ML20154N673
| ML20154N673 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 05/04/1979 |
| From: | Kammerer C NRC OFFICE OF CONGRESSIONAL AFFAIRS (OCA) |
| To: | Ahearne J, Bradford P, Gilinsky V, Hendrie J, Kennedy R NRC COMMISSION (OCM) |
| References | |
| TASK-TF, TASK-URFO NUDOCS 9810220053 | |
| Download: ML20154N673 (23) | |
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UNITED STATES 9
4 pt NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION WASHINGTON, D. C. 20555 '
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May'4, 1979 E [6 MEMORAN00M FOR: ' Chairman Hendrie Comissioner Gilinsky 1
Comissioner Kennedy Comissioner Bradford Comissioner rne FROM:
Carlto Kamerer rector i
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0ffi of Congre al Affairs
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SUBJECT:
TESTIMONY l'%
i U Attached is the proposed final version of the Chairman's testimony to be presented before Senator Jackson's Comittee on Energy and Natural Resources at 9:30 a.m.,
Thursday, May 10, 1979.
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Attachment:
As stated l-cc: EDO 0GC OPE SECY 1
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PDR COMMS NRCC CORRESPONDENCE PDR
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STATEMEi1T OF DR. JOSEPH M. HENDRIE 1
CHAIRMAli, U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES UflITED STATES SENATE THURSDAY, MAY 10, 1979
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Mr. Chairman and members of the Committee, I appreciate this opportunity to discuss legislative approaches to implementing the storage and disposal of nuclear waste. Appearing with me today are Commissioners Gilinsky, Kennedy, Bradford and Ahearne.
With your permission, Mr. Chairman, my remarks this morning will address major features of the legislative proposals being considered by this Comittee in the areas of spent fuel storage and nuclear waste management.
OV I will also submit coments on specific provisions S. 685 for the record.
Title V of S. 685 departs from the subject of nuclear waste management, t6 offer certain provisions related to the reform of the nuclear reactor siting and licensing process.
The Commission has been engaged in intensive consideration of siting and licensing issues for some time.
In December of last year, we directed our staff to prepare an analysis of the issues that might ce addressed in legislation concerning the licensing process.
On i
g the basis of that analysis, which included a discussion of the issues dealt with in Title V of S. 685, the Commission began a series of meetings to discuss possible NRC proposals for legislation.
Our meetings were open to the public, in accordance with the Sunshine Act, and were attended by a large number of observers from public interest groups, the nuclear industry, and Congressional l
staffs. The Conmission held some half dozen meetings between January and March.
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. The Commission had begun to consider the actual text of draft legislation when the Three Mile Island accident occurred on March 28. Since that time, the accident and other regulatory issues raised by it, have substantially dominated the Commission's attention. The Commission has therefore not had the opportunity to complete the analysis of siting and licensing issues and draft legislation on which it was engaged.
Consequently, the Commission would prefer to defer its comments on these important features of the bill, in view of investigations currently underway
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both'within and outside NRC to evaluate the recent accident at Three
- Mile Island (TMI). We expect that these investigations will provide significant new insights which should be available in planning any broad siting or licensing reform measure. Once our reviews of THI have been
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concluded, we would appreciate the opportunity to return to the Committee to address the issues raised in Title V.
Before proceeding to discuss the spent fuel storage and waste management aspects of S. 685, I would like to present the Commission's view of its
-role.in these hearings, Mr. Chairman, in your letter of April 13, you stated that in addition to considering S. 685, these hearings would also provide the Committee an opportunity to assess the impact of TMI on energy policy. The Commission believes that the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 f
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,.(ERA)~ represents a clear. statement of Congressional intent that the Commission's role:in this country's nuclear activities be limited to that of a regulator,
' Developmental and promotional responsibilities were.placed in the hands of the Department of Energy (DOE), to be reviewed and periodically revised by Congress.. Thus, we believe that our participation in the development of
)
-national energy policy is most properly accomplished by providing appropriate decisionmakers with' the results of our safety and environmental evaluations
- of nuclear energy systems and licensing procedures. We expect to fulfill
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this role with' respect to the incident at TMI by publishing the results of our investigation.
The spent fuel and nuclear waste management portions of S. 685 appear to present.a three-tiered program consisting of:
(1). interim storage of
. spent fuel, (2) longer term storage of spent fuel and other high-level waste, and (3) ultimate disposal. Alghough interim and long-term storage i
present similar issues, I will discuss them separately to parallel the
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organization of S. 685.
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.Interin Storace of Commercial Spent Fuel Spent fuel storage capacity associated with the current generation of nuclear reactors was originally designed on the assumption that commercial reprocessing would be available.
The fact that such reprocessing will not e
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be available in the near term, and the President's decision to defer indefinitely. commercial reprocessing, led the NRC to consider alternatives involving the interim storage of spent fuel.
The results of this study were published in 1978 in 'a Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement (GEIS) which analyzed interim spent fuel storage needs through the year pullfc -o404 (I1 2000.
The GEIS conclude that additional storage capacity would be required in spite of the increases in existing on-site capacity achieved through I
redesigning of. fuel racks in existence at reactor spent fuel pools. The O
GEIS also concluded that additional storage faci ities would have negligible environmental impacts, whether they were located on-site at reactors or at separate sites away from reactors.
In anticipation of requests to license Laway-from-reactor facilities, the NRC developed and published for comment J
d' raft regulations for' licensing storage of spent fuel in an independent spent feel storage' installation.
S. 685 recognizes the need for ad'ditional storage capacity for spent fuel and directs the Secretary to construct or acquire storage facilities.
These facilities would require NRC licenses under the bill.
The Commission believes it already possesses legal authority to license the storage of spent fuel in such facilities, because it considers spent fuel to be
< high-level waste for the purposes of Section 202(3) of the Energy Reorgani-e
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. zation Act of 1974 However, the Commission would welcome explicit legislative confirmation of this authority to avoid any possibility of confusion on the point.
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The Commission believes that the purpose of Section 4029) would be more fully accomplished by deleting the bill's refer n t
cilities " acquired
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.or constructed," and by amending Section 202(3) to authorize'the NRC to license DOE to store spent fuel in NRC-approved facilities used to store n
foreign generated spent fuel.
If NRC authority were to be limited to DOE V
facilities " acquired or constructed," the NRC might not have authority to review and approve existing DOE facilities, even if they are used in the future primarily to store DOE-acquired commercially-generated or foreign
- spent fuel. This result would be contrary to the concept that NRC licensing authority should extend over essentially all storage of commercially generated i
and_ foreign spent fuel.
. As currently drafted, Section 202(3) of the ERA may exclude from NRC licensing
'O authority some DOE facilities used to store spent fuel generated by foreign reactors and delivered under a subsequent arrangement, as provided for by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978 (NNPA).
42 USC 2160a(a)(E).
You will recall that a " subsequent arrangement" is defined to include an arrangement
. by a Federal agency with another nation, or group of nations, for the purpose r
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For example, foreign spen) fuel generatedfromuraniumcbtcinedcutsid:h the United States wetrlf no(t result
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from any activity licensed under the AEA.
It is not clear that DOE's importation of such fuel would require an flRC license, or that issuance of an 11RC license (should one be required) would imply that such wastes result from activities licensed under the Act for the purposes of Section 202(3) of the ERA. However, the storage and disposal of that fuel would present the same hazards as the licensed storage and disposal of commercial OV spent fuel. Consequently, I will forward an amended version of Section 202(3) which would explicitly authorize f4RC licensing of DOE receipt and am p t.r storage of spent fuel transferred under a subsequent agre ment entered into pursuant to the ilf;PA.
Disposal and Storage of Commercial Radioactive Waste Mr. Chairman, as you know, growing quantities of radioactive waste, including spent fuel, are being generated by commercial users of radioactive materials, especially the nuclear power industry. The continuing accumulation of waste g
volume and spent fuel has been accompanied by growing public concern over the continuing absence of final radioactive waste disposal facilities.
Consequently, the Commission welcomes Congressional attention to this ir.portant issue.
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I 1 S. 685 would explicitly affirm federal ownership and operation of a system for the long-term disposal of all high-level radioactive waste resulting from civilian nuclear activities. The Commission agrees that ultimate disposal is a national problem which must be solved primarily by the Federal government. This view is also shared by the Interagency Review Group on Nuclear Waste Management (IRG).
In its March 1979 report to the President, the IRG proposed a plan for carefully and expeditiously achieving ultimate waste disposal.
The Department of Energy (DOE) has designed its Commercial O
V Waste Management program to implement the recommendations of the IRG.
These developinents are of fundamental importance to the Commission because it is authorized by Section 202(3) of the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 to license any DOE facility for the storage of commercially generated wastes.
Title III of S. 685 proposes an alternative program for the long-term storage and ultimate disposal at high-level wastes.
Several aspects of this program are of concern to the Commission because they are not in accord with the developing federal program to which I have,iust referred.
If our inter-O pretetioa or it is e correct one. S. 885 env4sions lon9-term retrievable storage as the proper accommodation of spent fuel and high-level radio-active waste for concentrated development at this time.
Section 303 specifically calls for activity aimed at construction of a demonstration facility for this kind of disposal. The development of permanent method
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. method of disposal is made, under Section 306, the subject of considerable research, but without provision for an actual prototypic facility to demon-strate the feasibility of this ultimate mode of disposal. We believe that
' development of permanent disposal facilities should proceed apace with progress on long-term retrievable storage. We believe that public doubts and apprehensions about nuclear wastes will not abate until a method of permanent disposal is shown to be practicable.
NO In addition, the Commission faals that S. 685 does not provide for the O
extension of flRC licensing authority over defense generated waste contaminated by transuranic. (TRU) zn'.....mmi radioactive material, and also fails to provide for State participation in siting and licensing waste facilities.
f1RC Licensing of TRU Waste Disposal i
Ongoing military activities generate w'aste contaminated with transuranic (TRU) elements present long-term hatards comparable to those encountered Q
in the disposal of high-level comercial and military wastes. At the present time the Commission believes that disposal of these TRU wastes will not require a separate program.
Section 306 of S. 685 appear to acknowledge this situation by providing for an omnibus research program for developing long-term disposal of commercial and military high-level wastes. As proposed.
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i l that program would include independent NRC licensing review of disposal facilities. However, the Commission is not now authorized to license Department of Energy (DOE) facilities for the disposal of TRU waste.
The Commission believes it should have such licensing authority in light of the public health and safety risks presented by disposal of TRU wastes.
The IRG also supports such an extension of NRC licensing authority.
Consequently, the Commission believes that any legislation providing for the development of facilities for the long-term disposal of military and commercial
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wastes should include an extension of NRC licensing authority over DOE facilities for disposal of TRU wastes.
State Particioation The Commission is concerned that S. 685 does not make explicit provision for enhanced state participation in the proposed program for long-term storage of commercial radioactive waste.
The Commission believes that state participation in any national nuclear waste management program is a crucial element in making any program which is adopted a viable one.
This view is
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i shared by the IRG, which has suggested that legislation provide for state participation. Also, I would note that Congress specifically directed the Commission in the 1979 NRC Authorization Act (P.L.95-601) to report on means for improving opportunities for improving state participation in the process for siting, licensing, and developing nuclear waste storage or disposal facilities.
o o The Commission's report, which we recently transmitted to Congress, made several recorrendations for improving opportunities for state participation.
The recommendations requiring legislation included:
(1) establishment of a federally financed planning council composed of Federal and State represen-tatives; (2) federal funding of an independent technical review capability under the descretion of the planning council; (3) establishment of a Federal arant program to allow host states to more fully participate in the federal waste management program.
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t STATEMENT OF DR. JOSEPH M. HENDRIE CHAIRMAN, U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND NATURAL RESOURCES UNITED STATES SENATE THURSDAY, MAY 10, 1979 Q
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Mr. Chairman and members 'of the Comittee. I appreciate this opportunity to discuss legislative approaches to implementing the storage and disposal of nuclear waste.
Appearing with me today are Commissioners Gilinsky, Kennedy, Bradford and Ahearne.
With your permission, Mr. Chairman, my remarks this morning will address major features of the legislative proposals being considered by this Committee in the areas of spent fuel storage and nuclear waste management.
O 1 w'111 also submit comments on specif4c provisions s. 68s for the record.
Title V of S. 685 departs from the subject of nuclear waste management, tc offer certain provisions related to the reform of the nuclear reactor siting.and licensing process.
The Commission has been engaged in intensive consideration of siting and licensing issues for some time.
In December of last year, we directed our staff to prepare an analysis of the issues that might be addressed in legislation concerning the licensing process.
On O
the basis of that analysis, which included a discussion of the issues dealt with in Title V of S. 685, the Commission began a series of meetings to discuss possible HRC proposals for legislation. Our meetings were open to the public, in accordance with the Sunshine Act, and were attended by a large number of
~
observers from public interest groups, the nuclear industry, and Congressional r
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Lin staffs. The Comission held some' half dozen meetings between January and t.
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- yE The Comisswa had. begun to consider the actual text of draft legislation
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when the Three Mile Island accident occurred on March 28.
Since that time, the accident and other regulatory issues raised by it, have substantially dominated the Commission's attention. The Comission has therefore not had the opportunity to complete the analysis of siting and licensing issues and draft legislation on which it was engaged.
Consequently, the Commission would prefer to defer its comments on these important features of the bill, in view of investigations currently underway O
both within and outside naC to evaluate the recent accident at Three Mile Is'and (TMI). We expect that these investigations will provide l
significant new insights which should be available in planning any broad siting or licensing reform measure.
Once our reviews of TMI have been concluded, we would appreciate the opportunity to return to the Committee to address the issues raised in Title V.
Before proceeding to discuss the spent fuel storage and waste management aspects of S. 685, I would like to present the Comission's view of its role in these hearings, Mr. Chairman, in your letter of April 13, you stated that in addition to considering S. 685, these hearings would also provide the Comittee an opportunity to assess the impact of TMI on energy policy. The Comission believes that the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 u
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(ERA) rhpresents' a clear statement of Congri::sional intent that the Comission i i
role in this country's nuclear activities be limited to that of a regulator.
Developmental and promotional responsibilities were placed in the hands of the Department of Energy (DOE), to be reviewed and periodically revised by Congress. Thus, we believe that our participation in the development of national energy policy is most properly accomplished by providing appropriate decisionmakers with the results of our safety and environmental evaluations of nuclear energy systems and licensing procedures.
We expect to fulfill O
this role with respect to the incident at TMI by publishing the results of our investigation.
The spent fuel and nuclear waste management portions of S. 685 appear to present a three-tiered program consisting of:
(1) interim storage of spent. fuel, (2) longer term storage of spent fuel and other high-level waste, and (3) ultimate disposal. Alghough interim and long-term storage present similar issues, I will discuss them separately to parallel the
~
organization of S. 685.
Interim Storage of Commercial Spent. Fuel Spent fuel storage capacity associated with the current generation of nuclear reacto'rs was originally designed on tim assumption that comercial h h, reproce' sing wou'1d be available. The fact:that such reprocessing will not
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indefinitely commercial reprocessing, led 'the..:NRC to consider alternatives b
involving the interim storage of spent fuel. The results of this study were published in 1978 in a Draft Generic Environmentr' Impact Statement h
(GEIS) which analyzed interim spent fuel' storage need; through the year 2000.
The GEIS concluded that additional storage capacity would be required in spite of the increasca in existing on-site capacity achieved through redesigning of fuel racksin existence at reactor spent fuel pools. The GEIS also concluded that additional storage facilities would have negligible environmental impacts, whether they were located on-sita at reactors or at separate sites away from reactors.
In anticipation of requests to license away-from-reactor facilities, the NRC developed and published for comment draft regulations for licensing storage of spent fuel in an independent spent feel storage installation.
g S. 685 recognizes the need for additional storage capacity for spent fuel and directs the Secretary to construct or acquire storage facilities.
'.aese facilities would require NRC licenses under the bill.
The Commission believes it' already possesses legal authority to license the storage of spent fuel in such facilities, because it considers spent fuel to be high-level waste for the purposes of Section 202(3) of the Energy Reorgani-N J
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How5ver n the Commission would welcome explicit legislative'
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confirmation of this authoriti to avoid any possibility of confusion on the point.
The Commission believes that the purpose of Section 202(4) would be more fully accomplished by deleting the bill's reference to facilities " acquired or constructed," and by amending Section 202(3) to authorize the NRC to license DOE to store spent fuel in NRC-approved facilities used to store foreign generated spent fuel.
If HRC authority were to be limited to DOE facilities " acquired or constructed," the NRC might not have authority to review and approve existing DOE facilities, even if they are used in the future primarily to store DOE-acquired comercially generated or foreign spent fuel. This result would be contrary to the concept that NRC licensing authority should extend over essentially all storage of commercially generated and fc*eign spent fuel.
As currently drafted, Section 202(3) of the ERA may exclude from NRC licensing authority some DOE facilities used to store spent fuel generated by foreign reactors and delivered under a subsequent arrangement, as provided for by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978 (NNPA).
42 USC 2160a(a)(E). You will recall that a " subsequent arrangement" is defined to include an arrangement
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y 6-of storing or ' disposing-of fspent fuel.
For example, foreign spent fuel generated from uranium obtained outside the United States would not result from any activity licensed under the AEA..It is not clear that DOE's importation of such fuel would require an fiRC license, or that issuance of an'IiRC license (should one be required) would imply that such wastes result from activities licensed under the Act for the purposes of Section 202(3) of the ERA.
However, the storage and disposal of that fuel would present the same hazards as the licensed storage and. disposal of comercial Q
spent fuel.
Consequently, I will forward an amended version of Section 202(3) which would explicitly authorize 14RC licensing of DOE receipt and storage of spent fuel transferred under a subsequent agreement entered into pursuant to the litiPA.
Disposal and Storage of Commercial Radioa'ctive Waste Mr. Ch' airman, as you know, growing quantities of radioactive waste, including spent fuel, are being generated by commercial users of radioactive materials, especially the nuclear ~ power industry. The continuing accumulation of waste volume and spent fuel has been accompanied by growing public concern over the continuing absence of final radioactive waste disposal facilities.
Consequently, the Commission welcomes Congressional attention to this important issue.
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S. 665 would explicitly affirm federal. ownership and operation ~ of a ' system for the long-term disposal of all high-level radioactive waste resulting from civilian nuclear activities. The Comission agrees that ultimate disposal is a national problem which must be solved primarily by the Federal
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government.
This view is also shared by the Interagency Review Group on Nuclear' Waste Management (IRG).
In its March 1979 report to the President, the IRG proposed a plan for carefully and expeditiously achieving ultimate waste disposal.
The Department of Energy (DOE) has designed its Commercial O
waste nanagement program to impiement the recommendations of the ira.
These developinents are of fundamental importance to the Comission because it is authorized by Section 202(3) of the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974 to license any DOE facility for the storage of commercially generated wastes.
Title III of S. 685 proposes an alternative program for the long-term storage and ultimate disposal at high-level wastes.
Several aspects of this program are of concern to the Commission because they are not in accord with the developing federal program to which I have.iust referred.
If our inter-h pretation of it is a correct one, S. 685 envisions long-term retrievabie storage as the proper accommodation of spent fuel and high-level radio-active waste for concentrated development at this time.
Section 303 specifically calls for activity aimed at construction of a demonstration 3_ -
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d[S facility for this. kind of d'isposal. The >develo' pment of permanent method g
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research, but without provision for an actual prototypic facility to demon-strate the feasibility of this ultimate mode of disposal.
We believe that
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development of permanent disposal facilities should proceed apace with progress on long-term retrievable storage. We believe that public doubts x
and apprehensions about nuclear wastes will not abate until a method of perinanent disposal is shown t6 be practicable.
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In addition, the Commission taals that S. 685 does not provide for the O
extension of liRC licensing authority over defense generated waste contaminated by transuranic (TRU) _r:....ui... J radioactive material, and also fails to provide for State participation in siting and licensing waste facilities.
tiRC Licensing of TRU Waste Disposal Ongoing military activities generate waste contaminated with transuranic (TRU) elements present long-term hazards comparable to those encountered O
in the disposal of high-level comercial and. military wastes. At the present time the Commission believes that disposal of these TRU wastes wi.11 not require a separate program.
Section 306 of S. 685 appear to acknowledge this situation by providing for an omnibus research program for developing a.
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that program would include independent ~ NRC licensing review of dispokal
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facilities. However, the Comission is not now authorized to license Department of Energy (DOE) facilities for the disposal of TRU waste.' The Comission believes it should have such licensing authority in lighii of the public health and safety risks presented by disposal of TRU wastes.
The IRG.also supports such an extension of NRC licensing authority.
Consequently, the Comission believes that any legislation providing for the development of facilities for the long-term uisposal of military and commercial C
wastes should include an extension of NRC licensing authority over DOE facilities for disposal of TRU wastes.
State Particioation The Comission is concerned that S. 685 does not make explicit provision for enhanced state participation in the proposed program for long-term storage of comercial radioactive waste.. The Comission believes that state participation. in any national nuclear waste management program is a crucial element in making any program which is adopted a viable one.
This view is O
shared by the IRG, which has suggested that legislation provide for state participation. Also, I would note that Congress specifically directed the Comission in the 1979 NRC Authorization Act (P.L.95-601) to report on means for improving opportunities for improving state participation in
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tyc The Comission's report, which we recently, transmitted.to Congress, made several recomendations for improving opportunities for state participation.
The recomendations requirina legislation included:
(1)establishmentofa federally financed planning council composed of Federal and State represen-tatives; (2) federal funding of an independent technical review capability under. the descretion of the planning council; (3) establishment of a Federal crant program to allow host states to more fully participate in the federal waste management program.
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