New Yucca Mountain plan surfaces in Congress
Las Vegas Review-Journal
June 17, 2015
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WASHINGTON — A proposal that surfaced in Congress this week aims to spur a revival of the Yucca Mountain project, providing necessary land and water rights to build out the site if federal officials find that nuclear waste can be buried safely inside.
 
No member of Congress yet has stepped forward to take authorship of the proposal. A one-page summary of key provisions was reported Tuesday by Environment &Energy Publishing and later confirmed by the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
 
Sources said limited copies of the legislation itself have been shared on Capitol Hill and at the Department of Energy. Plans for House hearings were tentatively eyed for next week but have been postponed until later this summer.
 
The provisions appear to track the goals of House Republicans who have insisted that Yucca Mountain be a part of the mix as Congress sets a new strategy to manage the growing inventory of highly radioactive spent nuclear fuel accumulating at commercial power plants.
 
The site 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas once was the centerpiece of the government’s nuclear waste strategy until it was mothballed in 2010 by President Barack Obama.
 
Before the project was shelved, supporters envisioned storing thousands of canisters of waste in tunnels drilled throughout the mountain and construction of an extensive industrial complex above ground where nuclear waste could be received, repackaged and set on storage pads to await burial.
 
For Congress now, the goal is to relocate thousands of tons of waste that the government is paying utilities millions of dollars to keep on site in pools and in hardened above-ground containers.
 
The proposal would allow the Department of Energy to contract with companies willing to gather the waste and place it in centralized interim storage — but only after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission completes a review of Yucca Mountain and decides whether the controversial Nevada site can safely hold the material for periods up to a million years.
 
It also would authorize community benefits including payments and authority for federal agencies to prioritize prized activities for states hosting the repository or interim storage facilities.
 
The most controversial provisions would grant a formal land withdrawal for construction to start at the Yucca site and the water rights necessary for the repository to be built.
 
Nevada, which has battled the Yucca Mountain Project as unsafe and unwanted, has fought federal lawsuits after refusing to grant water rights for the endeavor. A bid in Congress to overrule a state’s control over water could prove highly controversial.
 
“This is a guarantee of lengthy litigation,” said Bob Halstead, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects.
 
In another likely hot-button issue, the proposal would allow a license amendment so that the capacity of a Yucca Mountain repository could be expanded beyond its current 70,000-ton limit set by law.
 
Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., has been the most outspoken proponent in Congress of reviving the Yucca project. He has said he was forming a nuclear waste bill but said he was not behind the specific provisions that surfaced this week.
 
Others said it appears the new plan was being put together by more senior members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, possibly including its chairman, Rep. Fred Upton, R-Mich., and its top Democrat, Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J. The lawmakers could not be reached Wednesday evening.
 
Nye County Commissioner Dan Schinhofen, a supporter of the Yucca project, said Wednesday he had been invited back to Washington to testify at a House committee hearing June 24 on the matter. But he said the session was postponed.
 
“I’m happy to do whatever we can to move this forward” to a resolution on Yucca, Schinhofen said. “I think this would help us do that.”
 
 
SRS contractor reduces spent fuel hazards
Aiken Standard
June 18, 2015
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Spent fuel project personnel at the Savannah River Site recently implemented the use of a new platform that increases efficiency and reduces hazards to employees while moving materials on site.
 
The material is ion exchanging resin, which is used to maintain the proper chemistry in the 3.4 million gallon L Basin, an underwater storage facility for spent nuclear fuel.
 
Savannah River Nuclear Solutions, the site’s management and operations contractor, said the resin attracts radioactive ions, removing them from the basin water in order to keep conductivity as low as possible and minimize corrosion of stored materials.
 
Over time, the resin is expended and required to be changed every six to nine months, the contractor said. The expended resin is then removed from the system by pumping it into a High Integrity Container – a steel container housed inside a concrete container that provides radiation shielding for employees conducting this process.
 
In the past, tall ladders were used to connect hoses from the deionization system to the top of the container, which is 12 to 13 feet tall, in order to remove the resin. Improvements were implemented, and a platform was created for easier and safer access.
 
Operators have recognized over time that the platform required more improvement. Some of the issues included the platform being difficult to use and time consuming to install and tripping hazards created by routing hoses.
 
Don Joyner, a day shift operations manager, said operators always make suggestions for improvement and that those suggestions make work easier while eliminating safety hazards.
 
“We believe the best way to handle a hazard is to eliminate it,” Joyner said. “SRS fosters a safety-conscience work environment, and this is evidence that suggestions for improvement are respected and appreciated.”
 
The new concrete platform was designed to incorporate more shielding to protect workers from radiation. It allows for easier installation, eliminates safety hazards and mounts the camera system in a way that eliminates the use of a crane.
 
The mission of the Spent Fuel Project in L Area is to reduce global nuclear threats and environmental hazards by safely receiving, processing and storing spent nuclear fuel. In 1996, L Basin equipment was reconfigured to safely handle and store spent nuclear fuel from off-site research reactors.
 
 
Hanford vapor protection slows work to empty tanks
Tri-City Herald
June 17, 2015
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The gear that is protecting Hanford tank farm workers from chemical vapors also is significantly slowing work, according to documents filed in federal court.
 
A Department of Energy analysis found that the reduction in efficiency ranges from 30 percent to 70 percent, with an average reduction of 50 percent. Tasks that once took a month now take two months.
 
Because of the change, DOE has proposed it be given an extra year to retrieve waste from the next set of nine tanks in the A and AX tank farms. Retrieval would be completed in fall 2023 under DOE’s proposed schedule to amend the 2010 consent decree, which set court-enforced deadlines for work related to Hanford tank waste.
 
In late 2014 Washington River Protection Solutions began requiring employees conducting much of the work in the Hanford tank farms to wear supplied air respirators after dozens of workers reported suspected exposure to chemical vapors from waste held in the underground tanks.
 
The additional safety gear that workers must wear weighs about 40 pounds, including a tank filled with compressed air for breathing that is similar to tanks used for scuba diving, according to court documents filed by DOE. Not only the weight, but also the heat of the extra gear makes workers tire sooner.
 
Work is interrupted every 20 to 40 minutes so workers can get a new tank of compressed air, and the change can be complicated in radiological areas. The mask used with the respirators disrupts communication among workers and reduces their vision.
 
More help is needed to support tank farm workers — including to maintain, refill and deliver compressed air tanks, to staff stations that issue masks and to change out tanks in the field.
 
DOE anticipates that the supplied air respirators will continue to be used for two years through fall 2016 in the A and AX tank farms, where preparations are under way to empty waste in leak-prone single-shell tanks into newer double-shell tanks. The waste, left from the past production of weapons plutonium, is being stored until it can be treated at the vitrification plant to prepare it for disposal.
 
Washington River Protection Solutions is implementing 47 recommendations made in an independent review that looked at the vapor issue and how workers could be better protected. The goal is to find better ways to protect workers from the vapors than wearing cumbersome supplied air respirators.
 
More time than the extra year proposed for the A and AX tank farms could be needed if a better way to protect workers is not found by fall 2016, DOE said. Washington River Protection Solutions is looking for engineered controls and technologies to protect workers, such as new ventilation systems and new methods to detect and sample chemical vapors.
 
Reports of possible vapor exposure have been reduced since workers have been required to wear supplied air respirators for any work in most of the single-shell tank farms and any work that disturbs waste in the double-shell tank farms. The double-shell tank farms have exhausters and most of the single-shell tank farms are passively vented into the atmosphere.
 
In just over a year through April 2, the number of workers medically evaluated for possible vapor exposures reached 56.
 
Since April 2 there have been just two incidents, with none of the workers involved working in places or under conditions where they were required to wear supplied air respirators. On April 7 and June 10 a few people reported possible exposure and were taken to the on-site medical provider. All were released to return to work.
 
The independent review of the tank vapor issue, led by Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina, found that short, unpredictable and intense releases of vapors were the possible cause of health effects reported by workers, particularly upper respiratory irritation.
 
Symptoms have included nosebleeds, headaches, increased heart rate, coughing, sore throats or dizziness. Vapors have been reported for more than 20 years at the Hanford tank farms and some past workers believe their long-term neurological or lung diseases were caused by the exposure.