[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 209 (Monday, October 29, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Pages 54378-54380]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-23509]
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NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
[Docket No. 40-9059; NRC-2018-0158]
Water Remediation Technology, LLC
AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Environmental assessment and finding of no significant impact;
issuance.
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SUMMARY: The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is considering
renewal of Water Remediation Technology, LLC (WRT) Source Materials
License No. SUC-1591, as well as WRT's request to expand the scope of
its licensed activities. License SUC-1591 was originally issued by the
NRC on January 25, 2007, and is a performance-based, multisite license
that authorizes WRT to use its ion exchange technology to remove
uranium from community drinking water systems (CWSs). WRT submitted its
request for license renewal and to expand the scope of licensed
activities on December 21, 2016, and on January 16, 2018, WRT revised
its application to request a 20-year renewal term.
DATES: The final environmental assessment (EA) referenced in this
document is available on October 29, 2018.
ADDRESSES: Please refer to Docket ID NRC-2018-0158 when contacting the
NRC about the availability of information regarding this document. You
may obtain publicly-available information related to this document
using any of the following methods:
Federal Rulemaking Website: Go to http://www.regulations.gov and search for Docket ID NRC-2018-0158. Address
questions about docket IDs in Regulations.gov to Jennifer Borges;
telephone: 301-287-9127; email: [email protected]. For technical
questions, contact the individual listed in the FOR FURTHER INFORMATION
CONTACT section of this document.
NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System
(ADAMS): You may obtain publicly-available documents online in the
ADAMS Public Documents collection at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. To begin the search, select ``Begin Web-based ADAMS
Search.'' For problems with ADAMS, please contact the NRC's Public
Document Room (PDR) reference staff at 1-800-397-4209, 301-415-4737, or
by email to [email protected]. The ADAMS accession number for the
document referenced (if it is available in ADAMS) is provided the first
time that it is mentioned in this document.
NRC's PDR: You may examine and purchase copies of public
documents at the NRC's PDR, Room O1-F21, One White Flint North, 11555
Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: James Park, Office of Nuclear Material
Safety and Safeguards, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington,
DC 20555-0001; telephone: 301-415-6954, email: [email protected].
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
I. Introduction
The NRC is considering the renewal of WRT's Source Materials
License No. SUC-1591 for a 20-year term and amending the license to
expand the scope of authorized licensed activities. Therefore, as
required by part 51 of Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations (10
CFR), the NRC performed an EA. Based on the results of this EA, the NRC
has determined not to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS)
for the license renewal and for the expansion of the scope of the
authorized licensed activities, and is issuing a finding of no
significant impact.
License SUC-1591 was originally issued by the NRC on January 25,
2007 (ADAMS Accession No. ML062960463), to R.M.D. Operations, LLC
(RMD), the predecessor of WRT. License SUC-1591 is a performance-based,
multisite license that authorizes WRT to use its ion exchange
technology to remove uranium from CWSs. WRT operates in several NRC
``Agreement States,'' where WRT's activities are subject to applicable
State law and regulation due to the NRC's relinquishment of certain
categories of its regulatory authority to the Agreement State.\1\
Currently, WRT does not operate in any non-Agreement States, where its
activities would be subject to NRC jurisdiction.
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\1\ Under Section 274 of the Atomic Energy Act, as amended (42
U.S.C. 2021), the NRC is authorized to relinquish certain prescribed
categories of its regulatory authority to a State, provided that the
State's governor enter into a duly authorized agreement with the NRC
in accordance with Section 274. Presently, there are 38 Agreement
States (Wyoming became the 38th Agreement State on September 30,
2018). Of these Agreement States, WRT operates in California,
Colorado, Georgia, Nebraska, New Jersey, South Carolina, and
Virginia.
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II. Summary of Environmental Assessment
The NRC staff's EA is available online in the ADAMS Public
Documents collection at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html (ADAMS
Accession No. ML18255A117). This section is a summary of the EA.
Description of the Proposed Action
The proposed action is the NRC staff's approval or disapproval of
WRT's application to renew its license for an additional 20-year term
and to expand the scope of licensed activities. The proposed action is
in accordance with the licensee's application dated December 21, 2016
(ADAMS Accession No. ML16358A447), and with its January 16, 2018,
request to extend the license renewal term from 10 to 20 years (ADAMS
Accession No. ML18016B080). Renewal of its NRC license would allow WRT
to continue using its ion exchange
[[Page 54379]]
uranium recovery system (URS) to safely remove and contain uranium from
CWS drinking water sources to levels at or below the uranium maximum
concentration limit (MCL) set by the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), and to transfer the uranium to an appropriately licensed
facility for either reuse (i.e., mixed uranium oxide [``yellowcake'']
production) or disposal. Expansion of the scope of WRT's authorized
licensed activities would allow WRT to remove uranium from non-drinking
water sources (e.g., mine sites, pit lakes, and groundwater remediation
sites). If approved by the NRC, these activities would be authorized
under a renewed License SUC-1591.
Need for the Proposed Action
The current version of License SUC-1591 authorizes the licensee to
install its URS at a CWS, to possess and store the extracted uranium in
the URS, and to transfer and properly disposition the extracted
uranium.
In addition to renewing its license for an additional 20-year term,
WRT seeks to expand the scope of its licensed activities to include the
use of its URS at customer facilities other than CWSs for the purpose
of removing uranium from non-drinking water sources (e.g., mines, pit
lakes, and groundwater remediation sites).
Environmental Impacts of the Proposed Action
The NRC staff assessed the environmental impacts of the license
renewal and expanded scope of activities and determined there would not
be significant impacts to the quality of the human environment. The NRC
staff concluded that impacts for most resource areas, namely, land use;
geology and soils; transportation; water resources; ecological
resources; air quality; noise; visual and scenic resources;
socioeconomics; public and occupational health; and waste management
were small. With respect to environmental justice, the NRC staff does
not expect that the proposed action (to include an expanded scope of
licensed activities) would cause noticeable impact on any population.
Therefore, the NRC staff has determined that there are no
disproportionately high and adverse human health and environmental
effects on minority or low-income populations.
For historic and cultural resources, the NRC expects that there
would be no adverse effects on historic properties from the continued
use of WRT's URS at CWSs and if the request to expand the scope of
authorized license activities is approved, the NRC similarly expects
that there would be no adverse effects on historic properties and
cultural resources resulting from the installation and operation of
WRT's URS at non-drinking water sites. As described in the
environmental assessment, the renewed SUC-1591 license will include
license conditions that sets parameters on the types of locations where
WRT can install its URS without prior NRC approval. These license
conditions are expected to prevent any adverse effects to historic
properties and cultural resources. If WRT seeks to install a URS at a
site not meeting these license conditions, WRT would then need to
submit a license amendment to the NRC for that specific site and the
NRC would then conduct a site-specific environmental review prior to
making its decision on whether to approve or disapprove that license
amendment request.
The NRC has also determined that the proposed action is not likely
to adversely affect threatened and endangered species. Similar to
historic and cultural resources, the license conditions setting
parameters on the types of locations where WRT can install its URS are
expected to prevent any impacts to threatened or endangered species and
their critical habitat.
Environmental Impacts of the Alternatives to the Proposed Action
The NRC staff evaluated the no-action alternative, that is denial
of WRT's license renewal request and by default, denial of its expanded
scope request--in effect, WRT's multisite license SUC-1591 would
expire. The NRC staff also evaluated a partial alternative involving
approval of WRT's license renewal request, but not its expanded scope
request, such that WRT would only be authorized to continue to use its
URS at CWS sites in non-Agreement States under its multisite license.
The no-action alternative (i.e., denial of the license renewal
request) would have no impact on current WRT operations, as those
operations occur exclusively in Agreement States, where WRT is subject
to applicable State law and regulation and operates in accordance with
its Agreement State licenses. As such, WRT could continue to operate in
its current locations as well as in other potential, future Agreement
State locations if the NRC denies the license renewal request. Thus, a
denial of the license renewal request would only forestall WRT from
operating in a non-Agreement State under its multisite license.
If the NRC exercises the no-action alternative, WRT could choose to
apply to the NRC for a specific license for each potential CWS client.
If, however, WRT chose not to apply for such a specific license, then
the affected CWS would not be able to utilize WRT's URS to meet the
EPA-mandated uranium MCL for drinking water. The CWS would then have to
rely upon other alternative treatment methodologies and technologies to
meet the applicable MCL. These other treatment methodologies and
technologies were described in the 2006 EA (ADAMS Accession No.
ML062490415) that supported the issuance of the 2007 license to RMD;
the environmental impacts of these alternative treatment methodologies
and technologies would most likely be similar to the use of the WRT
URS.
In assessing environmental impacts for CWSs under the partial
alternative (denial of the expanded scope request), the NRC staff noted
that it had evaluated the potential environmental impacts of
authorizing WRT to operate at CWS sites in its 2006 EA. The NRC staff's
evaluation of WRT's performance since 2007 has confirmed the findings
and conclusions of the 2006 EA. Therefore, the NRC staff has determined
that the partial alternative will present the same environmental
impacts that the proposed action would likely have with respect to CWS
facilities
With respect to non-drinking water sites, under both the no-action
alternative and the partial alternative, WRT could choose to apply for
a specific license for each potential non-drinking water site. If WRT
chose not to submit a specific license application for a given non-
drinking water site, then that site would not be impacted by WRT
operations. The owners and operators of such a non-drinking water site
would then have to consider other alternative treatment methodologies
or technologies to reduce uranium levels or would have to forego
reducing the uranium levels altogether (non-drinking water sites are
not subject to EPA's Safe Drinking Water Act regulations).
Agencies and Persons Consulted
By letters dated July 5, 2018 (ADAMS Accession No. ML18131A200),
the NRC staff requested comment on a draft of this environmental
assessment from a total of seven NRC Agreement States where the NRC
staff understood that WRT was currently operating: California,
Colorado, Georgia, Nebraska, New Jersey, South Carolina, and Virginia.
Responses were received from six of the seven of the Agreement States
(Nebraska did not respond), with the EA
[[Page 54380]]
revised to address the comments received.
III. Finding of No Significant Impact
Based on its review of the proposed action, as documented in the
EA, the NRC staff concludes that the renewal of License SUC-1591 with
an expanded scope of authorized activities will not have a significant
effect on the quality of the human environment. Therefore, the NRC
staff has determined not to prepare an EIS for the proposed action and
that, pursuant to 10 CFR 51.32, a finding of no significant impact is
appropriate.
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, on October 23, 2018.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Brian W. Smith,
Acting Director, Division of Fuel Cycle Safety, Safeguards and
Environmental Review, Office of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards.
[FR Doc. 2018-23509 Filed 10-26-18; 8:45 am]
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