment
This is a very odd hearing. We are considering the draft report of
a Blue Ribbon Commission with no witnesses from the Commission to
explain even their tentative findings.
It is very likely that we will need to rely on nuclear power more
in the future, but with nuclear power still far more expensive than
other forms of energy, even with massive subsidies from the Federal
Govermnent, and with the construction of nuclear power plants requiring
the capital investment of many billions of dollars, which investors
have been understandably reluctant to put down, it is not at all clear
why we did not wait at least until the Commission issued a final
report.
And while it is hard to imagine an energy future for the next
couple of generations that does not include more nuclear power, there
are still many reasons for caution, as the experience in Fukishuma
should underscore.
One ofthe unresolved issues is what to do with the high-level
radioactive waste, already 80,000 tons and growing, that nuclear power
plants produce. The high-level waste will need to be stored safely for
10,000 years. That's a long time. And we have to figure out how to
transport the waste safely to wherever we store it.
Unfortunately, the question of storage of nuclear has always been
driven more by politics than by science. We will hear today from local
leaders in Nye County, Nevada, who would welcome the economic boost of
storing nuclear waste at the proposed Yucca Mountain facility. But the
communities that the waste would go through, notably Las Vegas, are
adamantly opposed to the proposed Yucca Mountain facility.
The prevailing view of Nevadans is reflected in the Nevada
Congressional delegation's opposition, President Obama's opposition,
and the opposition of three Republican Presidential candidates when
asked in Nevada. It's good to be both an early primary and a swing
State in the fall.
And the resentment of Nevadans to the siting of the facility in
their State is more than understandable. A quarter century ago, there
were at least three proposed sites: one in the district ofthe Speaker
of the House, another in the district of the House Majority Leader, and
Yucca Mountain. Senator Reid is powerful now, but at the time he was in
his first year of service in the Senate. The Amendment to site the
facility in Nevada was colloquially called the ``screw Nevada''
amendment at the time.
We do need more science and less politics in this decision, but
there is little to suggest today's hearing is a move towards science,
away from politics.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Miller. I think we have a
unanimous consent request from Mr. Tonko.
Mr. Tonko. Yes, Mr. Chairman, if you would please yield a
moment of time.
Chairman Broun. Without objection.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.
As I am sure you are aware, the Washington Post is
reporting that former Member of Congress Howard Wolpe passed
away on Tuesday. Mr. Wolpe was a Representative from the State
of Michigan who served as Chair of the I&O Subcommittee back in
1991 and 1992. He held many landmarks hearings, and his
investigative staff was topnotch. Probably the one item that
the Representative was very fondest of and best remembered for
was his work to stop the Superconducting Super Collider
project. Representative Wolpe worked hard and hand in hand with
his Ranking Minority Member to stop that project, and their
efforts saved taxpayers, in their opinion, at least $10 billion
in construction costs and billions more in operating expenses.
His record as I&O Chair stands among the strongest of any
Chair to serve in that role. In my new capacity on this
Subcommittee, Mr. Chair, I look forward to emulating his
bipartisan spirit and productive working relationship that both
he and Mr. Boehlert, Representative Boehlert from my region,
conducted, and I appreciate you yielding me that time, and we
call to mind and to memory the service of Representative Howard
Wolpe.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Tonko, and we pray for his
family also.
At this time I would like to introduce our panel of
witnesses. Our first witness is Mr. Jack Spencer, Research
Fellow in Nuclear Energy Policy at the Heritage Foundation. Our
second witness is Dr. Peter Swift, Distinguished Member of the
Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratory. Dr. Swift has
worked on geological disposal of radioactive waste since 1989.
He worked on the Waste Isolation Pilot Project--that is hard
for a Southerner to say all those Ps--from 1989 to 1998, and on
the Yucca Mountain project since 1998, serving as the Yucca
Mountain Lead Laboratory's Chief Scientist since 2006. Our
third witness is Dr. Roger Kasperson, Research Professor and
Distinguished Scientist at Clark University. Our fourth witness
is Mr. Gary Hollis, who is Chairman of the Nye County Board of
County Commissioners. Yucca Mountain is located in his county
in Nevada. Our fifth witness is Mr. Rick McLeod, Executive
Director of the Savannah River Site Community Reuse
Organization. SRS currently stores the second-highest amount of
high-level radioactive material in the country. Our final
witness is Dr. Mark Peters, Deputy Laboratory Director for
Programs at the Argonne National Laboratory. Dr. Peters
previously served as Senior Scientific Adviser in the former
Applied Science and Technology Directorate, where he supported
the Director of the Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste
Management. Dr. Peters also served as the Director of Program
Development for nuclear waste management technical work at the
laboratory's former Chemical Engineering Division. Prior to
joining Argonne, he was the Yucca Mountain Project Science and
Engineering Testing Project Manager.
As our witnesses should know, spoken testimony is limited
to five minutes each, after which the Members of the Committee
will have five minutes each to ask questions. Your written
testimony will be included in the record of this hearing.
It is the practice of the Subcommittee on Investigations
and Oversight to receive testimony under oath. Do any of you
have any objection to taking an oath? Anybody, please? Shake
your head from side to side or up and down so I can see. Dr.
Kasperson, do you have an objection? I don't see your head
moving. Okay. Let the record reveal that all witnesses are
willing to take an oath. You may be represented by counsel. Do
any of you have counsel here today? Anybody have counsel? Mr.
Hollis? Dr. Kasperson? Mr. Hollis? No? Okay. Let the record
reflect that none of the witnesses has counsel.
Now, if all of you would please now stand and raise your
right hand. Do you solemnly swear or affirm to tell the whole
truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God? Let the
record reflect that all the witnesses participating have taken
the oath. Please be seated.
Those bells that you just heard is the sign to us that we
just started a vote. For Members' edification, we will go
through as many opening statements as we can. We will recess to
go for votes. We will recess at about five minutes so that
everybody has time to get to the Floor to vote, and we will
reconvene at 10 minutes after the last vote is called. So
please hurry back so we can get this hearing finished and
accomplished and hear from our witnesses and get to questions.
I now recognize our first witness, Mr. Spencer. You are
recognized for five minutes. Please keep it within five
minutes, and then if you can make it shorter, please do. Your
full testimony will be included in the record.
STATEMENT OF MR. JACK SPENCER,
RESEARCH FELLOW, NUCLEAR ENERGY POLICY,
HERITAGE FOUNDATION
Mr. Spencer. All right. We will do what we can.
Chairmen Broun and Harris, Ranking Members Tonko and
Miller, and Members of the Subcommittees, my name is Jack
Spencer. I am the Research Fellow for Nuclear Energy Policy at
the Heritage Foundation. The views expressed in this testimony
are my own and should not be construed as representing the
official position of the Heritage Foundation.
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 attempted to establish
a comprehensive disposal strategy for high-level nuclear waste.
This strategy has failed. The government has spent billions of
dollars without opening a repository, has yet to receive any
waste and is amassing billions of dollars in liability. The
strategy codified in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act seemed
straightforward and economically sound when it was developed in
the early 1980s. It charged the Federal Government with
disposing used nuclear fuel in Yucca Mountain and created a
structure through which users of nuclear energy would pay a fee
for that service. These payments would go to the Nuclear Waste
Fund, which the Federal Government could access through
Congressional appropriations. What has become clear over time,
however, is that this approach was wrought with problems.
Nonetheless, it continued to inch forward, providing some
confidence that the Nation was moving toward a nuclear waste
management solution.
The Obama Administration's anti-Yucca policy, however, had
destroyed any such notion. The combination of the Federal
Government's historical ineptness and this Administration's
actions has undermined all confidence in Washington's ability
to meet its legal nuclear waste obligations. To restore this
confidence, the Obama Administration established the Blue
Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future to develop a new
strategy. Though the Administration's actions had added
substantial uncertainty to an already unpredictable federal
policy on nuclear waste, it does provide an opportunity to
bring about the reform necessary to get America's nuclear waste
policy on track.
Unfortunately, the BRC's recommendations as currently
drafted will not achieve this because it accepts the basic
tenets of the current system; that is that the Federal
Government should be responsible for nuclear waste management
and that these activities should be financed through a flat
fee, largely disconnected from any actual service. Accepting
this leads to recommendations that focus more on symptoms than
on the underlying flaws. These basic flaws are that, one, waste
producers are relieved of their responsibility for waste
management. This structure misaligns incentives,
responsibilities and authorities. And secondly, that there is
no specific price for specific services rendered. Accurate
pricing is critical to any efficient marketplace. Nonetheless,
the BRC does provide a framework that, with modification, could
yield long-term solutions.
For example, the BRC proposes that a federal corporation be
responsible for nuclear waste management. Simply moving a
function from one government agency to another only perpetuates
existing deficiencies. This approach essentially blames current
problems on the federal bureaucracy when the actual problem is
relegating a commercial activity to a government entity. A
better approach is to use the federal corporation to facilitate
the transfer of responsibility for nuclear waste management to
the private sector. To achieve this, the corporation's
responsibilities should be limited to disposing of existing
nuclear waste and should get access to the approximately $25
billion paid into the Nuclear Waste Fund to fund its
activities. Once this is complete, the corporation should be
dissolved or privatized.
Moving forward, the waste disposal fee should be repealed
and waste producers should manage their own waste. Utilities
would then bear the responsibility and have the freedom to
choose how to best manage their waste. This could include
direct disposal, reprocessing or some combination thereof. The
federal role would be to set and enforce regulatory standards.
Next, I would like to talk a little bit about nuclear waste
finance. The BRC correctly spent significant effort on how to
finance nuclear waste management. It recommended paying nuclear
waste fees into escrow accounts. Only that amount appropriated
by Congress would be paid to the Treasury. Though this would
protect fees from being used to fund other government
priorities, currently a major problem, it falls short of the
reform necessary.
A better approach would mandate that nuclear utilities
place in escrow adequate funds to dispose of waste stored on
site. This would eliminate the federal role in waste financing,
ensure that utilities have access to the funds that they have
set aside for waste disposal, and protect taxpayers by
guaranteeing adequate disposal funds will be available if a
plant ever goes out of business.
The final area I would like to address is geologic storage.
Unfortunately, the Secretary of Energy directed the BRC to rule
out any consideration of Yucca Mountain. Luckily, the BRC
charter makes no such prohibitions. Indeed, it does the
opposite by directing the BRC to consider all options.
The reality is, is that neither the BRC nor anyone else can
make a truly informed decision on Yucca because the NRC has
stopped work on the DOE's application to construct a repository
and refuses to release the NRC technical staff's findings
regarding the application. Therefore, the most important
recommendation the BRC should make is to demand that the NRC
complete the Yucca application and publicly release all data
generated by the application process. Whether or not the Yucca
repository is ever built, the NRC's completed review process
will yield unique information that has important future
relevance.
That concludes my testimony. I look forward to your
questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Spencer follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Jack Spencer,
Research Fellow,
Nuclear Energy Policy, Heritage Foundation
Chairmen Broun and Harris, Ranking Members Tonko and Miller and
Members of the Subcommittees: My name is Jack Spencer. I am the
Research Fellow for Nuclear Energy Policy at The Heritage Foundation.
The views I express in this testimony are my own, and should not be
construed as representing any official position of The Heritage
Foundation.
Thank you for inviting me to testify before the Energy &
Environment and Investigations & Oversight subcommittees regarding the
very important draft recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission on
America's Nuclear Future.
As we sit here today, there are approximately 440 commercial
nuclear reactors operating around the world. One hundred four of them
are operating in this country alone. With the exception of a few highly
publicized and, I might add, often misunderstood accidents, these
reactors have operated safely, cleanly, and to the benefit of society.
This is not to suggest that no problems have ever arisen as the
accident in Fukushima, Japan, makes abundantly clear. It is merely to
acknowledge the good track record of nuclear power.
Strong, Predictable Policy Is Needed for Nuclear Expansion
Nuclear energy is among America's least expensive electricity
sources, emits nothing into the atmosphere, and has a safety record
that includes no injuries, much less fatalities. Despite these facts,
no new plants have been ordered in the U.S. for three decades.
Given what we know about nuclear energy, there must be some
underlying problems that would make investment in this proven
technology so scarce. Indeed, today, despite all of the benefits of
nuclear power, the industry insists that it will not build new plants
without backing from the U.S. taxpayer.
Providing taxpayer support has been the approach of most
politicians in recent years. They recognize that nuclear energy has
many benefits, and to show their support they propose subsidies. In
fact, looking at most of the proposals in recent years, one might
conclude that Washington thinks that it can subsidize nuclear energy
into commercial viability. Essentially, doing so was the basic premise
behind the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT) proposals. That
legislation put forth a series of subsidies to build five or so nuclear
plants. That was supposed to help the industry get off the ground so
that they could begin privately building plants. While the legislation
instigated a series of permit applications to build new plants and even
site work at two locations, it has not brought about the advertised
nuclear renaissance. Indeed, since the 2005 law passed, quite the
opposite has occurred.
Instead of helping the nuclear industry to reestablish itself in
the marketplace, the law has merely led to a proliferation of requests
for additional taxpayer support. Since EPACT 2005, Congress has
introduced a virtual parade of legislation to broaden the Federal
Government's support for the nuclear industry. These proposals would
increase capital subsidies, use taxpayer money for such activities as
workforce development and manufacturing improvements, empower the
Department of Energy to decide which technologies should move forward,
and create mandates that essentially dictate that nuclear power is
used.
One of the basic problems with using subsidies to promote an
industry is that it allows both industry and government to ignore the
underlying problems, from a business or government standpoint, that
give rise to the need for subsidies to begin with. This perpetuates
those structural issues and creates a cycle where industry becomes
dependent on Federal Government--and that is where the nuclear industry
is today.
I believe that this dependence is not a financial one. Commercial
nuclear reactors and the businesses that support them operate
profitably in the United States, largely subsidy free, despite an
enormous and growing regulatory burden and an organized anti-nuclear
opposition. Instead, the U.S. nuclear industry depends on the U.S.
government for strong, predictable, and rational policies that govern
how the industry operates. It is the lack of these policies that
increase the financial risk of new nuclear investment and drives the
pursuit of subsidies to counter it.
This dearth of policy falls into two major categories: nuclear
waste management and disposal and an antiquated, unpredictable
regulatory approach. The Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear
Future attempts to address one of these problems: nuclear waste.
Reforming Spent Nuclear Fuel Management and Disposal
Despite growing political and public support for nuclear power,
progress toward actually building any new plants has been a struggle.
While the blame for this stagnation often goes to inefficient
government subsidy programs, the real problem lies in why those
subsidies are necessary to begin with. Chief among these structural
problems is the nation's incoherent nuclear waste policy. Ultimately,
the lack of a pathway to waste disposal creates substantial
unpredictability for nuclear investors. That risk must be offset to
allow investment to move forward.
This was a problem prior to the Obama Administration. The Federal
Government was legally obliged, according to the Nuclear Waste Policy
Act (NWPA) of 1982, as amended, to begin collecting nuclear waste in
1998. Despite collecting approximately $30 billion (fees plus interest)
from electricity ratepayers and spending nearly $15 billion (ratepayer
and taxpayer funds), it has not collected one atom of nuclear waste.
The one bright spot was the progress on Yucca Mountain made by
President George W. Bush's Department of Energy (DOE).
The Obama Administration's anti-Yucca policy destroyed this
progress. It ignored existing statute, such as the NWPA and the Yucca
Mountain Development Act of 2002, which stated clearly that Yucca
Mountain shall be the location of the nation's nuclear materials
repository. It unilaterally requested the withdrawal of the DOE's
permit application for Yucca to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
(NRC). Questions over the legality of this policy are currently under
review by the courts.
Meanwhile, in October 2010, former advisor to Senator Harry Reid
and current NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko ordered a stop to all Yucca-
related NRC activities. He argued that his authority to close out the
Yucca program was derived from President Obama's 2011 budget request.
The problem is that neither the House nor the Senate had passed that
proposed budget. Further, the order ignores the fact that the NRC's own
Atomic Licensing and Safety Board agreed unanimously that the DOE
lacked authority to withdraw the application. The Chairman's actions
were so unusual and contentious that fellow NRC Commissioners were
compelled to publicly denounce the decision.
The combination of federal promises to store nuclear waste, the
Obama Administration's policy, and the NRC's actions has resulted in a
complete lack of direction on nuclear waste management and a
dereliction of responsibility on the part of the Federal Government.
This creates substantial government-imposed risk on the nuclear
industry, which is the primary obstacle to an expansion of U.S. nuclear
power.
The Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future
Understanding that his policy to end the Yucca program without a
backup plan would essentially end the American nuclear renaissance
before it started, the Obama Administration established the Blue Ribbon
Commission on America's Nuclear Future to develop with a plan to manage
and dispose of America's nuclear waste.
Unfortunately, the draft recommendations in President Barack
Obama's Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future (BRC) \1\
fall short of fixing America's nuclear waste policy dilemma. Though
some of the recommendations were positive, they would, if implemented,
not result in the fundamental reforms necessary for an economically
sustainable and technologically diverse approach to nuclear power to
emerge. \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future, ``Draft
Report to the Secretary of Energy,'' July 29, 2011, at http://brc.gov/
sites/default/files/documents/
brc-draft-report-29jul2011-0
.pdf (August 10, 2011).
\2\ Jack Spencer, ``Introducing Market Forces into Nuclear Waste
Management Policy,'' Statement to the Reactor and Fuel Cycle Technology
Subcommittee of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future,
Heritage Foundation Testimony, August 30, 2010, http://
www.heritage.org/research/testimony/introducing-market-forces-into-
nuclear-waste-management-policy.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
While acknowledging the many challenges and failures of America's
nuclear waste management and disposal program, the BRC unwisely accepts
that the basic structure of the system is sound. This acceptance leads
to recommendations that focus more on symptoms than on underlying
flaws. Real progress requires first identifying the real problems.
There are three fundamental problems with nuclear waste management
in the United States:
No long-term geologic storage. Deep geologic storage like
that proposed for Yucca Mountain, Nevada, provides a safe, long-term
solution and thus is critical to any comprehensive nuclear waste
management plan. To date, despite having spent approximately $15
billion in electricity rate payers' and taxpayers' money on Yucca
Mountain and a statutory mandate to do so, the U.S. still has no
functional geologic repository for nuclear waste.
Waste producers are relieved of their responsibility for
waste management. Private nuclear plant operators produce waste, but
under current law the Federal Government is responsible for managing
it. This removes the incentive for those who financially depend on
waste production, the nuclear utilities, to have any interest in how
the waste is managed because the Federal Government is wholly
responsible. Washington, however, has proven unable to implement
anything close to a workable solution. This outcome is predictable
given a structure that fundamentally misaligns incentives,
responsibilities, and authorities. The nuclear industry, which is fully
capable of running safe nuclear power plants, is likewise fully capable
of managing its own waste and should have the responsibility to do so.
No specific price for specific services rendered. Under
the current system, nuclear utilities produce waste, then pay the
Federal Government a flat fee for an undefined, not-rendered service.
Accurate pricing is critical to any efficient market place. Prices
provide suppliers and purchasers a critical data point to determine the
attractiveness of a product or service, and give potential competitors
the information they need to introduce new alternatives.
Although the BRC is missing an opportunity to address major
underlying issues, it does provide a framework that, with some
modification, could yield a long-term solution. To achieve it, the
BRC's final draft should consider the following recommendations.
Nuclear Waste Management Responsibility
The centerpiece of the BRC's recommendations is its proposal to
establish a federal corporation ``dedicated solely to implementing the
waste management program and empowered with the authority and resources
to succeed.'' While the general proposition could help transition the
United States toward a more market-based system, the BRC's version will
not work because it maintains the current system's basic underpinnings.
A government-based entity, separate from waste production, will remain
responsible for waste management and disposal, relieving producers of
all responsibility, and there would remain no direct connection between
services rendered and pricing.
Though the BRC goes to great lengths to define the responsibilities
of the new organization, these responsibilities are similar to those of
the Department of Energy under the current system. In both cases, the
Federal Government is fully responsible for all nuclear waste
management and disposal responsibilities. Simply moving a function from
one government agency to another (even if the new agency is called a
federal corporation) without changing the system fundamentals only
perpetuates existing deficiencies while creating the perception of
action.
This approach assumes that the basic premise of the current system
is correct--that nuclear waste management and disposal falls ideally
within the purview of the Federal Government. It essentially blames the
current problems on a misplaced federal bureaucracy when the actual
problem is relegating a commercial activity to a government
bureaucracy. Instead of trying to modify a fundamentally flawed system,
the BRC's final report should recommend transferring the responsibility
for nuclear waste management and disposal away from Washington and
toward the private sector.
The BRC's recommendation to create a federal corporation could
facilitate that transition to private-sector responsibility. Though the
objective should be to remove federal responsibility for nuclear waste
management and disposal, near-term privatization is likely not
practical. This is because the Federal Government is obligated by
virtue of signed contracts to take responsibility for the disposal of
nuclear waste produced at existing plants and the nuclear industry,
through fees levied on nuclear power users, has already paid $38.5
billion (about $750 million annually) for that service. \3\ The result
is that the Federal Government is currently responsible for disposing
of a total of about 70,000 tons of waste. A federal corporation,
limited in scope, could be the correct entity to take responsibility
for disposing of that waste.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\3\ Nuclear Energy Institute, ``Costs: Fuel, Operation, and Waste
Disposal,'' at http://www.nei.org/resourcesandstats/
nuclear-statistics/costs/ (August 10, 2011).
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In preparing its final recommendations, the BRC should emphasize
closely realigning incentives, responsibilities, and authorities in
nuclear waste management. These recommendations should include:
Creating a federal corporation with a limited scope of
responsibility, limited duration, and access to the Nuclear Waste Fund.
The federal corporation should have two basic responsibilities. First,
it should site a geologic repository. If the repository is located at
Yucca Mountain, as current law stipulates, then the federal corporation
should assume the Department of Energy's responsibilities of completing
the Yucca construction and operation permit application. Once issued,
the permit to operate Yucca should be transferred to a non-federal
entity to construct and operate the facility. If the Yucca location is
deemed technically deficient, the corporation should be responsible for
overseeing the selection of a new location. However, the permit
application should be prepared by whichever entity will eventually
construct and operate the facility.
The corporation's second responsibility should be to assure proper
disposal of the existing nuclear waste for which the Federal Government
is currently responsible and it should get access to the approximately
$25 billion in the Nuclear Waste Fund to finance its activities. This
would allow the Federal Government to meet its existing contractual and
regulatory waste disposal responsibility while allowing an eventual
transfer of waste management responsibility to the private sector. It
would also allow the Nuclear Waste Fund to be used for its intended
purpose. Most important, however, it would create a significant market
demand for privately offered waste management services like storage,
transportation, and processing. Businesses would naturally emerge to
meet this demand that would then be available for future private waste
management operations.
Finally, the transitional federal corporation must be mission
specific and its creation must be accompanied by a dissolution plan.
Once its two responsibilities are met, it should either be privatized
or abolished.
Removing the federal role in geologic repository
operations. All geologic repositories should be operated by non-federal
entities. The management organizations could be private, for-profit,
non-profit, state-based, or a combination thereof. Among their most
basic responsibilities would be to set market-driven prices for waste
emplacement. Market-driven prices would take waste characteristics,
such as heat load, toxicity, and volume as well as repository space
into consideration. Waste producers would then have different variables
to consider when deciding which fuels to purchase and what nuclear
technologies to use as these decisions would affect how they would
ultimately manage their waste. It could be most cost effective to place
waste directly in the repository for some utilities, while others might
find interim storage or another processes to be more economical.
Market-based price signals would encourage new technologies, such as
small nuclear reactors that have a different waste streams, and
services, such as reprocessing, to be introduced as new market demands
emerge.
Transferring responsibility for management of new waste
to waste producers. As noted above, the Federal Government through the
corporation should meet its responsibility to dispose of existing
waste. But moving forward, nuclear utilities should be made responsible
for waste they produce. This responsibility should be accompanied by a
repeal of the fee--1/10 of 1 cent per kilowatt hour of electricity
produced at nuclear power plants--paid to the Federal Government for
waste disposal. Utilities would then bear the responsibility and also
have the freedom to choose how best to manage their waste. The federal
role would be to ensure that private waste management activities meet
adequate regulatory standards. In essence, waste management would be
treated the same way the rest of the nuclear industry is treated. The
Federal Government is not responsible for getting the fuel to the
reactor and it should not be responsible for removing it.
Allowing the federal corporation to broker waste
management services. To further ensure that nuclear waste producers
have access to waste management services, the federal corporation could
be permitted, for a fee, to broker waste management services for
private industry. Transportation, reprocessing or repository
emplacement could be offered separately or as a bundled, comprehensive
service. This would allow waste producers to hire the federal
corporation to contract for waste management services on their behalf.
It may be the case as the corporation gains experience and establishes
relationships with waste management providers, it can negotiate better
terms based on volume, or other variables, for specific services. Or
waste producers may simply find the convenience of contracting with the
federal corporation to manage its waste is worth a premium. Waste
producers would not be obligated to seek waste management services
through the federal corporation. This brokering service would only be
available as long as the federal corporation is carrying out its
chartered mission, and would not justify its existence beyond those
specified responsibilities. However, one can imagine a business case
where brokering such services could provide the basis for future
privatization. Ultimately, while such an arrangement is not necessary,
it does provide an additional transition step toward the new, market-
based system.
Limiting the Federal Government's long-term role to
setting broad regulatory guidelines and taking final title of
decommissioned repository sites. Once the federal corporation carries
out its mission and is dissolved, the Federal Government should have
two roles. First, it should set the broad regulatory guidelines for
waste management just as it does for other parts of the nuclear
industry. Second, the Federal Government should take final legal
possession, what is commonly referred to as ``title,'' of geologic
repositories and their contents as they are decommissioned. While
private actors should manage nuclear waste and finance its final
disposal, including long-term maintenance, only the Federal Government
has the guaranteed longevity to credibly take long-term possession and
liability for whatever elements of waste end up in geologic
repositories after decommissioning, when the repository would be
permanently sealed.
Geologic Storage
Of the seven key elements addressed by the BRC, two are dedicated
to geologic storage. One calls for a new, consent-based approach to
searching out future nuclear waste management facilities, while the
other calls for a prompt effort to develop one or more geologic
repositories. While clearly stating the need for geologic storage is
important, the BRC's charge from the Secretary of Energy to rule out
any consideration of the Yucca Mountain facility weakens the utility of
its otherwise reasonable recommendations. For this reason, the BRC
should address Yucca in its final recommendations, which is allowable
per the BRC's charter that gives no direction to preclude Yucca.
Indeed, it does the opposite, by directing the BRC to consider all
options. It states that the Secretary of Energy established to
commission at the direction of the President to:
conduct a comprehensive review of policies for managing
the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle, including all alternatives for
the storage, processing, and disposal of civilian and defense used
nuclear fuel, high-level waste, and materials derived from nuclear
activities. \4\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\4\ Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future,
``Charter,'' March 1, 2010, at http://brc.gov/index.php?q=page/charter
(August 10, 2011).
Furthermore, the BRC's recommendations on geologic storage reflect
its more general flaw--that nuclear waste management should remain
within the purview of the Federal Government. These problems can be
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
addressed in the final report by the following actions:
Address Yucca Mountain head on. The BRC should state what
it believes should happen with Yucca Mountain based on the best science
and evidence available. If its members believe Yucca should be shut
down, it should state why and provide a recommendation for disengaging
from Yucca. If, on the other hand, it finds that Yucca should be
pursued, perhaps as one of a number of options, then the Commission
should provide recommendations on how to move forward. Such a
conclusion could reject the current Yucca program while proposing an
alternative. Such an alternative could embody the recommendations of
the BRC's consent-based approach where the people of Nevada are given
control over the future of the Yucca facility. Even though the
Secretary of Energy directed the BRC to pretend Yucca Mountain does not
exist, nothing in the BRC's charter prevents it from facing facts. For
the sake of the Commission's credibility, it must honestly and directly
address Yucca in its final conclusions.
Demand that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission complete
its review of the Department of Energy's Yucca Mountain application.
The reality is that the Blue Ribbon Commission can likely not make a
truly informed decision on Yucca Mountain because the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission has stopped work on the Department of Energy's
application to construct the repository and refuses to release the NRC
technical staff's findings regarding the application. Therefore, the
single most important recommendation that the BRC could make would be
to demand that the NRC complete the Yucca application and publicly
release all data generated by the application process. Whether anyone
ever builds a repository at Yucca or not, the NRC's completed review
process will yield unique information that will have important future
relevance. Furthermore, the public and electricity ratepayers deserve
to have the application review completed given its $15 billion
investment.
Limit the Federal Government's responsibility to siting
and permitting one geologic repository. Whether at Yucca or elsewhere,
the Federal Government's role should be limited to developing a single
geologic repository. This repository should be located at Yucca
Mountain unless the NRC deems that site to be technically deficient.
Should that be the case, the new site must at least match the capacity
of Yucca Mountain, which is sufficient to hold all of the waste
produced by America's existing commercial reactors over their expected
lifetimes. Once sited and permitted, a non-federal entity should
operate the repository. Developing future repositories should be the
responsibility of non-federal actors.
Rescind recommendation to develop one or more interim
storage facilities. The BRC is correct that interim storage of nuclear
waste, like geologic storage, is a critical part of any comprehensive
nuclear waste management system. Further, it correctly points out a
myriad of reasons why interim storage makes sense, such as allowing for
fuel removal from shutdown plants. However, the Federal Government
should neither construct such a facility nor mandate that one be built.
Instead, private-sector interim storage facilities would emerge to meet
the demand for such services in a market-based system. The Federal
Government's role should be to ensure that those willing and able to
develop appropriate interim storage facilities have an efficient and
predictable regulatory environment. The BRC makes very sound
recommendations toward this end.
Financing Nuclear Waste Management and Disposal
The BRC correctly spent significant effort on making
recommendations on how nuclear waste management should be financed.
Indeed, it correctly identifies many of the problems with the current
system, namely that it does not work as intended and that continuing to
collect fees for services not rendered is patently unfair. It also
correctly recognizes that government accounting rules make gaining
access to collected funds extraordinarily difficult. Finally, it
recognizes that building a sustainable nuclear waste policy program is
nearly impossible so long as it relies on the inherently inefficient
and unpredictable congressional appropriations process.
Separating finance issues from larger organizational issues is
impossible. The two are inherently related. How nuclear waste
activities are financed will ultimately depend on who is responsible
for its disposal. Therefore, any rational financing scheme must be
developed congruently with larger organizational reform. So if one
accepts the BRC's general proposition that the Federal Government
should remain responsible for nuclear waste management, its
recommendations on finance reform make sense. However, since its
recommended actions would do little to change the underlying system
fundamentals, the same inefficiencies that result from federal control
would ultimately resurface.
Similar to its larger organizational recommendations, the BRC does
provide a framework from which a more market-based, economically
rational system could be constructed. Indeed, the BRC introduces some
elements that are critical to a sustainable waste management system.
Instead of attempting to modify the current system, the BRC should
develop recommendations to allow the United States to transition to a
new model for financing nuclear waste management while ensuring that
existing resources are used for their intended purposes. To achieve
this transition, the BRC's final recommendations should include the
following:
Congress should immediately begin transferring the
Nuclear Waste Fund to the new organization. The BRC acknowledges that
whoever is ultimately responsible for waste management and disposal
must gain access to the $25 billion in the Nuclear Waste Fund, and puts
forth a basic plan to achieve this. The plan would allow limited access
to those funds 10 years after the new organization is established.
Near-term operations would be funded through ongoing fee payments. This
approach, however, assumes that the new organization would maintain
ongoing responsibility for waste management and disposal. Under the
modifications proposed in this analysis, the new organization would
only be responsible for waste produced to date, and should be funded
through fees already paid. Thus, the new organization would need
immediate access to the Nuclear Waste Fund, although dispersal could
take place over time.
Congress should mandate the creation of utility- or
plant-specific escrow accounts to fund waste management activities. An
innovative concept in the BRC report is to create escrow accounts held
by an independent third party into which nuclear waste fees are paid.
Only that amount appropriated by Congress for waste disposal activities
would be paid to the U.S. Treasury out of the escrow accounts. This
would ensure that only those funds actually being spent on waste
disposal would go to the government, thus preventing additional funds
from being placed into the Nuclear Waste Fund.
This specific idea is not consistent with the overall reform that
is necessary, but the introduction of waste management financed through
escrow accounts is consistent with fundamental reform. A better model
would mandate that nuclear utilities place in escrow adequate funds to
dispose of whatever waste is being stored on site. No funds would ever
go to the U.S. Treasury, and congressional appropriators would have no
role. Utilities would simply pay for waste management and disposal
services on an as-needed basis. This approach would benefit nuclear
utilities by ensuring they have access to the funds set aside for waste
disposal and it would protect the American taxpayer by making sure
adequate disposal funds will be available even if a plant owner goes
out of business.
Congress should repeal the fee paid to the Federal
Government for future waste disposal services. Since, under these
reforms, existing nuclear waste disposal would be financed through
existing nuclear waste fund fees, and future disposal through the
privately held escrow accounts, there would be no need to continue
paying the nuclear waste fee to the Federal Government.
Building on the BRC's Recommendations
The Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future has an
opportunity to resolve America's nuclear waste policy dilemma. While it
has provided a credible analysis and introduced some new ideas, it has
focused more on the symptoms of America's failed approach to nuclear
waste management than addressing the system's structural deficiencies.
Nonetheless, its recommendations provide a starting framework that
could be modified to address these difficult issues. Moving the
responsibility for nuclear waste management away from the Federal
Government will be difficult, but it is necessary to for an
economically rational, technologically diverse, and sustainable
resolution to America's nuclear waste dilemma.
That concludes my testimony.
I look forward to your questions.
The Heritage Foundation
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Foundation or its board of trustees.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Spencer.
Dr. Swift, I understand you have fairly short testimony. We
need to get to the floor, so go ahead, if you would, with your
oral testimony. You are recognized.
STATEMENT OF DR. PETER SWIFT,
DISTINGUISHED MEMBER OF THE TECHNICAL STAFF,
SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORY
Dr. Swift. Thank you. Chairman Broun, Chairman Harris,
Ranking Members Tonko and Miller, and the distinguished Members
of the Committee, thank you. I am Dr. Peter Swift from Sandia
National Laboratories.
In your letter requesting my testimony, you asked me to
address three topics. First, you asked me to provide my views
on the draft recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission
regarding the need for a permanent geological repository.
Second, you asked me to describe my role as the Chief Scientist
for the Yucca Mountain Lead Laboratory. And third, you asked me
to describe the various scientific issues and technical
conclusions in the Department of Energy's license application
for the proposed Yucca Mountain repository.
I will start with the second and third questions, and I
will close with my views on the Blue Ribbon Commission's draft
recommendations. I am speaking only for myself. Anything I say
here today represents my own personal beliefs and does not
necessarily represent the position of Sandia National
Laboratories or the U.S. Department of Energy. Specifically, I
am not here to amend or add to Sandia's technical position with
respect to the Yucca Mountain license application. That
position remains unchanged from its documentation in the
application.
I am a geologist by training, and I have worked for the
last 22 years studying how deep geologic repositories for
radioactive waste will perform over hundreds of thousands of
years. In my role as the Chief Scientist for the Yucca Mountain
Lead Laboratory team, I focused on ensuring the integrity and
credibility of the scientific basis for the postclosure
portions of the license application that the DOE submitted in
June 2008. I was extensively involved in interactions with
external and internal technical review and oversight groups,
and I had a significant role in preparing the application and
presenting it to the NRC.
The development of the technical basis for the repository
was the work of hundreds of scientists and engineers, spread
over decades. When I speak about the work contained in the
license application, I am summarizing the contributions of
multiple experts who prepared those sections.
What types of political--sorry--of postclosure scientific
issues does the application consider? The detailed analyses
presented in the application focus on those processes that have
a significant potential to affect long-term performance of the
repository, but all relevant events and processes, including
those that are highly unlikely and those that are shown to have
little or no impact on the system, are summarized in the
application and evaluated in detail in supporting documents.
Subsections of the application address each of the major
processes affecting the repository, including, for example,
climate change, groundwater flow, long-term degradation of the
waste packages. As required by EPA and NRC regulations,
analyses provide an estimate of the mean annual radiation dose
that a person living in the vicinity might receive at any time
in the next million years. One of the main conclusions of these
analyses is that estimated releases and radiation doses to
hypothetical future humans are well below the EPA and NRC
standards. Overall, the application concludes that there is a
significant--sorry--a sufficient technical basis for the NRC to
issue a license authorizing construction of the facility. This
conclusion was a fundamental basis for the 2008 submittal of
the application to the NRC for review.
This brings me to my views on the Blue Ribbon Commission's
draft recommendation regarding the need for a permanent
geological repository. The Commission observed in their draft
report that ``every foreseeable approach to the nuclear fuel
cycle still requires a means of disposal that assures the very
long-term isolation of radioactive wastes.'' I agree with this
observation. Alternative approaches to the nuclear fuel cycle
that involve separating and recycling fissile material in
irradiated fuel can change the type and character of waste
requiring geologic disposal, but they will not eliminate the
need. The Commission also concluded in its draft report that
``deep geological disposal is the most promising and accepted
method currently available.'' The Commission further noted that
disposal could occur either in mined repositories or
potentially in deep boreholes. Again, I agree. Research to date
in the United States and elsewhere provides confidence that
safe and effective disposal facilities could be designed and
operated in a range of geologic settings.
Recognizing that there is much to be done to establish the
scientific and technical basis for licensing any of the
disposal concepts available to us, and also recognizing that
the regulatory process essential to ensuring public health and
safety may be time-consuming, I strongly support the Blue
Ribbon Commission's draft recommendation for ``prompt efforts
to develop one or more geologic disposal facilities.''
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Swift follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Peter Swift,
Distinguished Member of the Technical Staff,
Sandia National Laboratory
Chairman Harris, Chairman Broun, Ranking Members Miller and Tonko,
and the distinguished Members of the Committee; thank you for the
opportunity to testify. I am Dr. Peter Swift, a Distinguished Member of
the Technical Staff at Sandia National Laboratories. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Sandia is a multiprogram national security laboratory owned by
the United States Government and operated by Sandia Corporation for the
National Nuclear Security Administration. Sandia Corporation is a
subsidiary of the Lockheed Martin Corporation under Department of
Energy prime contract no. DE-AC04-94AL85000.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In your letter requesting my testimony, you asked me to address
three topics. First, you asked me to provide my views on the draft
recommendations of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear
Future regarding the need for a permanent geological repository.
Second, you asked me to describe my role as the Chief Scientist for the
Yucca Mountain Lead Laboratory. Third, you asked me to describe the
various scientific issues and technical conclusions in the Department
of Energy's License Application for the proposed Yucca Mountain
repository.
I'd like to start with the second and third questions, and I'll
close with my views on the Blue Ribbon Commission's draft
recommendation.
I'm speaking only for myself; anything I say here today represents
my own personal beliefs and does not necessarily represent the position
of Sandia National Laboratories or the U.S. Department of Energy.
Specifically, I am not here to amend or add to Sandia's technical
position with respect to the Yucca Mountain License Application. That
position remains unchanged from its documentation in the License
Application.
I'm a geologist by training, and I've worked for the past 22 years
studying how deep geologic repositories for radioactive waste will
perform over hundreds of thousands of years. In my role as Chief
Scientist for the Yucca Mountain Lead Laboratory team, I focused on
ensuring the integrity and credibility of the scientific basis for the
postclosure portions of the License Application that the DOE submitted
to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in June 2008. I was extensively
involved in interactions with external and internal technical review
and oversight groups, and I had a significant role in preparing the
application and presenting it to the NRC.
The development of the technical basis for the Yucca Mountain
repository was the work of hundreds of scientists and engineers, spread
over decades. When I speak about the scientific and technical work
contained in the License Application, I'm summarizing the contributions
of the multiple experts who prepared the individual sections.
What types of postclosure scientific issues does the application
consider? The detailed analyses presented in the application focus on
those processes that have a significant potential to affect long-term
performance of the repository, but all relevant events and processes,
including those that are highly unlikely and those that are shown to
have little or no impact on the system, are summarized in the
application and evaluated in detail in supporting documents.
Subsections of the application address each of the major processes
affecting the repository, including, for example, climate change,
groundwater flow, and long-term degradation of the waste packages. As
required by EPA and NRC regulations, analyses provide an estimate of
the mean annual radiation dose that a person living in the vicinity of
the repository might receive at any time in the next million years. One
of the main conclusions of these analyses is that estimated releases
and radiation doses to hypothetical future humans are well below the
EPA and NRC standards. Overall, the application concludes that there is
a sufficient technical basis for the NRC to issue a license authorizing
construction of the facility. This conclusion was a fundamental basis
for the 2008 submittal of the application to the NRC for review.
This brings me to my views on the Blue Ribbon Commission's draft
recommendation regarding the need for a permanent geological
repository. The Commission observed in their draft report that ``every
foreseeable approach to the nuclear fuel cycle still requires a means
of disposal that assures the very long-term isolation of radioactive
wastes from the environment.'' I agree with this observation.
Alternative approaches to the nuclear fuel cycle that involve
separating and recycling fissile material in irradiated fuel can change
the type and character of waste requiring geologic disposal, but they
will not eliminate the need. The Commission also concluded in its draft
report that ``deep geological disposal is the most promising and
accepted method currently available,'' and the Commission further noted
that disposal could occur either in mined repositories or potentially
in deep boreholes. Again, I agree. Research to date in the United
States and elsewhere provides confidence that safe and effective
disposal facilities could be designed and operated in a range of
geologic settings.
Recognizing that there is much to be done to establish the
scientific and technical basis for licensing any of the disposal
concepts available to us, and also recognizing that the regulatory
process essential to ensuring public health and safety may be time-
consuming, I strongly support the Blue Ribbon Commission's draft
recommendation for ``prompt efforts to develop one or more geologic
disposal facilities.``
Thank you.
Summary
I am speaking for myself, and this statement does not necessarily
represent the positions of Sandia National Laboratories \1\ or the U.S.
Department of Energy. My statement neither amends nor adds to Sandia's
position regarding the Yucca Mountain License Application, which
remains unchanged from its documentation in the License Application.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ Sandia is a multiprogram national security laboratory owned by
the United States Government and operated by Sandia Corporation for the
National Nuclear Security Administration. Sandia Corporation is a
subsidiary of the Lockheed Martin Corporation under Department of
Energy prime contract no. DE-AC04-94AL85000.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
In my role as Chief Scientist for the Yucca Mountain Lead
Laboratory team, I focused on ensuring the integrity and credibility of
the scientific basis for the postclosure portions of the License
Application that the DOE submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
in June 2008.
The detailed analyses presented in the application focus on the
processes that have a significant potential to affect long-term
performance of the repository, but all relevant events and processes,
including those that are highly unlikely and those that are shown to
have little or no impact on the system, are summarized in the
application and evaluated in detail in supporting documents. As
required by EPA and NRC regulations, analyses provide an estimate of
the mean annual radiation dose that a person living in the vicinity of
the repository might receive at any time in the next million years.
These analyses conclude that estimated releases and radiation doses
to hypothetical future humans are well below the EPA and NRC standards,
and that there is a sufficient technical basis for the NRC to issue a
license authorizing construction of the facility.
The Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future draft report
recommends ``prompt efforts to develop one or more geologic disposal
facilities.'' The draft report concludes that ``deep geological
disposal is the most promising and accepted method currently
available'' for isolating high-level radioactive wastes, and that
disposal could occur either in mined repositories or potentially in
deep boreholes. I agree. Research to date in the United States and
elsewhere provides confidence that safe and effective disposal
facilities could be designed and operated in a range of geologic
settings.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Dr. Swift.
We have got to go to the floor to vote, so the Committee
will now stand in recess until 10 minutes after the last vote.
[Recess.]
Chairman Broun. We will reconvene the joint Committee
meeting.
I now recognize our next witness. Thank you, all of you,
for your indulgence in this vote series and appreciate you all
staying around. Our next witness is Dr. Kasperson. Doctor, you
are recognized for five minutes.
STATEMENT OF DR. ROGER KASPERSON,
PROFESSOR AND DISTINGUISHED SCIENTIST,
CLARK UNIVERSITY
Dr. Kasperson. In 2001, the National Academy of Sciences
published a major report that represented both an unusually
large committee for the academy and also a rather substantial
period of time with international representation of leading
world scientists as well as prominent engineers and scientists
in the United States, and I want to indicate what all that work
resulted in, an observation by the panel in its report that
despite the conversations we may have here today and what will
go on about Yucca Mountain and so forth, the major issues are
really not geology. There are a number of geological options
that would probably work quite well, and the failures and
challenges that we are seeing are really connected as the
Academy noted in achieving the sort of people-related problems,
the societal nature of the issues that are involved. And so
while you all have the responsibility of designing the next
steps in our national efforts to deal with radioactive waste,
you are going to need to give a lot of attention to issues that
have been quite neglected in the past.
I might remind you, I have been around long enough to know
that Alvin Weinberg, who was a very prominent scientist
involved in the early history of radioactive waste management,
noted that the problems that he had most underestimated were
connected with waste storage and waste disposal and
particularly the public interactions that occurred.
Now, there is--if we are honest about it, there are some
pretty serious problems to be dealt with in trying to come up
with a new program for radioactive waste, and I have noted some
of them here. They are what some of us might call deep
uncertainty problems that when you are talking about situations
where you have really long time frames like 10,000 and 100,000
years, and we don't know what the future of technology and
society is going to look at, that there are site-specific
problems connected with any site that can be reviewed and
considered as a repository site, and so there are things
connected with future populations, lifestyles and values,
health and medical issues and even the political context itself
where we really can't predict very well what is going to
happen, and that has implications, I think, for whatever
Administration takes this problem on. They are going to have to
deal with some of these, some of these issues, and they are not
easy issues.
Also, we might note that we have never done, you know, a
really high-level waste or spent fuel repository before, so it
will be a first-of-a-kind facility. There are also not
facilities that exist anywhere in the world at the moment, so
our experience is limited, and so we need to understand that
somehow the management process is going to need to be
evolutionary because that will be the nature of knowledge, will
be evolutionary and these uncertainties are going to change
over time.
Now, what I do want to focus on particularly is the problem
of social trust. Some of you may have seen in yesterday's New
York Times on the front page that a new New York Times/CBS
national poll has discovered that social trust has reached--it
has been--we have been experiencing long-term erosion in social
trust in our country, and in the last few weeks it has hit the
low point that has existed at any time in the last 20 or 30
years. The loss of trust is particularly pronounced in the
nuclear area, but we must understand that it really cuts across
and it is generally responsible and found elsewhere in many
other institutions. In other words, the social trust problem is
not just a matter of getting the nuclear things right because
it is a general problem in our society, and there has been a
loss of social trust in institutions, in corporations, in
Congress, regrettably, in the Presidency, and so forth, and
those things are--and it is not one particular poll because we
now have evidence drawn from a number of different surveys that
basically indicate that, and I am just about out of time.
Just to indicate, I can probably give you only one piece of
social science research. We actually have a large body of
evidence which has been accumulated among scientists and
researchers over the past 20 years. This is one example drawn
from work by psychologists, and you will see in the upper part
of this diagram, those are a whole--don't worry about reading
all those things. They are a whole list of actions that can be
taken that ought to build trust, and the lower part of the
diagram is actions that are taken and events that happen that
lose trust. Look at the size of the bars involved. And what we
have found, and I will just state it and maybe I will end
there, that what we think is that social trust is easily lost
and very difficult to recover. And so one of the things that is
going to be facing Yucca Mountain or in the next phase of the
radioactive waste problem is how do we deal with social trust,
and if you are dealing with very feared hazard and one that
concerns the public and the social trust in managers is very
low, you have got a real problem to deal with, and we are going
to need to give that a lot of thought in designing the process
of moving forward for radioactive waste.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Kasperson follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Roger Kasperson,
Professor and Distinguished Scientist,
Clark University
The management of spent nuclear fuel (SNF) and defense high-level
waste (HLW) is a complex socio-technical systems challenge.
Coordinated, reliable, and safe performance will be required over very
long periods of time within evolving and changing social and technical
contexts. To accomplish these goals, a waste management system will
involve a host of facilities for interim storage and long-term
disposal, a transportation infrastructure, and research and development
centers. The complexity of SNF and HLW management will also require an
array of robust institutions and procedures. Waste management is multi-
institutional, comprising multiple private companies and sectors (e.g.,
commercial nuclear utilities, trucking and railway companies), multiple
government agencies at different levels (local, State, National), non-
governmental organizations (NGOs) and other institutional stakeholders,
as well as citizens. At the moment, experience of how this will work is
limited.
No matter how many checks and balances are put into place, no
matter how much information is disclosed, no matter how many
instruments for monitoring, evaluation, and oversight are implemented
there will ultimately be individuals and groups entrusted to make sure
``it all works.'' Trust and confidence are necessary for stable
arrangements in contexts of unequal power, whether in terms of access
to information, economic resources, or ability to implement desired
actions (Kuhn and Ballard 1999). Stable arrangements, in turn, are
essential for the institutional continuity necessary for long-term
projects such as the disposal of SNF and HLW.
Unfortunately, the principal agencies responsible for nuclear
wastes, the Department of Energy (DOE) and the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, are not trusted by majorities of the public in recent
public opinion polls (e.g., Whitfield et al. 2009) and other earlier
assessments (e.g., DOE 1993, DOE 2000). Social perceptions of missteps
and failures in government and private parties' management of nuclear
wastes have contributed to long-term erosion of trust and confidence
(DOE 1993, DOE 2000, Hewlett 1978, Kraft 1996, NRC 2001, OTA 1985,
Pijawka and Mushkatel 1992, Rosa and Clark 1999, Rosa et al. 2010).
Reasons include Congressional scrapping of a site selection in the
Eastern half of the U.S., Congressional scrapping of technical
integrity and equity provisions in the Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments,
attempts to coerce Nevada rather than negotiate, failure to clearly
define regulatory criteria in advance and then adapt them to fit
existing conditions, attempts to re-negotiate or circumvent compliance
with cleanup agreements related to HLW at DOE sites, and treating the
public as if its concerns are irrational. In short, social distrust is
multi-lateral and ``widespread in the nuclear waste domain, is deeply
seated, reflects broader trends in society, and has a continuing
history of events to maintain it.'' (NRC 2001, pg. 74)
Two reasons for the difficulty of regaining social trust in the
context of SNF and HLW management stand out for special attention.
First, nuclear waste is thought of in largely negative terms. Changing
negative views can be hard. The ``affect heuristic'' explored in the
work of Slovic and colleagues (Finucane et al. 2000, Slovic et al.
2007) suggests that when people like an activity or technology, they
tend to view it as having high benefit and low risk. On the other hand,
if they dislike it, they see benefits as low and risk as high.
Furthermore, recent work on ``cultural cognition'' reinforces findings
that people tend to select and interpret information to support
preexisting views, protect values and worldviews (e.g., anti-nuclear or
pro-nuclear), or preserve identity with an ideological group (Braman et
al. 2005, Kahan et al. 2007). Thus, information intended to educate or
persuade is all too often impotent.
Second, evidence suggests that events and activities that erode
social trust have a stronger impact on overall levels of trust than do
those thought to strengthen social trust (Figure 1). This is often
referred to as the ``asymmetry of trust'' (Slovic 1993). Slovic (1993)
found that of the many trust-building actions investigated, only one
had a moderate effect: ``An advisory board of local citizens and
environmentalists is established to monitor the plant and is given
legal authority to shut it down if they believe it to be unsafe.''
Figure 1. Differential impact of trust-increasing and trust-
decreasing events on levels of trust among respondents. Respondents
were asked about each event whether it would increase or decrease their
trust in the management of a nuclear power plant. They then rated how
strongly their trust would be affected (1 = very small impact on trust;
7 = very powerful impact on trust). Source: Slovic, 1993.
Rebuilding Social Trust
Based upon the sizable literature on social distrust, we offer six
recommendations for how nuclear waste management should move forward.
The planning process should commission a set of focus
papers by leading experts on the major social and ethical problems that
must be addressed in the evolving approach. These should include
options for solutions and their pluses and minuses.
Social science and policy expertise will be essential
(Rosa et al. 2010). We suggest convening a standing advisory committee
of leading social scientists and policy analysts with whom nuclear
waste planner regularly consult.
A dual strategy should be adopted. First, planning,
including the design of institutional architecture and procedures,
should proceed in a way that recognizes the need to perform and be
effective in a context of social distrust. It may be that proceeding on
the recognition of a deficit in social trust will lay the foundation
for transparent, participatory procedures that can rebuild functional,
critical social trust over the long term. Second, while working in a
context of distrust, there must also be consistent efforts at all
levels and in all aspects of nuclear waste policy-making--planning,
implementation, and operations--to support the (re)development of
critical social trust.
Given the long, apparently obdurate distrust of the DOE,
it is time to think of putting waste management in the hands of
alternative institutions. We argue that responsibility should be placed
in a public corporation, as many countries have done.
A premium should be placed on openness, inclusive
stakeholder involvement, and truly independent peer review (including
impacted communities and knowledgeable, demanding critics) during the
planning, decision, and monitoring process for all stages of program
development and operation. The role of public involvement and peer
review should be clear and meaningful. Independent review by critics.
Contingent on geological suitability, the approach to
siting should emphasize voluntary consent rather than coercion as much
as possible.
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Chairman Broun. Thank you, Doctor.
Mr. Hollis, you are recognized for five minutes.
STATEMENT OF MR. GARY HOLLIS, CHAIRMAN,
NYE COUNTY BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS
Mr. Hollis. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, Members of the
Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify. I am Gary
Hollis, Nye County--I am Chairman of the Nye County Board of
Commissioners.
In July of 2002, Congress designated Nye County as the site
for nuclear waste repository in accordance with the provision
of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the law Congress enacted to
establish our Nation's policy on high-level radioactive waste.
The act gives Nye County the authority to oversee federal
activities on the repository. It is a duty that I and my fellow
commissioners take very seriously.
We have worked with DOE on the science. We have
participated in the licensing and carefully followed the
deliberation of the Blue Ribbon Commission.
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act is clear. It sets out a
process to determine if the repository can be built safely, and
in 2008 the DOE submitted a licensing application to the NRC
with the assurance that it could be built safely. Two years
later, they asked to withdraw that application.
There is no need for the BRC to make alternatives to Yucca
Mountain. DOE, NRC and the Obama Administration should comply
with the law or change it.
Nye County has been fully engaged with the BRC. We are
disappointed that the draft report implies there is no local
support in Nevada when it insists that the siting of any
repository have the consent of local government and
communities.
Mr. Chairman, Yucca Mountain has local support. If the NRC
determines it is unsafe to build this repository, Nye County
would oppose its construction. If it is found to be safe, we
favor its construction. In a very real sense, Nye County is the
only community close to Yucca Mountain. At least six rural
Nevada counties support continuing the licensing application
process to determine that Yucca Mountain can be built safely.
The land mass of these counties taken together is larger than
many States. By any reasonable geographic definition, Yucca
Mountain has the support of the surrounding communities.
The DOE, the ERDA and the AEC spent many years attempting
to site a geological repository. The current language in the
NWPA has a compromise by Congress to deal with the local
support issue, but it also has set up procedures to follow if
no local support is found. In other words, Congress carefully
considered the possibility that the repository could have to be
built despite State or local opposition. Congress determined
that building the repository was the national priority and
should take--should proceed despite local conditions.
Mr. Chairman, the State of Nevada currently opposes Yucca
Mountain. However, in 1975, the Nevada legislature passed a
resolution that said in part, and I quote, ``The legislature of
the State of Nevada strongly urges the Energy, Research and
Development Administration to choose the Nevada Test Site for
the storage and processing of nuclear material.'' In 1987, the
State legislature created Bullfrog County that completely
enclosed Yucca Mountain with the intent to control the receipts
of the benefits of payment. The point is, the State of Nevada
at one time was not opposed to dealing with nuclear waste.
Follow the money.
It will take decades to study, license and build something
other than Yucca Mountain. What if we do not find a willing
State? What happens if a State changes its mind? Would the fate
of the repository be in jeopardy at every election? Would that
violate the consent-based goal? The draft report does not
answer these questions.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, as I said earlier, we take our site
county responsibilities seriously. We conducted a robust
science program to determine if a repository could be built
safely. To this date, our studies have shown that the
repository can be built safely, but we want an additional
confidence that a complete license process will provide. To
ignore the science, the law and facts, not to mention the
Administration's scientific integrity policy because the BRC
says Yucca Mountain does not have local support is an insult to
the process and contrary to the rule of law. Yucca Mountain
does have local support. My presence here today confirms that.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Hollis follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Gary Hollis, Chairman,
Nye County Board of County Commissioners
Mr. Chairman, Members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify today about some of the recommendations of the
Blue Ribbon Commission. I am Gary Hollis, Chairman of the Nye County
Board of Commissioners and one of the County's two liaison
Commissioners on Yucca Mountain issues. I have worked at the Nevada
Test Site and also worked on Yucca Mountain characterization
activities.
As you know, Yucca Mountain is located in Nye County. In July 2002
Congress specifically designated Nye County as the site county for a
nuclear waste repository in accordance with provisions of the Nuclear
Waste Policy Act--the law Congress enacted to establish our Nation's
policies on high-level radioactive waste. The Act also gives Nye County
authority to oversee federal activities on the repository. It is a duty
that I and my fellow commissioners take very seriously.
As part of Nye County's oversight role, we worked with DOE on the
science of the Yucca Mountain project, participated in the licensing
proceedings, and carefully followed the deliberations of the Blue
Ribbon Commission. Personally, Mr. Chairman, I have questions about the
need for the Blue Ribbon Commission.
The provisions of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act are clear. The Act
sets out specific procedures and rules to determine if a repository at
Yucca Mountain can be built safely. In 2008, when the Department of
Energy submitted the license application to the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission, it was with their assurance it could be built safely. Two
years later DOE tried to withdraw the license application, but not on
safety grounds. To me, this is a clear violation of the law. To me,
there is no need for a Blue Ribbon Commission to determine alternatives
to Yucca Mountain. Instead, DOE, the NRC and the Obama Administration
should either obey the clear mandates in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act,
or should try to change it.
However, in our oversight role, Nye County has been fully engaged
with the Blue Ribbon Commission. We have attended a majority of the
Commission's public hearings. We shared our unique and extensive
experience and offered thoughtful advice.
IWe are disappointed that the BRC draft report implies there is no
local support in Nevada when it insists that the siting of any
repository be with the consent of the communities surrounding the
project. Mr Chairman, Yucca Mountain has the support of the surrounding
communities. Nye County supports completing the licensing process. If
the NRC determines it is unsafe to build the repository, and that
determination is based on sound science and not political pressure, Nye
County would oppose the construction of the repository. If it is found
to be safe, we favor its construction.
Mr. Chairman, Nye County is the third largest county in the United
States. In a very real sense Nye County is the only community close to
Yucca Mountain. At least six rural Nevada counties support continuing
with the license application process to determine if Yucca Mountain can
be build safely. Included in my written testimony are resolutions of
support from Nye, Esmeralda, Mineral, Lander, Churchill and Lincoln
counties. The land mass of these counties, taken together, is larger
than many States in this country. By any reasonable geographic
definition, Yucca Mountain has the support of the surrounding
community.
The DOE, ERDA, and AEC spent many years in unsuccessful attempts to
site a geologic repository. The current language in the NWPA was a
compromise by Congress to deal with a very difficult problem. The
Nuclear Waste Policy Act tries to encourage local support, but it also
sets up procedures to follow if no local support is found. In other
words, Congress carefully considered the possibility that the
repository would have to be built despite local opposition. Congress
determined that building the repository was a national priority and
should proceed despite local conditions.
It is true that the State of Nevada currently opposes Yucca
Mountain. However at one time it supported it. In 1975, the Nevada
legislature passed a resolution that said in part:
``the legislature of the State of Nevada strongly urges the
Energy Research and Development Administration to choose the
Nevada Test Site for the storage and processing of nuclear
material.''
In 1987, the State Legislature created a new county that completely
enclosed Yucca Mountain. It was called Bullfrog County. The new county
had no population, which meant that any payment by the Federal
Government for Yucca Mountain would go to the State government. The
State fully intended to benefit from the repository.
The point is that the State of Nevada, at one time, was not opposed
to dealing with nuclear waste.
It will take decades to study, license, and build something other
than Yucca Mountain. What if we do not find a willing state? Or if we
find a willing state, what happens if it later changes its mind? If 10
or 15 years into the process, what will happen if there is an election
and the new Governor opposes the repository? Would we go back to the
drawing board again? Would the fate of the repository be in jeopardy
with every local government election? What if the State favors the
repository but it is opposed by an outspoken community activist group?
Would that violate the consent based goal? The BRC does not answer
those questions.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, I want to point out that Nye County, in
addition to its oversight role, has conducted a robust science program
to determine if the repository can be built safely. The full list of
our investigations is in my submitted testimony, but they include
extensive study of the underground water aquifer by:
more than forty boreholes into about 145 water zones and
tracer tests to determine underground water flow;
structural geologic studies;
development of information on hydrology south of Yucca
Mountain that DOE needed to complete its license application;
underground ventilation measurements and modeling for
worker safety; and
participation, as a cooperating agency, in the
preparation of Environmental Impact Statements
In short, Nye County took its site county oversight
responsibilities seriously. We have been active participants in the
science of Yucca Mountain. To date, our studies have shown that the
repository can be built safely. We do not have all the scientific
facts, but that is why we want to see the licensing process completed.
We want a decision to be made based on science.
To ignore all this science, the law and the facts, not to mention
this administration's stated ``scientific integrity policy,'' because
the BRC says Yucca Mountain does not have local support, is an insult
to the process and contrary to the rule of law. Yucca Mountain does
have local support. My presence here today confirms that.
Thank you. I am available to answer any questions you may have. I
am here with one of the County's technical professionals. He is
available to answer questions as well.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Hollis.
Mr. McLeod, you are recognized for five minutes.
STATEMENT OF MR. RICK MCLEOD,
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SAVANNAH RIVER SITE
COMMUNITY REUSE ORGANIZATION
Mr. McLeod. Mr. Chairmen Broun and Harris and Members of
the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today
regarding the draft recommendations of the President's Blue
Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
I am Rick McLeod, Executive Director of the Savannah River
Site Community Reuse Organization, or SRSCRO. The SRSCRO is a
nonprofit regional group supporting economic diversification
and job creation in the five-county region of Georgia and South
Carolina near the Department of Energy's Savannah River Site,
or SRS. Our organization is unique across the DOE complex in
that our area of interest covers multiple counties and two
States. We have prepared extended remarks for inclusion in the
record, but during my time today I would like to focus briefly
on four of the Blue Ribbon Commission's draft recommendations.
Let me preface my remarks by saying that the individuals
and groups I represent in South Carolina and Georgia continue
to believe that the Administration's decision to halt work on
Yucca Mountain is wrongheaded and counter to the Nation's long-
term best interest. We applaud Congressional efforts, including
those of this Committee, specifically the June 2011 report on
Yucca Mountain, to scrutinize the Administration's actions with
respect to Yucca Mountain and the lack of scientific integrity,
openness, and transparency in its determination to terminate
the project. Now to the Commission's recommendations.
We fully agree with recommendation number one, which calls
for consent-based, transparent and science-based approach to
the nuclear waste management solutions. If a science-based
approach were followed, we would be completing the Yucca
Mountain project today.
We are on record multiple times with our strongly held
concerns about high-level defense waste continuing to be stored
at the Savannah River Site with no disposition path available
and by default becoming the de facto Yucca Mountain.
On the following point, we want to be extremely clear: in
its final report, the Blue Ribbon Commission needs to decouple
high-level defense waste from commercial spent fuel. The
defense waste is different. The quantity is different. The
number of locations affected is different. The potential for
future use is different. The legal and financial implications
for the government are different. Specific separate
recommendations are needed for disposition of high-level
defense waste and for commercial spent fuel.
Second, we share the view of those who fear that forming
some type of federal corporation dedicated to managing nuclear
waste could further delay efforts to dispose of the waste,
especially defense waste, which had no other disposition path
than a geologic repository. Rather than create a new
organization, why not simply focus for a shorter period and for
less money on just disposing of the waste? We need solutions,
not more bureaucracy.
While we appreciate the need for interim storage, our
concerns center on the term ``interim.'' When it comes to
nuclear waste, this is a relative term that is almost never
associated with a fixed time frame. Rather, it can mean
anything from 10 years to 500 years or more. ``Interim'' needs
to be clearly and legally defined before communities such as
ours can begin to address the potential and advisability of
such storage.
In any event, our community would not support interim
storage scenario of commercial spent fuel at the Savannah River
Site unless a permanent solution is pursued at the same time.
This means progress towards a permanent repository for both
high-level defense waste and commercial spent fuel and/or a
program to reprocess or recycle commercial used nuclear fuel.
Community support also requires removal of a sufficient
quantity of waste currently stored at SRS and the recommitment
of processing used nuclear fuel currently stored at SRS storage
pools. These two conditions along with ongoing health and
safety monitoring, proper regulatory oversight, both at the
local and State level, and a legally binding commitment to a
final disposition plan are essential to community support for
an interim storage option.
Finally, we strongly urge the Blue Ribbon Commission to
amend its recommendation number seven to specifically recognize
the critical role of H Canyon at the Savannah River Site in
international nonproliferation efforts. H Canyon, as you know,
is a one-of-a-kind facility of immense importance to DOE and
the Nation. In our view, it is imperative to reinstate H Canyon
to operational status, fully funded and fully staffed.
I thank the Committee for its oversight and contribution to
the national dialog, and I will be happy to answer any
questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. McLeod follows:]
Prepared Statement of Mr. Rick McLeod,
Executive Director, Savannah River Site
Community Reuse Organization
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify today regarding the draft recommendations of the
President's Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future.
I am Rick McLeod, Executive Director of the Savannah River Site
Community Reuse Organization--or ``SRSCRO.''
The SRSCRO is a non-profit regional group supporting economic
diversification and job creation in a five-county region of Georgia and
South Carolina near the Department of Energy's Savannah River Site.
Our organization is unique across the DOE complex in that our area
of interest covers multiple counties and two states.
Blue Ribbon Commission Draft Recommendations
The Blue Ribbon Commission's draft report issued in July included
seven recommendations:
1. Develop an approach to siting and developing nuclear waste
management and disposal facilities in the U.S. that is
``adaptive, staged, consent-based, transparent, and standards-
and science-based.''
2. Create a new, single-purpose organization to develop and
implement a focused, integrated program for the transportation,
storage, and disposal of nuclear waste in the U.S.
3. Assure access by the nuclear waste management program to the
balance in the Nuclear Waste Fund and to the revenues generated
by annual nuclear waste fee payments.
4. Initiate prompt efforts to develop, as quickly as possible,
one or more permanent deep geological facilities for the safe
disposal of spent fuel and high-level nuclear waste.
5. Initiate prompt efforts to develop, as quickly as possible,
one or more consolidated interim storage facilities as part of
an integrated, comprehensive plan for managing the back end of
the nuclear fuel cycle.
6. Provide stable, long-term support for research, development,
and demonstration (RD&D) on advanced reactor and fuel cycle
technologies that have the potential to offer substantial
benefits relative to currently available technologies and for
related workforce needs and skills development.
7. Provide international leadership to address global non-
proliferation concerns and improve the safety and security of
nuclear facilities and materials worldwide.
Halting Yucca Mountain Is Wrong Decision
First, let me say that the individuals and groups I represent in
South Carolina and Georgia continue to believe that the
Administration's decision to halt work on Yucca Mountain is wrongheaded
and counter to the Nation's long-term best interests.
Our objection to the Administration's Yucca Mountain policy is
well-known and highlighted by actions taken by our organization.
We produced a widely distributed community white paper
designed to facilitate discussion and a regional and national consensus
on safe, permanent nuclear waste disposal.
We gathered resolutions from 22 governmental bodies and
economic development groups in our region supporting continuation of
the Yucca Mountain project.
We held a well-covered press conference at the National
Press Club in Washington to amplify our objections to the
Administration's decision.
We co-sponsored print ads as part of a national campaign
to ask our elected officials and candidates where they stand on Yucca
Mountain.
We have communicated frequently with our state and
federal elected officials concerning our views and concerns.
We appeared three times before the President's Blue
Ribbon Commission on America's Energy Future.
Most recently, we joined with 25 other organizations
across the country in signing a letter to the U.S. Senate supporting
funding resumption of the NRC's review of the Yucca Mountain license
application.
In short, we have mounted an extremely proactive community response
in an effort to force reconsideration of the government's ill-advised
decision to halt work on Yucca Mountain, especially since Congress
specifically stated so in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act and Yucca
Mountain is still considered the ``law'' of the land.
DOE Should Reconsider Its Position
We continue to urge DOE to reconsider its position and allow
science and engineering--not politics--to establish the most
appropriate means for disposal of high-level defense nuclear waste.
And we applaud Congressional efforts--including those of this
Committee, specifically the June 2011 report on Yucca Mountain--to
scrutinize the Administration's actions with respect to Yucca Mountain
and the lack of scientific integrity, openness, and transparency in its
determination to terminate the project.
We continue to believe Yucca Mountain was--and is--the right answer
for permanent nuclear waste disposal, and its completion should be
pursued vigorously, especially for high-level defense waste. We note
that the Blue Ribbon Commission did not address Yucca Mountain in its
draft report at the direction of the Secretary of Energy. We consider
this to be the ``missing recommendation.''
Transparent, Science-Based Approach Is Needed
With respect to the Blue Ribbon Commission's recommendations, we
fully agree with Recommendation #1 which calls for a consent-based,
transparent, and science-based approach to waste management solutions.
If a science-based approach were followed with transparency, we
would be completing the Yucca Mountain project today.
High-Level Defense Waste Needs Separate Consideration
It should be pointed out that we are on record multiple times with
our strongly held concerns that because of the Yucca Mountain decision
high-level defense waste will continue to be stored at the Savannah
River Site with no disposition path available, thus by default becoming
the ``de facto'' Yucca Mountain.
On this point, we want to be extremely clear. In its final report,
the Blue Ribbon Commission needs to de-couple high-level defense
waste--including the vitrified waste and used nuclear fuel from foreign
and domestic research reactors--from commercial spent fuel.
The waste is different. The quantity is different. The number of
locations affected is different. The potential for future use is
different. The legal and financial implications for the government are
different.
Commercial spent fuel and high-level defense waste should be
treated differently based on their unique characteristics and
requirements for safe storage and retrieval. Specific, separate
recommendations are needed for disposition of high-level defense waste.
New Federal Corporation Will Delay Progress
With respect to the Commission's second recommendation, we share
the view of those who fear that forming a federal corporation dedicated
to managing nuclear wastes could further delay efforts to dispose of
the waste, especially defense waste which has no other disposition path
than a geologic repository.
All evidence points to the fact that disposal of defense waste at
Savannah River Site is low among the Department of Energy's priorities.
It is also a fact that considerable time, money and effort would
have to be devoted to setting up a new federal or quasi-federal
organization to oversee disposition.
Rather than create new bureaucracy, why not simply focus for a
shorter period and for less money on just disposing of defense waste. A
new organization just doesn't seem to be a helpful solution in the
current environment. We need solutions, not more bureaucracy.
Nuclear Waste Fund Should Be Used for Its Purpose
Third, we fully agree that access by the nuclear waste management
program to the balance in the Nuclear Waste Fund and to the revenues
generated by annual nuclear waste fee payments should be assured.
Permanent Geologic Facility Is Needed Soon
Fourth, we also fully agree with the Commission's recommendation
that prompt efforts should be initiated to develop, as quickly as
possible, one or more permanent deep geological facilities for the safe
disposal of spent fuel and high-level nuclear waste. We believe Yucca
Mountain is the first of those facilities.
``Interim'' Should Be Legally Defined
The Commission's fifth recommendation is that we develop one or
more interim storage facilities as quickly as possible.
While we appreciate the need for such storage, our concern centers
on the term ``interim.'' When it comes to nuclear waste, this is a
relative term that is almost never associated with a fixed time frame.
Rather, it can mean anything--from 10 years to 500 years or more.
``Interim'' needs to be clearly and legally defined before communities
such as ours can begin to address the potential and advisability of
such storage.
In any event, our community will not support any interim storage of
commercial spent fuel scenario unless a permanent solution is pursued
at the same time.
This means progress toward a permanent repository for commercial
spent fuel and high-level defense waste and/or a program to reprocess
or recycle commercial used nuclear fuel.
Community support also requires removal of a sufficient quantity of
waste currently stored at SRS and the re-commitment of processing used
nuclear fuel currently stored at SRS in used fuel pools.
These two conditions--along with ongoing health and safety
monitoring, proper regulatory oversight both at the local and State
level, and a legally binding commitment to a final disposition plan--
are essential to community support for an interim storage option for
commercial spent fuel at SRS.
Fuel Cycle R&D Is Needed; H Canyon Should Be Utilized
We strongly agree with Recommendation Six which calls for stable,
long-term support for research, development, and demonstration on
advanced reactor and fuel cycle technologies. Furthermore, we believe
the Commission needs to make a specific recommendation regarding the
preservation and use of H Canyon as part of this R&D program.
H Canyon, as you know, is a one-of-a-kind facility of immense
importance to DOE and the Nation.
It is the only large-scale DOE facility that can
stabilize and separate DOE's inventory of complex plutonium materials
into a form suitable for disposition.
It is the only facility that can prepare the large and
growing inventory of research reactor fuel at the Savannah River Site
for disposition, while recovering valuable highly enriched uranium.
It is the only facility that can support engineering
development and ``hot'' testing of alternate nuclear fuel cycles and
advanced Small Nuclear Reactors.
We strongly urge the Blue Ribbon Commission to amend its
Recommendation Number 7 to specifically recognize the critical role of
H Canyon at the Savannah River Site in international non-proliferation
efforts.
The Commission should acknowledge that H Canyon is a national
treasure that should be fully deployed to complete the original plan of
disposing of nuclear materials brought to SRS.
We believe DOE's decision to place H Canyon at the Savannah River
Site in modified operational status is short-sighted, especially at a
time when critical existing mission needs are unmet.
In our view, it is imperative to reinstate H Canyon to operational
status--fully funded and fully staffed.
Nuclear Waste Solution Is Critical National Challenge
As we point out in our Yucca Mountain white paper, the challenge of
properly disposing of nuclear waste touches every man, woman and child
in America.
It speaks to public safety, to energy independence, to technology
and innovation, to global competitiveness and economic leadership and
to the political will to do what is right--what must be done for the
good of our communities today and of future generations tomorrow.
I thank this Committee for its oversight and contribution to the
national dialog. I urge you to carefully consider our comments and urge
the Blue Ribbon Commission to incorporate our views into their final
report.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. McLeod. And if any member of
the Committee would like some interpretation, Mr. McLeod and I
will be glad to interpret each other for you all. So thank you,
Mr. McLeod. I appreciate your testimony.
Dr. Peters, you are recognized for five minutes.
STATEMENT OF DR. MARK PETERS,
DEPUTY LABORATORY DIRECTOR FOR PROGRAMS,
ARGONNE NATIONAL LABORATORY
Dr. Peters. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning. I would
like to thank Chairman Broun, Ranking Member Tonko and Members
of the Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight, also
Chairman Harris, Ranking Member Miller and Representative
Biggert and the other Members of the Subcommittee on Energy and
Environment for the opportunity to testify this morning.
My name is Mark Peters and I am the Deputy Laboratory
Director for Programs at Argonne National Laboratory. Mr.
Chairman, I ask that my full written testimony be entered into
the record, and I will summarize it here.
I am honored to be here today to testify about science and
technology challenges and opportunities associated with the
nuclear fuel cycle, the need to develop new, sustainable
technologies to enable America's nuclear energy future, and
finally, my perspectives on the BRC draft recommendations.
For decades, the United States has grappled with the
multiple challenges of crafting a long-term solution for the
management of legacy and future used nuclear fuel. Over this
past year, these persistent challenges have taken on new
urgency as the accident at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear
power plant has focused international attention on the safety
and security of used nuclear fuel storage. Today as we consider
the BRC's draft recommendations, it is critically important for
us to take a close look at the many challenges that must be
addressed if we are to succeed in managing our used nuclear
fuel.
I concur with the BRC's draft recommendation to move
forward expeditiously with siting, licensing and operating a
storage and disposal system to manage legacy and future used
nuclear fuel. I believe this is an important and necessary step
toward enabling a sustainable nuclear energy future. A storage
and disposal system is required in any nuclear fuel cycle.
I also strongly support the BRC recommendation to conduct a
robust advanced fuel cycle R&D program to inform future
domestic fuel cycle options and maintain U.S. leadership in the
global nuclear energy and fuel cycle enterprise. Yet while I
understand the BRC's conclusion that it is premature to seek
consensus on the policy question of whether the United States
should commit to closing the fuel cycle, I believe the BRC's
omission of this issue will result in a missed opportunity to
inform our nuclear waste policy going forward.
Given the necessary linkages between fuel cycle
technologies and ultimate disposition of nuclear waste, I
believe it is vital to make advanced nuclear fuel cycle R&D a
critical component of our long-term strategy for nuclear waste
management, and that our national strategy must simultaneously
address issues of economics, uranium resource utilization,
nuclear waste minimization and a strengthened nonproliferation
regime.
This is an increasingly urgent issue. At present, nuclear
energy is the sole proven, reliable, abundant, affordable, and
carbon-free source of electricity generation for the United
States and the world. Our current nuclear-generating capacity
is not sufficient to support the goals of our energy system
going forward. Additionally, most existing nuclear power plants
in the United States will reach the end of their operating
licenses in the next few decades, so we must work swiftly and
urgently to extend, replace, and add to the nuclear energy-
generating capacity in the United States.
To a great extent, our future capacity for nuclear energy
generation will depend on our ability to safely dispose of
nuclear waste, and perhaps even more importantly, to assure the
public of the safety and security of our used nuclear fuel.
Failure to find new workable solutions to the continuing
problem of nuclear waste management will have serious long-term
ramifications for our national economy and future global
competitiveness.
Real technological progress in addressing these challenges
is possible only within the context of a thoughtful, consistent
policy for nuclear waste management, one that acknowledges the
reality that a once-through fuel cycle may not be sustainable
if global nuclear energy generation increases substantially.
Our national policy must include substantial support for an
advanced fuel cycle R&D program that is focused on outcomes,
that is closely integrated with storage and disposal efforts,
and that ultimately leads to down-selection, demonstration, and
deployment of effective advanced fuel cycle technologies.
To that end, the United States should conduct a science-
based advanced nuclear fuel cycle research, development, and
demonstration program to evaluate recycling, transmutation, and
disposal technologies that minimize proliferation,
environmental, health, and safety risks. This program should be
carried out through robust public-private partnerships
involving the Department of Energy, its national laboratories,
universities and industry, and it should be conducted with a
sense of urgency and purpose. My written testimony provides a
more specific set of recommendations to advance nuclear fuel
cycle R&D.
I thank you, and I would be pleased to answer any of your
questions.
[The prepared statement of Dr. Peters follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Mark Peters,
Deputy Laboratory Director for Programs,
Argonne National Laboratory
Summary
The Blue Ribbon Commission's (BRC) draft recommendation to move
forward expeditiously with siting, licensing, and operating a storage
and disposal system to manage legacy and future used nuclear fuel is an
important and necessary step to enabling a sustainable nuclear energy
future. A storage and disposal system is required in any nuclear fuel
cycle. The BRC recommendation to conduct a robust advanced fuel cycle
R&D program to inform future domestic fuel cycle options and maintain
United States leadership in the global nuclear energy and fuel cycle
enterprise is also important. Given the necessary linkages between fuel
cycle technologies and ultimate disposition of nuclear waste, it seems
most rational and efficient to address the challenges of advanced fuel
cycle technologies concurrently with the broader policy questions of
America's nuclear waste management program. Real progress in addressing
these challenges is possible only within the context of a thoughtful,
consistent policy for nuclear waste management, one that acknowledges
the reality that a once-through fuel cycle will not be sustainable if
global nuclear energy generation increases substantially.
Our national policy must include substantial support for a robust
advanced fuel cycle research and development program that is focused on
outcomes, that is closely integrated with storage and disposal efforts,
and that ultimately leads to down-selection, demonstration, and
deployment of effective advanced fuel cycle technologies. To that end,
the United States should conduct a science-based, advanced nuclear fuel
cycle research, development, and demonstration program to evaluate
recycling and transmutation technologies that minimize proliferation
risks and environmental, public health, and safety impacts. This
program should be carried out through robust public-private
partnerships involving the Department of Energy (DOE), its national
laboratories, universities, and industry, and it should be conducted
with a sense of urgency and purpose.
Introduction
For decades, the United States has grappled with the multiple
challenges of crafting a long-term solution for the management of
legacy and future used nuclear fuel. Over this past year, these
persistent challenges have taken on new urgency, as the accident at
Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has focused international
attention on the safety and security of used nuclear fuel storage.
Today, as we consider the BRC draft recommendations on America's
nuclear energy future, it is critically important for us to take a
close look at the scientific and technological challenges that must be
addressed if we are to succeed in managing our used nuclear fuel.
We must keep in mind, however, that real technical progress is
possible only within the context of a thoughtful, consistent policy for
nuclear waste management. Our national policy must include substantial
support for a robust advanced fuel cycle research and development
program that is focused on outcomes, that is closely integrated with
storage and disposal efforts, and that ultimately leads to down-
selection, demonstration, and deployment of effective advanced fuel
cycle technologies. Only a reasoned plan for research, development, and
deployment can lead to a decision on a preferred fuel cycle technology
that will enable safe, sustainable expansion of the U.S. nuclear fleet.
I concur with the BRC recommendation for prompt action regarding
siting, licensing, and operation of storage and disposal systems to
manage used nuclear fuel. Yet while I understand the Commission's
conclusion that it is premature to seek consensus on the policy
question of whether the United States should commit to closing the fuel
cycle, I believe the BRC draft report's omission of this issue will
result in a missed opportunity to inform U.S. nuclear waste policy
going forward. As the draft report notes: ``Future evaluations of
potential alternative fuel cycles must account for linkages among all
elements of the fuel cycle, (including waste transportation, interim
storage and disposal).'' Given those necessary linkages between fuel
cycle technologies and ultimate disposition of nuclear waste, it seems
most rational and efficient to address the challenges of advanced fuel
cycle technologies concurrently with the broader policy questions of
America's nuclear waste management program.
To that end, as I have testified previously to the House of
Representatives, I believe that the United States should conduct a
science-based, advanced nuclear fuel cycle research, development, and
demonstration program to evaluate recycling and transmutation
technologies that minimize proliferation risks and environmental,
public health, and safety impacts. This program should be carried out
through robust public-private partnerships involving the Department of
Energy (DOE), its national laboratories, universities, and industry,
and it should be conducted with a sense of urgency and purpose. To be
most effective, this program must support evaluation of alternative
national strategies for commercial used nuclear fuel disposition in
close conjunction with ongoing efforts to site and develop a permanent
geologic repository(s).
Sustainable Nuclear Energy
The ongoing challenge of America's nuclear waste management program
must not be considered in a vacuum. World energy demand is increasing
at a rapid and largely unsustainable pace; each year, humans consume an
average of 15 trillion watts of electricity and release over 30
gigatons of carbon into the atmosphere, and worldwide energy use is
expected to soar over the coming decades. To satisfy national and
worldwide energy demand, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and protect
the environment, energy production must evolve from current reliance on
fossil fuels to a more balanced, sustainable approach based on
abundant, clean, and economical energy sources. At present, nuclear
energy is the sole proven, reliable, abundant, affordable, and
``carbon-free'' source of electricity generation for the United States
and the world. However, our current capacity for nuclear generation is
not sufficient to support the goals of reliable, carbon-free, and
affordable energy. Additionally, most existing nuclear power plants in
the United States will reach the end of their operating licenses in the
next few decades. At present, it is extremely unlikely that renewable
energy sources, such as solar, wind, hydro, and geothermal energy, will
be sufficient to replace that reliable, base-load capacity when those
nuclear power plant licenses expire. So we must work swiftly and
urgently to devise economically viable, environmentally responsible
means to extend, replace, and add to the generating capacity of
America's 104 existing nuclear power plants, which now produce nearly
20% of our electricity.
As we seek to expand our portfolio of sustainable energy sources,
we must take into account the national and international response to
the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which
occurred in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake and tsunami
that struck northeastern Japan on March 11, 2011. The Fukushima
accident has led to worldwide uncertainty about the future of nuclear
power; in response, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy have announced
plans to phase out or cancel all existing and future reactors. To a
great extent, our future capacity for nuclear energy generation will
depend on our ability both to safely dispose of nuclear waste and--
perhaps even more importantly--to assure the public of the safety and
security of our used nuclear fuel. Failure to find new, workable
solutions to the continuing problem of nuclear waste management will
have serious long-term ramifications for our national economy and
future global competitiveness.
In considering the draft recommendations of the Blue Ribbon
Commission, I believe it is vital to make advanced nuclear fuel cycle
research a critical component of our long-term strategy for nuclear
waste management, and that our national strategy must simultaneously
address issues of economics, uranium resource utilization, nuclear
waste minimization, and a strengthened nonproliferation regime. All of
these issues will require both systems analysis and substantial,
consistent investments in research and development, demonstration, and
test and evaluation, with those efforts directed toward the ultimate
goal of a closed fuel cycle for waste and resource management.
Used Nuclear Fuel Management
It is the composition of used nuclear fuel that make its ultimate
disposal challenging. Fresh nuclear fuel is composed of uranium dioxide
(about 96% Uranium-238, and 4% Uranium-235). During irradiation, most
of the Uranium-235 is fissioned, and a small fraction of the Uranium-
238 is transmuted into heavier elements known as transuranics. The used
nuclear fuel contains about 93% uranium (mostly Uranium-238), about 1%
plutonium, less than 1% minor actinides (neptunium, americium, and
curium), and about 5% fission products. Uranium, if separated from the
other elements, is relatively benign, and could be disposed of as low-
level waste or stored for later re-use. However, some of the other
byproducts raise significant concerns:
The fissile isotopes of plutonium, americium, and
neptunium are potentially usable in weapons and therefore raise
proliferation concerns. However, used nuclear fuel remains intensely
radioactive for more than 100 years. Without the availability of remote
handling facilities, these isotopes cannot be readily separated,
essentially protecting them from diversion.
Three isotopes, which are linked through a decay process
(Plutonium-241, Americium-241, and Neptunium-237), are the major
contributors to long-term radiotoxicity (100,000 to 1 million years).
Hence, they are potential significant dose contributors in a
repository, and also major contributors to the long-term heat
generation that is a key design limit to the amount of waste that can
be placed in a given repository space.
Certain fission products (notably cesium and strontium)
are major contributors to any storage or repository's short-term heat
load, but their effects can be mitigated through engineering controls.
Other fission products, such as Technetium-99 and Iodine-
129, also contribute to long- term potential dose in a repository.
The time scales required to mitigate these concerns are daunting:
several of the isotopes of concern will not decay to safe levels for
hundreds of thousands of years. Thus, the solutions to long-term
disposal of used nuclear fuel are limited to three options (not
necessarily mutually exclusive): the location of a geologic environment
that will remain stable for that period; the identification of waste
forms that can contain these isotopes for that period; or the
destruction of these isotopes. These three options underlie the major
fuel cycle strategies that are currently being developed and deployed
in the United States and abroad.
The nuclear fuel cycle is a cradle-to-grave framework that includes
uranium mining, fuel fabrication, energy production, and nuclear waste
management. There are two basic nuclear fuel-cycle approaches. An open
(or once-through) fuel cycle, as currently envisioned by the United
States, involves treating used nuclear fuel as waste, with ultimate
disposition of the material in a geologic repository (see Figure 1).
In contrast, a closed (or recycle) fuel cycle, as currently planned
by other countries (e.g., France, Russia, and Japan), treats used
nuclear fuel as a resource, separating and recycling actinides in
reactors and using geologic disposal for remaining wastes (see Figure
2).
The open nuclear fuel cycle relies on disposition of used nuclear
fuel in a geologic repository that must contain the constituents of
that fuel for hundreds of thousands of years. Several countries have
programs to develop these repositories. This approach is considered
safe, provided suitable repository locations and space can be found. As
noted in the BRC draft report, the challenges of long-term geologic
disposal of used nuclear fuel are well recognized and are related to
the uncertainty about both the long-term behavior of used nuclear fuel
and the geologic media in which it is placed.
For the closed nuclear fuel cycle, limited recycle options are
commercially available in France, Japan, and the United Kingdom. These
nations currently use the Plutonium and Uranium Recovery by Extraction
(PUREX) process, which separates uranium and plutonium and directs the
remaining transuranics to vitrified waste, along with all the fission
products. In this process, uranium is stored for eventual reuse and
plutonium is used to fabricate mixed-oxide fuel that can be used in
conventional reactors. Used mixed-oxide fuel currently is not
reprocessed, though the feasibility of mixed-oxide fuel reprocessing
has been demonstrated. It is typically stored for eventual disposal in
a geologic repository. Although a reactor partially loaded with mixed-
oxide fuel can destroy as much plutonium as it creates, this approach
results in increased production of americium, a key contributor to the
heat generation in a repository.
This limited recycle approach has two significant advantages:
It can help manage the accumulation of plutonium.
It can significantly reduce the volume of used nuclear
fuel and high-level waste destined for geologic disposal. For example,
the French experience indicates that this limited recycling can achieve
volume reductions by a factor of 5 to 10.
However, there are several disadvantages to the PUREX process:
It imposes a small economic penalty by increasing the net
cost of electricity a few percent.
The separation of pure plutonium in the PUREX process is
considered by some to be a proliferation risk.
This process does not significantly improve the use of
the repository space (the improvement is around 10%, as compared to
many factors of 10 for closed fuel cycles).
This process does not significantly improve the use of
natural uranium (the improvement is around 15%, as compared to several
factors of 10 for closed fuel cycles).
Full recycle approaches are currently being researched in France,
Japan, China, Russia, South Korea, India, and the United States. These
typically comprise three successive steps: an advanced separations
technology that mitigates the perceived disadvantages of PUREX, partial
recycle in conventional reactors, and closure of the fuel cycle in fast
reactors. Note: the middle step can be eliminated and still attain the
waste management benefits; inclusion of the middle step is a fuel cycle
system-level consideration.
The first step, using advanced separations technologies, allows for
the separations and subsequent management of high-purity product
streams. These streams are:
Uranium, which can be stored for future use or disposed
of as low-level waste.
A mixture of plutonium and neptunium, which is intended
for partial recycle in conventional reactors, followed by recycle in
fast reactors.
Separated fission products intended for short-term
storage, possibly for transmutation, and for long-term disposal in
specialized waste forms.
The minor actinides (americium and curium) for
transmutation in fast reactors.
The advanced separations approach has several advantages:
It produces minimal liquid waste forms and eliminates the
issue of the ``waste tank farms.''
Through advanced monitoring, simulation, and modeling, it
provides significant opportunities to detect misuse and diversion of
weapons-usable materials.
It provides the opportunity for significant cost
reduction.
Finally, and most importantly, it provides the critical
first step in managing all hazardous elements present in the used
nuclear fuel.
The second step--partial recycle in conventional reactors--can
expand the opportunities offered by the conventional mixed-oxide
approach. In particular, it is expected that, with significant R&D
effort, new fuel forms can be developed that could burn up to 50% of
the plutonium and neptunium present in used nuclear fuel. Some studies
also suggest that it might be possible to recycle fuel in these
reactors many times--i.e., reprocess and recycle the irradiated
advanced fuel--and further destroy plutonium and neptunium; other
studies also suggest possibilities for transmuting americium in these
reactors. Nevertheless, the practicality of these schemes is not yet
established and requires additional scientific and engineering
research. The advantage of the second step is that it reduces the
overall cost of the closed fuel cycle by consuming plutonium in
conventional reactors, thereby reducing the number of fast reactors
needed to complete the transmutation mission of minimizing hazardous
waste. As mentioned above, this step can be entirely bypassed, and all
transmutation performed in advanced fast reactors, if recycle in
conventional reactors is judged to be undesirable.
The third step, closure of the fuel cycle using fast reactors to
transmute the fuel constituents into much less hazardous elements, and
advanced reprocessing technologies to recycle the fast reactor fuel,
constitutes the ultimate step in realizing sustainable nuclear energy.
This process will effectively destroy the transuranic elements,
resulting in waste forms that contain only a very small fraction of the
transuranics (less than 1%) and all fission products. These
technologies are now being developed in the U.S. at Argonne National
Laboratory and Idaho National Laboratory, with parallel development
internationally (e.g., Japan, France, and Russia).
Several disadvantages have been noted for a closed fuel cycle,
including:
Increased cost. (Note that, in practice, closed fuel
cycle processes actually would have limited economic impact; the
increase in the cost of electricity would be less than 10%.)
Expected increased generation of low-level waste,
although this increase might be addressed successfully through improved
technologies.
Management of potentially weapons-usable materials may be
viewed as a proliferation risk.
These disadvantages can be addressed through a robust research,
development, and demonstration program focused on advanced reactors and
recycling options. In the end, the full recycle approach has
significant benefits:
It can more effectively utilize repository space.
It can effectively increase the use of natural uranium.
It eliminates the uncontrolled buildup of isotopes that
are a proliferation risk.
An advanced reactor and associated processing plant can
be deployed in small co-located facilities that minimize the risk of
material diversion during transportation.
A fast reactor does not require the use of very pure,
weapons-usable materials, thus decreasing proliferation risk.
Finally, full recycle can usher the way towards full
sustainability to prepare for a future time when uranium supplies may
become increasingly difficult to obtain.
In summary, the overarching challenge associated with the choice of
any fuel cycle option is used nuclear fuel management. While geologic
repositories will be needed for any type of nuclear fuel cycle, a
closed fuel cycle would result in very different use of a repository.
For reprocessing to be beneficial (as opposed to counterproductive), it
must be followed by recycling, transmutation, and destruction of the
long-lived radiotoxic constituents (i.e., plutonium, neptunium,
americium). Reprocessing (with PUREX) followed by thermal-recycling
(mixed-oxide [MOX] fuel in light water reactors [LWRs]) is well
established, but is only a partial solution. It is not at all clear
that the United States should embark on this path, especially since we
have not made a large investment in a PUREX/MOX infrastructure. (N.B.
The U.S. is proceeding with a plan to reduce excess-weapons plutonium
inventory using MOX in LWRs.) In contrast, advancement of fast reactor
technology for transuranic recycling and consumption would maximize the
benefits of waste management and also allow essential progress toward
the longer-term goal of sustainable use of uranium (and subsequently
thorium) with fast reactors. These differences illustrate the
importance of integrating advanced fuel cycle technology research and
development into any national plan to address nuclear waste management.
As we approach this subject, we also must remember that, while
there is no urgent need to deploy recycling today, a once-through fuel
cycle will not be sustainable if global nuclear energy generation
increases substantially. To maximize the benefits of nuclear energy in
an expanding nuclear energy future, it will be necessary to close the
fuel cycle.
Detailed Discussion
Argonne National Laboratory
Located 25 miles southwest of Chicago, Argonne National Laboratory
is a direct descendant of the University of Chicago's Metallurgical
Laboratory, where Enrico Fermi and his colleagues created the world's
first controlled nuclear chain reaction. Appropriately, Argonne's first
mission 64 years ago was to develop nuclear reactors for peaceful
purposes. Managed by the UChicago Argonne, LLC for the U.S. Department
of Energy, Argonne has grown into a multidisciplinary laboratory with a
unique mix of world-class scientists and engineers and leading-edge
user facilities, working to create new technologies that address the
most important scientific and societal needs of our nation.
Argonne's experience over many years of research and development in
the advancement of nuclear energy positions it as a leader in the
development of future generation reactors and fuel cycle technologies.
A primary goal of Argonne's nuclear energy research program is to
advance the sustainable use of nuclear energy through research and
development of technologies that enable waste minimization, enhanced
resource utilization, competitive economics, and increased assurance of
reliability, safety, and security. Expertise in reactor physics,
nuclear and chemical engineering, computational science and
engineering, and fuel cycle analysis is applied in the assessment and
conceptual development of advanced nuclear energy systems that meet
these important goals.
In collaboration with other DOE laboratories and universities,
Argonne is advancing a science- and simulation-based approach for
optimizing the design of advanced nuclear energy systems and assuring
their safety and security. This approach seeks increased understanding
of physical phenomena governing system behavior and incorporates this
understanding in improved models for predicting system performance in
operating and off-normal situations. Once validated, these models allow
the simulation and optimization of system design and operation, to
enhance safety assurance and cost competitiveness with alternative
energy supply options. They also promise to accelerate the
demonstration of commercially attractive systems in partnership with
industry.
Primarily, the DOE's Office of Nuclear Energy (DOE-NE), through its
Fuel Cycle Research and Development program, supports Argonne's waste
management and reprocessing research and development activities. The
objective of Argonne's research in this area is to develop and evaluate
separations and treatment processes for used nuclear fuel that will
enable the transition from the current open fuel cycle practiced in the
U.S. to a sustainable, environmentally acceptable, and economic closed
fuel cycle.
Our research focuses on the science and technology of chemical
separations for the treatment of used fuel from both commercial and
advanced nuclear reactors, used fuel characterization techniques, and
waste form engineering and qualification. Ongoing projects related to
reprocessing and waste management include:
Using advanced modeling and simulation coupled with
experiments to optimize the design and operation of separations
equipment.
Exploring an innovative one-step extraction process for
americium and curium, radionuclides that are major contributors to
nuclear waste toxicity, to reduce the cost of used-fuel treatment.
Further developing pyrochemical processes for used fuel
treatment. These processes enable the use of compact equipment and
facilities, treatment of used fuel shortly after discharge from a
reactor, and reduction of secondary waste generation.
Developing highly durable and leach-resistant waste forms
of metal, glass, and ceramic composition for safe, long-term disposal.
In addition, Argonne's nuclear science and engineering expertise
utilizes theory, experiment, and modeling and simulation in the
assessment and conceptual development of innovative, advanced reactors
operating with a variety of coolants, fuel types, and fuel cycle
schemes. Argonne also leads U.S. development of innovative technologies
that promise to reduce the cost of fast-neutron reactors and increase
their reliability. These technologies include high-performance fuels
and materials; compact, low-cost components for the heat transport
systems; advanced power conversion and refueling systems; and improved
capabilities for in-service inspection and repair.
Argonne's research into the behavior of irradiated fuels and
materials supports the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in the
regulation of industry initiatives to extend the operational lifetime
and optimize the operation of existing and evolutionary nuclear
reactors. Leading-edge systems analysis and modeling capabilities are
used to assess the relative merits of different advanced nuclear energy
systems and fuel cycles for various domestic and global scenarios of
energy demand and supply consistent with environmental constraints and
sustainability considerations. Argonne also has expertise in the
components of nuclear technology that are critical for national
security and nonproliferation, including the conversion of research
reactors to low-enrichment fuels, technology export control, risk and
vulnerability assessments, and national-security information systems.
Current Nuclear Waste Reprocessing Technologies
PUREX
As discussed above, current commercial used nuclear fuel
reprocessing technologies are based on the PUREX process, a solvent
extraction process that separates uranium and plutonium and directs the
remaining minor actinides (neptunium, americium, and curium) along with
all of the fission products to vitrified waste. The PUREX process has
over 50 years of operational experience. For example, the La Hague
reprocessing facility in France treats used fuel from domestic and
foreign power reactors. The plutonium recovered is recycled as a mixed-
oxide fuel to generate additional electricity. This technology is also
used for commercial applications in the United Kingdom and Japan.
There are a number of drawbacks to the PUREX system. PUREX does not
recover the minor actinides (neptunium, americium, curium, and heavier
actinide elements), which compose a significant fraction of the long-
term radiotoxicity of used fuel. Advanced reactors can transmute and
consume minor actinides if they are separated from other fission
product elements, but incorporation of minor actinide separations into
existing PUREX facilities adds complexity and is outside commercial
operating experience. Moreover, existing international facilities do
not capture fission gases and tritium; these are discharged to the
environment within regulatory limits. Although plutonium is recycled as
mixed oxide fuel, this practice actually increases the net discharge of
minor actinides. Finally, the production of pure plutonium through
PUREX raises concerns about materials security and proliferation of
nuclear weapons-usable materials.
PYROPROCESSING
Pyroprocessing is currently being used at the Idaho National
Laboratory to treat and stabilize used fuel from the decommissioned
EBR-II reactor. The key separation step, electrorefining, recovers
uranium (the bulk of the used fuel) in a single compact process
operation. Ceramic and metallic waste forms, for active metal and noble
metal fission products respectively, are being produced and have been
qualified for disposal in a geologic repository. However, the
demonstration equipment used for this treatment campaign has limited
scalability. Argonne has developed conceptual designs of scalable,
high-throughput equipment as well as an integrated facility, but to
date only a prototype advanced scalable electrorefiner has been
fabricated and successfully tested.
Advanced Reprocessing Technologies
Research on advanced reprocessing technologies focuses on processes
that meet U.S. non-proliferation objectives and enable the economic
recycling of long-lived actinides in used fuel, while reducing the
amount and radiotoxicity of high-level wastes that must be disposed.
Main areas of research include:
Aqueous-based Process Design--Current studies target the
simplification of aqueous processes that can recover the long-lived
actinides as a group in one or two steps.
Pyrochemical-based Process Design--Present work is
focused on development of scalable, high-throughput equipment and
refining our understanding of the fundamental electrochemical process.
We are targeting greater control of the composition of the recovered
uranium/transuranic alloy, which will facilitate safeguards consistent
with U.S. non-proliferation goals.
Off-gas Treatment--Environmental regulations limiting the
release of gaseous fission products require the development of
materials that will efficiently capture and retain volatile fission
products. Because these volatile fission products are generally
difficult to retain, development of novel materials with strong
affinities for specific fission products is essential.
Product/Waste Fabrication--This development effort
includes concentrating the product streams and recovery/recycle of
process fluids, solidification of products for both waste form and fuel
fabrication/recycle. The products must meet stringent requirements as
nuclear fuel feedstocks or must be suitable for waste form fabrication.
Process Monitoring and Control--Advanced computational
techniques are being developed to assess and reduce uncertainties in
processing operations within a plant. Such uncertainties in design, in
processing, and in measurements significantly increase costs through
increased needs for large design margins, material control and
accounting, and product rework.
Sampling Technologies--The tracking of materials is
critical to the safeguarding and operational control of recycle
processes. Improving the accuracy of real-time measurements is a major
goal for material accountancy and control. Reducing the turnaround time
for analysis by applying state-of-the-art sampling and analytical
techniques will enable ``on-line'' material accountancy in real time.
Advanced spectroscopic techniques are under study to reduce gaps in our
ability to identify key species at key locations within a plant.
Impact on Future Nuclear Waste Management Policy
The BRC draft report details possible solutions for the ultimate
disposal of used nuclear fuel in the United States. To be most
effective, these efforts should proceed in parallel with advances in
used fuel processing and recycling, to ensure development of a fully
integrated policy for nuclear waste management in the United States--
one that is consistent with our energy security, nonproliferation, and
environmental protection goals.
As previously noted, high-level waste disposal facilities are
required for all fuel cycles, but the volumes and characteristics of
the wastes generated by these fuel cycles are different. A cohesive
waste classification system will be needed to define the facilities
required to support waste disposal. Currently, the United States relies
on an ad hoc system based on point of origin to address management of
specific wastes. The result is a complex dual waste categorization
system, one for defense wastes and another for civilian wastes. This
approach has resulted in high disposition costs, nuclear waste with no
disposition pathways, limited disposition sites, and a system that will
be difficult to align with any alternative fuel cycle that is adopted.
Without a consistent waste classification system, it is impossible to
compare waste management costs and risks for different fuel cycles
without making arbitrary assumptions regarding theoretical disposition
pathways.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recommends a risk-
based classification system that accounts for the intensity of the
radiation and the time needed for decay to an acceptable level. The
intensity of radiation is given by a range of radioactivity per unit of
weight. Decay time is split into short lived (<30 years) and long lived
(>30 years). The IAEA system does not consider the source of nuclear
waste in either categorization or disposition options. The result is a
simple, consistent, standardized system.
The question of waste categorization is yet another example of why
reprocessing technologies should be fully considered in any discussions
about disposal options and long-term waste management policies.
Alternative technologies will have different economies of scale based
on the type and number of wastes. In addition, waste packages may be
retrievable or not, and waste forms should be tailored to the
repository site geology. Given the need to craft the most cost-
effective solution, it would be a missed opportunity to approach the
question of long-term disposition without developing a congruent
approach to the fuel cycle.
An Effective Fuel Cycle Strategy Going Forward
Argonne believes that advanced recycle processes and waste
management technologies should be developed and demonstrated at
engineering scale during the next few decades. To enable an effective
research and development strategy, the development of advanced fuel
treatment technologies and waste forms must be closely coordinated with
R&D on:
Advanced fuels and interim storage strategies for current
light water reactors (LWRs), as these affect the requirements on
reprocessing and waste technologies. Research on advanced fuels for
light water reactors is one of the proposed thrusts of the DOE-NE Light
Water Reactor Sustainability program.
Advanced reactors such as liquid metal and gas-cooled
``Generation IV'' reactors, which employ different fuel types and thus
discharge used fuel that is very different from that of LWRs. Advanced
fast spectrum reactors can efficiently consume the residual actinides
in used nuclear fuel, effectively converting these actinides to
electricity instead of discharging them as waste.
Recommendations
As part of our long-term strategy for nuclear waste management, the
United States should conduct an advanced nuclear fuel cycle research,
development, and demonstration program to evaluate recycling and
transmutation technologies that minimize proliferation risks and
environmental, public health, and safety impacts. This would provide a
necessary option to reprocessing technologies deployed today, and
supports evaluation of alternative national strategies for commercial
used nuclear fuel disposition, effective utilization and deployment of
advanced reactor concepts, and eventual development of a permanent
geologic repository(s). This should be done as part of robust public-
private partnerships involving the Department of Energy, its national
laboratories, universities, and industry, and conducted with a sense of
urgency and purpose consistent with the U.S. retaining its intellectual
capital and leadership in the international nuclear energy community.
Over the next several years, the research, development, and
demonstration program should:
Complete the development and testing of a completely
integrated process flow sheet for all steps involved in an advanced
nuclear fuel recycling process.
Characterize the byproducts and waste streams resulting
from all steps in the advanced nuclear fuel recycling process.
Conduct research and development on advanced reactor
concepts and transmutation technologies that consume recycled
byproducts resulting in improved resource utilization and reduced
radiotoxicity of waste streams.
Develop waste treatment processes, advanced waste forms,
and designs for disposal facilities for the resultant byproducts and
waste streams characterized.
Develop and design integrated safeguards and security
measures for advanced nuclear fuel recycling processes that enable the
quantification and minimization of proliferation risks associated with
deploying such processes and facilities.
Evaluate and define the required test and experimental
facilities needed to execute the program.
Upon completion of sufficient technical progress, the program
should:
Develop a generic environmental impact statement for
technologies to be further developed and demonstrated.
Conduct design and engineering work sufficient to develop
firm cost estimates with respect to development and deployment of
advanced nuclear fuel recycling processes.
Cooperate with the NRC in making DOE facilities available
for carrying out independent, confirmatory research as part of the
licensing process.
Argonne supports a greater emphasis on coupling the science-based
approach for system development with an active design and technology
demonstration effort that would guide and appropriately focus R&D, and
thus enable assessment of programmatic benefits in a holistic manner.
This would be accomplished by close cooperation of DOE, national
laboratories, universities, and industry. The overall approach would
seek to:
Increase understanding of the diverse physical phenomena
underlying reactor and fuel cycle system behavior.
Improve ability to predict system behavior through
validated modeling and simulation for design, licensing; and operation.
Develop advanced materials, processes, and designs for
reactor and fuel cycle systems through application of scientific
discoveries and advanced modeling and simulation capabilities, as well
as the insights and lessons learned from past nuclear energy
development programs.
These efforts would allow for fuel cycle demonstration in a time
frame that could influence the course of fuel cycle technology
commercialization on a global basis. Moreover, each of the individual
elements of the planned R&D (e.g., separations, waste forms,
transmutation fuels) is potentially vast in scope and could absorb
substantial resources, without commensurate benefit, if the different
areas are not sufficiently integrated for the results to fit together
in a viable system.
It is clear that the United States must address significant
hurdles, both in policy and in technology, as we seek effective
solutions to the pressing question of used nuclear fuel management. We
can expect success only if we can craft a consistent national policy
that includes substantial support for a robust advanced fuel cycle
research and development program, to be carried out through strong
public-private partnerships involving the Department of Energy (DOE),
its national laboratories, universities, and industry. This program
must be focused on outcomes and closely integrated with storage and
disposal efforts. It also must support evaluation of alternative
national strategies for commercial used nuclear fuel disposition in
close conjunction with ongoing efforts to site and develop a permanent
geologic repository(s). Ultimately, this program must lead to down-
selection, demonstration, and deployment of effective advanced fuel
cycle technologies. Only through a reasoned plan for research,
development, and deployment can we expect to reach a wise, workable
decision on a preferred fuel cycle technology that will enable safe and
sustainable expansion of the U.S. nuclear fleet.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Dr. Peters. I thank the panel
for you all's testimony. Reminding members that Committee rules
limit questioning to five minutes, the Chair at this point will
open the first round of questions. The Chair recognizes himself
for five minutes.
Mr. McLeod, in your opinion, does the demand of the
Secretary of Energy that BRC exclude Yucca in its deliberations
detract from its ability to develop the best possible
recommendations for nuclear waste management?
Mr. McLeod. Yes, sir, Congressman, we do. We believe that
is fact. We also believe that they could--we know eventually
there is going to have to be another repository as well. We can
move first with Yucca Mountain and then start work on the
second one, and as I stated in our testimony, the written
testimony, we also believe that maybe one of the missing
recommendations from this report is where is the recommendation
to utilize Yucca Mountain.
Chairman Broun. Very good. Thank you.
Dr. Swift, please summarize the scientific evaluation of
Yucca Mountain that you led for Sandia and the Department of
Energy. How many years was the site studied? Can you describe
some of the issues considered--hydrology, seismic activity, the
robustness of engineering barriers--and what was found?
Ultimately, what was concluded regarding the site's suitability
and its ability to meet NRC safety recommendations and
requirements?
Dr. Swift. Thank you. Certainly. The site was studied from
the early 1980s until the time the license application was
submitted. Work continued after the submittal of the license
application in response to questions received from the NRC.
Just in terms of the--one way to look at it is the volume of
the work, the page count. The application is about 8,000 pages,
8,600. You know, there are 196 documents that went with it.
These were not simple documents. These were thick technical
reports, maybe 50,000, 60,000 pages total. The types of topics
that were addressed, from a technical point of view, we saw our
responsibility to evaluate essentially everything that was
potentially relevant, so we catalogued what might happen,
potentially relevant things, and including things that were on
the face of them probably not relevant but for completeness
there they were--changes in sea level, the effects of future
changes in sea level, for example, effects of erosion at the
land surface well above where the waste would be buried,
seismic effects, the effects of possible volcanism at the site.
Each of these ends up with a detailed technical analysis,
specialists focusing on it, sometimes for years.
The other processes, groundwater flow, transport of
radionuclides in the groundwater away from the site, the way
radionuclides might be taken up in the biosphere through
potential pathways for human exposure in the future, the
treatment of uncertainty that Professor Kasperson mentioned,
and all of this we did attempt to estimate the range of
uncertainty in our knowledge understanding of those physical
processes, and that would be incorporated into what I refer to
as an estimate, not a prediction of the future. It is an
estimate based on our understanding of the uncertainty.
And I think you asked for the conclusions of it. Again, as
I said in my testimony, we concluded with good confidence that
the site would perform well, that it would meet the NRC and EPA
requirements, that the two things, the primary measures that
the regulations judge on would be the releases from the site
into groundwater and potential doses to humans. Those are both
well below regulatory limits.
Chairman Broun. Very good, sir. Thank you.
Mr. Hollis, the State of Nevada currently opposes the
repository at Yucca Mountain. You were very clear that your
local community does ardently support it being there. One of
the primary recommendations from the draft, the Blue Ribbon
Commission report, was that any repository should have local
support. Why does Nevada oppose the Yucca Mountain project yet
your county favors it, and how do you define consent-based
siting and local support?
Mr. Hollis. Mr. Chairman, I think one of the big things is
people calling it a dump. If you go out and ask people, do you
favor a radioactive site, that it is a dump, you are going to
get no, I don't want it. If you were to ask them, do you want a
repository to keep the radioactive source safe, you will
probably get a yes. Most people keep their money in banks.
Banks are a repository. That is what this facility is, a
repository to keep something safe.
And as far as the consent basis program, the Blue Ribbon
Commission didn't answer any question. What if a State doesn't
or no State wants the repository? That is the reason Congress
had a provision in there that the Congress would vote on it
after a disapproval by the State.
Chairman Broun. Very good. My time is expired.
Now I recognize the Ranking Member Tonko for five minutes.
Mr. Tonko. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Dr. Kasperson, could you briefly tell us about the role of
politics in the 1987 decision to designate Yucca Mountain as a
permanent repository for waste?
Dr. Kasperson. The history of radioactive waste management
not only in the United States but elsewhere has indicated that
it has never been a purely scientific process anywhere as far
as I know, and there has always been a mixture of politics and
science and interaction between the two, in particular, a 1987,
a concern that I think went through the scientific community as
well as people in Nevada. By the way, I also don't like the
terminology of calling a repository a dump, but I don't think
we fix the problem by changing the name.
Anyhow, in the case of the 1987 amendments, what happened
in effect was that although a commitment had been made in the
original Nuclear Waste Policy Act to have a competitive
process, if you will, about characterizing the technical
qualities and quality assurance and risks associated with
sites, a decision was made basically to make the choice prior
to the scientific work being completed, and that was a major
problem in a loss of social trust and in polarizing the local
people of Nevada. There have been other issues like this, for
example, in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of fairness. Actually,
Congress, I think, tried very hard on--in that legislation to
achieve fairness of process, and subsequently the President
simply eliminated the eastern repository as basically a
political move, I think, primarily because of the dangers that
were represented and the election going on at that time.
Mr. Tonko. Now, even if the geology and the climate, for
instance, were perfect or are perfect, which some dispute,
Yucca has been a political failure with, you know, then-
Presidential candidate Senator Obama promising to close it.
Now, leading Republican candidates for the Presidency are
making that same sort of pledge, and we hear about the vast
number of Nevadans who oppose, you know, hosting that
repository. Are there any lessons that you can cite for us, Dr.
Kasperson, from the failure that can be used to guide future
siting processes?
Dr. Kasperson. Well, let me indicate one example. I spent
some time in Sweden earlier, in the early years of this
century, and had some contact with their process there, and the
Swedes really take a rather different approach than we have
taken, and I think it is a lesson from both the process going
on in Sweden and a lesson from Yucca Mountain that if you
really rely upon coercion rather than on trying to achieve a
high degree of voluntary consent, you are going to find
yourself in a war with local States, and I think a number of us
wrote in the 1980s that we already had learned enough about
radioactive waste management to know that if you had to deal
with trying to coerce an unwilling State with an active and
talented Attorney General, you were going to have a major
problem in winning over consent, and the polarization that has
happened in Nevada is, I think, a good lesson that we ought to
try to do more of what the Swedes have done of achieving a high
degree of voluntary consent, taking things off the agenda that
local people are concerned about and moving that whole process
along, greasing the wheels rather than producing the backs up
of local people.
Mr. Tonko. I yield back.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Tonko.
Now I recognize my fellow Subcommittee Chairman, Dr.
Harris, for five minutes.
Mr. Harris. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I want to get back to, you know, talking about the science
of Yucca Mountain. We have spent, as I said in my opening
statement, billions of dollars, many of years studying it, and
all the science that we are aware of right now says that the
nuclear waste can be stored there safely, but much of that
scientific effort and data is being blocked from public view
because the NRC simply refuses to release the safety reports
that scientists prepared and refuses to complete its review of
the Yucca Mountain license application. In fact, Chairman Hall,
Dr. Broun and myself have sent multiple letters to the NRC
demanding release of this information and action on the
license.
I want to ask the panel, and begin with Mr. Spencer, how
important is it for the NRC to finalize and release its
scientific reviews of the site, that is, the safety evaluation
reports? Can any of you think of any reason why you would want
to withhold any of that from the public, stonewall this, and
what does the continued suppression of those reports mean with
respect to the scientific integrity goals and guidelines that
this Administration, you know, to their credit regularly talk
about but, you know, I would like to actually see it in action?
So, Mr. Spencer.
Mr. Spencer. As I testified today and I have written
extensively on in the past, I think it is absolutely critical
that all that information be made available if for no other
reason, notwithstanding whether we ever build the repository or
not, to allow us all to make the most informed decisions
possible about Yucca Mountain. In addition to that, the fact
is, we have spent as a country $15 billion characterizing that
project. There simply is no good reason not to allow all the
information relevant to that project be shown the light of day
so that we can make our determinations on that.
Mr. Harris. Thank you.
Dr. Swift, any reasons you can think of not to do it?
Dr. Swift. I want to thank you for the question. I want to
emphasize the importance of the role of the regulator in this
process. I asserted earlier that I believe the site meets those
regulations. The test of that is when a regulator makes that
finding. I as a scientist don't actually make a decision here.
I inform a decision, and we do have a process here which
decision is up to the regulator, a lengthy and detailed process
to be followed. Yes, I see value in following that process.
Mr. Harris. Mr. McLeod?
Mr. McLeod. I will give a short answer. Yes, they should
release the report.
Mr. Harris. No reason you can think of where we should hide
any of that from the public?
Mr. McLeod. No reason.
Mr. Harris. Okay. Dr. Peters?
Dr. Peters. Yes, I would agree. I would like to see it
released. The reason I would also like to see it released is
because regardless of whether we move forward with Yucca
Mountain, we have to develop a repository, so there is a
tremendous amount to learn from understanding what----
Mr. Harris. What we have done so far.
Dr. Peters. What we have done so far and what the regulator
said about the license application.
Mr. Harris. Thank you.
Let me just ask two other very short questions. One is, is
that, you know, Dr. Kasperson, I appreciate your point about,
you know, coercion versus voluntary consent. That is important.
But right next to you is Mr. Hollis. I mean, he lives in the
area. His family drinks the water, breathes the air, and he is
here, he doesn't look coerced to me. So I am going to ask you,
Mr. Hollis, you know, according to your testimony, you have--
Nye County has done some scientific investigation, according to
your written testimony, and based on that, I mean, do you need
to be coerced or are you, you know, looking at the data,
looking at what the county itself looked at, you want to be
neighbors with this facility?
Mr. Hollis. Absolutely. We have had a really good
relationship with the Department of Energy until about two
years ago, three years ago, then they started cutting down the
program. The cooperation kind of went blank. And they don't
talk to us much anymore.
Mr. Harris. But your testimony is that the county most
affected and the people most affected, and it will never be
everyone but they want this to go forward, at least to complete
the investigation?
Mr. Hollis. Absolutely. I have--I don't get calls on Yucca
Mountain. I get more phone calls on dogs and cats than I do----
Mr. Harris. I appreciate that, being a local elected
official. I appreciate that.
Dr. Swift, I just want to ask you one question, because I
understand the DOE has asked Sandia to begin review of deep
borehole methods versus other methods of disposal. Could you
just briefly discuss the advantage and disadvantage of the deep
borehole methods, and then of course whether or not--because
one of the conditions that is supposed to be retrievable is
whether or not that is accomplishable with a deep borehole
method.
Dr. Swift. With respect to that last point first, if
permanent disposal is not what you intend, a deep borehole
probably is not the preferred option. There are ways to
retrieve things out of a deep borehole. The oil industry, for
example, can retrieve things from quite surprising depths out
of a hole. But no, you are making it harder on yourself there.
The premise of the concept is, you drill a relatively large
diameter hole, say a half a meter in diameter, to maybe a five-
kilometer depth into bedrock, crystalline bedrock, and you use
the lower two kilometers of the hole for disposal and that
gives you a very long column to seal it. It is a very long
transport pathway for radioactive material to come back out.
The premise is straightforward. The technology is within reach
now. It is there now to implement it. There is work to be done
to demonstrate that seal technology would work, that the
permeability of bedrock at that depth is as low as we think it
is. There is work to be done.
Mr. Harris. And just out of curiosity, and I know I am a
little over time, about how many of these boreholes would you
need for the current nuclear waste we have? It seems like you
would need a lot. Any idea?
Dr. Swift. Yes, we looked at that. Without reconsolidating
waste and just taking the fuel assemblies as they exist today,
the entire projected inventory from the current fleet of 104
commercial reactors would fit in under--probably under 1,000
boreholes.
Mr. Harris. Okay. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Dr. Harris.
The Chair now recognizes Mr. Miller for five minutes.
Mr. Miller. Thank you.
Dr. Kasperson, I had the experience a couple years ago of
living through a proposal to locate a facility in my district
that initially everyone was for, and by the time it was done,
hardly anyone was for it. It was a biological research center.
It was to move the Plum Island facility from Plum Island.
Supposedly, the decision to site it there in the first place
was always completely political. There was a provision written
into the law that required that it be on an island, supposedly
to contain foot-and-mouth disease but supposedly that was
always just to make sure it went to Plum Island and had no
scientific basis. Initially everyone saw it as research, great
jobs with all four of the county commissioners of that county
was for it, everybody nearby was for it. NC State was for it,
Duke was for it, Carolina was for it, everybody was for it.
Over the course of several public hearings, all public support
for it in Granville County deteriorated, and eventually the
county commissioners reversed their positions, and at that
point I reversed my position from having supported local
government's desire to bring it into their county to not
supporting bringing the facility to a county in my district
that did not want it.
How would the NBAF--it was called NBAF, that is an acronym
for something--how did bringing--how did the siting decision
for NBAF compare to the Yucca Mountain decision? Are you
familiar with both processes?
Dr. Kasperson. No, I am really not, but I might make one
observation, that we have been looking with interest on the
siting of wind energy facilities in the United States, and
everybody agrees in principle. At first, everybody favors it,
and they agree in principle that wind energy is a fairly benign
energy source as compared with nuclear and coal and so forth.
But we also know that in many of these cases what starts--what
you are seeing in that particular facility is something that
occurs in many places, that people start off very positive
about it. As they learn more and as issues are raised about it
and risks get onto the agenda and become discussed, that
people's fears and concerns tend to take over in the process,
and many of these situations end up with people quite negative,
and I think it has become really difficult for hazardous
facilities, hazardous industrial facilities and energy
facilities very generally, even when they are as benign as wind
energy and solar units, for example, to site any of those
things, and the Cape Wind case, which you may be familiar with,
is a good illustration of this where there has been a 10-year
fight about establishing offshore wind turbines.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Hollis, you testified that there is support
in your county that would actually be the--the Yucca Mountain
facility would actually be in your county and that folks in
your county do support it, see it as bringing jobs, economic
activity, and as I said in my opening statement, though, this
high-level nuclear waste, although there are concerns enough
about keeping it someplace safely for 10,000 years, you have
got to get it there first and it will not magically appear at
Yucca Mountain, and all the rail lines, all of the roads that
it would likely travel through, on to get to your county, to
the Yucca Mountain facility, go through Las Vegas, and what is
the population of your county and what is the population of Las
Vegas, and would there be any jobs associated with having high-
level nuclear waste coming through Las Vegas on roads or on
rail?
Mr. Hollis. Well, I have shipments of waste going to the
test site pretty much every day, and none of that waste goes
through Las Vegas. All of it goes around Las Vegas into Nye
County and to the test site.
Mr. Miller. Okay. My understanding is that 80,000 shipments
a year would go through Clark County, through Las Vegas.
Mr. Hollis. Far as I know, none of the shipments would go
through downtown Las Vegas.
Mr. Miller. Downtown Las Vegas. How about Clark County?
Mr. Hollis. There might be a few shipments that would come
in from down and towards California but far as I know, all of
it--well, there might be some coming across a little piece of
Clark County going into Lincoln County, but most of it would go
around Clark County.
Mr. Miller. Why is Clark County designated as an affected
area?
Mr. Hollis. Well, I think it is an affected area. We used
it as affected local units of government because it was
designated at one time to have transportation. But there has
never been any transportation that I know of nuclear waste
going through Clark County. All the nuclear waste comes through
Nye County, and I get it from every which way, no matter if it
comes east, west, north or south. It has to go though Nye
County.
Chairman Broun. The gentleman's time is expired. I now--the
Chairman now recognizes Ms. Biggert for five minutes.
Mrs. Biggert. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
holding this hearing. I wish that this wasn't kind of a getaway
date because I think this is a very important hearing, and we
really could spend a lot more time, I think, than we have
today.
Dr. Peters, I have been at Argonne, and since I have been
in Congress, we have gone through electrometallurgic process,
we have gone through the pyro process, we have gone through the
reprocessing, and now we are talking about recycling, and so I
would like to know what you recommend for the next stage for
the advanced nuclear fuel cycle R&D program.
Dr. Peters. I think DOE, Department of Energy's, nuclear
energy program has a lot of the right priorities set in place,
so we have an R&D program that is developing advanced fuels for
transmutation and fast reactors. There is fast reactor R&D
going on. There is also work on materials for reactors and also
bench-top experiments on electrometallurgical or pyro
processing as well as aqueous reprocessing of spent fuel, so
there has been tremendous research done. Resources are being
provided. That needs to continue. As I said in my testimony, my
plea would be to take that to try to start to develop some
down-selection and actual demonstration of some of these
technologies at the pilot scale. Take it out of the lab and
start to demonstrate at the pilot scale working with
industries. Even by the end of this decade would be optimal.
Mrs. Biggert. You know, we really tried to jumpstart with
GNEP and several programs and it just--it just seems to be
stalled. Wouldn't it make a difference if we had the closed
nuclear fuel--the closed reactor to be able to then recycle and
recycle and recycle so that we don't have the waste that
really--if we were to put the waste into some repository like
Yucca Mountain, it would fill up with all the nuclear waste
that we have right now, and it seems like before we really, you
know, make such a site, that really to get the advanced fuel
cycle recycling going would really be a benefit to how we are
going to deal with this waste.
Dr. Peters. Yes, I agree. I agree, Mrs. Biggert. I think
closing the fuel cycle will have a variety of benefits. It will
reduce the volume and the toxicity of the waste. As I said
before, there is still a repository required, but you could
design a repository in a much different way if you close the
fuel cycle. All that would go there is fission product waste.
And you can also optimize the real estate that you take up in a
repository, Yucca Mountain or any other repository. You are
also reusing the actinides in the uranium to make additional
electricity, so it is a more sustainable approach. The research
that we are doing is to try to make it more economic and also
reduce the amount of waste that is produced from those
processes, but I firmly believe that if you grow nuclear,
closing the fuel cycle is the right path, but we have got to--
if I may, I would actually like to go back briefly to the
question about boreholes because it is a systems question.
I would argue, it may not make sense to put spent fuel down
a borehole, but it may make sense to put process waste down a
borehole, so you have got to think about this whole thing as a
system. The repository has to work with whatever fuel cycle you
decide to do.
And back to your point about the GNEP program, I think we--
I would like to think we learned from that, and I think we did
premature down-select in that case. I think we need to do a
much more rigorous job of doing the R&D and having a
transparent selection process that would allow us to down-
select.
Mrs. Biggert. And a demonstration?
Dr. Peters. Right, into a demonstration. I agree.
Mrs. Biggert. Thank you.
Mr. McLeod, you seem to be----
Mr. McLeod. I wanted to say that we would love to see the
R&D done at the H Canyon at the Savannah River Site, which is
one of the few facilities that could do that research and
development.
Mrs. Biggert. I might fight for Argonne, but we could do it
more than one place.
Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. McLeod. We would be glad to share.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Ms. Biggert.
The Chair now recognizes Mr. McNerney for five minutes.
Mr. McNerney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
This is an important and serious topic, and I am getting
the feeling, or I got the feeling, that the majority party here
is using at least in part this topic as an opportunity to bash
the Obama Administration. So we are going down a political path
that we don't need to go down, and I would rather talk about
this in terms of issues that are going to help us solve the
problem.
As a graduate student at the University of New Mexico, I
studied--I worked on a fault tree analysis for the Waste
Isolation Pilot Project. So I have some scientific
understanding of the issue, and my opinion is that deep
geologic sequestration is a good approach and it can work, but
I agree wholeheartedly with Dr. Kasperson that public trust and
public acceptance is absolutely essential. We are not going to
get this solved unless we have the public trust. Lawsuits are
going to hold up everything. And, you know, I do appreciate the
comments of Mr. Spencer that--or at least the approach that we
think about using a method that will gain public acceptance. It
is just that going to the private sector and letting them take
care of it is not going to really engender public acceptance,
and in fact, it would require an enormous amount of federal
oversight and then there is also profits involved, so I think
it would end up costing more and getting less done, so that is
why I would not favor that particular approach.
But I do think that you start out, Mr. Spencer, with very
inflammatory language when you said the Obama anti-Yucca
policy, and again, when you use that language, shutters close
and people are going to react in a negative way, so my
recommendation is to take a less inflammatory approach to this
if you want to get your idea across. That is just a
recommendation that I give to you personally.
Now, I wanted to ask Dr. Swift, I thank you for your
testimony and I wanted to ask you personally, do you think that
there is other alternatives to the Yucca Mountain that would be
technically feasible?
Dr. Swift. Yes, I do.
Mr. McNerney. I mean, one of the things that struck me here
is, I think that nuclear waste has potential value in the
future, and drilling a hole down there five kilometers and just
dumping material waste and then closing it up, it is not going
to be a repository, it is going to be a dump. Nuclear waste
needs to be carefully stored and safely stored and monitored
with the idea, in my opinion, that a withdrawal sometime in the
future will be necessary. So I can't say that I like that
approach very well. That isn't what is being done at the Waste
Isolation Pilot Plant, is it?
Dr. Swift. The--on your last point there, the Waste
Isolation Pilot Plant does not have waste that has any
particular recycling value to it.
Mr. McNerney. Right.
Dr. Swift. It would not be easy to recover waste out of it
but it would be feasible, and that is actually a regulatory
description of the situation. You would mine back through the
salt and extract the salt and the waste at the same time. It
can be done.
In terms of other viable alternatives, for those that are
fully retrievable at all times, actually Yucca Mountain was an
excellent--that was one of the strongest features of Yucca
Mountain because of its location above the water table in dry
rock. Retrievability is fairly straightforward there. But other
disposal options, the Swedish granite repository concept also
being employed in Finland, being developed there. The French
are looking and the Belgians and the Swiss are looking at
disposal in clay formations. The Germans are looking at
disposal in salt formations. These are concepts that are
potentially viable in this country also as alternatives to
Yucca Mountain.
Mr. McNerney. How is the--what is the current plan for
encasing the actual high-level waste? Is it encased in--not in
barrels obviously but in glass formations or something before
it----
Dr. Swift. It----
Mr. McNerney [continuing]. Can be sent downstairs?
Dr. Swift. It depends on the environment you would want to
put it into. You would want to choose a metal canister that was
as corrosion-resistant, as long-lived as possible in the
environment you were putting it in. So for example, in
chemically reducing environments such as deep granites or
clays, copper is a metal of choice. It is very stable in a
reducing environment. In Yucca Mountain, where it is an
oxidizing environment, the choice was a nickel-molybdenum-
chromium-based alloy called alloy 22 that was as corrosion-
resistant in that environment as we could come up with.
Mr. McNerney. Well, I guess my final words are that we need
to have public buy-in on this, and using inflammatory language
isn't going to help that happen.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. McNerney.
The Chair now recognizes Mr. Rohrabacher for five minutes.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Thank you very much, and I am very happy
to hear Mr. McNerney admonish people for using--politicizing
science and using harsh language. I guess when George Bush was
in, that never happened. The other side never did that when
Bush was in. I just want to make that clear for the record,
that that only happens now.
Let me just note that when you find yourself--this is a
truism that I have learned. When you find yourself in a hole
that you don't want to be in, you should quit digging. That is
a truism. And in this case, it sounds like to me what we have
done is we have a Blue Ribbon Commission who is supposed to
come up with our alternative or a vision of what we are going
to be doing with nuclear waste, and they can't get out of their
mind the idea of digging a hole, and what I have seen here and
what I am listening to is that it sounds like new technologies
are not being addressed. What is being addressed is digging the
hole. Can we dig the shafts this deep or whatever, whatever.
You know, this--talk about old think. This is the ultimate old
think, and here we were supposed to have a Blue Ribbon
Commission that was going to give us a vision of what we would
do in the future, and it has all been based on only what has
been happening in the past. The Blue Ribbon Commission seems,
from what I am understanding, what I can see here as well as
from what I have heard, is that they have been negative or even
hostile to looking into new concepts, for example, gas-cooled
reactors, thorium reactors, or fast reactors, and their
interest in small modular reactors seems to stop right at, let
us say, the water's edge, meaning that they are only interested
in looking at water-cooled reactors.
What I don't understand is, we have several very prominent
scientific and very, very responsible companies that are
involved with development of technologies that have told us
there are other alternatives than water-cooled reactors and
they have done the science. One of them is General Atomics, who
has a great track record. And we have many people talking about
small modular reactors. We have many people talking about these
pebble-based reactors, pebble base for fuel. All of these
things offer a tremendous alternative to digging a hole and
letting it sit there for thousands of years. I am shocked to
hear that we have spent $15 billion on digging a hole in Yucca
Mountain but we haven't been able to come up with the money
necessary to build a prototype of one of these reactors that
would go a long way in reducing the challenge of nuclear waste.
Am I wrong that these new reactors do offer a promise in the
future of reducing the amount of nuclear waste that we would
face? Dr. Peters?
Dr. Peters. No, you are not wrong, but I would emphasize
the word ``promising.'' If I may, a lot of what you are
referring to, the fast reactor technology has been demonstrated
in the United States and worldwide so it could be--if there was
a market for a fast reactor in the United States, we could
develop that relatively quickly.
Mr. Rohrabacher. The market? Where is the market for $15
billion to dig a hole in the desert?
Dr. Peters. But----
Mr. Rohrabacher. I mean, there is a market for the fact
that we would be creating electricity and there would be less
nuclear waste left over here.
Mr. Chairman, this is--what we have here is an example. If
you put the people in the electronics industry who only could
think about building the huge computers of the past, you know,
they used to build them as big as this room, and then you got
them to say well, can we--is there any solutions that we might
have by building a small computer or maybe there could be a
computer the size of your telephone. They wouldn't know what
you were talking about.
There are some visionaries in this country that can help us
solve the problem of nuclear waste, and we aren't even building
the prototypes and moving forward on the prototypes to see if
they are actually correct, but the people who are advocating
this are very high-quality scientists and engineers and people
in the private sector. I would suggest that this hearing,
while--and the Blue Ribbon Commission, while they have focused
on what was--what they could have focused on in the 1970s
should be focusing on a vision for the better future based on
technologies that can change our reality, and until we do that,
I am just afraid that we are--$15 billion. We are going to
waste another $15 billion?
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Peters. Mr. Chairman, may I real quick, very quickly
respond?
Chairman Broun. Very quickly.
Dr. Peters. I guess I just wanted to--I mean, I don't want
to disagree. I want to agree with everything that you said, but
a lot of the promising ones that you are referring to are on
paper at this point so we need to go do the research and the
prototyping to----
Mr. Rohrabacher. Yeah, but they were put on paper by
prominent scientists and people who have built nuclear power
plants and people who are--we are not saying Dana Rohrabacher
put it on paper.
Dr. Peters. No, but we----
Mr. Rohrabacher. Some really prominent people put it on
paper.
Dr. Peters. We need to make the investment to do it.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Albert Einstein put something on paper and
he ended up helping us usher us into this nuclear world.
Chairman Broun. Thank you, Mr. Rohrabacher.
Before we close, I would like to enter in the record by
unanimous consent a number of documents previously exchanged
with the Minority. Without objection, so ordered.
[The information may be found in Appendix 2.]
Chairman Broun. This hearing has allowed the Subcommittees
to hear expert outside opinions about the BRC draft report. For
the record and in response to comments by the minority at the
outset, the Committee was in contact with the BRC prior to the
hearing at which time that they indicated it would be premature
to participate as their report is still in draft form and they
are continuing to accept public comment. We will certainly
continue to work with the BRC as they finalize their report and
we will likely have an opportunity to hear from the BRC after
they finalize their report.
I want to thank the witnesses for you all's valuable
testimony and the members for you all's questions. The members
of the Subcommittee may have additional questions for you all,
and we ask for you to respond to those in writing, and please
do it quickly. The record will remain open for two weeks for
additional comments from members.
The witnesses are now excused and the hearing is now
adjourned, and I thank you all very much.
[Whereupon, at 12:43 p.m., the Subcommittees were
adjourned.]
Answers to Post-Hearing Questions
Responses by Mr. Jack Spencer, Research Fellow,
Nuclear Energy Policy, Heritage Foundation
Questions Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. Do you believe the demand of the Secretary of Energy that the Blue
Ribbon Commission exclude consideration of Yucca Mountain as the site
for a permanent geological repository in its deliberation detract from
its ability to develop the best possible recommendation for nuclear
waste management?
A1. I absolutely believe that the demand by the Secretary of Energy to
exclude any consideration of Yucca Mountain from the Blue Ribbon
Commission on America's Nuclear Future detracted from the Commission's
ability to develop the best possible answer. As the Blue Ribbon
Commission (BRC) stated in its draft report, the Nation will need a
geologic repository regardless of what other technologies are brought
to bear for the disposition of high-level commercial nuclear waste.
Further, the BRC's establishing document demands that it consider
``all'' options for nuclear waste disposal.
Given both its findings and its charge, reason would dictate that
the BRC be free to consider the Yucca location. After all, federal
statue names the site as the Nation's nuclear waste repository and the
Nation's taxpayers and electricity rate payers have invested over $15
billion in it so far. Thus, demanding that the BRC not even consider
the Yucca project undermines the credibility of the entire BRC's draft
findings. If it ignores the facility that most clearly meets the
conditions that the BRC has determined are necessary for any nuclear
waste solution, one must question the legitimacy of the remainder of
its findings.
Giving the BRC the freedom to actually fulfill its charge by
considering ``all'' options would not have necessarily been an overt
endorsement of Yucca Mountain. The BRC could have acknowledged the
political controversy surrounding the project and even recommended that
a new site be found. At a minimum, it should have recommended that the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission complete its review of the Department of
Energy's application to construct the repository and that all
information relevant to that review be made public, including the
entire Safety Evolution Report.
However, denying the BRC the ability to even consider Yucca
represents a major shortfall in the Commission's analysis.
Q2. How important it is for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to
finalize and release its comprehensive technical reviews of the site
(known and the ``Safety Evaluation Reports'')? Are there any drawbacks
from completing the technical review of Yucca Mountain?
A2. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission must release all information
pertaining to the Yucca application. Regardless of whether or not the
Yucca repository is ever built, the application contains critical
analysis that is relevant to future repository activities. Though the
information in the application is public, whether or not the NRC deemed
the analysis provided by the Department of Energy sufficient to move
forward with the project is not. Understanding how the NRC staff
approached this analysis is critical to future repository applications.
Further, regardless of President Obama's current policy to abandon
the Yucca project, the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as amended,
clearly states that Yucca Mountain shall be the site of the Nation's
nuclear waste repository. The legality of the President's policy is
currently being determined by the court system. Should the courts find
DOE's attempt to withdraw the Yucca application to be illegal, then one
would presume that the Yucca project would move forward. By releasing
all data and analysis relevant to the Yucca application, the NRC would
ensure that it could pick up its application review where it stopped.
Just as important, the public would have access to this critical data,
which would help them also to ensure that the NRC is picking up where
it left off, as opposed to starting over or purposefully dragging its
feet on the process.
Even if the courts were to determine that the DOE could withdraw
the application, there is a possibility that the Yucca project could
move forward at some future point under other circumstances. In that
situation, all data regarding the NRC's review of the application would
be critical.
Finally, the public deserves to know what the NRC staff thought
about the Yucca project. The public has invested too much money for the
government to not provide an answer to the whether Yucca could have
been built safely. This is especially true given that many in the
public base their opposition to the repository on the belief that it is
not safe. Should the NRC determine it is not safe, then the NRC should
show clear, science-based analysis as to why it is not safe, allowing
the nation to then move beyond Yucca. However, if it is deemed safe by
the NRC, then the public can have an open and transparent debate on the
project's merits.
Q2a. What might the continued suppression of this technical
information mean with respect to the scientific integrity goals and
guidelines that the President regularly touts?
A2a. Continuing to suppress this critical data seems to contradict
President Obama's scientific integrity objectives. Indeed, whether one
is discussing climate change policy, policies regarding access to
America's vital natural resources, or nuclear waste policy, it seems
that the President's policies often do not respect science-based
analysis. The fact is that whether the issue is building the XL
Pipeline, drilling for oil and natural gas off America's shores, or
building the waste repository at Yucca Mountain, the science says one
thing while the President's policies and actions seems to convey
another.
Q3. You recommend that an entity other than the government have title
over nuclear waste. Assuming that an entity could be created to
accomplish this, what types of federal guarantees would be needed for
the entity to operate in the long term? What sort of liability
protections would be necessary? Do you believe the Federal Government
has a role in providing liability protections to such an entity?
A3. I recommend that nuclear waste producers be responsible for
managing their own waste. They are best positioned to determine whether
waste should be recycled, reprocessed, placed in a repository, or some
combination thereof. Government management of commercial activities
does not work. The outcomes are the same each time it is attempted.
Despite the best intentions of politicians and bureaucrats, they are
not capable of planning the best combination of activities and
investments to yield an efficient and economically sustainable
commercial activity. There are simply too many variables to consider.
Ultimately, nuclear waste management is a commercial activity. It is
part of the process, often referred to as the nuclear fuel cycle,
necessary to produce useable energy from natural uranium. And just like
other parts of the nuclear fuel cycle have been successfully run by the
private sector over the past decades, so too must nuclear waste
management.
Instead of relying on politicians and bureaucrats to centrally
manage the system, which has been a demonstrable failure, subjecting
nuclear waste management to the powers of the market would yield real
solutions. Ultimately, those that stand to profit from the production
of waste have the greatest incentive to develop sound, safe, and
economically sustainable solutions. Indeed, the private sector would
even have the incentive, just as it has the ability, to develop
commercial uses for spent nuclear fuel that have not been thought of
before.
This does not mean, however, that the private sector should take
title of the final disposed waste. Given the long-lived nature of
nuclear waste, the Federal Government should take ultimate title of
whatever ends up in a repository once the repository is decommissioned.
In essence, the waste producers would be responsible for getting the
waste from the reactor to the repository.
The repository should be privately operated as well. By allowing
the repository to be privately operated and setting a specific price
for emplacing waste, the nuclear industry could decide how best to
manage its waste.
Imagine that the repository operator sets a price to emplace waste
based on a formula that considers waste volume, heat load, and
toxicity. A reactor operator would know that it costs ``X'' amount of
dollars to place a certain amount of waste in the repository based on
that formula. It could then decide how to manage its waste based on
that price. Perhaps placing it in interim storage to allow the heat
load and radio toxicity to dissipate, thus resulting in reduced
repository emplacement costs would make sense. If so, this would create
a demand for interim storage, which a company could provide. It might
make sense to reprocess the fuel as well. There is any number of
combinations of services that could be brought to bear. The important
thing is that the market would help guide investment towards that which
makes the most sense. Because the waste producers would be responsible,
they would pursue those options in the market place.
Privatizing nuclear waste management, however, does not remove the
role of government. The Federal Government's role would be the same as
it is for the rest of the nuclear industry. It would set strict safety
guidelines and enforce them through the regulatory process. I would not
recommend that any federal guarantees be made. My view is that nuclear
energy only makes sense if it can be done economically. I believe that
it can be. But the only way to really find out is to subject the entire
industry to the market. In fact, I believe that the best way to
maximize its economic benefit is through market-based policies.
Alternatively, the quickest way to ensure that the United States never
realizes the full benefit of nuclear energy is for a major sector of
the industry to be controlled by the Federal Government.
That said, there is a limited role for liability protection until
the United States creates a better system that allows businesses to
operate without the fear of being subject to frivolous lawsuits. I
believe that nuclear waste management activities should fall under
Price-Anderson as do other commercial nuclear activities. However, I
also believe that the Price-Anderson should not be extended beyond
2025, the current date it is set to expire. For this to happen,
however, the U.S. must engage in regulatory, nuclear waste policy, and
liability reforms that would allow the commercial nuclear industry to
prepare for a post-Price-Anderson environment.
Questions Submitted by Representative Randy Neugebauer, Subcommittee on
Energy and Environment
Q1. In your testimony, you mentioned the importance of transferring
nuclear waste disposal responsibility to the private sector. How can we
ensure that the private sector will be willing to take the risks
associated with nuclear waste disposal, as well as the regulatory
concerns that will inevitably continue at the local, state, and
national level?
A1. We do not know with certainty that the private sector will take on
these risks, but I believe that they will. We do know that the nuclear
industry already engages in all other parts of the fuel cycle in order
to produce and sell electricity. It mines the uranium, going thousands
of feet underground to retrieve the valuable ore. It takes that ore and
mills it into yellowcake, which is then enriched so that the uranium
can be fabricated into fuel pellets. These pellets are then placed into
bundles that ultimately fuel the reactors. The private sector then
takes this used fuel, stores it in cooling pools, and then moves it
into dry casks where it is being safely stored indefinitely. We have
seen the private nuclear industry safely and profitably engage in every
step of the fuel cycle, except for waste management.
That has not always been the case. The Federal Government was at
one time responsible for all parts of the nuclear fuel cycle. Most of
these have been privatized over time. Most recently, in the late 1990s
the nation privatized the uranium enrichment industry, and today the
United States enjoys a robust, technologically modern, and private
enrichment industry. That is the case across the board in nuclear
energy. As government steps back, industry steps up. Consider the
extremely high efficiency at which American power plants operate today.
American nuclear power plants operate at over a 90 percent capacity
factor. This feat was not a function of government intervention. It was
the result of private nuclear plant operators responding to the market
and figuring out how to maximize their profits, which ultimately
benefits ratepayers.
Even nuclear waste management has benefited from private ingenuity.
The Federal Government decided in 1976 that it would not reprocess used
commercial nuclear fuel, and the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act, as
amended, places the responsibility for nuclear waste management with
the Federal Government. It was determined during that time that all
nuclear waste would be placed in geologic storage. Nearly three decades
later, having not implemented any solution for nuclear waste
management, President Obama created the Blue Ribbon Commission on
America's Nuclear Future to come up with an alternative strategy for
disposing of America's nuclear waste. Essentially, they determined
again that nuclear waste be placed in geologic storage. In three
decades, the Federal Government has made zero technological progress on
nuclear waste management.
Quite a different story exists in the private sector. Each nuclear
power plant was built with a spent fuel pool in which to house the
spent fuel when it is removed from the reactor. The initial thinking
was that the fuel would spend roughly five or so years in the pools
until it got moved to some other facility--either for burial or some
other process. The pools were sized to meet this requirement. Over
time, however, the pools began to fill up since the Federal Government
never collected any of the fuel. This created a dilemma for the private
utilities. They either had to figure out a way to store additional fuel
or stop operating. So they did what the private sector always does if
they want to stay in business: innovate.
The nuclear industry developed two methods to allow it to store
more fuel. First, it developed a technique call re-racking, which
allowed them to safely place more fuel into the pools than they were
originally designed to hold by placing newer fuel next to older fuel.
But more impressively, they developed dry cask storage options. Since
the Federal Government was not coming to pick the fuel up, private
industry figured out a way to safely store the fuel outside of the
pools on dry casks. This innovation is allowing America's nuclear power
plants to operate despite the Federal Government's failures.
The nuclear industry has demonstrated time and again that it can
solve most any problem. The flaw of the current system is that nuclear
waste is a government problem. Solving nuclear waste could be
accomplished by making it an industry problem.
Q2. Most scientists agree that we need long-term storage of nuclear
waste. Our experiences with Yucca Mountain highlight the political
difficulties locally, statewide, and nationwide in accomplishing such
an objective. How can we build local consensus anywhere in the country
to accept long-term storage of nuclear wastes?
A2. Building a local consensus to accept long-term storage can be
accomplished. However, the Federal Government cannot do it. The fact is
that no local community will want to negotiate with the Federal
Government. It has proven to be an untrustworthy partner. The better
approach is to allow industry to negotiate directly with local
communities and for them to rely on the force of law through negotiated
contracts to be the guarantor of terms. Further, it is critical that
the local communities be in control of the negotiations. It is not fair
if the Federal Government comes in and states that it is going to do
something either way. That is not a negotiation. That is subjugation.
The private sector does a very good job at working with local
communities to site major projects, and it could do the same for a
nuclear materials repository.
Consider Yucca as an example. Under the current process, as
dictated by the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, as amended, the Federal
Government owns and operates the facility and predetermines that Yucca
Mountain, Nevada, is the location. The negotiation was never really a
negotiation at all. It was the Federal Government stating what was
going to happen and trying to force the Nevadans to accept it.
A better approach would be to transfer all of the permits and
regulatory authorities to construct and operate the Yucca facility away
from the Federal Government and to some entity that represented Nevadan
interests. It could be the state of Nevada, a Nevada-based non-profit
or even a Nevada-based business. Once those permits were in hand, then
that entity could negotiate directly with the nuclear industry the
terms that would be acceptable. This approach places all parties on
equal ground and would allow for an actual negotiation that could yield
a positive outcome.
The government role in such a system would be to provide regulatory
predictability and integrity. In essence, the private sector should be
permitted to carry out whatever waste management activities that it
deems appropriate if it meets local, state and federal regulatory and
safety standards.
Question Submitted by Representative Sandy Adams, Subcommittee on
Investigations and Oversight
Q1. Ratepayers in my state alone have contributed over $800 million to
the Nuclear Waste Fund to date. While the used fuel is currently being
held safely onsite by our utilities, doing so constitutes an additional
economic burden. With the Administration pulling the plug on Yucca
Mountain for political, not scientific, reasons, and no realistic
alternative in place, why should my constituents continue to have to
pay into the Waste Fund?
A1. Your constituents should not have to pay into the Nuclear Waste
Fund. The Federal Government has collected over $30 billion (principal
and interest) since the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, as amended became
law. While competently collecting this money, the Federal Government
has completely failed in its obligation to dispose of nuclear waste.
Since the Federal Government has provided no nuclear waste disposal
services, it is unclear why electricity rate payers should be compelled
to continue paying the nuclear waste fee. At a minimum, rate payers
should be relieved of this fee until the Federal Government instates a
reliable nuclear waste disposal policy. Unfortunately, this seems to be
beyond the Federal Government's capability. That is why the focus of
any solution should not be on reforming how the nuclear waste fee is
collected but rather on repealing the fee altogether. This would
eliminate the Federal Government from the nuclear waste business by
allowing the utilities to directly finance nuclear waste management and
disposal activities.
While the blame for the Nation's lack of a feasible nuclear waste
policy lies squarely on the Federal Government's shoulders, the
solution should come from the private sector.
Unfortunately, that is not what the Blue Ribbon Commission on
America's Nuclear Future recommends. The draft recommendations that we
discussed during this hearing would do little, if anything, to change
the underlying flaws of the current system. Thus, the same problems
plaguing nuclear waste management today will ultimately resurface. That
is because the Federal Government remains responsible for nuclear waste
management under the BRC's recommendations. This is a flawed approach.
Central government planning of commercial activities does not work. A
better approach would be to put waste producers in charge of their own
waste.
Under such a system, your constituents would no longer pay any fee
to the Federal Government. Instead, the cost of waste management would
be folded into the price of nuclear-generated electricity. This would
allow the nuclear utilities to build business models around the entire
fuel cycle. Currently, they need only consider fueling the reactors and
operating them, because the government takes responsibility for dealing
with the waste. The problem with this system is that waste management
is critical part of the nuclear fuel cycle. By giving that
responsibility to the waste producers, the utilities would then seek
the most cost-effective means to manage and dispose of the waste. This
market-based approach would not only ensure that solutions were
developed, since the utilities would need to dispose of their waste to
keep operating their reactors, but it would ensure that the solutions
made the most economic sense.
This is in direct opposition to the current system, which misaligns
incentives, authorities, and responsibilities. Currently, the Federal
Government has no real incentive, despite the force of law, to develop
any solution whatsoever, as evidenced by decades of incompetence on the
issue. And further, even if it were to find a solution, there is no
incentive for the Federal Government to operate economically. Placing
waste producers in charge of their own waste management would fix both
problems.
That does not relieve the Federal Government of any responsibility.
It would set strict regulatory guidelines and enforce them, for
example. In essence, it would treat nuclear waste management activities
the same as it does the rest of the nuclear industry.
Responses by Dr. Peter Swift, Distinguished Member,
of the Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratory
Questions Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. Currently, two sets of federal regulatory standards for high-level
radioactive waste repositories exist, one specifically developed for
Yucca Mountain and another that would apply to all other sites. Which
of these two standards is more stringent?
A1. Background: Each of the two existing sets of federal regulations
that govern permanent disposal of high-level radioactive waste is
consistent with the legal framework defined in the Nuclear Waste Policy
Act, and each set includes overall safety standards set by the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and implementing criteria defined
by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). One set, including
EPA`s 40 CFR part 197 and NRC`s 10 CFR part 63, was written in the past
15 years specifically for the proposed Yucca Mountain repository, and
would not apply to any other disposal concept without new rulemaking
activities. The other set, EPA`s 40 CFR part 191 and NRC`s 10 CFR part
60, date from the middle 1980s, prior to the decision to focus solely
on Yucca Mountain, and, in the absence of new rulemaking, would still
apply in principle to any disposal concept other than Yucca Mountain.
The older regulations, framed by the EPA in 40 CFR part 191,
defined the regulatory period to be 10,000 years and set quantitative
limits for scenarios that include all release pathways on the
probability that the total amount of radiation released during the
entire period would exceed specified values, rather than on the peak
release in any single year. These regulations also tied the magnitude
of the allowable release to the amount of waste emplaced in the
repository: allowable releases were smaller for smaller repositories
and larger for larger repositories. Consequences of inadvertent human
intrusion by drilling were required to be included in the probabilistic
compliance analysis. For the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP), which
is the only repository operating under 40 CFR part 191, the approach to
estimating the density of future drilling was specified by the EPA in
the implementing criteria (40 CFR part 194.33).
The newer regulations, framed by the EPA in 40 CFR part 197, are
based on and consistent with guidance from the National Academy of
Sciences (National Research Council, 1995) and were written
specifically for Yucca Mountain. These regulations focus on the long-
term annual dose from a repository and, following resolution of legal
challenges, set limits on the peak dose allowable in any one year
during the next one million years. (The period of one million years is
consistent with the National Academy`s guidance indicating that the
period of geologic stability at Yucca Mountain is on the order of one
million years.) There is no provision for scaling the allowable release
to the size of the repository: the peak dose limits apply regardless of
the amount of waste emplaced at the site. Human intrusion is required
to be considered separately from overall performance in a stylized
analysis, and releases directly to the land surface during drilling
were excluded from consideration.
Response: Both sets of regulations are highly protective of future
human health and the environment, and it is not useful to attempt to
determine which is more stringent during the 10,000-year period
required by the older set of regulations. The Yucca Mountain standards
apply for 1,000,000 years, and can therefore be viewed as being more
stringent during the longer time period. However, I agree with the Blue
Ribbon Commission`s caution relevant to requirements for quantitative
standards that apply for one million years: ``the Commission believes
that over-reliance on million-year calculations can reduce credibility
rather than enhance it. As the IAEA has warned: `Care needs to be
exercised in using the criteria beyond the time where the uncertainties
become so large that the criteria may no longer serve as a reasonable
basis for decision making` '' (BRC 2010, p. 103; IAEA 2006).
Q1a. If Yucca Mountain has the more stringent regulatory standards, do
you believe the government should abandon it to pursue an unknown
repository with less robust thresholds?
A1a. While I do not believe that the government should abandon Yucca
Mountain to pursue an unknown repository, I also do not believe that
the existing standards that would apply to other repositories would
necessarily be less protective of human health and the environment. In
addition, I concur with the conclusion in the draft report of the Blue
Ribbon Commission that ``the generic regulations that would currently
apply to all other sites will need to be revisited and revised in any
case'' (BRC 2011, p. 98). The NRC staff has come to the same
conclusion, indicating in public presentations that they intend to
update or replace 10 CFR part 60 prior to licensing disposal at
locations other than Yucca Mountain (e.g., Kokajko, 2011). I believe it
is unlikely that any alternative repository would be subject to
significantly less protective standards than those applied to Yucca
Mountain.
Q2. Knowing how long Yucca Mountain was studied, do you anticipate a
similar timeline to establish confidence in the safety of a
consolidated interim storage facility? What would you estimate such an
evaluation to cost?
A2. I believe technical issues associated with demonstrating the
safety of a consolidated interim storage facility could be addressed
with substantially less time than was required for Yucca Mountain. It
is relevant in this regard to note that there are currently 63
independent spent fuel storage installations (ISFSIs) licensed by the
NRC under 10 CFR part 72. Most of these facilities are located at
existing nuclear power plants, and none store as much spent fuel as
would be present at a consolidated interim storage facility, but the
existing record indicates that both the nuclear industry and the NRC
have substantial experience in constructing, licensing, and operating
storage facilities.
There is one recent example of a consolidated interim storage
facility in the U.S. that may be directly relevant to this question.
The NRC issued a license in 2006 to Private Fuels Storage, LLC (PFS),
to construct and operate a consolidated interim storage facility, in
Skull Valley, Utah, 13 years after the Goshute Tribe first negotiated
with the Department of Energy for an interim storage facility and nine
years after PFS began the licensing process (NRC 2006). The license
allows dry cask storage of up to 40,000 metric tons of spent nuclear
fuel from commercial nuclear power plants. The license conditioned
authorization to construct the facility on obtaining funding and
necessary approvals from other agencies, including the Department of
Interior. The Department of the Interior subsequently denied the PFS
application to use rights-of-way across federal land and to lease
tribal land (BLM 2006; BIA 2006). A federal court overturned the
Department of Interior`s decisions in July 2010 (U.S. District Court
2010), but the future of the facility remains uncertain despite a valid
license from the NRC.
Commenting on the total cost of licensing an interim storage
facility is outside my area of expertise. The Government Accountability
Office estimated in 2009 that the total cost of 100 years of
centralized interim storage of 70,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel
would be in the range of $12 billion to $20 billion and that the cost
of 100 years of centralized storage for 153,000 metric tons would be in
the range of $15 billion to $29 billion (GAO 2009, table 4).
Q3. The Department of Energy has asked Sandia National Laboratory to
begin review of a deep borehole method of disposal for high-level
radioactive waste. Can you describe how a mined repository differs from
a deep borehole? Please describe the primary advantages and
disadvantages associated with the two types of repositories.
A3. As proposed in the U.S. and internationally, mined repositories
are generally 1,000 to 3,000 feet below the land surface, in a variety
of geologic media including salt, clay or shale, granitic crystalline
rocks (including high-grade metamorphic rocks), volcanic tuff, and
limestone. Mined openings are large enough for access by both humans
and heavy equipment, either by inclined ramps or hoists in vertical
shafts. For waste that emits little gamma radiation, such as the
transuranic waste disposed of at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, waste
can be emplaced by human-operated equipment. For high-level waste and
spent nuclear fuel, waste is packaged in robust containers, and
emplacement is done by remotely-operated equipment. After waste
containers and, in many disposal concepts, backfill are emplaced,
access shafts and ramps are filled and sealed and the combination of
engineered and natural barriers provides long-term isolation.
As proposed in recent work on deep borehole disposal concepts
(e.g., Gibb, 1999; MIT 2003; Brady et al., 2009; Arnold et al., 2011),
disposal would occur within crystalline bedrock at substantially
greater depths, between approximately 10,000 and 16,000 feet (3-5
kilometers). Boreholes would be drilled so that they had a bottom-hole
diameter of up to approximately 17 inches (0.43 m), depending on waste
type and configuration. Although drilling for oil and gas routinely
goes to much greater depths in sedimentary rocks that have the
potential to produce hydrocarbons, this is a relatively large diameter
for current drilling technology. However, as Arnold et al. (2009, p.
19) state, ``there are no known technical issues that present
unreasonable barriers to drilling to this diameter at depth.'' The
stated diameter was chosen to allow emplacement of intact fuel
assemblies from typical commercial reactors without disassembling or
processing the spent fuel. If fuel is to be processed or consolidated
before disposal, narrower diameter boreholes could be used. Holes would
be lined with steel casing to facilitate emplacement operations. Spent
nuclear fuel or high-level radioactive waste would be placed within
containers of steel pipe and lowered down the hole by cable. The lower
portion of the borehole (nominally the lower 2 km, or approximately the
bottom 6500 feet) would be used for waste disposal, allowing
emplacement of a very long (i.e., 3 km or approximately 10,000 feet)
borehole seal, primarily of compacted clay and concrete.
Advantages of mined repositories are that they rely on well-
understood mining technology, they have been studied in great detail
for decades in disposal programs in the United States and other
nations, and safety assessments for multiple repository concepts
indicate they have the potential to provide excellent long-term
isolation. The size of mined repositories allows for disposal of large
volumes of spent nuclear fuel or high-level radioactive waste at a
single location.
Relatively less research has been done on deep borehole disposal
concepts, and there are far fewer examples that can be called on to
evaluate the long-term performance of the approach. Studies in the
United States and other nations since the 1970s have concluded that the
approach is feasible and has a high potential to provide essentially
complete long-term isolation, but no full-scale demonstration projects,
with or without radioactive waste, have been completed at the relevant
depths. Potential advantages for the approach include the relative
simplicity of the isolation concept, widespread availability of
suitable geology, and modularity of construction.
The deep borehole isolation concept relies primarily on the
extremely low permeability of crystalline rocks at the greater depths
proposed for waste disposal, where pressure from the overlying rock
will tend to keep fractures closed. Clearly, the low permeability of
rocks at that depth must be demonstrated, but this is something that
can be measured directly in a borehole before waste is emplaced. If
borehole tests show unexpectedly high permeability, or flowing water,
or other unfavorable conditions at the disposal depths, the site can be
abandoned before waste is emplaced. In the absence of open fractures,
the primary pathway for radioactive material to get back to the near-
surface environment will be back up the borehole, where thousands of
feet of compacted clay and concrete seals will provide an extremely
effective and permanent barrier to flow.
Fundamentally, deep boreholes have the potential to isolate
radioactive waste much further away from the human environment than
mined repositories, while minimizing the pathways for release.
Potentially suitable rocks could be found in large portions of the
continental United States, where old and stable crystalline bedrock is
found within approximately one mile or less of the land surface. As a
further benefit, rocks of this type and depth are unlikely to ever
provide a source of natural resources that might encourage future
drilling operations in the region.
The modularity of borehole disposal provides another potential
benefit. Boreholes can, in principle, be drilled on an as-needed basis,
with less infrastructure than mined repositories. The benefit here may
be greater for other nations with smaller quantities of spent nuclear
fuel and high-level radioactive waste, but even in the United States,
it is perhaps worth considering the flexibility introduced by a
disposal option in which all of the spent fuel generated in the 60-year
lifespan of a typical light-water reactor could be disposed of in 10
(or fewer) deep boreholes, drilled and sealed as needed. Alternatively,
the concept could be applied on a limited basis for a subset of high-
level waste forms, including, for example, fission product wastes
already existing at the Hanford site in Washington State. A perhaps
significant advantage associated with the modularity of the concept is
the ability to make a decision to proceed or not with a specific site
with the relatively modest investment required to make a pilot
borehole.
With respect to cost, Arnold et al. (2009, table 9) estimate costs
for drilling a typical disposal borehole, emplacing waste, and sealing
the hole to be on the order of 40 million dollars. Actual costs are
uncertain, but this figure is competitive with, and potentially
significantly less than, the costs associated with disposal of the same
quantity of waste in a mined geologic repository.
Disadvantages to deep borehole disposal fall into three main
categories: the relative scarcity of research on crystalline rock
properties at these depths; operational limitations caused by the
narrow diameter of the borehole; and issues associated with
retrievability of the waste. The first two are addressed here, and
retrievability issues are addressed in the response to the following
question.
Scarcity of data on crystalline rock properties at depth is not
surprising, given that most deep drilling has been done in sedimentary
rocks that have the potential to produce oil and gas. Much of the data
that are available for crystalline rock come from drilling done for
geothermal research, where scientists and engineers have sought out
deep rocks with both anomalously high temperatures and high
permeabilities, neither of which would be desirable conditions for
waste disposal. There is no reason to believe a priori that suitable
low permeability rocks at depth will be exceptionally difficult to
find, but further research, including field tests in instrumented
boreholes, is needed to demonstrate the broad applicability of the
concept.
Operational limitations associated with the relatively narrow
diameter of the borehole need to be acknowledged directly. Individual
containers of existing borosilicate high-level radioactive waste (i.e.,
reprocessing waste currently stored at the Savannah River Site in South
Carolina and at the West Valley site in western New York State) are too
large to be emplaced in a deep borehole. The glass waste forms planned
for the liquid wastes stored at the Hanford site will also be too
large, as presently designed, for borehole disposal. Furthermore,
essentially all spent nuclear fuel currently in dry storage would need
to be repackaged in single-assembly canisters. (Repackaging of spent
fuel currently in dry storage is likely to be needed for mined
repository concepts also, because thermal constraints encourage
disposal in smaller packages than are typical for storage; disposal
packages could be larger in mined repositories than in boreholes,
however.)
Q3a. The Nuclear Waste Policy Act requires stored high-level waste to
be retrievable. Do you believe storage of spent nuclear fuel in a deep
borehole meets that definition?
A3a. I believe deep borehole disposal concepts could be designed and
operated to meet the retrievability requirements of the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act. With that said, I also believe that deep geologic disposal,
either in boreholes or in mined repositories, should not be undertaken
if there is any foreseeable intent to retrieve the waste. Geologic
disposal should be viewed as permanent, and not as a storage option
that allows ready retrieval of the spent nuclear fuel.
The requirement for retrievability in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act
is as follows:
Sec. 122. Notwithstanding any other provision of this
subtitle, any repository constructed on a site approved under this
subtitle shall be designed and constructed to permit the retrieval of
any spent nuclear fuel placed in such repository, during an appropriate
period of operation of the facility, for any reason pertaining to the
public health and safety, or the environment, or for the purpose of
permitting the recovery of the economically valuable contents of such
spent fuel. The Secretary shall specify the appropriate period of
retrievability with respect to any repository at the time of design of
such repository, and such aspect of such repository shall be subject to
approval or disapproval by the Commission as part of the construction
authorization process under subsections (b) through (d) of section 114.
As I understand the language of Section 122, the NWPA requires that
it be possible to retrieve spent nuclear fuel during the operations of
the repository. I believe a deep borehole repository could be designed
such that it was possible to retrieve canisters of spent nuclear fuel
as long as the borehole remained open and unsealed (i.e., during the
period of operation) using essentially the same equipment that was used
to emplace the canisters in the borehole. Looking beyond the
operational-period requirements of the NWPA, however, I do not believe
it is feasible to design a deep borehole repository such that canisters
can reliably be retrieved intact after disposal operations have ended
and the borehole is sealed. I believe techniques could be implemented
using current drilling and solution mining technology that would
recover some and perhaps most of the radioactive material in the spent
nuclear fuel, but full retrievability of intact waste forms after a
borehole has been sealed should not be viewed as a realistic option
with today`s technology.
The potential for recovering some portion of the wastes after the
borehole has been sealed is relevant because the EPA expanded on the
NWPA approach in 40 CFR part 191, by requiring that ``disposal systems
shall be selected so that removal of most of the wastes is not
precluded for a reasonable period after disposal'' (40 CFR 191.14(f)),
where disposal is defined to occur when the repository is sealed. The
NRC, on the other hand, stayed close to the language of the NWPA by
requiring, at 10 CFR 60.111(b)(1), that ``the geologic repository
operations area shall be designed so that any or all of the emplaced
waste could be retrieved on a reasonable schedule starting at any time
up to 50 years after waste emplacement operations are initiated, unless
a different time period is specified by the Commission.''
In 40 CFR part 197, specific to Yucca Mountain, the EPA defers to
the NRC regulation: ``Because NRC`s proposed licensing criteria . . .
contain requirements similar to the assurance requirements in 40 CFR
part 191 . . . we believe it is unnecessary for us to include similar
requirements in this rule'' (EPA 2001, 66 FR 32103). The NRC repeats
its retrievability requirements from 10 CFR part 60 essentially
unchanged at 10 CFR 63.111(e)(1).
Because of the differences between the EPA`s requirement in 40 CFR
191 that the majority of the waste must be removable for some period
after a repository is sealed and the NRC`s emphasis on maintaining
retrievability during operations, existing U.S. regulations provide
ambiguous guidance for evaluating disposal concepts. Deep borehole
concepts that might otherwise provide excellent long-term isolation of
the waste might be challenged to meet removal and retrievability
expectations under the current EPA or NRC regulations, depending on the
interpretation of phrases such as ``most of the wastes'' and ``on a
reasonable schedule.''
Lastly, the potential difficulty of retrievability in deep borehole
disposal can also be viewed as an advantage in preventing subsequent
theft, diversion or sabotage of fissile material and helping to achieve
nuclear nonproliferation and security objectives.
Questions Submitted by Representative Randy Neugebauer, Subcommittee on
Energy and Environment
Q1. What are the alternative, legitimately viable options for nuclear
waste storage in the United States aside from Yucca Mountain? How do
the benefits and drawbacks of those options compare to those of Yucca
Mountain?
A1. Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, as amended in 1987, there are
no legally viable alternatives to Yucca Mountain for permanent disposal
of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive wastes in the United
States. Were the Act to be amended to allow alternative sites, there
are potentially many viable options. I agree with the Blue Ribbon
Commission`s statement in its draft report (BRC 2011, p. 33) that
``[d]ecades of research and site investigations in the United States
and elsewhere suggest that a wide variety of rock types and geologic
environments could--in combination with appropriate repository design--
be suitable for achieving [safe isolation of the waste]. The rock types
that have been considered for a deep geologic repository have included
bedded and domed rock salts, crystalline rocks (i.e., granite or
gneiss), clay, shale, volcanic tuffs, basalt, and various other types
of sedimentary rocks.'' I also agree with the BRC`s observation that
``[d]eep boreholes represent another form of deep geologic disposal
that may offer benefits, particularly for the disposal of certain forms
of waste'' (BRC 2011, p. 33). Potentially suitable rock types are
widely distributed across the United States, and I share the BRC`s
``confidence that many geologic formations and sites that would be
technically suitable for hosting a permanent repository can be found''
(BRC 2011, p. 33).
Any comparison of benefits and drawbacks of the various
alternatives should begin with the observation that before any disposal
concept can be implemented it will have been shown to meet EPA and NRC
regulatory requirements. Long-term safety of a disposal facility, as
defined by the EPA and the NRC, is not negotiable, and concepts that do
not meet the safety standards should not be considered viable or
technically suitable. Benefits and drawbacks of viable alternatives
therefore are most usefully compared in terms of metrics other than
safety, such as the extent to which inherent properties of the geologic
media simplify (or complicate) the licensing case, and programmatic
attributes such as operational efficiency, schedule, and cost.
Benefits and drawbacks are discussed in general terms for the
primary alternative concepts in the following section. Relative
benefits and drawbacks of deep borehole disposal are also discussed in
more detail above in response to a question from Representative Broun.
All of these concepts, as well as Yucca Mountain, have the potential to
provide excellent long-term isolation, and the benefits and drawbacks
described here should be considered in that context. None of the
alternatives mentioned here, however, has a sufficient technical basis
for the United States to proceed directly to site selection and
licensing. For any alternative, I believe the United States will need
to move through a staged process of site and concept screening, site
selection, site characterization, and facility design before beginning
the licensing process.
Attributes of mined repositories in granitic rocks. Granitic rocks
are widely distributed in the United States, and are found in
geologically stable areas where the likelihood of seismicity and
volcanism is low. There is extensive experience in mining granitic
rocks, and underground openings remain open and stable with relatively
little support, facilitating emplacement operations and retrieval,
should it be necessary. Granitic rocks tend to have very low
permeability when unfractured. Granitic rocks are not associated with
oil and gas resources, and locations can be found where the likelihood
of competition with other resources (e.g., metals or geothermal
resources) is very low.
As is true for most potential repository locations deep below the
water table, water chemistry within granites tends to be reducing
(i.e., with a low oxygen content). Reducing conditions lower the
solubility of most of the important radioactive species in the waste,
including uranium, plutonium, and other transuranic elements. (Iodine,
and its long-lived radioisotope I-129, is an exception, in that it
remains highly soluble in essentially all groundwater conditions). This
is in contrast to the chemical environment at Yucca Mountain, where the
decision to place the repository above the water table (and therefore
in a largely dry environment) means that if and when water does reach
the waste, oxidizing conditions will allow greater dissolution of
radioactive species. Reducing groundwater conditions can therefore be
viewed as a positive attribute for potential repositories in granitic
rocks (and in essentially all other deep locations far below the water
table). Oxidizing conditions, however, should not be viewed as a
disqualifying attribute; if little water reaches the waste, for example
because of the use of long-lived waste packages, solubility is of less
importance, and locations above the water table can provide other
benefits that should be taken into account.
Potential drawbacks of granitic rocks begin with the observation
that at the depths envisioned for mined repositories, granitic rocks
may have relatively high-permeability fractures that can allow
significant amounts of groundwater to enter the disposal region. These
same fractures can provide a pathway for radionuclides to reach the
near-surface environment if and when waste packages fail and waste is
exposed to water. Granitic repository concepts, therefore, typically
include clay backfill and long-lived corrosion-resistant waste packages
as components of the engineered system, providing additional barriers
to groundwater flow and radionuclide transport.
In common with other disposal concepts that call for a clay
backfill surrounding the waste packages (e.g., mined repositories in
clay or shale), repositories in granitic rocks will require waste
packages that are small relative to the packages that could be emplaced
in Yucca Mountain or another similar repository designed without
backfill. The size limitation comes from the desire to keep
temperatures in the clay backfill below approximately 100 +C, to avoid
changes in the material properties of the clay. There are four primary
ways to manage the heat output of spent nuclear fuel and reprocessing
wastes in disposal operations: waste can be allowed to decay in surface
storage before disposal, waste packages can be kept small enough to
limit the thermal load, waste packages can be spaced far enough apart
to limit cumulative heating effects, and the disposal region can be
ventilated after the waste packages are emplaced to remove heat.
Because of its location above the water table and the lack of a clay
backfill, the Yucca Mountain design allowed for relatively higher
temperatures on the waste package surface, mitigated by effective
ventilation of the disposal region during the operational period. This
in turn allowed for emplacement of relatively large waste packages
spaced relatively close together. Specifically, the waste packages
designed for Yucca Mountain can each accommodate 21 pressurized water
reactor fuel assemblies. Waste packages in typical mined repositories
in granitic rocks (or clay/shale settings) would be much smaller,
accommodating perhaps 4 assemblies with fuel of similar
characteristics. Thermal loading constraints do not affect the long-
term safety of a repository. Rather, they have the potential to affect
the efficiency of the disposal operation.
Attributes of mined repositories in clay and shale rocks. Like
granitic rocks, clay and shale are widely distributed in the United
States, and are found in geologically stable regions where the
likelihood of seismicity and volcanism is low. Many of the potential
benefits and drawbacks are similar to those of granitic rocks: for
example, groundwater chemistry will be reducing in these settings, and
thermal constraints on repository design and waste package size are
essentially the same. Additional potential benefits of clay or shale
sites include the extremely low permeability of the host rock,
relatively low frequency of open fractures, and chemical properties
that tend to sorb most radionuclides of concern. A potential drawback
for clay and shale sites is the frequent association of these rocks
with oil and gas resources, both in underlying porous rocks and trapped
within the low-permeability shale layers themselves.
Attributes of mined repositories in salt. Like the other rock types
discussed, salt deposits are widely distributed in the United States
and are found in geologically stable regions where the likelihood of
seismicity and volcanism is low. Unique properties of rock salt provide
significant potential benefits for disposal of radioactive waste. Salt
is relatively easy to mine. Pure salt is essentially impermeable, and
it is realistically possible to find places in the center of thick salt
deposits where water has not moved in hundreds of millions of years.
Salt is a plastic material at the pressures found at repository depths,
and it will flow relatively rapidly (on a scale of decades) to heal
fractures opened by the mining of the repository and to entomb the
waste packages. Waste surrounded by salt will remain fully isolated
from the surrounding environment indefinitely, for as long as the salt
remains intact. Thermal constraints for salt repositories are
intermediate between those of repositories above the water table (like
Yucca Mountain) and repository concepts that call for clay backfill.
Acceptable peak temperatures are higher in salt than clay, and the high
thermal conductivity of salt means that waste packages could
potentially be larger in salt repositories than in granitic rocks or
clay/shale sites.
Properties of salt pose potential drawbacks, also. Salt is easily
dissolved in fresh water, and although the presence of salt deposits
today is proof that dissolution has not occurred in the geologic past,
repository sites in salt must be chosen so that they remain isolated
from flowing water in the future. The capability of salt to flow under
pressure will complicate (but not preclude) retrieval of waste after it
is emplaced. The bedded salts (in which the original sedimentary
layering is preserved) that are the most widely distributed salt
deposits in the United States tend to have layers of other evaporite
minerals (primarily anhydrite) and clay interspersed with layers of
pure halite. These layers have somewhat higher permeability than the
pure halite, and can complicate the analysis of the potential for water
to move in the rock. Finally, like clay and shale, salt is commonly
found in association with oil and gas resources.
Attributes of mined repositories in other rock types. Mined
repositories have also been proposed in other rock types, most
noteworthy basalt at the Hanford site in eastern Washington site in the
early 1980s, and recently limestone in a proposed repository for
intermediate level waste in Canada. Potential benefits and drawbacks to
these and other less commonly investigated rock types primarily relate
to their availability, their ability to isolate the waste from moving
water, and their association with natural resources. To the extent that
any potential host rock displays appropriate characteristics such as
low water content, low permeability, absence of open fractures, and/or
favorable chemical characteristics, it could be considered as a viable
medium for disposal.
Attributes of deep borehole disposal in crystalline rock. Deep
borehole disposal could potentially be implemented anywhere where low-
permeability crystalline bedrock occurs within approximately a mile or
less of the land surface. Although relatively few data are available
from deep crystalline rock in much of the United States, potentially
favorable rock types are widely distributed. As discussed in more
detail in response to a question from Representative Broun, deep
boreholes have the potential to provide essentially complete isolation
for the wastes indefinitely. Potential conflicts with natural resource
extraction are virtually nonexistent. Thermal constraints that provide
a point of comparison between Yucca Mountain and other mined repository
concepts are not as relevant for deep boreholes, because geometric
constraints posed by the diameter of the hole are likely to keep
thermal loads below levels of concern. Costs are believed to be
competitive with, and perhaps significantly less than, those
anticipated for mined repositories. The modularity of borehole
construction and operation allows a level of flexibility in waste
management that is not available in mined repository operations.
Potential drawbacks of deep borehole disposal are straightforward.
There are relatively few data from deep crystalline rocks in the United
States, and further research, including demonstrations of rock
properties in instrumented boreholes, is needed to confirm the concept.
The narrow diameter of the borehole creates geometric constraints that
preclude disposal of some waste forms, including existing borosilicate
glass reprocessing waste at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina
and the West Valley site in western New York State. Removing waste from
a deep borehole after the hole has been sealed will not be simple
(although recovery of much of the waste could perhaps be achieved using
drilling and solution mining techniques), and deep borehole disposal
should not be undertaken if full retrieval of intact waste forms is
considered essential. From the alternative perspective of
nonproliferation goals, however the relative difficulty of retrieving
radioactive materials from a deep borehole could be viewed as a
potential benefit-fissile material at the bottom of a deep borehole is
unlikely to be recovered for use in a nuclear weapon.
Attributes of other disposal concepts. Various alternatives to deep
geologic disposal have been proposed over the past decades for the
management of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive wastes.
Rechard et al. (2011) provide a summary explanation of past proposals,
four of which warrant a brief mention here. Constructing an engineered
mountain or mausoleum over waste stored at the land surface has been
proposed informally at various times, but the concept does not meet the
intent of requirements for deep geologic disposal and, to the best of
my knowledge, no substantive design concepts have been developed.
Launching radioactive waste into space has been proposed at least since
the 1970s; cost and risk analyses indicate that it is not a viable
option. Disposal in polar ice sheets was proposed in the 1970s;
analyses raised concerns about operational feasibility and the
potential for long-term isolation, and the concept was subsequently
precluded in Antarctica by international treaty. Finally, disposal in
clay sediments below the deep ocean floor was proposed in the 1970s.
Detailed evaluations in the 1980s indicate excellent potential for
long-term isolation in sub-seabed sediments, and I believe the concept
remains technically feasible. International treaty agreements in the
1990s eliminate it from further consideration.
Q2. How long can we expect current storage sites at existing nuclear
facilities to remain safely operable? How long would new temporary
repositories be able to handle nuclear waste?
A2. The safe operation of currently operating independent spent fuel
storage installations (ISFSIs) is regulated by the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission under 10 CFR part 72. The duration of a license granted
under 10 CFR 72.42 is limited to 40 years, with the opportunity to
apply for a 40 year license renewal. With respect to fuel stored either
in spent fuel pools at reactor sites or at ISFSIs, the NRC has
concluded in its most recent update to 10 CFR part 51.53 (NRC 2010)
that ``if necessary, spent fuel generated in any reactor can be stored
safely and without significant environmental impacts for at least 60
years beyond the licensed life for operation . . . of that reactor in a
combination of storage in its spent fuel storage basin and at either
onsite or offsite spent fuel storage installations.''
There are no fundamental technical reasons why temporary storage
facilities could not be operated indefinitely as long as the spent
nuclear fuel and its containers are monitored appropriately and
structures, systems, and components are repaired or replaced as needed.
The condition of the spent fuel will change through time, and
degradation of the spent fuel and associated structures, systems, and
components may complicate options for future handling of the waste, but
I am not aware of any foreseeable processes inherent in the aging of
the facility that would create unsafe conditions that could not be
mitigated as needed. Non-technical factors that may limit the realistic
duration of temporary storage include regulatory requirements, legal
obligations concerning ownership of the spent fuel, and financial
considerations regarding the cost of maintaining indefinite temporary
storage. The Government Accountability Office evaluated two relevant
scenarios for extended temporary storage at existing sites in a 2009
assssment of nuclear waste management options (GAO 2009): in one
scenario storage was limited to 100 years, and in a second scenario
storage was extended to 500 years with the assumption that spent fuel
required repackaging every 100 years. Estimated costs for storing
153,000 metric tons of spent fuel at existing sites for 100 years
ranged from $13 billion to $34 billion; estimated costs for storing the
same amount of fuel for 500 years ranged from $34 billion to $225
billion (GAO 2009, table 5).
Acknowledgment
Sandia is a multiprogram national security laboratory owned by the
United States Government and operated by Sandia Corporation for the
National Nuclear Security Administration. Sandia Corporation is a
subsidiary of the Lockheed Martin Corporation under Department of
Energy prime contract no. DE-AC04-94AL85000. The statements expressed
here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views
or policies of the United States Department of Energy or Sandia
National Laboratories.
References cited
Arnold, B.W., P.V. Brady, S.J. Bauer, C. Herrick, S. Pye, and J.
Finger, 2011, Reference Design and Operations for Deep Borehole
Disposal of High-Level Radioactive Waste, SAND2011-6749, Sandia
National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM.
Brady, P.V., B.W. Arnold, G.A. Freeze, P.N. Swift, S.J. Bauer, J.L.
Kanney, R.P. Rechard, J.S. Stein, 2009, Deep Borehole Disposal of High-
Level Radioactive Waste, SAND2009-4401, Sandia National Laboratories,
Albuquerque, NM.
BIA (U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs), 2006, ``Notice of Availability
of the Record of Decision (ROD) for a Proposed Lease of Tribal Trust
Lands Between Private Fuels Storage, L.L.C. (PFS) and Skull Valley Band
of Goshute Indian (Band) in Tooele County, UT,'' Federal Register vol.
71, no. 192, p. 58629-58630, October 4, 2006.
BLM (U.S. Bureau of Land Management), 2006, ``Notice of
Availability of the Record of Decision for the Right-of-Way
Applications Filed by Private Fuel Storage, L.L.C., for an Independent
Spent Fuel Storage Installation on the Reservation of the Skull Valley
Band of Goshute Indians and the Related Transportation Facility in
Tooele County, UT,'' Federal Register vol. 71, no. 188, p. 57005-57006,
September 28, 2006.
BRC (Blue Ribbon Commission on America`s Nuclear Future), 2011.
Draft Report to the Secretary of Energy, July 29, 2011.
GAO (Government Accountability Office), 2009, Nuclear Waste
Management: Key Attributes, Challenges, and Costs for the Yucca
Mountain Repository and Two Potential Alternatives, GAO-10-48, United
States Government Accountability Office Report to Congressional
Requesters.
Gibb, F.G.F., 1999, ``High-temperature, very deep, geological
disposal: a safer alternative for high-level radioactive waste?'' Waste
Management v. 19, p. 207-211.
IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency), 2006, Geological
Disposal of Radioactive Waste: Safety Requirements, IAEA Safety
Standards Series No. WS-R-4, IAEA, Vienna.
Kokajko, L., 2011, ``Assuring Safety and Security for an Evolving
Nuclear Fuel Cycle,'' presentation to the Nuclear Regulatory
Information Conference, Session T14, Rockville, MD, March 8, 2011.
http://www.nrc.gov/public-involve/conference-symposia/ric/past/2011/
docs/abstracts/sessionabstract-42.html.
MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), 2003, The Future of
Nuclear Power: An Interdisciplinary MIT Study, Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, Cambridge, MA, ISBN 0-615-12420-8.
National Research Council, 1995, Technical Bases for Yucca Mountain
Standards, National Academy Press, Washington, D.C.
NRC (U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission), 2006, ``Notice of
Issuance of Materials License SNM-2513 for the Private Fuel Storage
Facility,'' 7590-01-P, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Docket No.
72-22, Private Fuel Storage, Limited Liability Company.
NRC (U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission), 2010, ``10 CFR Part 51:
Consideration of Environmental Impacts of Temporary Storage of Spent
Fuel after Cessation of Reactor Operation; Waste Confidence Decision
Update; Final Rules,'' Federal Register Vol. 75, page 81032-81076,
December 23, 2010.
Rechard, R.P., B. Goldstein, L.H. Brush, J.A. Blink, M. Sutton, and
F.V. Perry, 2011, Basis for Identification of Disposal Options for
Research and Development for Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Waste,
FCRD-USED-2011-000071, Department of Energy Office of Nuclear Energy
Fuel Cycle Research and Development Program. http://www.ne.doe.gov/
FuelCycle/
neFuelCycle-UsedNuclearFuelDispositionReports.html.
U.S. District Court (United States District Court for the District
of Utah), 2010, Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians, and Private Fuel
Storage,, Plaintiffs, v. Laura Daniel Davis, Associate Deputy Secretary
of the Interior, Chad Calvert, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of
the Interior for Land and Minerals Management, United States Department
of the Interior, C. Stephen Allred, Assistant Secretary of the Interior
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0526-DME-DON: United States District Court for the District of Utah,
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Laws and Regulations Cited
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, as amended, 42 U.S.C. 10101
and following.
10 Code of Federal Regulations Part 51, Environmental Protection
Regulations for Domestic Licensing and Related Regulatory Functions.
10 Code of Federal Regulations Part 60, Disposal of High-Level
Radioactive Wastes in Geologic Repositories.
10 Code of Federal Regulations Part 63, Disposal of High-Level
Radioactive Wastes in a Geologic Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada.
10 Code of Federal Regulations Part 72, Licensing Requirements for
the Independent Storage of Spent Nuclear Fuel, High-Level Radioactive
Waste, and Reactor-Related Greater Than Class C Waste.
40 Code of Federal Regulations Part 191, Environmental Radiation
Standards for Management and Disposal of Spent Nuclear Fuel, High-Level
and Transuranic Radioactive Wastes.
40 Code of Federal Regulations Part 194, Criteria for the
Certification and Re-Certification of the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant's
Compliance with the 40 CFR Part 191 Disposal Regulations.
40 Code of Federal Regulations Part 197, Public Health and
Environmental Radiation Standards for Yucca Mountain, NV.
Responses by Dr. Roger Kasperson,
Professor and Distinguished Scientist, Clark University
Question Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. In his testimony, Mr. Spencer testified that the BRC should
address Yucca Mountain head-on, stating:
``The BRC should state what it believes should happen with Yucca
Mountain based on the best science and evidence available. If its
members believe Yucca should be shut down, it should state why and
provide a recommendation for disengaging from Yucca. If, on the other
hand, it finds that Yucca should be pursued, perhaps as one of a number
of options, then the Commission should provide recommendations on how
to move forward. Such a conclusion could reject the current Yucca
program while proposing an alternative. Such an alternative could
embody the recommendations of the BRC's consent-based approach where
the people of Nevada are given control over the future of the Yucca
facility.''
Do you agree or disagree with this recommendation, and why?
A1. Answer:
The science must be there and it must be strong;
Strong science suggests that alternatives must be
considered, not one site selected before the evidence is in;
Beyond that, technical science is not the only thing that
matters. Fairness in process and collaboration with those who will bear
the burdens and risks are essential. They must have a role;
And so a consent-based role is the way to proceed. In the
end it will be the most successful, as Sweden and Finland have fully
shown. Can we ever stop screwing it up here in the U.S.?
Responses by Mr. Gary Hollis, Chairman,
Nye County Board of County Commissioners
Questions Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. Do you believe the demand of the Secretary of Energy that the Blue
Ribbon Commission exclude consideration of Yucca Mountain as the site
for a permanent geological repository in its deliberations detracts
from its ability to develop the best possible recommendation for
nuclear waste management?
A1. Yes. Doing so sets up the Blue Ribbon Commission to be complicit
in the Department of Energy's violation of the Nuclear Waste Policy
Act. It is an outrage that Federal law is so blatantly being ignored.
Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Either it should be
followed or Congress should change it. The BRC is not a siting
commission, but remaining silent regarding the abandonment of the Yucca
Mountain Project has nothing to do with repository siting. For the BRC
to claim that the Secretary's direction prohibits the BRC from
considering Yucca Mountain is disingenuous. The BRC charter makes no
such prohibition and the Federal Advisory Committee Act does not allow
the sponsoring authority to unduly influence the BRC as an independent
commission, a direct compromise of the BRC's credibility.
Q2. How important is it for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to
finalize and release its comprehensive technical reviews of the site
(known as the ``Safety Evaluation Reports'')? Are there any drawbacks
from completing the technical review of Yucca Mountain?
A2. It is extremely important that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
be allowed to complete their review of the Yucca Mountain license
application, and if appropriate, make a technical finding as to the
safety of the Yucca Mountain site. The Country needs a repository to
dispose of its spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. The
BRC did not discover a previously unknown solution; they recommended
that the country proceed expeditiously to develop one or more geologic
disposal facilities. With more than $11 billion invested in studying
the science of Yucca Mountain, the country has a right to know whether
or not it is possible to complete a first of a kind Nuclear Regulatory
Commission licensing proceeding. That knowledge is invaluable whether
or not the country develops the Yucca Mountain repository or seeks
another location. It will take billions of dollars and decades to
develop another repository site; to come as close as the country is
today without finding the answer to the safety of the Yucca Mountain
repository would be a crucial mistake.
With the completion of the Safety Evaluation Reports and the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission hearings, it will also be possible to
once and for all separate the technical questions about the Yucca
Mountain site from the political rhetoric and misinformation that has
been used in the past. If a new political solution is to be crafted, it
should not be based on a false premise that the Yucca Mountain science
was bad.
Over the years, the opponents of the project have tried to delay
every phase of the project and the NRC review is no exception. It is
widely viewed that completion of the NRC licensing process would show
that the NRC technical staff concurs with DOE and their national
laboratory partners that a repository at Yucca Mountain could be
constructed and operated safely. Opponents who continue to vocally
claim that a Yucca Mountain repository would be unsafe would lose
credibility.
Q3. In his testimony, Mr. Spencer testified that the BRC should
address Yucca Mountain head-on, stating:
``The BRC should state what it believes should happen with Yucca
Mountain based on the best science and evidence available. If its
members believe Yucca should be shut down, it should state why and
provide a recommendation for disengaging from Yucca. If, on the other
hand, it finds that Yucca should be pursued, perhaps as one of a number
of options, then the Commission should provide recommendations on how
to move forward. Such a conclusion could reject the current Yucca
program while proposing an alternative. Such an alternative could
embody the recommendations of the BRC's consent-based approach where
the people of Nevada are given control over the future of the Yucca
facility.''
Do you agree or disagree with this recommendation, and why?
A3. We agree. The BRC should address Yucca Mountain head on. The most
difficult issue in high-level radioactive waste disposal in this
country (and likely the world) is finding an acceptable geologic
repository. The BRC touts a consent-based approach to finding the
appropriate repository site. If the opponents of Yucca Mountain are
correct, then what harm is there to allow the NRC licensing process to
proceed to its completion or allow the NRC Safety Evaluation Reports
regarding Yucca Mountain to be published? Even with DOE's decision to
abandon Yucca Mountain, they and their national laboratory partners
have continued to maintain that Yucca Mountain is safe. The licensing
process should be completed, and if Yucca Mountain is determined to be
a safe option for a repository, then it is at least a baseline for
comparison of other sites. This would also be a good starting point for
negotiations with the State of Nevada and Nye County on mitigation of
impacts and possible benefits. The only way to ever get consent for a
repository is to understand the impacts to the State and local
governments and then negotiate for money, land, water, etc., that help
to offset these impacts.
Q4. During hearing Q&A, Ranking Member Miller asserted that ``all the
rail lines, all of the roads that [waste] would likely travel through,
on to get to your county, to the Yucca Mountain facility, go through
Las Vegas'' and that ``80,000 shipments a year would go through Clark
County, through Las Vegas.'' You disputed this assertion. Please
elaborate on your response. Should Yucca Mountain be licensed and
accept shipments of spent nuclear fuel, what is the planned route for
transportation of the spent fuel containers? Are any container required
or expected to pass through Las Vegas? What about Clark County?
A4. The opening assertion that ``all the rail lines, all of the roads
that [waste] would likely travel through, on to get to your county, to
the Yucca Mountain facility, go through Las Vegas'' is inaccurate.
There is no existing rail to Yucca Mountain, and there are other roads
and new routes that do not go through Las Vegas. Nye County endorses
rail and road options that would completely avoid the Las Vegas valley.
The second assertion that ``80,000 shipments a year would go
through Clark County, through Las Vegas'' is also inaccurate. The
Department of Energy Environmental Impact Statement that selected
mostly rail as the preferred option acknowledges 95 rail shipments and
90 truck shipments per year for 25 to 30 years, a combined total of
5,550 shipments during those 30 years.
The aforementioned EIS Record of Decision rail route is a 350-mile
spur through central Nevada from Caliente, NV (approximately 125 miles
northeast of Las Vegas), that dead ends at Yucca Mountain. That route,
although it would not be Nye County's choice, would result in
approximately nine (9) percent of the total rail shipments through Las
Vegas. Nye County, along with Esmeralda, Mineral, Lander, and Churchill
Counties prefers a north/south through-going rail alignment (a
combination of the Mina and Jean routes) that would completely avoid
the Las Vegas Valley, cost less to construct, provide greater economic
development opportunities within Nevada, and more directly connect with
the major east/west national railroad systems.
Road routes were not finalized. Individual states are authorized to
designate preferred alternative road routes within their borders There
are road routes in Nevada that would avoid the Las Vegas valley. Nevada
has yet to designate alternative routes.
Transportation routes that avoid the requirement or expectation of
any shipments through Las Vegas are easy and have already been studied.
Completely avoiding all of Clark County is possible but more difficult.
The through-going rail route that is easiest to construct requires
construction of the Jean Corridor in the rural southwestern part of
Clark county about 30 miles from Las Vegas.
Question Submitted by Representative Randy Neugebauer, Subcommittee on
Energy and Environment
Q1. Most scientists agree that we need long-term storage of nuclear
waste. Our experiences with Yucca Mountain highlight the political
difficulties locally, Statewide, and Nationwide in accomplishing such
an objective. How can we build local consensus anywhere in the country
to accept long-term storage of nuclear waste?
A1. The issue is not with local community consensus; the local support
for WIPP is well documented, the local support for the PFS Interim
Storage Facility is clear, and the local support for the Yucca Mountain
facility has been demonstrated to the Committee. The State of New
Mexico ultimately supported WIPP after negotiations that included
regulatory changes, transportation improvements and other benefits,
while the State of Utah found ways to block the privately owned PFS
facility after it had been licensed.
The State of Nevada exercised its legal authority to submit a
notice of disapproval when the President recommended that Yucca
Mountain be designated and a license application submitted. That
provision was explicitly included in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act;
Congress recognized there could be resistance at the State level and
required a supermajority vote to override the notice of disapproval.
The strongest argument the State of Nevada has against the Yucca
Mountain repository is a fairness complaint. When Congress amended the
Nuclear Waste Policy Act and eliminated the second repository program,
Nevada was able to build support for their argument about unfair
treatment; a fundamental compromise in crafting the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act was that no one State would have to take all of the waste. A
meaningful step in building consensus could be reinstating a commitment
to more than one repository.
The Blue Ribbon Commission has based their recommendation for a
new, consent-based approach to siting future nuclear waste management
facilities on the success of the Swedish program in siting a
repository. It must be recognized that the Swedish model is not
applicable in the U.S.; in Sweden, the decision authority is the local
community, and there is not a state-level government. A meaningful step
in building consensus could be to focus on local communities that host
an acceptable geologic disposal medium, with commitments for meaningful
mitigation and compensation for both the local community and the State.
Incidentally, the six rural Nevada counties that have provided
resolutions attesting to local support encompass an area of more than
46,500 sq. mi. That is equivalent in area to a square of more than 215
miles on a side, the distance from Washington, DC, to New York City.
That area is also larger than the areas of 18 states, including
Pennsylvania, Ohio, or Virginia. It is also larger than a number of
countries, including, for example, Portugal, Austria, or Iceland. It is
difficult to argue that local community support in Nevada is not
meaningful.
There are other dimensions of consensus that should be addressed.
The State of Nevada's arguments that the Yucca Mountain site is based
on bad science has never had technical peer consensus; the best way to
address their concerns would be to complete the license application.
The State of Nevada's arguments that compensation for accepting the
repository is not forthcoming is without merit; despite specific
provisions of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, the State has never entered
into discussions for a consultation and cooperation agreement. If
Congress were to initiate discussions with the state and local
governments on compensation and impact mitigation, it could weaken
support for the State's opposition. Finally, it is appropriate to note
that contrary to Nevada's State's rights arguments, two facts must be
acknowledged. First, the majority of the land encompassed by the rural
Nevada Counties that have stated their support for Yucca Mountain is
federally controlled public lands; Nye County is 98% federally
controlled land. And second, the State of Nevada raised the State's
rights issue in its lawsuits following the recommendation of Yucca
Mountain and were not successful in that claim with the Court rejecting
the State's challenge to the constitutionality of the resolution
approving the Yucca Mountain site (see United States Court of Appeals
for the District of Columbia Circuit, No. 01-1258, Nuclear Energy
Institute, Inc., Petitioner v. Environmental Protection Agency,
Respondent, Decided July 9, 2004.)
Responses by Mr. Rick McLeod, Executive Director,
Savannah River Site Community Reuse Organization
Questions Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. Please describe concerns associated with constructing and
operating a consolidated interim storage facility prior to the
licensing of a permanent high-level waste repository. What assurances
would be necessary from the Federal Government to satisfy those
concerns and begin consideration of a consolidated storage facility?
A1. First, our community leaders have studied the issues associated
with nuclear waste storage for the past two years. The SRS Community
Reuse Organization produced a White Paper in 2009 describing the
impacts of waste storage and outlining the path for a community
consensus position. A copy of the White Paper is attached.
[The White Paper may be found in Appendix 2.]
Secondly, in considering Consolidated Interim Storage, it is
important to point out a couple of significant points: (1) Consolidated
Interim Storage only applies to commercial spent fuel. We believe it is
important that there is a clear distinction between commercial spent
nuclear fuel and high-level defense waste. The two should be de-coupled
and considered independently of each other. While many debate the
disposal of commercial spent fuel as a ``states right'' issue, the
disposal of high-level defense waste can only be regarded as a national
issue. The high-level defense waste is our Nation's waste and it needs
a national solution. We believe Yucca Mountain is that solution. (2)
The storage of commercial spent fuel either separately or consolidated
can be conducted safely. Safety is not the concern. We remain concerned
about the definition of ``interim`` which, in discussing nuclear waste,
can mean anything from 10 years to 500 years or more. ``Interim'' must
be clearly and legally defined before communities such as ours can
agree to host Consolidated Interim Storage. In the absence of such
clear definition, we are in danger of becoming a ``de facto'' permanent
repository for nuclear waste.
In addition, as stated in our testimony, our five-county region in
South Carolina and Georgia will not support any interim storage
scenario unless a permanent solution in pursued at the same time. This
means measurable progress toward a permanent repository for commercial
spent fuel and high-level defense waste and/or a program to reprocess
or recycle commercial used nuclear fuel.
Community support also requires removal of a sufficient quantity of
waste currently stored at DOE's Savannah River Site and the re-
commitment of processing used nuclear fuel currently stored at SRS in
used fuel pools.
These two conditions must be accompanied by ongoing health and
safety monitoring, proper regulatory oversight at both the local and
state level, and a legally binding commitment to a final disposition
plan. All such considerations must be vetted in the local community in
conjunction with State officials before any type of Consolidated
Interim Storage can be considered.
Q2. Do you believe the demand of the Secretary of Energy that the Blue
Ribbon Commission exclude consideration of Yucca Mountain as the site
for a permanent geological repository in its deliberations detracts
from its ability to develop the best possible recommendations for
nuclear waste management?
A2. Our position on this is clear. Excluding Yucca Mountain definitely
detracts from the Blue Ribbon Commission's ability to develop the best
possible recommendations, In fact, we consider this to be the ``missing
recommendation.''
The BRC draft report recommends that prompt efforts be undertaken
to develop, as quickly as possible, one or more permanent, deep
geologic facilities for waste disposal, yet fails to mention Yucca
Mountain.
We continue to believe Yucca Mountain was--and is--the right answer
for permanent nuclear waste disposal, and its completion should be
vigorously pursued, especially for high-level defense waste. To
blatantly and purposefully omit consideration of Yucca Mountain as an
option is misguided and ignores three decades of intense research and
billions in funding, which brought the Nation to the edge of a highly
workable, ultimately safe solution for storing nuclear waste.
In addition, it should be noted that the vitrified glass logs of
high-level defense waste from the Defense Waste Processing Facility
(DWPF) at the Savannah River Site were produced based on Waste
Acceptance Criteria developed for Yucca Mountain. We have to wonder if
some ``new'' permanent geologic repository will be able to accept this
waste mixture. If not, where will this national waste stream go? This
underscores the point that science--not politics--should govern the
process for selecting a permanent repository for nuclear waste.
Q3. How important is it for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to
finalize and release its comprehensive technical reviews of the site
(known as the ``Safety Evaluation Reports'')? Are there any drawbacks
from completing the technical review of Yucca Mountain?
A3. We see no drawbacks whatsoever in the NRC completing its technical
review of Yucca Mountain, The public needs to know that Yucca Mountain
is safe, and the Safety Evaluation Report will be reassuring.
This multi-discipline review involves dozens of trained
professionals with expertise in numerous technical and scientific
disciplines, including geochemistry, hydrology, climatology, structural
geology, volcanology, seismology and health physics, as well as
chemical, civil, mechanical, nuclear, mining, materials, and geological
engineering.
It offers a comprehensive review of all aspects of the repository's
siting, construction, and operation. This report can become an
important part of an overall education and awareness program necessary
for public acceptance.
Q4. In his testimony, Mr. Spencer testified that the BRC should
address Yucca Mountain head-on, stating:
``The BRC should state what it believes should happen with Yucca
Mountain based on the best science and evidence available. If its
members believe Yucca should be shut down, it should state why and
provide a recommendation for disengaging from Yucca. If, on the other
hand, it finds that Yucca should be pursued, perhaps as one of a number
of options, then the Commission should provide recommendations on how
to move forward. Such a conclusion could reject the current Yucca
program while proposing an alternative. Such an alternative could
embody the recommendations of the BRC's consent-based approach where
the people of Nevada are given control over the future of the Yucca
facility.''
Do you agree or disagree with this recommendation, and why?
A4. Mr. Spencer is right in his view that Yucca Mountain should be
included in the BRC recommendations, but he overlooks an important
consideration. His recommendation fails to recognize that Yucca
Mountain is not just an option for waste storage. It is the law of the
land. As a Nation, we should be moving forward in accordance with the
law established by Congress through the Nuclear Waste Policy Act unless
and until that law is changed.
It can only be changed by legislative initiative in Congress. It
cannot be altered by the Blue Ribbon Commission, which can only advise
and has no authorizing, regulatory, or legal mandate. We should not be
waiting on the Blue Ribbon Commission in moving Yucca Mountain forward
Q5. Can you describe in greater detail the opportunities associated
with the development of a research and development center to be located
at Savannah River Site's H Canyon?
A5. Researchers at Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL), along
with H Canyon personnel, are currently conducting a comprehensive
feasibility study to determine the benefits and challenges associated
with establishing an R&D test bed for advanced detector technologies.
The need for such a test bed has been expressed the National
Nuclear Security Administration's (NNSA) Next Generation Safeguards
Initiative (NGSI) and would serve as a way to transfer emerging
safeguards technologies from the laboratory to an operational
environment.
This technology strengthens the U.S. safeguards program by opening
the possibility for more efficient and cost-effective detection of
nuclear materials, improving the timeliness of detection, minimizing
uncertainty, and improving confidence in results.
As identified in the NGSI program plan, there is a lack of fully
operational facilities that allows for full-scale testing of new
technologies. H Canyon has been identified as a potential location due
to its unique standing as the Nation's only operational nuclear
chemical separations plant.
H Canyon offers several areas where full-scale testing could be
conducted. Combined with nearby SRNL, the needed expertise for
developing, deploying, testing, and evaluating advanced detector
technologies is readily available.
The concept would eventually open SRNL to other DOE National
Laboratories, resulting in a comprehensive initiative for testing
national and international safeguards-related equipment.
Q6. What would be the impact on the Savannah River Site and
surrounding communities should consideration of Yucca Mountain site be
halted and the Nation embark on a new search for a nuclear waste
repository? How would this impact Savannah River Site concerns about
the cost of managing, guarding, monitoring, and other issues relating
to existing nuclear material?
A6. There are numerous potential impacts.
First and most significantly, there has been a substantial loss of
trust and credibility. The Federal Government has broken faith with our
community and with others across the country that trusted implicitly in
the Department of Energy's commitment to complete Yucca Mountain as the
Nation's preferred method of nuclear waste storage.
The Federal Government has reneged on its promise to provide a
permanent repository for defense nuclear waste and for commercial spent
fuel from nuclear power plants. As a region, we have counted on this
promise and on the government's assurances that our site and others
would be a temporary home for nuclear waste.
We relied even more heavily on this promise once the choice of
Yucca Mountain became the law of the land through the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act.
Today, the Savannah River Site has approximately 3,000 canisters of
stabilized legacy high-level waste from the Cold War stored onsite, and
another 3,000 to 4,000 canisters will be generated in the process of
stabilizing the remaining liquid radioactive waste now stored in aging
tank farms at SRS. This stabilized high-level waste must be disposed in
a federal repository, but until a federal repository is available, it
will have to be stored at SRS.
In addition, Savannah River Site is the receipt and storage site
for aluminum-clad research reactor spent fuel from decommissioned
research reactors worldwide. Based on approved operational plans, SRS
will reprocess this fuel in H Canyon to recover the enriched uranium
for use as fuel in nuclear reactors pending operational approval by DOE
and budget approvals by Congress. The high-level waste resulting from
processing the fuel will be stabilized along with other high-level
waste at SRS and stored until a repository is available.
Savannah River Site was also selected by DOE to provide interim
storage for surplus non-pit plutonium in the United States. The
plutonium originally located at Rocky Flats, Hanford, Los Alamos, and
several weapons research laboratories will be consolidated at SRS.
Approximately 60 percent of the plutonium by weight is scheduled to be
converted to commercial reactor fuel in the Mixed Oxide Fuel
Fabrication Facility (MOX).
However, DOE planned to dispose of the remaining 40 percent in the
federal repository by dissolving in H Canyon, incorporating plutonium
into borosilicate glass in the Defense Waste Processing Facility with
existing high-level liquid waste, and storing it in the Glass Waste
Storage Buildings at SRS until a repository is available.
If there is no repository, the costs for monitoring materials
stored at SRS will continue for a longer period of time and will
increase as years go by. In addition, SRS will be forced to build
additional glass log storage buildings to accommodate material that
should be going to the repository. There are currently two glass log
storage buildings at SRS, and a third is being designed with more to
follow. These facilities only have a design life of approximately 50
years. A study on the consequences of long-term storage (100-plus
years) has yet to be conducted, and therefore their suitability for
long-term storage is unknown.
While we recognize that DOE, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and
the nuclear utilities are diligent in ensuring that these materials are
stored securely, and we have no concerns about the ability to store
these materials safely in the near term, the impacts of long-term
interim storage, including continued safety, have not been adequately
evaluated. This represents an additional cost required for community
support.
Question Submitted by Representative Sandy Adams, Subcommittee on
Investigations and Oversight
Q1. ``Ratepayers in my State alone have contributed over $800 million
to the Nuclear Waste Trust Fund to date. While the used fuel is
currently being held safely on site by our utilities, doing so
constitutes an additional economic burden. With the administration
pulling the plug on Yucca Mountain for political, not scientific
reasons, and no realistic alternative in place, why should my
constituents continue to have to pay into the Waste Fund?''
A1. The Nuclear Waste Fund was created to provide a permanent solution
for nuclear waste disposaL We do NOT believe your constituents should
continue to pay into the Nuclear Waste Fund, UNLESS those funds are
used for that purpose or for specific, current storage needs. For
example, they could be earmarked for safeguards, security and
environmental protection at the existing storage sites which now dot
the country.
In addition to nuclear plant sites where commercial spent fuel is
currently stored, these funds could also be utilized by communities who
agree to host a Consolidated Interim Storage facility for commercial
spent fuel.
New legislation in the form of amendments to the Nuclear Waste
Policy Act would be needed to allow funds to be used in this way.
Otherwise, if payments to the Nuclear Waste Fund are not being used
to provide permanent storage. as intended, the payments should cease.
Question Submitted by Representative Judy Biggert, Subcommittee on
Energy and Environment
Q1. A primary recommendation from the BRC is to establish a new
``consent-based siting'' process that would require relevant State and
local governments to accept a facility before it proceeds. The report,
however, is silent on the question of consent by local communities
where nuclear waste currently resides. If the BRC's recommendation is
worthy of consideration, how can the Federal Government ensure
``consent'' requirements are a two-way street? In other words, should
all the communities around the country currently storing spent fuel be
required to do so indefinitely without their consent?
A1. We do NOT believe communities currently storing spent fuel around
the country should be required to do so indefinitely without their
expressed consent. First, storage of commercial spent fuel was--and
is--a legal obligation of the Department of Energy, one that has
important implications in health and safety, the economics of nuclear
power as an energy source, and national security. DOE has not lived up
to its obligatIons in this regard and, by default, has left the job to
utilities and local communities across the Nation.
Secondly, consent by local communities is an essential element of
long-term success in storage of commercial spent fuel and high-level
defense waste. Because of the stalemate that currently exists in
progress toward a permanent solution, the matter of consent by local
communities where nuclear waste currently resides has taken on added
importance.
A key to the ``two-way street'' assurance concerning consent
requirements is education and engagement with DOE, congressional
delegations, and the industry AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE in the decision-
making process.
Local governments working alongside organizations like ours are the
formal voice and institutional authority speaking on a community's
behalf and pursuing community interests with Federal and State
Governments. They also are uniquely positioned to negotiate economic
benefits on behalf of the impacted community. It is imperative that any
economic benefits reside at the local community level first, not merely
directed from the State level down. We must keep in mind that this is
where the waste will ultimately reside. whether that is interim or long
term.
Question Submitted by Representative Randy Neugebauer, Subcommittee on
Energy and Environment
Q1. Most scientists agree that we need long-term storage of nuclear
waste. Our experiences with Yucca Mountain highlight the political
difficulties locally, Statewide, and Nationwide in accomplishing such
an objective. How can we build local consensus anywhere in the country
to accept long-term storage of nuclear waste?
A1. Clearly, this is a major challenge--one not subject to glib, easy
answers. For starters, to develop local consensus, potential host
communities must get educated on nuclear issues and then educate their
citizens. Outreach and education can include hosting meetings for the
community at large with site managers, contractors or utilities;
creating public information centers; and building websites and
producing written materials that outline the pros and cons of the
proposed initiative.
Local communities and governments must help ensure there is a
defined public participation process and appropriate government
services and funding for key activities, including oversight
infrastructure development, workforce development and emergency
training and preparedness.
The public participation process needs to be locally focused.
Outside stakeholders (those not living in the community), while having
a right to an opinion, must not be allowed to dictate or confuse the
consensus process or decision. Many times their more vocal views are
taken by DOE, congressional delegations, and the press above the voice
of the local community.
Local communities and governments also can play an important role
in working with States and private companies to ensure that local
values, concerns, and priorities are understood and taken into account
in any proposed project and that appropriate incentives and benefits
result. Some of these include:
Infrastructure improvements, including highways,
railroads, waterways, airports or other public projects;
Environmental improvements, including the cleanup of
existiny air, water or waste problems;
Public school assistance programs;
Higher education programs;
Health care programs;
Proposed co-location of other federal projects or
existing federal expansions;
General economic development programs;
Transfer of ownership of federal properties;
Tax subsidy or property value protection programs;
Public recreation improvement projects;
Direct financial assistance;
Local employment or product purchasing agreements;
Any other type of assurance, equity, or assistance
desired.
A basic and fundamentally important principle of this program is
that a host jurisdiction has the opportunity--and the responsibility--
to define the benefits and conditions appropriate to its particular and
unique needs.
Finally. it is essential that communities have a defined oversight
role, particularly with respect to safety. security, and emergency
response training.
Responses by Dr. Mark Peters, Deputy Laboratory Director
for Programs, Argonne National Laboratory
Questions Submitted by Representative Paul C. Broun, Chairman,
Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight
Q1. What areas of nuclear energy-related research, development and
demonstration offer the most promise to make a significant change in
the quantity of spent nuclear fuel produced and the manner in which it
is handled?
A1. The most promising research areas relate to the development and
demonstration of safe, secure, and economic technologies for
``closing'' the nuclear fuel cycle. The current nuclear fuel cycle in
the United States is ``open,'' which means that fuel is used only once
in a reactor, for about four years. The fuel then is removed from the
reactor and stored at the plant site while it cools and its
radioactivity decreases.
The ``open'' fuel cycle yields wastes that still contain a
substantial amount of untapped energy. At present, the fuel for our
operating light water reactors (LWRs) is discharged after only about
five percent of the uranium has been fissioned and another one or two
percent has been converted to plutonium and ``minor actinides,'' such
as neptunium, americium, and curium. If the residual uranium,
plutonium, and minor actinides in used LWR fuel were recycled and
reused, they could generate additional electricity. Recycling also
would minimize the discharge of plutonium and minor actinides as waste.
Because these constituents of used fuel remain radiologically toxic for
thousands of years, recycling would increase the efficient use of our
uranium resources while minimizing the creation of ultralong-lived
radioactive waste requiring permanent deposition.
Specific research priorities include:
Development and demonstration of efficient processing
techniques to extract/recover all long-lived constituents (plutonium
and minor actinides) from used nuclear fuel. These techniques must be
economical to implement and safeguard, must minimize creation of
secondary wastes, and must produce high-quality feedstock for fuel re-
fabrication. Wastes generated during the processing and recycle should
be compact, durable, and leach-resistant.
Design and demonstration of economical and passively safe
fast-spectrum reactors (including their fuels) for consuming long-lived
constituents in used nuclear fuel.
Development and validation of advanced modeling and
simulation approaches for designing efficient recycling systems and
facilities, enhancing assurance of their safety, and facilitating
safeguards and protection of nuclear materials.
Research also should be undertaken to improve the existing once-
through fuel cycle. Specific recommendations include:
Development of LWR fuels that will achieve increased
burnup, provide greater reliability and operational flexibility, offer
enhanced ``accident tolerance,'' and assure long-term stability
following discharge from the reactor.
Verification of the stability and integrity of existing
LWR fuels and their packaging (containers) after fuel discharge, during
extended storage, and during transport following extended storage.
Q2. In his testimony, Mr. Spencer testified that the BRC should
address Yucca Mountain head-on, stating:
``The BRC should state what it believes should happen with Yucca
Mountain based on the best science and evidence available. If its
members believe Yucca should be shut down, it should state why and
provide a recommendation for disengaging from Yucca. If, on the other
hand, it finds that Yucca should be pursued, perhaps as one of a number
of options, then the Commission should provide recommendations on how
to move forward. Such a conclusion could reject the current Yucca
program while proposing an alternative. Such an alternative could
embody the recommendations of the BRC's consent-based approach where
the people of Nevada are given control over the future of the Yucca
facility.''
Do you agree or disagree with this recommendation, and why?
A2. The duties specified for the BRC in its Charter center on the
consideration and assessment of a broad range of technological and
policy alternatives for managing the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle
in the United States. The Commission's intent, as well as its direction
from the Administration, evidently focused on identification of
workable alternatives to the Yucca Mountain Repository. In its draft
report, the Commission offers only generic technical and policy options
for nuclear waste management, with no specific recommended locations
for interim storage or permanent disposal. In particular, the report
neither includes nor excludes Yucca Mountain in its identification of
options, and instead calls for a consent-based approach to siting
nuclear waste management and disposal facilities.
The BRC draft report does include some discussion of the Yucca
Mountain program. Section 3.4.3 of the draft report summarizes the
``Experience with the Yucca Mountain Repository Program,'' highlighting
delays and difficulties that affected the program and discussing the
erosion of public trust in the program, particularly in Nevada.
Moreover, in p. 24 of the draft report, the Commission acknowledges
that ``with key decisions by the courts and the NRC still pending, the
future of the Yucca Mountain project remains uncertain.'' It also
should be noted that the Yucca Mountain repository is a specific
example of a mined geologic repository (in volcanic tuff), which is one
of the generic disposal options identified in the draft report.
As I stated during my testimony, I believe that completion and
release of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Safety Evaluation
Reports on Yucca Mountain would provide an important opportunity for
lessons learned as we seek options for permanent disposition of new and
legacy nuclear wastes. These reports, combined with the Yucca Mountain
license application to the NRC, represent a substantial investment of
both scientific endeavor and taxpayer funding, and I believe they will
be valuable to the nuclear energy industry and to policymakers and
regulators going forward.
Q3. Having watched the situation unfold in Japan in the wake of their
historic earthquake and tsunami, I think we can all agree that it is
appropriate to study what happened at Fukushima Daiichi and apply any
lessons learned to our fleet of American nuclear reactors. However, it
is also clear that the Japanese regulatory model is a different one
than ours. What can we learn from what happened in Japan, and what do
we know about the safety and security of our own plants?
A3. It is important to remember that the nuclear industry in the
United States has an outstanding safety record, along with a history of
improving its procedures and practices in response to safety incidents
and accidents worldwide. However, the Fukushima accident highlights the
need for continued vigilance and attentiveness to safety in the
operation and regulatory oversight of nuclear power plants. As we learn
more about the Fukushima Daiichi accident and its aftermath, the NRC
and regulatory agencies in other nations should thoughtfully re-
evaluate safety requirements and verification of industry compliance.
In the weeks following the Fukushima accident, nuclear plant
operators in the United States and other nations re-examined and
verified their preparedness to cope with emergencies, especially the
type of station-blackout scenario that occurred at Fukushima after the
Japanese earthquake and tsunami. Additionally, the NRC sent inspectors
to every U.S. nuclear plant to review preparedness for natural and/or
man-made disasters, especially those which could cause prolonged loss
of offsite power. The NRC also established a Near-Term Task Force,
which has issued a report on its initial recommendations to assure the
safe operation and emergency preparedness of U.S. plants. The NRC
currently is reviewing those initial recommendations and is planning a
more intensive six-month study.
Given the U.S. nuclear industry's decades-long track record of safe
and reliable operation, it seems that the safety and security risks of
continued operation of America's existing nuclear power plants appear
to be relatively low, especially when compared with the safety and
health risks caused by other means of baseload electricity generation.
However, it should be noted that important design improvements have
been made since the construction of America's current operating fleet.
Wherever possible, next-generation nuclear plant designs replace
``active'' systems, which are dependent on pumps, valves, and human
operators, with ``passive'' systems that use natural forces, such as
gravity and convection, to respond to malfunction. For example, in
next-generation designs, the reactor may be engineered so that, if core
temperature rises above normal levels, the efficiency of the fission
reaction decreases and it slows down automatically. Control rods that
stop the nuclear reaction can be suspended above the reactor and held
in place with electricity, so that any interruption to the station's
electrical power will automatically insert the rods into the reactor.
These passive safety systems mean that if a plant loses power, as
happened at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan, the reactor does not
require electricity to cool the core after shutdown. Incorporating
these technologies in future construction of American nuclear power
plants would provide additional safeguards against any possibility of a
Fukushima-type disaster in the United States.
The Fukushima accident also highlights the need for safe storage
and management of used nuclear fuel. As the United States seeks
workable policies and practices for short- and long-term management of
nuclear wastes, we must carefully consider the need to find prompt,
safe, and cost-effective means to limit risks associated with used fuel
storage at plant sites, especially risks arising from inadequate
cooling or proximity to operating reactors.
Appendix 2
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Additional Material for the Record
Report by the Majority Staff of the House Science, Space, and
Technology Committee: Yucca Mountain: The Administration's Impact on
U.S. Nuclear Waste Management Policy, June 2011
Documentation from Nye County
What's Next for Nuclear Waste? A New Strategy for the CSRA
Letter from Department of Energy Pertaining to
Yucca Mountain Repository License Application
``Federal Report: Nuclear Waste: Can Nevada Keep America's
Sizzling Nuclear Waste Out of Its Backyard?''
Governing Magazine, April 1990
Testimony of Martin G. Malsch,
Special Deputy Attorney General for the State of Nevada