NRC

Staff at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) should expeditiously complete and implement cybersecurity rulemaking for nuclear fuel-cycle facilities, the regulatory agency’s commissioners have ordered.  In a March 24 agency memorandum to Mark Satorius, NRC executive director for operations, the commission disapproved the one option, which was the staff’s recommendation, to issue a security order to […]

The balance in the Zion Nuclear Power Plant decommissioning trust fund was about 30% lower at the end of 2014 than it was the previous year according to a report filed by ZionSolutions with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on March 30. The Report on Status of Decommissioning Funding for Shutdown Reactors—due annually—indicated that there was […]

More than six and a half years after the Department of Energy (DOE) submitted its license application seeking authorization to build a geologic repository, Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff published the final two volumes of the safety evaluation report (SER) on the Yucca Mountain site. Released on Jan. 29, Volume 2 covers repository safety before […]

In the third part of a long-awaited safety evaluation report (SER) for the stalled Yucca Mountain permanent nuclear waste repository released today, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) says the Department of Energy (DOE) fails to meet necessary requirements relating to ownership of land and water rights.  Volume 4 (Administrative and Programmatic Requirements) of the five-part […]

Although the official title of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on Dec. 3 was “[Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s] Implementation of the Fukushima Near-T­erm Task Force Recommendations and other Actions to Enhance and Maintain Nuclear Safety,” much of the testimony focused on possible seismic problems in and around the Diablo Canyon nuclear power […]

William D. Magwood, IV, formerly head of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Nuclear Energy and commissioner at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and current director-general of the Organisation

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s recent “waste confidence” ruling, which declares storage of spent fuel at reactor sites safe indefinitely, could fundamentally undercut the decades-long U.S. policy of seeking an off-site, permanent burial site for high-level nuclear waste. A five-decades-old goal of the U.S. nuclear power industry, its regulators, and the Department of Energy (DOE)—permanent, off-site […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s (NRC’s) final rule governing long-term spent nuclear fuel storage onsite at U.S. power plants is illegal and should be overturned, the attorneys general of New York, Connecticut, and Vermont claim in a legal challenge filed on Monday.   In a petition filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. […]

Decommissioning the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant will cost up to $1.24 billion, owner Entergy Corp. said in a study submitted to Vermont regulators on Friday.  Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee (ENVY) plans to shutter the reactor in late 2014. The decision to close the plant stems from a settlement agreement negotiated by several Vermont state agencies […]

The stalled Yucca Mountain permanent nuclear waste repository will meet regulatory requirements when permanently closed, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has found in a long-awaited safety evaluation report (SER).  The federal regulatory body on Oct. 16 issued Volume 3 of the five-part SER on the underground geologic nuclear waste repository proposed to be built in […]