ISP Interim Storage Site Passes NRC Review; Final Licensing Decision by September

July 30, 2021
By Exchange Monitor

In a major milestone for the otherwise moribund U.S. spent-fuel-storage scene, one of two proposed commercial interim storage sites got the environmental green light from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this week.

If licensed, the site in west Texas would be allowed to store up to 5,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel and highly-radioactive Greater-than-Class-C waste for up to 40 years.

On Thursday, NRC staff “recommend[ed] that, subject to the determinations in the staff’s safety review of the application,” the commission should license Interim Storage Partners’ (ISP) proposed interim storage site in Andrews County, Texas, according to the agency’s final environmental impact statement for the site published Thursday.

ISP, a joint venture between Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists (WCS) and the U.S. arm of French nuclear services company Orano, is seeking federal permission to build its proposed interim storage site at WCS’s existing low-level waste disposal facility in Andrews.

NRC’s environmental cost-benefit analysis of the proposed site found that the effects of building and maintaining an interim storage facility at Andrews would be low. In addition, agency staff found that the project would “provide a net or aggregate positive economic impact within the region” for the duration of the site’s license, according to the environmental impact statement.

A spokesperson for NRC told RadWaste Monitor via phone Wednesday that a final licensing decision should come down in September. The agency’s environmental review must now be submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency, which should issue a Federal Register Notice on the review September 6. That action will start a 30-day waiting period before the commission can make a final call, the spokesperson said.

A spokesperson for WCS said in an emailed statement Thursday that the environmental review was “another indication of our application’s quality and thoroughness.”

“We appreciate the rigorous and deliberate process of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to thoroughly investigate the environmental soundness of our license application,” the statement said.

Rod McCullum, senior director of fuel and decommissioning at the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), a major industry group, told RadWaste Monitor via phone Thursday that the results of the environmental review were “very good news.”

“We think NRC did a great job of listening to public comments,” McCullum said. “We look forward to the next steps of the process.”

NRC’s recommendation is bad news for opponents of ISP’s proposed interim storage site like Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), who said Tuesday during floor debate on the House’s minibus spending bill that NRC was “acting unilaterally” in licensing the Texas site, even in the face of bipartisan opposition.

Cuellar’s office didn’t return a request for comment on the environmental review by deadline Friday for RadWaste Monitor.

Anti-nuclear watchdog Beyond Nuclear didn’t return a request for comment by deadline Friday for RadWaste Monitor. In a Monday statement the watchdog said that “[o]pponents will continue to fight high-level radioactive waste storage in Texas and New Mexico, even if the NRC licenses one or both facilities.”

Meanwhile, opposition to the proposed ISP site has been ramping up in the Lone Star State in recent weeks. Dozens of state legislators penned a letter to NRC July 23 alleging that a license would violate the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in the absence of a permanent federal spent fuel repository. 

NEI says that argument is “false.”

In Andrews, the county commissioner’s court voted unanimously July 15 to write its own letter of resolution opposing the proposed interim storage site after a widely-attended community meeting.

In Austin, the state legislature briefly considered, but didn’t pass, a bill that would have banned the storage of high-level waste like spent nuclear fuel in Texas. State Rep. Brooks Landgraf’s (R) measure got kicked back into committee after a parliamentary row on the state House floor in May. Neither Landgraf’s bill nor its state Senate-side counterpart heard debate before the state legislature adjourned May 31.

ISP’s proposed interim storage site is only one of two such projects under federal consideration.

NRC is also reviewing a license application from Camden, N.J.-based Holtec International for its own interim storage facility in Lea County, N.M. Commission chair Christopher Hanson told members of Congress earlier this month that a license decision for Holtec’s site should come down in January.