NUCLEAR WASTE POLICY DILEMMA

THE FIRST FIFTY YEARS:


A CHRONOLOGY






 


1945 The first nuclear weapons are produced by the 
United States.


1954 The Atomic Energy Act was passed by Congress 
directing the federal government to promote the peaceful use of atomic energy, 
with the understanding that disposal of the highly radioactive waste produced 
would be the responsibility of the federal government.


1956 The National Academy of Sciences recommended 
deep geologic disposal of the long-lived, highly radioactive wastes from nuclear 
reactors, suggesting that buried salt deposits and other rock types be 
investigated for permanent repositories.


Early 1960s The Atomic Energy Commission began 
investigating the buried salt beds of the Salina Basin beneath Michigan and 
Ohio, but when state and local officials became aware of the studies they forced 
them to be terminated.


Early 1970s The Atomic Energy Commission announced 
that a salt mine, at Lyons, Kansas, would be developed as a high-level 
radioactive waste repository, only to reverse its decision after Kansas State 
geologists discovered the site to be riddled with abandoned oil and gas 
exploration boreholes.


Later 1970s Federal government screening of sites 
for a geologic repository continued with emphasis on buried salt deposits, and 
on federal nuclear facility sites.


1980 Deep geologic disposal was selected by the 
Department of Energy (DOE), in an Environmental Impact Statement, as the 
preferred alternative for permanent disposal of commercial high-level nuclear 
waste.


1982 Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 
1982, establishing a repository site screening process, requiring two 
repositories to assure regional equity, establishing a schedule leading to 
federal waste acceptance for disposal beginning in 1998, establishing the 
Nuclear Waste Fund to pay for the waste program with fees collected on the 
generation of electricity from nuclear power plants, and requiring that the 
repositories be licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission using 
environmental protection standards set by the Environmental Protection 
Agency.


1983 The DOE named 9 previously screened potentially 
acceptable repository sites in six states, with 7 in salt deposits, and two on 
western federal nuclear facility sites, in buried volcanic rock 
deposits.


1984 The DOE issued Guidelines for the 
Recommendation of Sites, as required by the Act, and continued investigation of 
the potentially acceptable sites.


1985 The President, as provided by the Act, 
determined that highly radioactive waste from nuclear weapons production would 
be disposed with commercial high-level waste.


1986 The DOE, in final Environmental Assessments, 
nominated 5 candidate repository sites, from the original nine sites, and then 
selected three western sites, in Nevada, Texas, and Washington, for detailed 
investigation, from which one was to be selected later for repository 
licensing.


1986 The DOE indefinitely postponed the second 
repository site screening program, after much objection from states in the 
northern mid-west and east where potentially acceptable repository sites, in 
granite, were proposed.


1986 The DOE proposed to Congress that an interim 
Monitored Retrievable Storage (MRS) facility for commercial waste be authorized 
for development at a site in Tennessee.


1987 With rising site characterization cost 
projections ($1 billion per site) and significant siting delays predicted, the 
House was considering a siting moratorium and nuclear waste policy review and 
the Senate was considering sequential characterization of the three candidate 
repository sites.


Late 1987 A House-Senate conference committee 
drafted, and Congress adopted the Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act which was 
said to put the repository program "back on track" by:


    

  • naming Yucca Mountain as the only site to be characterized 
for development as a repository;
    

  • ending the second repository screening program;
    

  • prohibiting studies of repository sites in granite;
    

  • linking development of Monitored Retrievable Storage to 
progress in siting and licensing a repository;
    

  • prohibiting siting the MRS in Tennessee;
    

  • establishing the Office of the Nuclear Waste Negotiator to 
seek volunteer states or Indian tribes to host a repository or MRS;
    

  • establishing the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board to 
review the technical validity of DOE's site characterization work and nuclear 
waste transportation planning;
    

  • offering Nevada financial benefits in exchange for giving up 
its legal right to object to development of the repository at Yucca 
Mountain.


1989 The Secretary of Energy determined that the 
nuclear waste program could not succeed in its present form and developed a new 
program strategy that called for waste acceptance beginning at a repository in 
2003.


1990 The National Academy of Sciences Board on 
Radioactive Waste Management determined that regulation for licensing a 
repository needed to be less stringent and prescriptive, and DOE needed more 
flexibility in siting and licensing the repository.


1992 DOE testified to the Senate Energy and Natural 
Resources Committee that overly stringent NRC and EPA repository licensing 
regulations were causing delays and escalating costs in the Yucca Mountain 
Project, implying that relief was necessary for the project to 
succeed.


Late 1992 Congress adopted Section 801 of the Energy 
Policy Act of 1992 which instructed EPA to establish new site-specific 
environmental regulations for Yucca Mountain based on "reasonable" safety 
standards recommended by the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), and the NRC was 
instructed to revise its repository licensing regulations to conform to the new 
EPA standards. 


Late 1992 The Secretary of Energy announced that the 
efforts of the Nuclear Waste Negotiator to provide a volunteer Monitored 
Retrievable Storage site had failed, and a new strategy was needed to begin 
waste acceptance from the commercial reactors in 1998. (The Negotiator Office 
was terminated in 1994.)


1993- 1994 A new Program Approach was being 
developed (and finally adopted in 1994) that set the beginning of waste 
acceptance in 2010, relies on DOE's development and distribution of 
Multi-Purpose Containers (for waste storage, transport, and possibly disposal) 
to begin interim waste storage in 1998, sets out a schedule for site 
characterization (costing $6 billion) leading to a repository license 
application to NRC in 2001, and defers some site characterization work to a long 
repository performance confirmation period lasting up to 100 years after 
beginning waste emplacement.


Mid- 1995 Bills are pending in Congress that put 
highest priority on DOE providing interim waste storage, at Yucca Mountain, 
beginning in 1998, or as soon as possible, and continuing Yucca Mountain site 
characterization as a lower priority. Other bills call for stopping the waste 
program pending a comprehensive nuclear waste policy review, and other 
initiatives would stop the repository program and provide only for interim 
storage. 


August 1995 The National Academy of Sciences panel 
released its recommendations for a new, risk-based site specific EPA standard 
for Yucca Mountain. The EPA began drafting new standards for Yucca Mountain 
which are still pending in mid-1999. NRC expects to issue a site specific 
repository licensing rule for Yucca Mountain within one year after the EPA 
standard is final. 


Fall 1995 Congress appropriated only about half of 
the money DOE said was necessary to implement the Program Approach, which 
resulted in DOE revising its plans for the program. The development of the 
Multi-Purpose Container was terminated, as were plans for interim storage. A new 
schedule was developed for the Yucca Mountain Project that includes a "viability 
assessment" in late 1998 to be used by Congress to decide whether the site's 
potential suitability, and the cost and schedule to finish site 
characterization, license the repository, and operate it are acceptable. If the 
program continues, the site suitability determination would be in 2001, with a 
license application to be submitted to NRC in 2002. Repository operations would 
begin in 2010. The DOE site suitability criteria would also be 
revised.


May 1996 DOE's new Program Plan is completed. Bills 
are still pending in Congress to develop an interim storage site at the Nevada 
Test Site in 1998, and DOE is doing generic planning for an interim site in the 
event such a bill is passed. President Clinton said he would veto such a bill 
that names Nevada as an interim storage site. The EPA also has objected to the 
bills because they contain provisions that would remove EPA's regulatory 
authority for the site and set a lax, unprecedented radiation protection 
standard for the site.


Late 1996 In the 1997 Energy and Water 
Appropriations Act, Congress directed that a Viability Assessment of the Yucca 
Mountain project be delivered by October 1998. The VA is to contain (a) a 
preliminary design concept for the repository and waste package; (b) a total 
system performance assessment for a Yucca Mountain repository; (c) a plan and 
cost for the remaining work necessary to prepare a license application; and (d) 
a cost estimate to construct and operate the repository.


Dec. 1996 DOE issues a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking 
to revise its site suitability guidelines for a Yucca Mountain repository. It 
relies on performance assessment and contains no technical qualifying and 
disqualifying conditions for the site.


1997 House and Senate bills emphasizing interim 
storage of spent fuel at the Nevada Test Site are again introduced. President 
Clinton again says he will veto any such bill.


Jan. 1998 DOE issues a revision of its Waste 
Isolation and Containment Strategy that is re-named the Repository Safety 
Strategy. Limiting doses from repository releases relies on (a) limited water 
contacting waste packages; (b) long waste package lifetime; (c) slow rate of 
release of radionuclides from the waste form; and (d) concentration reduction 
during transport through engineered and natural barriers.


July 1998 DOE issues a revised Program Plan, 
estimating the program will cost $1.47 billion from FY 99 to 2002 when a license 
application will be submitted. Program cost through FY 98 were approximately $3 
billion.


Dec. 1998 DOE issues the Viability Assessment for a 
Yucca Mountain repository, reporting that much work still needs to be done for a 
site recommendation in 2001 and a license application in 2002, but there are no 
known "show stoppers".


Feb. 1999 NRC proposes a new Repository Licensing 
rule, specific to licensing a Yucca Mountain repository. It is a performance 
based rule that, in advance of EPA repository safety standards being 
promulgated, proposes a dose limit and defines a critical group of potential 
dose recipients and their future condition. As required by law, NRC stated it 
would conform its licensing rule to an EPA repository safety standard when such 
a standard is promulgated. (As of mid-1999, there was no EPA standard). 
 


Early-mid 1999 House and Senate bills emphasizing 
interim storage of spent fuel at the Nevada Test Site are introduced again. 
Again, President Clinton has said he will veto any such bill. Additional bills 
and amendments are being prepared to direct studies of transmutation technology, 
and to have the government take title to spent fuel at reactors and otherwise 
financially assist utilities with on-site storage. In return utilities would 
have to agree to cease litigation for damages from the Department of Energy's 
failure to begin accepting spent fuel for disposal by January 31, 1998.