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26–799PS 2006

ASSESSING THE GOALS, SCHEDULE,

AND COSTS OF THE GLOBAL

NUCLEAR ENERGY PARTNERSHIP

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

APRIL 6, 2006

Serial No. 109–44

Printed for the use of the Committee on Science

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/science

(II)

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE

HON. SHERWOOD L. BOEHLERT, New York, Chairman

RALPH M. HALL, Texas

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas

CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania

DANA ROHRABACHER, California

KEN CALVERT, California

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan

GIL GUTKNECHT, Minnesota

FRANK D. LUCAS, Oklahoma

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois

WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland

W. TODD AKIN, Missouri

TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois

J. RANDY FORBES, Virginia

JO BONNER, Alabama

TOM FEENEY, Florida

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas

BOB INGLIS, South Carolina

DAVE G. REICHERT, Washington

MICHAEL E. SODREL, Indiana

JOHN J.H. ‘‘JOE’’ SCHWARZ, Michigan

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas

MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida

BART GORDON, Tennessee

JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas

LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California

DARLENE HOOLEY, Oregon

MARK UDALL, Colorado

DAVID WU, Oregon

MICHAEL M. HONDA, California

BRAD MILLER, North Carolina

LINCOLN DAVIS, Tennessee

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas

BRAD SHERMAN, California

BRIAN BAIRD, Washington

JIM MATHESON, Utah

JIM COSTA, California

AL GREEN, Texas

CHARLIE MELANCON, Louisiana

DENNIS MOORE, Kansas

VACANCY

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY

JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois, Chair

RALPH M. HALL, Texas

CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania

ROSCOE G. BARTLETT, Maryland

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan

W. TODD AKIN, Missouri

JO BONNER, Alabama

RANDY NEUGEBAUER, Texas

BOB INGLIS, South Carolina

DAVE G. REICHERT, Washington

MICHAEL E. SODREL, Indiana

JOHN J.H. ‘‘JOE’’ SCHWARZ, Michigan

SHERWOOD L. BOEHLERT, New York

MICHAEL M. HONDA, California

LYNN C. WOOLSEY, California

LINCOLN DAVIS, Tennessee

JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois

JIM MATHESON, Utah

SHEILA JACKSON LEE, Texas

BRAD SHERMAN, California

AL GREEN, Texas

BART GORDON, Tennessee

KEVIN CARROLL Subcommittee Staff Director

DAHLIA SOKOLOV Republican Professional Staff Member

CHARLES COOKE Democratic Professional Staff Member

MIKE HOLLAND Chairman’s Designee ́

COLIN HUBBELL Staff Assistant

(III)

C O N T E N T S

April 6, 2006

Page

Witness List ............................................................................................................. 2

Hearing Charter ...................................................................................................... 3

Opening Statements

Statement by Representative Judy Biggert, Chairman, Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives ........................... 22

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 23

Statement by Representative Michael M. Honda, Ranking Minority Member,

Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives ....................................................................................................................... 25

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 26

Prepared Statement by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson, Member, Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives ....................................................................................................................... 27

Prepared Statement by Representative Lincoln Davis, Member, Subcommittee

on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives ................. 28

Prepared Statement by Representative Sheila Jackson Lee, Member, Subcommittee on Energy, Committee on Science, U.S. House of Representatives ....................................................................................................................... 28

Witnesses:

Mr. R. Shane Johnson, Deputy Director for Technology, Office of Nuclear

Energy Science and Technology, Department of Energy

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 30

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 31

Biography .......................................................................................................... 34

Dr. Neil E. Todreas, Kepco Professor of Nuclear Engineering; Professor of

Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 35

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 36

Biography .......................................................................................................... 42

Financial Disclosure ......................................................................................... 43

Dr. Richard L. Garwin, IBM Fellow Emeritus, Thomas J. Watson Research

Center, Yorktown Heights, NY

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 44

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 45

Biography .......................................................................................................... 59

Financial Disclosure ......................................................................................... 60

Mr. David J. Modeen, Vice President, Nuclear Power; Chief Nuclear Officer,

Electric Power Research Institute

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 60

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 63

Biography .......................................................................................................... 70

Financial Disclosure ......................................................................................... 72

Discussion ................................................................................................................. 73

Page

IV

Appendix 1: Answers to Post-Hearing Questions

Mr. R. Shane Johnson, Deputy Director for Technology, Office of Nuclear

Energy Science and Technology, Department of Energy .................................. 92

Dr. Richard L. Garwin, IBM Fellow Emeritus, Thomas J. Watson Research

Center, Yorktown Heights, NY ........................................................................... 96

Mr. David J. Modeen, Vice President, Nuclear Power; Chief Nuclear Officer,

Electric Power Research Institute ...................................................................... 98

Appendix 2: Additional Material for the Record

Statement by Harold F. McFarlane, President-Elect, American Nuclear Society .......................................................................................................................... 104

(1)

ASSESSING THE GOALS, SCHEDULE, AND

COSTS OF THE GLOBAL NUCLEAR ENERGY

PARTNERSHIP

THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 2006

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY, COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE, Washington, DC.

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:05 a.m., in Room

2318 of the Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Judy L. Biggert

[Chairwoman of the Subcommittee] presiding.

2

3

HEARING CHARTER

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY

COMMITTEE ON SCIENCE

U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Assessing the Goals, Schedule,

and Costs of the Global

Nuclear Energy Partnership

THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 2006

10:00 A.M.–12:00 P.M.

2318 RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING

1. Purpose

On Thursday, April 6, 2006, the Energy Subcommittee of the House Committee

on Science will hold a hearing to examine the goals, schedules and costs of the advanced fuel cycle technologies research and development (R&D) program in the Administration’s Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) proposal.

2. Witnesses

Mr. Shane Johnson, Deputy Director for Technology, Office of Nuclear Energy

Science and Technology, Department of Energy

Dr. Neil Todreas, Kepco Professor of Nuclear Engineering and Professor of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Dr. Richard Garwin, IBM Fellow Emeritus, Thomas J. Watson Research Center,

Yorktown Heights, NY

Mr. David Modeen, Vice President, Nuclear Power and Chief Nuclear Officer,

Electric Power Research Institute

3. Overarching Questions

• Is the R&D program envisioned by GNEP likely to be an effective approach

to get us to an advanced nuclear fuel cycle that minimizes waste and ensures

the long-term sustainability of nuclear power?

• Are the proposed timelines for technology demonstration and deployment realistic? Do we know enough to build three major demonstration facilities in

the next ten years?

• What are the cost estimates for GNEP and are they realistic?

• If GNEP were successful, how would the domestic nuclear energy landscape

change?

4. Brief Overview

• Nuclear reactors generate about 20 percent of the electricity used in the U.S.

No new nuclear plants have been ordered in the U.S. since 1973, but there

is renewed interest in nuclear energy both because it could reduce U.S. dependence on foreign oil and because it produces no greenhouse gas emissions.

• One of the barriers to increased use of nuclear energy is concern about nuclear waste. Every nuclear power reactor produces approximately 20 tons of

highly radioactive nuclear waste every year. Today, that waste is stored onsite at the nuclear reactors in water-filled cooling pools or, at some sites, after

sufficient cooling, in dry casks above ground. About 50,000 metric tons of

commercial spent fuel is being stored at 73 sites in 33 states. A recent report

issued by the National Academy of Sciences concluded that this stored waste

could be vulnerable to terrorist attacks.

• Under the current plan for long-term disposal of nuclear waste, the waste

from around the country would be moved to a permanent repository at Yucca

Mountain in Nevada, which is now scheduled to open around 2012. The Yucca

4

1 ‘‘burner’’ refers to the fact that these reactors consume (or ‘‘burn’’) highly radioactive spent

fuel components and ‘‘fast’’ refers to the fact that these reactors involve high temperature (and,

therefore, fast moving) neutrons. Fast neutrons can produce nuclear reactions that change, or

‘‘transmute,’’ some highly radioactive elements into less radioactive elements. 2The report accompanying H.R. 2419, the Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act

for Fiscal Year 2006, which the House passed in May 2005, directed DOE to focus research in

its Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative program on improving nuclear reprocessing technologies. The

report went on to state, ‘‘The Department shall accelerate this research in order to make a specific technology recommendation, not later than the end of fiscal year 2007, to the President and

Congress on a particular reprocessing technology that should be implemented in the United

States. In addition, the Department shall prepare an integrated spent fuel recycling plan for

implementation beginning in fiscal year 2007, including recommendation of an advanced reprocessing technology and a competitive process to select one or more sites to develop integrated

spent fuel recycling facilities.’’ 3During Floor debate on H.R. 2419, the House defeated an amendment that would have cut

funding for research on reprocessing. In arguing for the amendment, its sponsor, Mr. Markey,

explicitly raised the risks of weapons proliferation. Specifically, the amendment would have cut

funding for reprocessing activities and interim storage programs by $15.5 million and shifted

the funds to energy efficiency activities, effectively repudiating the report language. The amendment was defeated by a vote of 110–312.

Mountain facility continues to be a subject of controversy. But even if it

opened and functioned as planned, it would have only enough space to store

the nuclear waste the U.S. is expected to generate by about 2010.

• Consequently, there is growing interest in finding ways to reduce the quantity of nuclear waste. A number of other nations, most notably France and

Japan, ‘‘reprocess’’ their nuclear waste. Reprocessing involves separating out

the various components of nuclear waste so that a portion of the waste can

be recycled and used again as nuclear fuel (instead of disposing of all of it).

In addition to reducing the quantity of high-level nuclear waste, reprocessing

makes it possible to use nuclear fuel more efficiently. With reprocessing, the

same amount of nuclear fuel can generate more electricity because some components of it can be used as fuel more than once.

• Experts on nuclear energy have suggested that if the United States is to expand the use of nuclear power, it will have to develop an advanced fuel cycle

that involves reprocessing spent fuel and ‘‘transmutation’’ of some of the most

radioactive waste components in special reactors called ‘‘burner’’ or ‘‘fast’’ 1 reactors that change, or ‘‘transmute,’’ some of the most radioactive elements

into less radioactive elements.

• During last year’s appropriations process, the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water expressed the view,2,3 that DOE must accelerate the development and demonstration of reprocessing technology to enable

the development and deployment of an advanced fuel cycle for nuclear power

reactors in the U.S.

• On February 6, the Administration announced the Global Nuclear Energy

Partnership as part of its fiscal year 2007 (FY07) budget request. According

to the Administration, the vision for GNEP is to provide for the safe and extensive expansion of nuclear power worldwide, while addressing nuclear

weapons proliferation and waste management concerns. GNEP has two main

components:

1. the development of a domestic advanced nuclear fuel cycle that includes

reprocessing and ‘‘transmutation’’ of the most highly radioactive waste

components into less radioactive elements; and

2. the establishment of an international framework for the selling and leasing of nuclear fuel and reactor technologies.

• The component of GNEP that is the subject of this hearing, the development

of an advanced nuclear fuel cycle for use by the domestic commercial nuclear

power industry, has the potential to significantly reduce both the volume and

the radioactivity of nuclear waste produced by commercial power reactors.

Successful deployment of an advanced fuel cycle could reduce nuclear waste

from electricity generation to the extent that the Yucca Mountain geological

waste repository would be sufficient to store most, if not all, of the waste expected to be produced by commercial power reactors during the next 100

years. Without an advanced fuel cycle, continued use of nuclear power would

require the construction and licensing of several more geological waste repositories like Yucca Mountain.

5

4 In September 2005, the Basic Energy Sciences Office (BES) of the DOE Office of Science

hosted a workshop entitled The Path to Sustainable Nuclear Energy: Basic and Applied Research

Opportunities for Advanced Fuel Cycles. Workshop participants identified several science and

engineering challenges that must be overcome in the course of developing advanced fuel cycle

technologies.

• Under the GNEP, the Administration is proposing to build and operate three

major new advanced fuel cycle technology demonstration facilities within ten

years—

1. a UREX+ nuclear fuel reprocessing facility (UREX+ is an advanced nuclear fuel reprocessing technology that works in the laboratory but that

has not yet been tested on a sufficient scale to demonstrate its feasibility);

2. an Advanced Burner Reactor (ABR), a specialized nuclear reactor (in this

case, a sodium-cooled fast reactor) designed to ‘‘transmute’’ highly radioactive nuclear waste components into to less radioactive elements; and

3. an Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility (AFCF), a specialized R&D and test facility to develop and test reprocessed nuclear fuels produced by the

UREX+ process to be used in the ABR.

• Questions remain as to the scale and cost of these facilities (current estimate

of construction costs alone is $4 billion over ten years to build all three demonstration facilities), the reasonableness of the proposed timeline, and the

fundamental R&D that still must be carried out to make these demonstrations successful.

• In particular, Energy Subcommittee Chairman Judy Biggert, in a conversation with Deputy Secretary of Energy Clay Sell last year, asked DOE to conduct a complete systems analysis the of the anticipated fuel cycle, and the

R&D steps necessary to implement it. (A systems analysis involves an integrated analysis and modeling of all the components of a an advanced fuel

cycle—commercial power reactors, reprocessing technologies and facilities, Advanced Burner Reactors, and waste disposal technologies and facilities—, how

all of the components would interact as a system, and how technology choices

related to any one component would affect other elements of the system.) In

addition, Section 955 of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 requires DOE to do a

survey of the civilian nuclear infrastructure and facilities in the national laboratory system. Neither of these efforts has been completed.

5. Issues

Do we know enough to build each of these three major demonstration facilities?

Science and engineering related to advanced fuel cycle technologies have not advanced much in the last 30 years because, until quite recently, it has been U.S. policy not to pursue reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel. Consequently, many fundamental questions remain in the areas of chemistry, materials and physics related

to fuel recycling (reprocessing and ‘‘transmutation’’) and advanced waste management.

These questions can be addressed, in part, through the development of sophisticated molecular-scale computer models, but all models have to be validated empirically (both in the lab and through engineering scale demonstrations) to be useful.

According to some experts, neither the computer models, nor the experiments required to validate them, have been developed to an extent sufficient to address the

outstanding science and engineering questions related to advanced fuel cycle technologies. The Basic Energy Sciences Office (BES) of the DOE Office of Science is

planning the second in a series of workshops4 on the advanced fuel cycle this coming

summer. The second workshop will focus specifically on the R&D required to support GNEP. To what extent will or should the results of this workshop influence

the timeline for technology demonstrations?

Are the proposed timelines for technology demonstration and deployment realistic?

The proposed timeline calls for all three demonstration facilities—the UREX+ reprocessing facility, the Advanced Burner Reactor (ABR), and the Advanced Fuel

Cycle Facility (AFCF)—to be built and operational in approximately the next ten

years, at a total estimated construction cost of at least $4 billion. The current budget request for these activities is $250 million, meaning construction costs alone

would require the budget to almost double over the next decade. There are also

R&D activities that will need to be done to feed into the design and construction

activities. In addition, there is another large demonstration elsewhere in the nuclear

6

5The enrichment process increases the ratio of the 235U isotope relative to the 238U isotope.

Uranium ore contains less than one percent 235U by weight and only 235U is fissionable. Lowenriched uranium for light-water reactors typically contains 3–4 percent 235U.

energy R&D program, the Next Generation Nuclear Plant, that is legally required

to be operational by 2021 and is likely to compete for funding.

If resources are constrained, is there a logical way to sequence these activities?

If an advanced fuel cycle were in commercial operation, reprocessing would precede

fuel fabrication and its use in special reactors (‘‘burner’’ or ‘‘fast’’ reactors, such as

the ABR) that are necessary to recycle the fuel. But experts say that the benefits

of the advanced fuel cycle are dependent on the success of the ABR, which, in turn,

may first require the construction and operation of the AFCF.

Are the cost estimates for GNEP realistic?

Many of the parameters of the research program and the demonstration facilities

have not yet been determined, making current cost estimates unreliable. According

to testimony given by Deputy Secretary of Energy Clay Sell before the Senate Appropriations Committee on March 2, the Department ‘‘will be looking for a sizeable

portion of GNEP costs to be shared by [their] partners and industry starting in FY

2008.’’ How interested is industry in cost-sharing and what level of commitment is

DOE counting on?

How does the nuclear industry view GNEP?

Key players in the nuclear future, most notably industry and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) were not at the table during the development of GNEP.

Some in industry and in Congress are concerned that GNEP will distract from licensing and building new nuclear power plants and the Yucca Mountain repository

in the next 5–10 years. The Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), representing

all of the nuclear-owning utilities, issued a draft ‘‘Consensus Strategy for U.S. Government and Industry’’ (Appendix A). In short, EPRI identifies industry priorities

and R&D goals that do not seem entirely aligned or complementary to the R&D

goals outlined in GNEP.

If GNEP were successful, how would the domestic nuclear energy landscape change?

The U.S. Government heavily subsidized the nuclear industry to get it to where

it is today. Utilities building new nuclear power plants over the next several years

will also have access to federal subsidies and risk insurance, but they will own, operate and safeguard the plants. There is little disagreement that an advanced fuel

cycle will be much more expensive than the once-through fuel cycle currently in use.

What happens if industry isn’t willing to build, buy or operate any of the technologies of the advanced fuel cycle? Is the public benefit large enough that the government should pay the entire bill?

Workforce needs.

One issue that several experts have brought up is that of the scientific and engineering workforce necessary for the future of nuclear power. The Administration has

proposed zeroing its University support program (housed in the Nuclear Energy Office) in FY07, claiming that the goals of the program have been met in terms of the

number of undergraduate students enrolled in nuclear engineering programs. There

is some disagreement over which numbers are relevant. The number of students

graduating from these programs, in addition to the number of masters and doctoral

students, has actually declined in recent years. This does not appear to bode well

for an expanded domestic nuclear industry.

6. Background

Current U.S. Practice: The open fuel cycle

Current U.S. nuclear technology uses what is called an ‘‘open fuel cycle,’’ also

known as a ‘‘once-through cycle’’ because the nuclear fuel only goes through the reactor one time before disposal, leaving most of the potential energy content of the

fuel unused. In an open cycle, the uranium is mined and processed, enriched,5 and

packaged into fuel rods, which are then loaded into the reactor. In the reactor, some

of the uranium atoms in the fuel undergo fission, or splitting, releasing energy in

the form of heat, which in turn is used to generate electricity. Once the fission efficiency of the uranium fuel drops below a certain level, the fuel rods are removed

from the reactor as spent fuel.

7

6The percentage of 235U in spent fuel is only slightly higher than the naturally occurring

level; however, other isotopes of uranium in the spent fuel must be removed before the uranium

can be re-enriched into usable fuel. 7Four percent of the spent fuel consists of fission products (elements that result from splitting

the Uranium—primarily Strontium, Cesium, Iodine, Technetium and elements in a series

known as the Lanthanides) and transuranics (elements greater than Uranium that result from

the capture of neutrons, including Plutonium, Neptunium, Americium and Curium). The fission

products and transuranics have half-lives ranging from a few days to millions of years. The

‘‘half-life’’ of a radioactive substance is the period of time required for one-half of a given quantity of that substance (e.g., plutonium) to decay either to another isotope of the same element,

or to another element altogether. The substances with shorter half-lives tend to generate more

heat. 8Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage, Board on Radioactive Waste

Management, National Academy Press, 2005.

Spent fuel contains approximately 95 percent uranium by weight.6 The remaining

five percent consists of other radioactive elements, including plutonium, which accounts for one percent of the total spent fuel.7 The radioactivity of the spent fuel

means that it still generates a lot of heat, so after removal, the spent fuel rods are

cooled in deep, water-filled pools. After sufficient cooling (typically 3–5 years), the

fuel rods may be transferred to dry cask storage pending ultimate disposal at a geologic waste repository such as Yucca Mountain. Often they are just left in the cooling pools while awaiting disposal.

The repository at Yucca Mountain will effectively be full by the year 2010 with

the spent fuel from the current fleet of reactors. As the industry looks to extend the

operational lifetime of existing nuclear power plants while beginning the process of

getting new plants designed and built, current waste management policies and statutes deserve to be reexamined. The options are:

• increase the statutory storage capacity of Yucca Mountain to its technical

limit (approximately double the statutory limit);

• build a second repository;

• establish a plan for indefinite above-ground dry storage until another solution

is found; or

• develop an advanced fuel cycle that minimizes nuclear waste such that only

a single repository will be needed for the next century.

In fact, some suggest that selecting one of these options is a necessary prerequisite to any expansion of the nuclear industry in this country because the public

needs to be convinced that the U.S. has a long-term strategy for waste disposal. In

addition, by law, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission must make a ‘‘waste confidence determination’’—that the waste created can be safely disposed of—in order

to continue issuing facility licenses. The political hurdle to increasing the statutory

capacity of Yucca or building a second repository seems insurmountable for the time

being. A National Academy of Sciences panel determined that dry storage is a valid

option from a technical and safety standpoint.8 But the Administration is taking the

position that interim storage is insufficient, and that the U.S. must lead the world

toward a long-term solution. GNEP would put the U.S. on a path toward developing

an advanced fuel cycle.

The advanced fuel cycle as envisioned in GNEP

The advanced fuel cycle requires the same mining, processing and fuel fabrication

as the open cycle, at least for the current generation of nuclear reactors. However,

in the advanced fuel cycle, the cooled spent fuel is reprocessed, or chemically separated into various combinations of its many components. In this approach, some

components of the spent fuel, known as the ‘‘transuranics,’’ can be used to fabricate

fuel for a ‘‘burner’’ or ‘‘fast’’ reactor, such as the ABR. The transuranics are elements

listed after uranium in the period table of the elements. Plutonium is included in

this group. In theory, the transuranics could be recycled several times in fast reactors until most of the energy content is converted into electricity and the remaining

material is sent to Yucca Mountain. However, there is still a waste stream associated with each of these recycles, and utilization of fast reactors, such as the ABR,

as part of an advanced fuel cycle may require the development of additional reprocessing technology. Recycling the transuranics in fast reactors involves a physical

process called ‘‘transmutation,’’ which, in addition to producing electricity, reduces

the radioactivity and associated heat output of the remaining spent fuel. This is significant because the repository at Yucca Mountain is technically limited by the heat

content of the stored waste rather than simply the volume. If the United States is

able to develop and deploy an advanced fuel cycle for commercial power reactors

that includes ‘‘transmutation’’ of highly radioactive waste in fast reactors, such as

8

9The separated uranium is considered low-level waste and can be stored as such—that is, it

does not need to be stored in a geologic repository like Yucca Mountain. While the uranium,

which makes up 95 percent of the spent fuel by weight, theoretically can be treated to make

it usable reactor fuel again, the technology to do so in practice does not exist and is not considered practical in the near-term. 10 Under the most likely U.S. reprocessing scenario, some of the most problematic but shortlived radioactive waste could be stored above ground in dry casks for 100 years until it decayed

significantly, at which point it could either be moved to Yucca Mountain or perhaps treated further using some other technology. Some of the longer-lived material could go directly to Yucca

Mountain following the separations process. Some of the shorter-lived highly radioactive material would be left in with the fuel materials, at least temporarily, to make the fuel materials

more difficult to divert for weapons purposes. However, this same ‘‘protective’’ material may

have to be separated out before a usable fuel can be fabricated. 11One point of controversy regarding Yucca Mountain is whether the radiation standard

should be for 10,000 years or more than a million years. According the DOE’s calculations, the

advanced fuel cycle scenario described above could result in a hundred-fold increase in the technical capacity of the Yucca Mountain repository, as well as a reduction in the radiotoxicity of

the repository waste to below the level of natural uranium ore in less than 1,000 years. A radiation level this low would eliminate that particular debate over Yucca Mountain. 12Several countries around the world, including Japan, Russia and France, currently reprocess their spent fuel with a process known as PUREX, short for plutonium-uranium extraction,

in which plutonium and uranium streams are isolated from the remaining elements in the spent

fuel. (PUREX was developed as part of the U.S. weapons program explicitly to make plutonium

for nuclear weapons.) In the current commercial application of PUREX, most of the highly radioactive components are cooled and then vitrified, or encased in glass, for long-term disposal. The

uranium separated through PUREX is disposed of as low-level waste. The pure plutonium can

be mixed with freshly mined and enriched uranium to fabricate a mixed-oxide fuel known as

MOX, which is recycled into thermal reactors to generate more power. Current practice in these

countries is to reuse the plutonium only once and then dispose of the remaining spent fuel. This

approach is known as partial recycle, and is far different from the advanced fuel cycle envisioned under GNEP. Fast reactors needed to consume other long-lived radioactive elements (in

particular the transuranics) are not currently part of this fuel cycle, but there are plans to incorporate fast reactors in France several decades from now.

the ABR, it may be possible to store all future commercially-generated nuclear

waste in Yucca Mountain.9,10,11,12 Without an advanced fuel cycle capability, several

more geological waste repositories like Yucca Mountain will be required.

Near-term GNEP technology demonstration plans

The Administration is requesting $250 million in the FY07 Nuclear Energy,

Science and Technology (NE) budget to accelerate R&D and begin design work on

three major advanced fuel cycle demonstration facilities: a UREX+ reprocessing facility, an advanced burner (fast) reactor, and an advanced fuel cycle facility. According to DOE, $155 million of that sum, if appropriated, will go toward design work

for an engineering scale demonstration of UREX+. A preliminary timeline calls for

all three facilities to be built over the next ten years or so, in anticipation of advanced fuel cycle technology initial deployment in twenty years. Much of the cost

of these facilities will depend upon the scale of the facilities and the scope of the

R&D. The three facilities combined are currently estimated to cost at least $4 billion

just to build.

1. UREX+

UREX+ is based on the PUREX technology originally developed in the U.S. and

in use today in other countries as mentioned above. In both processes, spent fuel

rods are chopped up and dissolved in an acidic bath before constituent elements are

chemically separated. The main differences are: 1) UREX+ does not separate a pure

plutonium stream—instead it always leaves plutonium mixed with some combination of other highly radioactive elements and 2) UREX+ is a continuous rather than

batch process. These differences mean that UREX+ is more proliferation-resistant

than PUREX, and could have significantly less liquid radioactive waste associated

with the process. In fact, DOE’s conceptual goal is to recycle the liquid solvent in

the process multiple times, then purify the liquid before disposal by removing the

remaining radioactive elements. If this proves successful at the engineering scale,

DOE would be able to mitigate concerns about a repeat of the type of environmental

problems experienced at the DOE Hanford site.

Different versions of UREX+ have been demonstrated at the bench scale in batch

processes—processing approximately one kilogram of spent fuel per year. DOE officials have been inconsistent in predictions of the scale of the demonstration plant,

with scales under discussion ranging from hundreds of kilograms to 200 metric tons.

For comparison, an industrial scale reprocessing facility might be on the order of

2,000 metric tons total input capacity per year, approximately the output of the current fleet of light water reactors. Scale-up of chemical processes can involve numerVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
9

13 A possible future GNEP technology is pyroprocessing, or electro-metallurgical reprocessing,

a dry process in which fuel rods are mechanically chopped and fuel is electrically separated into

constituent products. At this time, pyroprocessing appears to be the best candidate for reprocessing the spent fuel coming out of the ABR, assuming that the ABR is operated with metal fuel

rather than metal-oxide fuel (e.g., uranium rather than uranium oxide). The U.S. has experience

operating a small-scale pyroprocessing facility in Idaho, to reprocess the stockpiled spent fuel

from the EBR–II, an experimental fast reactor shut down ten years ago. However, the nature

of that stockpile is quite different from the spent fuel that the ABR would produce in the advanced fuel cycle, so much research still needs to be done on the pyroprocessing technology

itself.

ous chemical engineering challenges that do not exist at the bench scale. Chemistry

involving nuclear materials presents additional and unique challenges. Discovering

and addressing all of these challenges is the main purpose of an engineering scale

demonstration.

2. Advanced Burner Reactor

The advanced burner reactor (ABR) being proposed by DOE is, to be more precise,

a sodium-cooled fast reactor. This particular design selection was made from the six

technologies that were considered under DOE’s Generation IV (GenIV) reactor program. The other designs are being pursued by other countries in the GenIV partnership, and domestic R&D on those designs has been all but eliminated in the FY07

budget request (with the exception of the very high temperature reactor selected

under the Next Generation Nuclear Plant program). In general, GenIV reactors are

designed to be more energy efficient, proliferation-resistant and safer than the current fleet of reactors. In particular, the sodium-cooled reactor design chosen for the

ABR is considered by the technical community to be one of the best choices for efficient transmutation of the transuranics. Notably, not a single fast reactor has been

successfully commercialized anywhere in the world. However, the U.S. and several

other countries do have a long history of research on fast reactor technologies, including sodium-cooled fast reactors.

3. Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility

The advanced fuel cycle facility (AFCF) would serve the fuel design and testing

needs for the ABR. The fast reactor fuels made possible by the UREX+ separations

process currently exist only in concept. AFCF would be a dedicated facility for the

R&D necessary to make these fuels a reality, assuming there are no as-yet-unknown

technical showstoppers. Once fuels were designed and tested in the demonstration

ABR, tests to characterize and understand the new spent fuel, and tests using that

information to optimize the fuel, would also be done at AFCF.13

7. Witness Questions

Mr. Johnson

• Please describe the timelines for major Global Nuclear Energy Partnership

(GNEP) demonstration projects as currently envisioned. What are the anticipated costs of each component? What is the life cycle cost of the program and

what does that encompass? How and when will the Department of Energy

(DOE) determine how to distribute the $250 million requested for fiscal year

2007?

• Please describe the fuel cycle systems analysis that is currently underway by

DOE. What questions will this analysis answer? What is its status? To what

extent will the results from this analysis influence GNEP program planning?

• What other research will be performed under GNEP?

Dr. Todreas and Dr. Garwin

• How realistic are the goals, timelines and budgets being proposed under the

Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP)?

• What does the Department of Energy (DOE) need to do to develop a robust

program to meet its goal of an advanced nuclear fuel cycle—one that includes

both recycling and transmutation—while sufficiently addressing non-proliferation and waste management needs?

• What significant research and development (R&D) questions, both science and

engineering, exist for UREX+? Sodium-cooled fast reactors? Mixed-actinide

fuels? In your view, how well do the GNEP R&D priorities coincide with these

research needs?

10

• DOE is in the process of developing the tools to carry out a cradle-to-grave

systems analysis of the advanced fuel cycle. What questions should that systems analysis be able to answer?

Mr. Modeen

• Please summarize the draft report, ‘‘The Nuclear Energy Development Agenda: A Consensus Strategy for U.S. Government and Industry,’’ presented by

the Electric Power Research Institute at a nuclear energy research and development summit in February. Who was involved in the development of this report and what is its status?

• What are the utility industry’s nuclear research and development (R&D) priorities? How do they compare to the R&D priorities in Global Nuclear Energy

Partnership (GNEP)?

• How realistic are the goals, timelines and budgets being proposed under

GNEP?

• DOE officials have stated that they expect industry to cost-share in the demonstration of GNEP technologies, including reprocessing, fuel fabrication and

fast reactor technologies. What does industry see as its role in GNEP technology demonstrations?

11

Appendix A

The Nuclear Energy Development Agenda:

A Consensus Strategy for U.S. Government and Industry

Executive Summary

Nuclear energy in the U.S. is entering a renaissance. With strong interest and

support for new plant construction, there is a sense of a bright future not only for

nuclear energy’s increasing role in U.S. electricity generation and reliability, but

also in helping meet the challenges of (1) revolutionizing the transportation sector’s

dependence on foreign oil, (2) reducing the need to use natural gas for electric power

generation and for the production of hydrogen for industrial applications, (3) fostering safe and proliferation-resistant use of nuclear energy throughout the world,

and (4) achieving these in an environmentally responsible manner.

Meeting these challenges with nuclear energy requires consensus, and a coordinated effort on what needs to be done. Achieving this nuclear energy agenda will

require the combined efforts of industry and government, supported by the innovation of the research community. The Department of Energy and Congress will play

a critical role in this consensus, facilitating nuclear energy’s expanding role in a sustainable national energy policy.

The Electric Power Research Institute has developed a technically-based, marketrelevant, and nationally-oriented assessment of the nuclear systems needed in the

United States over the next half century. This assessment was supported by the

technical resources of the Idaho National Laboratory. The assessment is founded on

the assumption that nuclear energy will be challenged to expand dramatically in the

world over the coming decades: It must provide safe, reliable and environmentally

responsible electricity and process heat to meet the needs of the industrial and residential sectors. U.S. nuclear energy technology, along with realistic plans, resources

and a renewed infrastructure must all be ready for this expansion. Government and

industry must share and coordinate their responsibilities with a consensus strategy

for nuclear energy.

To forecast the U.S. nuclear technology needs, moderately aggressive planning assumptions were developed to guide the types and timing of the technology needed

in seven major goals:

1. Ensure the continued effectiveness of the operating fleet of nuclear plants.

2. Establish an integrated spent fuel management system consisting of centralized interim storage, the Yucca Mountain repository, and, when necessary,

a closed nuclear fuel cycle.

3. Build a new fleet of nuclear plants for electricity generation.

4. Produce hydrogen at large-scale for transportation and industry, and eventually for a hydrogen economy.

5. Apply nuclear systems to desalination and other process heat applications.

6. Greatly expand nuclear fuel resources for long-term sustainability, commercializing advanced fuel cycles when market conditions demand them in the

long-term.

7. Strengthen the proliferation resistance and physical protection of closed nuclear fuel cycles both in the U.S. and internationally.

With these goals, a matrix of technology options to address each goal was developed with an assessment of the technology capabilities and challenges of each option. From this matrix, a technology development agenda was derived, with timing

and cost estimates. The evolving role of government and industry in the agenda was

also considered. Finally, current nuclear R&D programs were reviewed in relation

to this assessment, and three areas were identified for action:

1. Significant light water reactor research is needed. Many significant needs

exist for the current fleet and the new fleet, especially in areas of age-related materials degradation, fuel reliability, equipment reliability and obsolescence, plant

security, cyber security, and low-level waste minimization. Also, developing a

new generation of LWR fuel with much higher burnup will better utilize uranium

resources, improve operating flexibility, and significantly reduce spent fuel accumulations, resulting in additional improvements in nuclear energy economics. A

number of these are mid-term R&D needs whose impact would be considerable,

if accelerated with government investment.

12

2. Nuclear energy’s role in a future hydrogen economy can begin now. An

essential consideration in reducing dependence on foreign sources of oil and natural gas is found in the fact that hydrogen is necessary today in upgrading heating oil and gasoline, and in making ammonia for fertilizers. In fact, making hydrogen today consumes five percent of all natural gas in the U.S. and demand

for hydrogen is growing rapidly. This situation can be improved with a nuclear

system having hydrogen production capability as soon as it can be developed. In

the mid-term, nuclear-produced hydrogen can be used to exploit heavy crude

from large reserves in Canada and Venezuela. Of course, in the long-term, many

believe that a hydrogen economy is essential for revolutionizing transportation,

in which case the demand for competitive and environmentally responsible hydrogen will greatly increase. A large-scale, economical nuclear source would hasten that future.

3. A proliferation-resistant closed fuel cycle for the U.S. should be ready

for deployment by mid-century. Establishing a closed fuel cycle with the demonstrated ability to handle much more nuclear waste will bring added confidence

in a stable fuel supply and long-term spent fuel management in the U.S. in support of greatly expanding the use of nuclear energy. It will also bring the potential for establishing a nuclear fuel lease/take-back regime internationally. This

would reduce the number of countries that need to develop enrichment and reprocessing technology, a goal of the President’s nuclear nonproliferation initiatives. Importantly, various advanced fuel cycle technology options provide the

ability to supply sufficient nuclear fuel in the future to ensure long-term energy

and environmental sustainability for the U.S. and globally.

Necessary technologies include cost-effective and proliferation resistant reprocessing to separate and manage wastes, and alternate reactor concepts (e.g., fast

reactors) to generate electricity as they generate additional fuel and burn the

long-lived minor actinides and other constituents that are recycled. These are

both critical to assuring an adequate and economic supply of fuel, reducing the

spent fuel backlog, and increasing the effective capacity of Yucca Mountain

many-fold in the long-term. While the technology challenges and market uncertainties are many, large-scale deployment of a closed fuel cycle by government

and industry could begin by mid-century.

Introduction: A New Paradigm for Public-Private Cooperation on Nuclear

R&D

For many years, disagreement over the future direction of nuclear energy technology in the United States has existed, hindering progress toward the full potential

of this energy source. There is general agreement among experts in government and

industry that nuclear energy must expand as a major component of national energy

policy. In fact, the 2001 National Energy Policy included a recommendation supporting this expansion for reasons of national security, energy security and environmental quality. The disagreements have been over how to achieve this expansion

safely and economically, with differing views on goals, direction, timing, R&D priorities, and the respective roles of public and private sectors.

A recent step toward forging a consensus on the future direction of nuclear energy

was undertaken by the Idaho National Laboratory in July 2004, when it assembled

a ‘‘Decision-Makers Forum’’ in Washington, DC. That forum attracted a broad spectrum of key stakeholders in the nuclear technology enterprise. Although the Forum

was successful at engaging industry, national laboratories and academia, significant

differences among key sectors still remain.

Using the results of this forum as a starting point, the Electric Power Research

Institute (EPRI), technically supported by the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), has

developed this assessment of the nuclear systems R&D needed in the United States

over the next half century. The assessment is founded on the assumption that nuclear energy will be challenged to expand dramatically in the world over the coming

decades. An important focus is on improved coordination and prioritization of government and industry nuclear energy R&D programs.

A series of strategic planning sessions was held to map out a common set of highlevel goals and time-based planning assumptions for nuclear energy, and to then

identify the R&D needed to prepare for deployment consistent with those assumptions. These assumptions were formulated to be aggressive yet achievable, and were

grounded upon open market principles. Following this, R&D challenges were identified. Finally, an assessment of current nuclear R&D programs was made to identify

opportunities for action.

A benefit of this joint approach is its potential to build a framework for cooperation between public and private sectors for completing the needed R&D. This frameVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
13

work would be based on an 80–20 paradigm, to replace the current paradigm that,

‘‘Government only works on long-term research, and industry only works on shortterm research.’’ Instead, having government dedicate about 20 percent of its efforts

to short-to-medium-term R&D, and having industry dedicate about 20 percent of its

efforts to medium-to-longer-term R&D was seen as a new way to encourage collaboration in areas of common interest, and to bridge the gaps and sustain the alignment on overall goals for nuclear energy.

Vision, Principles and Methods

The purpose of this consensus strategy is to develop an aggressive, success-oriented, yet credible and defensible R&D strategy for nuclear energy in the U.S. over

the next 50+ years. The long time horizon is necessary to include the development

of a closed fuel cycle. Emphasis was placed on global nuclear issues only to the extent they directly impact development in the U.S. Research programs and advances

internationally were not specifically incorporated.

Recent works on nuclear energy planning were reviewed (a summary is found in

Appendix A), and the session leaders agreed that the primary focus of the effort

should be on national energy and security missions and imperatives, and especially

on the vision and goals nuclear energy must strive toward in meeting those imperatives. While these goals have been prepared by EPRI and INL, it is important for

the Department of Energy (for the government) and the Nuclear Energy Institute

(for the industry) to consider the merits and credibility of these planning assumptions and goals to base new actions. National goals and priorities for nuclear energy,

if supported by both industry and government, will have a substantial impact on

the development of new nuclear technology. New technologies with great potential

to the Nation will not be brought to market if government and industry do not jointly make them a priority.

The session leaders reviewed a number of existing high level vision and mission

statements for nuclear energy, and arrived at a vision deemed appropriate for the

planning exercise:

Expand the use of safe and economical nuclear energy in the United States to

meet future electricity demand and industrial process heat needs, foster economic

growth and energy diversity, provide security and proliferation resistance, and

enhance environmental stewardship.

The session leaders also provided three guiding principles for the consensus strategy:

1. Strive for a moderately aggressive yet credible technology portfolio.

2. Understand the importance of market forces to long-term planning. It is

recognized that each future Administration and Congress will make federal investments in nuclear R&D only to the extent necessary to achieve national goals.

However, each values the private sector’s participation in that investment, and

ultimately in its deployment. Thus, long-term market demand is a key factor in

long-term nuclear energy investments and deployment.

3. Align the technology portfolio with evolving nuclear energy policies and

priorities. There has been a general perception that widely divergent views on

nuclear energy policy exist in the U.S. Yet a surprisingly close consensus exists

on the basic priorities for technology development, as shown by a review of five

key government and independent studies on the future of nuclear energy in Appendix A.

The process was to lay out a high level set of success-oriented planning assumptions for 2015, 2030, and 2050, covering reactor technologies, fuel cycle technologies,

spent fuel management, infrastructure needs, etc. These planning assumptions were

then weighed against the three guiding principles above, in terms of broad national

energy, economic, safety and environmental goals, considering achievability, timing

and sequencing.

Next, the minimum set of nuclear technologies that would satisfy the planning assumptions were determined. Where multiple nuclear technologies could meet the

goal, factors were identified that determine which ones should be pursued and/or

what the appropriate ‘‘mix’’ in effort or investment should be. These factors included

budgetary limits on R&D, technology risk, commercial cost-competitiveness, NRC licensing risk (i.e., cost and duration of review; likelihood of success), implications to

overall waste management strategies and costs, etc. Also considered were marketdemand issues. For example, ‘‘Will demand for hydrogen lead or lag technology development?,’’ and ‘‘When will uranium prices justify reprocessing?’’

14

Finally, the length of time that each of these technologies will need to become

commercially competitive to support the planning assumptions was estimated; and

the R&D timeline needed for each technology was set to assure in-time licensing,

demonstration, and commercialization. It is important to be realistic and objective

about the time and resources needed to commercialize new technologies, factoring

in technological, licensing, and funding uncertainties. In particular, the time required to prepare for and successfully complete the regulatory process was included.

Planning Assumptions

The planning assumptions proposed below are intentionally challenging, but also

realistic and achievable. The predicted rapid growth is enabled by competitive economics, but is also accelerated in response to the growing societal demand to reduce

the environments impacts of fossil fuels, including the risk of global climate change

(by imposing limits on CO2), which will increase demands for low- or zero-emitting

sources. All three categories of low or zero-emitting technologies—nuclear energy,

renewable energy, and fossil energy with carbon capture and sequestration—will

face formidable challenges. Specific planning assumptions are presented in Appendix B, and are summarized below:

Currently Operating Nuclear Plants:

• All existing plants remain operational in 2015, and all have applied for and

have been granted a 20-year life extension. Despite continued high safety performance and record-setting reliability, materials aging and equipment obsolescence have moderated their former profitability. Continued high performance is maintained in part by strategic, safety-focused plant management,

and in part by new technology solutions, e.g., advanced monitoring and repair

techniques, improved fuel performance, remedial coolant chemistry, greater

reliance on advanced materials and digital controls.

• In the 2020–2030 timeframe, some plants are granted an additional 20-year

life extension (i.e., to 80 years). Advanced fuel designs with higher burnup

limits enable longer fuel cycles, significantly increase fuel economy, and significantly reduce the rate of spent fuel generation.

New Plants for Electricity Generation:

• Six to twelve new nuclear plants are in commercial operation by 2015, with

many more under construction. 30 GWe of new nuclear electric generating capacity is on line or under construction by 2020. A cumulative total of 100

GWe of new nuclear capacity has been added by 2030. By 2050, nuclear energy is providing 35 percent of U.S. electricity generation by adding a cumulative total of about 400 GWe of new nuclear capacity. This number includes

electricity generation from all reactor types. It also includes replacement

power for a large segment of the current fleet of reactors, most of which have

been retired or are close to retirement by 2050. This build-rate severely challenges U.S. industrial infrastructure.

New Plants for Process Heat:

• Based on a prototype Very High Temperature Reactor (VHTR) built and operating by 2020, about twelve VHTRs are in commercial operation by 2030,

with about twelve more under construction. VHTRs are assumed to be commercially successful at 600 MWth per module (nominally four modules per

plant), and with an outlet temperature around 850–900C. The VHTRs are initially dedicated to producing hydrogen for commercial and industrial use, focused primarily on rapidly expanding hydrogen demand by the oil, gas and

chemical industries. They expand to a fleet of roughly 200 by 2050, still focused primarily on industrial applications, but also serving a growing market

for hydrogen to power fuel cells in hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles. U.S.-

built commercial VHTRs are also serving hydrogen demand for U.S. companies at some petrochemical facilities operating overseas.

• Commercial versions of the VHTR, without hydrogen production equipment,

also begin to serve process heat needs in the petrochemical and other industries. High value-added applications above 800C are found in recovery of petroleum from oil shale and tar sands, coal gasification, and various petrochemical processes (e.g., ethylene and styrene).

• Nuclear energy begins to assume a significant role, starting in the 2020 timeframe, in support of the desalination mission for arid coastal regions of the

U.S. with acute shortages of potable water. Some 16 trillion additional gallons

15

per year will be required in the United States by 2020 for municipal and light

industrial uses. This is equivalent to one quarter of the combined outflow

from the Great Lakes. If desalination is viable with nuclear energy, it will

likely be accomplished by equipment designed for new light water reactors,

or by new reactors dedicated to desalination as are being pursued in other

countries.

Spent Fuel Management and Expanding Nuclear Fuel Resources:

• Licensing of a spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain Nevada is completed

by 2015, with construction and waste acceptance into the repository and into

nearby above-ground storage underway by that date. Interim storage away

from reactor sites is also established at two other locations in the U.S., one

east and one west of the Mississippi River.

• With a rapidly expanding nuclear energy industry and a growing inventory

of spent fuel, an integrated spent fuel management plan for the U.S. emerges

by 2015 that obtains bipartisan support for implementation. Key elements of

the plan include expansion of the capacity of the Yucca Mountain repository,

and a decision to maintain continued monitoring of the repository well in excess of 50 years (e.g., 300 years) prior to closure. The plan also includes a

commitment to begin reprocessing spent fuel in a demonstration plant by

about 2030, based on an active R&D program aimed at identifying cost-effective and proliferation-resistant means to recover usable reactor fuel. These

technologies will also demonstrate the reduction of radiotoxicity and heat output of spent fuel, and the potential to greatly extend repository capacity. The

reprocessing plan is integrated with both reactor technology and repository

strategies, and offers a least-cost path for safe, long-term management of

spent nuclear fuel.

• The reactor technology part of this integrated strategy develops means (e.g.,

fast reactors) to recycle light water reactor spent fuel in order to burn minor

actinides as well as produce electricity, and later to breed additional fuel. Following a demonstration plant, built and operated with government funding in

2035, new fast reactors are deployed commercially, with government subsidy

as needed for the waste burning mission. In the long-term, the price of uranium increases to a level that supports breeding.

R&D Technology Matrix

A matrix was created to detail the specific technology agendas and programs. Goal

areas were mapped against specific technology options, missions and capabilities.

Estimates were made for when each capability is needed, how many years are needed to develop, license, and demonstrate each, and from these estimates, when R&D

must start or ramp up. Key R&D needs for each technical capability were identified,

along with specific challenges that needed to be addressed. Next, the matrix was

used to compare the relative R&D challenges, and to consider the likelihood of success. The full R&D matrix is found in Appendix C, and is summarized below.

16

Timing and Costs of the Nuclear Energy Development Agenda

The timing and costs associated with addressing the R&D challenges were roughly estimated. The timelines in Appendix B are moderately optimistic estimates of

how long it will take to meet the challenges. Costs were estimated based on both

U.S. and international experience.

The near-term deployment goals for electricity generation, including a renewed

commitment to LWR research, are the least expensive. The bulk of federal investments are envisioned to occur over the next ten years, with continued modest funding after that as necessary. Costs of federal spending on electricity generation are

based on continued funding on a cost-shared basis of the NP2010 program, and projections that the private sector will deploy ALWRs for electricity generation by 2015,

based on limited federal incentives, with no federal funding requirements for

NP2010 after that date. Total federal costs are roughly $500M through 2015, with

equal or greater cost share by industry. This does not include costs of completing

Yucca Mountain, which are uncertain; nor does it include the costs of revitalizing

nuclear industrial infrastructure.

Federal spending for nuclear generated hydrogen and other process heat applications are based on projections that the commercial VHTR technology can be demonstrated and will become competitive in the 2020 timeframe for industrial applications. This timeline assumes that conservative technology choices are made to maximize near-term licensing and commercial deployment. Total federal costs for the nuclear hydrogen mission (exclusive of hydrogen economy infrastructure, which come

17

later and are not projected here) are estimated at $2B through about 2020, after

which VHTRs will go forward as commercial units.

The costs of establishing centralized interim storage and of completing Yucca

Mountain are covered by the Nuclear Waste fund (funded by a fee paid by nuclear

generating plants). Eventually, after these requirements are met, and as uranium

fuel prices justify a shift from an open to a closed nuclear fuel cycle, Nuclear Waste

Fund revenues, at the current fee rate of one mil/KWH), are assumed to defray the

costs of closed fuel cycle facilities, as discussed below.

The costs of establishing a closed nuclear fuel cycle are considerably higher than

reestablishing the ALWR option for electricity generation and creating a commercial

VHTR option for hydrogen generation. There are a number of significant technical,

cost, and institutional challenges facing reprocessing that will force the postponement of the start of prototype demonstration until about 2030, and large scale deployment until mid century. Rough costs to the Federal Government for the leastcost path will probably exceed $35B by 2050 and could exceed $60B by 2070, including both R&D and government-funded subsidy for a portion of the construction and

operation of a large number of fast reactors and nuclear fuel reprocessing plants.

These costs assume significant reliance on the private sector to construct and operate fast reactors as commercial power plants (after the technology is demonstrated

and licensed, and the learning curve is ascended). These costs are highly uncertain

because of the speculative nature of estimating when nominal commercial viability

can be achieved for these facilities.

• Federally funded research for a closed nuclear fuel cycle includes major R&D

to develop new separations technologies that are more proliferation resistant

and less expensive than current separations processes (i.e., PUREX). R&D is

also required to develop alternate fuel cycles and reactor applications (e.g.,

fast reactors) to generate electricity with reprocessed fuel that includes plutonium and minor actinides from ALWRs. Total RD&D costs to 2050 are estimated at roughly $15B comprising $5B for fast reactor development and demonstration and $10B for advanced separations technology.

• Federal spending to deploy closed fuel cycle technologies is estimated at

roughly $20B by 2050. This estimate includes $15B for the first reprocessing

plant and initial costs for a second plant beginning construction, and $5B in

cumulative subsidies to construct and operate the initial modular fast reactor

plants. Fast reactor subsidies would continue until cost parity with ALWRs

opens the commercial market for closed cycle systems.

• Full deployment, including conversion of the nuclear generation base in the

U.S. to fast reactors will take well over a century to complete.

Rough costs to the Federal Government through mid-century depend primarily on

whether the reprocessing plan has been structured to be the least-cost path for safe,

long-term management of spent nuclear fuel (per above planning assumptions), or

whether an accelerated plan is chosen that does not wait for the market price for

uranium to drive the shift from the once-through fuel cycle to a closed fuel cycle,

and from LWRs to a mix of LWRs and fast reactors.

A rough estimate of federal investments in future nuclear R&D is shown in the

figure.

18

There are fundamental differences between the deployment of nuclear energy generation with ALWRs and commercial VHTRs, and technologies to close the nuclear

fuel cycle. First, there are commercial markets for electricity and hydrogen that enable near-term deployment of ALWRs, and a transition of VHTRs to the private sector as soon as the technology is ready. There is no comparable commercial market

for reprocessing. A market could evolve for the fast reactor component of closed fuel

cycle systems because fast reactors can produce electricity. However, based on today’s technology and uranium ore costs, fast reactors are not expected to compete

with ALWRs in power generation until about mid-century. Economic parity could be

achieved when new fuel for ALWRs based on enriched U–235 becomes sufficiently

more expensive than fast reactor fuel using recycled components. In the long-term,

as uranium prices rise, the alternate fuel cycles will advance to breeding and the

need for subsidy will end.

In addition, reprocessing plants are expensive and not attractive to commercial

financing in the context of the U.S. economy. Thus, the cost increment for reprocessing (i.e., the incremental cost above the cost of repository disposal) will be subsidized initially by the Federal Government. Although the estimate above does not

include repository costs, it is expected that reprocessing will remain more expensive

than storage (centralized above-ground plus geologic repository) for the foreseeable

future. Projections of major savings in Yucca Mountain repository costs as a result

of reprocessing are highly speculative at best. On the other hand, the increased revenues to the Nuclear Waste Fund from an expanding fleet of new reactors will eventually help defray the costs of operating closed fuel cycle facilities.

It is important to note that despite the extended timetable for introducing reprocessing in the U.S. (due to R&D prerequisites to satisfy cost and nonproliferation objectives, policy considerations, etc.), that a single expanded-capacity spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain is adequate to meet U.S. needs, and that construction

of a second repository is not required under this timetable.

If, however, reprocessing is implemented on an accelerated schedule before it is

economic to do so based on fuel costs, then the Federal Government will need to

bear a much larger cost. As discussed in Appendices B and D, the optimum scenarios for transitioning nuclear energy to a closed fuel cycle in the U.S. context requires us to focus the R&D on those technologies that would enable a transition to

cost-effective and proliferation resistant ‘‘full actinide recycle’’ mode with fast reactors that would eventually replace light water reactors. This path is preferred over

one that maintains for decades a ‘‘thermal recycle’’ mode using MOX fuel in light

water reactors, because the high costs and extra waste streams associated with this

latter path do not provide commensurate benefits in terms of either non-proliferation or spent fuel management costs.

19

Assessment of Current Programs

Current federal programs in three major nuclear energy R&D areas were reviewed in relation to the development agenda.

Light Water Reactor R&D

Many significant needs exist for the current fleet and the new fleet, especially in

areas of age-related materials degradation, fuel reliability, equipment reliability and

obsolescence, plant security, cyber security, and low-level waste minimization. Also,

developing a new generation of high reliability LWR fuel with much higher burnup

will better utilize uranium resources, improve operating flexibility, and significantly

reduce spent fuel accumulations, resulting in additional improvements in nuclear

energy economics. A number of these are mid-term R&D needs whose impact would

be considerable if accelerated with government investment.

Process Heat R&D

An essential consideration in reducing dependence on foreign sources of oil and

natural gas is found in the fact that hydrogen is necessary today in upgrading heating oil and gasoline, and in making ammonia for fertilizers. In fact, making hydrogen today consumes five percent of all natural gas in the U.S. and demand for hydrogen is growing rapidly. This situation can be improved with a nuclear system

having hydrogen production capability as soon as it can be developed. In the midterm, nuclear-produced hydrogen can be used to exploit heavy crude from large reserves in Canada and Venezuela. Of course, in the long-term, many believe that a

hydrogen economy is essential for revolutionizing transportation, in which case the

demand for competitive and environmentally responsible hydrogen will greatly increase. A large-scale, economical nuclear source would hasten that future.

Closed Fuel Cycle R&D

Establishing a closed fuel cycle with the demonstrated ability to handle much

more nuclear waste will bring added confidence in a stable fuel supply and longterm spent fuel management in the U.S. in support of greatly expanding the use

of nuclear energy. It will also bring the potential for establishing a nuclear fuel

lease/take-back regime internationally. This would reduce the number of countries

that need to develop enrichment and reprocessing technology, a goal of the President’s nuclear nonproliferation initiatives. Importantly, various advanced fuel cycle

technology options provide the ability to supply sufficient nuclear fuel in the future

to ensure long-term energy and environmental sustainability for the U.S. and globally.

Necessary technologies include cost-effective and proliferation resistant reprocessing to separate and manage wastes, and alternate reactor concepts (e.g., fast reactors) to generate electricity as they generate additional fuel and burn the long-lived

minor actinides and other constituents that are recycled. These are both critical to

assuring an adequate and economic supply of fuel, reducing the spent fuel backlog,

and increasing the effective capacity of Yucca Mountain many-fold in the long-term.

While the technology challenges and market uncertainties are many, large-scale deployment of a closed fuel cycle by government and industry could begin by mid-century.

Conclusions

• The strategy for nuclear energy development and implementation in the

United States requires a consensus of industry and government.

• The overall strategy should be determined by a combination of market needs

and long-term nationally established energy goals for energy security, national security, and environmental quality.

• The priorities in the consensus nuclear energy strategy should address nearterm, medium-term, and long-term priorities. R&D needs to proceed now on

all fronts, but priorities for implementation and deployment are as follows:

– Near-term: license renewal for the current fleet, and licensing and deployment of new, standardized ALWRs within the next decade. Nearterm deployment of ALWRs will require demonstration of a workable licensing process, and completion of first-of-a-kind engineering for at least

two standardized designs. Industry and DOE should cost share these

R&D programs.

To enable the resurgence of nuclear energy, the near-term elements of an

integrated spent fuel management plan must proceed with bipartisan

support from both the Administration and Congress. These near-term

elements include completion of the repository at Yucca Mountain, deployVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00023 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
20

ment of multi-purpose canisters approved by the NRC, implementation of

an effective spent fuel transportation system, and provision for centralized interim storage. This effort should be funded by the Nuclear Waste

Fund, established by Congress and paid for by nuclear energy ratepayers

and nuclear plant licensees for these purposes, in accordance with the

Fund provisions in the Nuclear Waste Policy Act.

– Medium-term: development of a high temperature commercial VHTR capable of generating hydrogen and electricity at competitive costs, for initial use by the petroleum and chemical industries. Deployment will require concept development, defining end-user requirements and interfaces, engineering, resolution of design and licensing issues and prototype

demonstration. This effort should be funded by government, but targeted

for rapid commercialization.

– Long-term: development of new closed fuel cycle technologies supporting

an integrated, cost-effective spent fuel management plan. Key elements

of the plan include expansion of the capacity of the Yucca Mountain repository, and a decision to maintain continued monitoring of the repository well in excess of 50 years prior to closure. The plan also includes

provisions for centralized interim storage of spent fuel, and a commitment to begin reprocessing spent fuel in a demonstration plant by about

2030, based on an active R&D program aimed at identifying more costeffective and proliferation-resistant means to recover usable reactor fuel.

It also includes development of safe and cost-effective fast-spectrum reactor technology for ‘‘burning’’ the long-lived actinides in spent fuel, and

‘‘recycling’’ the usable uranium and plutonium recovered from spent fuel.

These capabilities, along with other advanced fuel cycle options, should

be used to achieve long-term energy supply sustainability—long after fossil fuel supplies are exhausted. These facilities should be funded by government. They are not authorized expenses to be recovered from the Nuclear Waste Fund, but eventually, as uranium fuel prices justify a shift

from an open to a closed nuclear fuel cycle, Nuclear Waste Fund revenues are assumed to defray the costs of closed fuel cycle facilities.

• A strategy for rebuilding the nuclear industrial infrastructure in the U.S. is

necessary. Currently, major equipment must be procured offshore. Long-term

energy security requires that the U.S. industry have the capability of supplying and supporting U.S. energy producers, and better integrating energy

supplier and end-user needs. These infrastructure needs include large numbers of new skilled construction workers, engineers, nuclear plant operators

and other key personnel needed for construction, operation and maintenance

of new facilities.

21

Appendix B

22

Chairwoman BIGGERT. The Subcommittee on Energy of the

Science Committee will come to order.

I will now recognize myself for an opening statement.

I want to welcome everyone to this hearing on the President’s

Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, commonly referred to as

GNEP. The purpose of this partnership is to clear the way for the

safe expansion of nuclear energy worldwide. How do we do this? By

using technology to address growing inventories of spent nuclear

fuel, and today we intend to take a look at the goals, schedules,

and costs associated with this innovative research and development

program.

In 20 years, electricity demand in the United States is expected

to increase by 50 percent. We must meet that demand and do so

in an environmentally responsible way. Carefree increases in

greenhouse gas emissions are not an option. We need a diverse

supply of clean electricity, and nuclear power must be part of that

mix. It is the only reliable, carbon-free, emissions-free source of

electricity currently available that could provide the baseload capacity to meet this demand. If we cannot supply our nation’s need

for clean energy, we run the risk of unacceptable environmental

and economic consequences.

However, for the United States and the world to benefit from the

expanded use of nuclear energy, there is one vitally important

issue that must be resolved: What do we do with the inventory of

spent nuclear fuel? Yucca Mountain was to be the solution. Unfortunately, its intended opening slipped from 1998 to 2010, and it

slipped again to 2012 or 2014, or even possibly later. And we all

know by now that the statutory limit of Yucca Mountain is such

that the repository effectively will be full from the waste generated

by 2010.

Yesterday, President Bush sent to Capitol Hill draft legislation

intended to speed construction of the nuclear waste repository at

Yucca Mountain. As part of this proposal, President Bush would

lift the statutory limit on the capacity of Yucca Mountain, which

is set at 70,000 metric tons under the current law. Lifting this

limit would allow for storage of up to 120,000 metric tons of spent

fuel, which is still less than the repository’s technical capacity.

This proposal certainly buys us some time, but it would not obviate the need for additional repositories this century. At one of this

subcommittee’s previous hearings on the future of nuclear energy,

a witness testified that the United States would need up to nine

additional repositories, nine additional Yucca Mountains, to accommodate the waste generated in the 21st century alone.

The good news is that we can achieve the vision of a single repository for the next century. And how do we do this? By transitioning

to a closed, or some prefer the word advanced, fuel cycle now. The

advanced fuel cycle that I envision involves a lot more than just

the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel. Reprocessing alone won’t

help, it won’t really help. It would only reduce the heat load of

waste destined for Yucca Mountain by 10 percent. We also need to

recycle and reduce spent fuel using fast reactors for transmutation,

which could reduce the heat load by a factor of 10 or more.

To ensure a sustainable future for nuclear power in the United

States, we must develop an advanced fuel cycle with all three comVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00026 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
23

ponents. We must take bold action now to realize the benefits of

the advanced fuel cycle to our energy security, our economic security, and our national security. And I believe that the Administration has stepped up to the challenge with the announcement of the

Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

GNEP supports the comprehensive development of an advanced

fuel cycle, including all three of the important elements that I just

mentioned: reprocessing, recycling, and the use of advanced burner

reactors to reduce the waste. And it puts their development on a

very aggressive timetable. We need to start now, because these

technologies won’t be developed overnight.

We are eager to learn more about the details of this important

initiative, especially details about the comprehensive systems analysis. It is essential that DOE understands how every component of

the advanced fuel cycle interacts as the fuel moves through the system from cradle to grave. This will ensure the success of the program and raise the confidence of Congress and the public that we

are making smart choices. Through modeling that incorporates the

relevant technical, economic, and policy considerations, this ‘‘systems approach’’ will allow us to optimize the fuel cycle and make

informed decisions about how to proceed.

I understand that this effort is already underway, and I applaud

DOE for requesting a separate funding line in the fiscal year 2007

budget request to support this systems analysis. I believe such an

analysis is the linchpin of the GNEP.

Whether we are motivated by climate change, our addiction to

foreign sources of energy, or skyrocketing energy costs, all of which

have national security implications, nuclear power is a necessary

and significant part of the solution. However, nuclear energy, as we

know it today, won’t be sustainable without an advanced fuel cycle.

I realize that some of the witnesses on the panel today are concerned about the timeliness and research and development priorities proposed by the DOE. I think it is important that we allow

smart, informed nuclear scientists and engineers from outside the

Administration to weigh in. It is also important that we hear from

members of the energy industry, who, in the long-term, will be an

important player in the development of an advanced fuel cycle.

Without hesitation, I support the vision of GNEP. We owe our

children and grandchildren our best efforts to secure a clean, safe,

reliable future—fuel for the future.

With that, I want to thank our witnesses for agreeing to share

their knowledge and insight with us today, and I look forward to

an open and spirited discussion on this very important subject.

[The prepared statement of Chairman Biggert follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN JUDY BIGGERT

I want to welcome everyone to this hearing on the President’s Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, commonly referred to as GNEP. The purpose of this partnership

is to clear the way for the safe expansion of nuclear energy worldwide. How do we

do this? By using technology to address growing inventories of spent nuclear fuel,

including the risk of proliferation. Today we intend to take a look at the goals,

schedules and costs associated with this innovative research and development

(R&D) program.

In twenty years, electricity demand in the United States is expected to increase

by 50 percent. We must meet that demand and do so in an environmentally responsible way. Carefree increases in greenhouse gas emissions are not an option. We

24

need a diverse supply of clean electricity, and nuclear power must be part of that

mix. It is the only reliable, carbon-free emissions-free source of electricity currently

available that could provide the base-load capacity to meet this demand. If we cannot supply our nation’s need for clean energy, we run the risk of unacceptable environmental and economic consequences.

However, for the United States and the world to benefit from the expanded use

of nuclear energy, there is one vitally important issue that must be resolved—what

we do with growing inventories of spent nuclear fuel. Yucca Mountain was to be the

solution. Unfortunately, its intended opening slipped from 1998 to 2010. Then it

slipped again to 2012 or 2014, or possibly even later. And we all know by now that

the statutory limit of Yucca Mountain is such that the repository effectively will be

full from the waste generated by 2010.

Yesterday, President Bush sent to Capitol Hill draft legislation intended to speed

construction of the nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. As part of his proposal, President Bush would lift the statutory limit on the capacity of Yucca Mountain, which is set at 70,000 metric tons under current law. Lifting this limit would

allow for the storage of up to 120,000 metric tons of spent fuel, which is still less

than the repository’s technical capacity.

This proposal certainly buys us some time, but it would not obviate the need for

additional repositories this century. At one of this subcommittee’s previous hearings

on the future of nuclear energy, a witness testified that the U.S. would need up to

nine additional repositories—nine additional Yucca Mountains—to accommodate the

waste generated in the 21st Century alone.

The good news is that we can achieve the vision of a single repository for the next

century. How do we do this? By transitioning to a closed—or some prefer the term

advanced—fuel cycle now.

The advanced fuel cycle that I envision involves a lot more than just the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel. Reprocessing alone won’t really help. It would only reduce the heat load of waste destined for Yucca Mountain by 10 percent. We also

need to recycle and reduce spent fuel using fast reactors for transmutation, which

could reduce the heat load by a factor of 10 or more.

To ensure a sustainable future for nuclear power in the United States, we must

develop an advanced fuel cycle with all three components. We must take bold action

now to realize the benefits of the advanced fuel cycle to our energy security, our

economic security, and our national security. And I believe that the Administration

has stepped up to the challenge with the announcement of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

GNEP supports the comprehensive development of an advanced fuel cycle, including all three of the important elements I just mentioned—reprocessing, recycling,

and the use of advanced burner reactors to reduce the waste. And it puts their development on a very aggressive timetable. We need to start now because these technologies won’t be developed overnight.

We are eager to learn more about the details of this important initiative, especially details about the comprehensive systems analysis. It is essential that DOE

understands how every component of the advanced fuel cycle interacts as the fuel

moves through the system from cradle to grave. This will ensure the success of the

program and raise the confidence of Congress and the public that we are making

smart choices. Through modeling that incorporates the relevant technical, economic,

and policy considerations, this ‘‘systems approach’’ will allow us to optimize the fuel

cycle and make informed decisions about how to proceed.

I understand that this effort already is underway, and I applaud DOE for requesting a separate funding line in the FY07 budget request to support this systems

analysis. I believe such an analysis is the lynchpin of GNEP.

Whether we are motivated by climate change, our addiction to foreign sources of

energy, or skyrocketing energy costs—all of which have national security implications—nuclear power is a necessary and significant part of the solution. However,

nuclear energy as we know it today won’t be sustainable without an advanced fuel

cycle.

I realize that some of the witnesses on the panel today are concerned about the

timelines and R&D priorities proposed by the DOE. I think it’s important that we

allow smart, informed nuclear scientists and engineers from outside the Administration to weigh in. It’s also important that we hear from members of the energy industry, who, in the long-term, will be an important player in the deployment of an advanced fuel cycle.

Without hesitation, I support the vision of GNEP. We owe our children and grandchildren our best effort to secure a clean, safe, reliable fuel for the future.

25

With that, I want to thank our witnesses for agreeing to share their knowledge

and insight with us today. I look forward to an open and spirited discussion on this

very important subject.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. I will now recognize the Ranking Member,

Mr. Honda, for his opening statement.

Mr. HONDA. Thank you. And I thank the Chairwoman Biggert for

holding this hearing today so we can learn more about the Global

Nuclear Energy Partnership, which President Bush announced

without providing much detail in February in his budget request.

As we all know, currently, the United States does not reprocess

nuclear spent fuel because of concerns about the proliferation of

nuclear weapons material.

In addition, reprocessing is not cost-effective since uranium supplies around the world are plentiful and can be fabricated into fuel

at far less cost than reprocessing spent fuel. The economics of the

situation have not changed and are not going to change for a long

time.

Which brings us to the real reason that the Bush Administration

is putting forward a nuclear fuel reprocessing program, the problem of dealing with nuclear waste.

The politics of Yucca Mountain have made it clear that siting

and licensing a second waste repository is highly unlikely. At this

point, it still isn’t clear how things are going to proceed with Yucca

Mountain.

The Bush Administration has seized upon this political situation

to justify reprocessing of spent fuel to reduce the heat of the material that would potentially be put in Yucca Mountain in order to

expand the capacity of the proposed repository.

Yesterday, the Administration sent a legislative proposal to Congress to expedite the repository, which would lift the current statutory limit on the amount of waste that could be stored there. Such

a move is essential to justify developing a reprocessing program.

What troubles me about this whole Global Nuclear Energy Partnership proposal is the haste with which it seems to have been developed and the fact that a very small number of people seem to

have made all of the key decisions without much input from the

industry or scientific community.

For example, it appears that the technology for reprocessing

spent fuel, UREX+, has already been selected by the advocates for

the program. While the final decision hasn’t been made, it seems

that the decision has essentially been made to use metal fuel,

which would require the construction of a pyroprocessing plant for

each fast reactor that will be used to convert reprocessed fuel into

electricity.

What isn’t clear to me is who made these decisions, what process

was used to make those decisions, or even why they have been already made, given the premature stage of the technologies and

huge uncertainty as to whether they will be successful and cost effective.

The spent nuclear fuel we have now can safely be stored in dry

casks for 50 years or more, giving us plenty of time to do more research, more fully evaluate technology alternatives, and have a

greater engagement from all interested parties in the decision-making process.

26

Now for a program that may cost as much as hundreds of billions

of dollars in taxpayer money, it seems that such a study and scrutiny is at—the least we can do to ensure that the best policy is

what is pursued.

From where I sit, the way that the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership has been put together and then proposed looks a lot like

the way in which the President took the Nation to war in Iraq.

The policy decisions have already been made by a small isolated

group within the Administration without all of the facts and without input from the experts from outside the group. Once that decision was made then a justification for it was developed and sold to

Congress.

A story posted on the website of the scientific journal Nature yesterday about the disbanding of the Secretary of Energy’s advisory

board, which was chartered to provide the Secretary with timely,

balanced external advice on issues of importance only reinforces

the impression that outside input is not welcome on major programs such as GNEP.

But as with Iraq, there seems to be major uncertainties in

GNEP, uncertainties in the technical feasibility, the cost, and uncertainty in the ability of the agency in charge to successfully carry

out such a large effort. I don’t believe that it is wise for us to rush

to judgment on GNEP, as we rushed the war, and I certainly don’t

want to see the kind of outcome that a rushed decision and incomplete plan are sure to deliver.

This decision doesn’t need to be made today. We have other

means for storing nuclear waste temporarily while we wait for all

of the facts.

In closing, Madame Chairwoman, I thank you again for holding

this hearing so that we can try to get some answers on how these

decisions were made, we can hear some outside thoughts on this

proposal, and perhaps hear some alternative options for dealing

with the problem.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Honda follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE MICHAEL M. HONDA

I thank Chairwoman Biggert for holding this hearing today so that we can learn

more about the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, which President Bush announced without providing much detail in February with his budget request.

As we all know, currently the United States does not reprocess nuclear spent fuel

because of concerns about the proliferation of nuclear weapons material.

In addition, reprocessing is not cost effective, since uranium supplies around the

world are plentiful and can be fabricated into fuel at far lest cost than reprocessing

spent fuel. The economics of this situation have not changed and are not going to

change for a long time.

Which brings us to the real reason that the Bush Administration is putting forward a nuclear fuel reprocessing program—the problem of dealing with nuclear

waste.

The politics of Yucca Mountain have made it clear that siting and licensing a second waste repository is highly unlikely. At this point, it still isn’t clear how things

are going to proceed with Yucca Mountain.

The Bush Administration has seized upon this political situation to justify reprocessing of spent fuel to reduce the heat of the material that would potentially be put

in Yucca Mountain in order to expand the capacity of the proposed repository.

Yesterday the Administration sent a legislative proposal to Congress to expedite

the repository which would lift the current statutory limit on the amount of waste

27

that could be stored there. Such a move is essential to justifying developing a reprocessing program.

What troubles me about this whole Global Nuclear Energy Partnership proposal

is the haste with which it seems to have been developed and the fact that a very

small number of people seem to have made all of the key decisions without much

input from industry or the scientific community.

For example, it appears that the technology for reprocessing spent fuel, UREX+,

has already been selected by the advocates for the program. While the final decision

hasn’t been made, it seems that the decision has essentially been made to use metal

fuel, which would require the construction of a pyroprocessing plant for each fast

reactor that will be used to convert reprocessed fuel into electricity.

What isn’t clear to me is who made these decisions, what process was used to

make those decisions, or even why they have already been made, given the premature stage of the technologies and huge uncertainty as to whether they will be

successful and cost effective.

The spent nuclear fuel we have now can safely be stored in dry casks for 50 years

or more, giving us plenty of time to do more research, more fully evaluate technology alternatives, and have greater engagement from all interested parties in the

decision making process.

For a program that may cost as much as hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer money, it seems that such study and scrutiny is the least we can do to ensure

that the best policy is what is pursued.

From where I sit, the way that the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership has been

put together and then proposed looks a lot like the way in which the President took

the Nation to war in Iraq.

The policy decisions have already been made by a small, isolated group within the

Administration without all of the facts and without input from experts from outside

their group. Once that decision was made, then a justification for it was developed

and sold to Congress.

A story posted on the web site of the scientific journal Nature yesterday about the

disbanding of the Secretary of Energy’s Advisory Board, which was chartered to provide the Secretary with timely, balanced external advice on issues of importance,

only reinforces the impression that outside input is not welcome on major programs

such as GNEP.

But as with Iraq, there seem to be major uncertainties in GNEP, uncertainties

in the technical feasibility, the cost, and uncertainty in the ability of the agency in

charge to successfully carry out such a large effort.

I don’t believe that it is wise for us to rush to judgment on GNEP as we rushed

to war, and I certainly don’t want to see the kind of outcome that a rushed decision

and incomplete plan are sure to deliver. This decision doesn’t need to be made

today, we have other means for storing nuclear waste temporarily while we wait for

all of the facts.

In closing, Madame Chairwoman, I thank you again for holding this hearing so

that we can try to get some answers on how these decisions were made, we can hear

some outside thoughts on this proposal, and perhaps hear some alternative options

for dealing with the problem.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you, Mr. Honda.

With that, any additional opening statements submitted by

Members may be added to the record.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Johnson follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member.

According to the Energy Information Administration, Texas ranked 7th among the

31 states with nuclear capacity.

In 2004, the Nation set a new record for electricity generation at nuclear power

plants.

During 2004, the larger of Texas’ two nuclear power plants was up-rated in capacity, contributing to a new State record for nuclear output. For the first time, Texas

generated more than 40 billion kilowatt hours. Of Texas energy, ten percent comes

from nuclear plants.

Together, the Comanche Peak plant near Dallas and South Texas plant near

Houston produce 100 percent of the nuclear energy in Texas.

As Texas makes great strides with nuclear energy, the state continues to struggle

to modernize its overall energy economy.

28

Texas regrettably still relies heavily on fossil fuels to the detriment of the environment. Texas ranks first in the Nation in carbon dioxide emissions, third in nitrogen oxide, and fourth in sulfur dioxide. These chemicals contribute toward Texas’

poor air quality.

I am concerned for my constituents in Dallas as well as residents in Houston, two

major Texas cities with some of the poorest air quality in the Nation. Bad air leads

to cancer, asthma, and a host of other diseases.

For these reasons I strongly advocate for clean, efficient and alternative fuel

sources. Development of these technologies and support of a national infrastructure

will require great investment.

But Mr. Chairman, if one has a toothache, does it not make sense that one would

pay the dollars to have the issue addressed?

I look at federal investment in clean energy that way. It may cost money, but it

is an investment we cannot afford not to make.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Davis follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE LINCOLN DAVIS

Good morning. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman and Ranking Member, for the

opportunity for us to discuss the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) Proposal. I would also like to thank all the witnesses for their presence today.

Before I get into the issue at hand, I would like to express my support for nuclear

energy in this country. As America has become more addicted to fossil fuels that

pollute our air and our water, I believe nuclear energy can play a major role in our

country’s energy future. Opponents of nuclear energy argue that it is unsafe.

With that mind set America has not ordered a new nuclear plant in over 25 years.

However, over the same time the Navy has acquired over 80 vessels that contain

nuclear reactors. To date, there have been no incidents reported on any of these 80

vessels and none of the crew on these ships has become ill from serving on them.

So, clearly the technology exists that can make nuclear power safe. It is my hope

once we solve the nuclear waste question we can add more nuclear power to the

Nation’s power grid.

While I believe that nuclear energy needs to play a major role in our energy future, I also have serious reservations about the GNEP proposal. My main concerns

stem from the fact that it appears a majority of important decisions about this program have already been made—such as site locations and specific technologies to

be used for GNEP. These possible actions concern me because they exclude the expertise of industry leaders and scientists who are at the forefront of nuclear energy.

I believe for this program to be successful we must include all the experts and not

just a selective few.

As you may know, Oak Ridge National Lab is near my district and employs some

of the brightest and most experienced scientists on nuclear technology. For years

Oak Ridge has been at the forefront of developing and maintaining nuclear programs for DOE and DOD. However, to my knowledge no one from Oak Ridge was

involved in the development of GNEP. To me it makes sense to have people involved

that have a clear and long history of working within this field to help plan the future of the technology.

I hope today’s hearing will ease some of my concerns as I believe we must act

now to deal with nuclear waste and the successful expansion of nuclear energy in

America.

Madame Chairwoman, thank you and I yield back the balance of my time.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Jackson Lee follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE SHEILA JACKSON LEE

Chairwoman Biggert, Ranking Member Honda, I want to thank you for organizing

this very important Energy Subcommittee hearing on the Global Nuclear Energy

Partnership (GNEP). While energy policy may not captivate the attention of most

Americans right now, it is one of the most important and complex issues that the

Nation must face in the coming years. And we will need hearings such as this to

discuss our future energy policies.

In the news these days, most of what we see are stories from Iraq and Afghanistan, or the latest political scandal. The energy policies of the United States are

complex and multi-faceted, and many Americans simply do not understand the gravity of the issues. I hope that the witnesses testifying today will shed some light on

a very difficult issue that often falls through the cracks.

29

Madam Chairwoman, I have a number of concerns regarding the policies put forth

in the GNEP. Not the least of my concerns is the cost of the program. Over the next

decade, the Bush Administration wants to build three new uranium reprocessing facilities that will cost the taxpayers an estimated $20 to $40 billion dollars.

In this age of skyrocketing record deficits, this is not the time to take on massive

new projects when we cannot get our fiscal house in order. Until we have scientific

data to prove that this alternative is feasible, now may not be the time to increase

the deficit even more.

Nuclear energy is a large part of our nation’s energy structure. 20 percent of all

the electricity generated in the U.S. comes from nuclear sources. And with nuclear

energy comes a large amount of nuclear waste. With every single nuclear power

plant generating about 20 tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste every year, we

must find a way to deal with the waste. The Yucca Mountain waste storage facility

was supposed to have been the solution 20 years ago, so we do need to plan our

next steps. The GNEP program has good ideas for a starting place. But the simple

fact is that the budget may not currently allow it.

Madam Chairwoman, President Bush recently announced that he will run a $423

billion deficit this year. The Congress was just forced to raise the debt ceiling once

again. It now stands at $9 trillion. That means that every child born in the United

States is immediately saddled with over $28,000 in debt. We are essentially giving

the child a birth certificate and a credit card bill. Our energy policy is not perfect.

However, until we can afford to build new facilities, we should not be spending over

$20 billion without specific, clear, and informed plans.

In addition, even if we did build the small-scale reprocessing facilities, and even

if they did work as they are supposed to work, there are indications that they would

only process a small fraction of our nuclear waste output. In order to reduce the

waste output to the level that GNEP envisions, it could easily end up costing US

taxpayers over $100 billion.

The current nuclear energy policies are not sustainable. Over the next two decades, we are going to need to change the way that waste is handled, or build new

storage facilities. I look forward to today’s hearing to shed some light on how we

can effectively move forward.

Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and I yield the remainder of my time.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. And at this time, I would like to introduce

our witnesses and thank you all for coming this morning. And

going from left to right—or my left to right, Mr. Shane Johnson is

the Deputy Director for Technology in the Office of Nuclear Energy,

Science, and Technology at the Department of Energy, though just

a few days ago, Mr. Johnson served as the Acting Director of the

Office. So thank you, Shane, for agreeing to appear before us today.

We do understand that three days on the job probably wasn’t

enough for your new Assistant Secretary, Dennis Spurgeon, to

catch up on everything, but I do want to take this opportunity to

congratulate Mr. Spurgeon and to brag a little. Mr. Spurgeon

would be a Director rather than an Assistant Secretary if I hadn’t

fought hard for the elevation of that position in the Energy Bill last

summer, and I think that is a—that was a much-needed change in

title.

Dr. Neil Todreas is the Kepco Professor of Nuclear Engineering

at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is also a member

of the distinguished MIT panel that wrote the 2003 report on the

future of nuclear power. Welcome.

Dr. Richard Garwin is an IBM Fellow Emeritus at the Thomas

J. Watson Research Center in New York and has a—has had a long

and distinguished career in research, teaching, writing, and government policy on nuclear issues. Welcome.

And then Mr. David Modeen is the Vice President for Nuclear

Power and the Chief Nuclear Officer of the Electric Power Research

Institute and is also a nuclear engineer by training.

30

As the witnesses know, spoken testimony will be limited to five

minutes each, after which the Members will have five minutes each

to ask questions.

So we will start with Mr. Johnson. You are recognized for five

minutes.

STATEMENT OF MR. R. SHANE JOHNSON, DEPUTY DIRECTOR

FOR TECHNOLOGY, OFFICE OF NUCLEAR ENERGY SCIENCE

AND TECHNOLOGY, DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Mr. JOHNSON. Chairman Biggert, Ranking Member Honda, and

Members of the Subcommittee, I would like to express my thanks

for the opportunity to discuss the Administration’s proposed Global

Nuclear Energy Partnership, or GNEP, with you this morning. I

have submitted a written statement for the record but would like

to provide a few summary remarks.

The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership is the nuclear energy

component of the President’s Advanced Energy Initiative, and it

addresses the global issues of energy security, the environment,

and nuclear proliferation. To support the Global Nuclear Energy

Partnership, the Department has proposed $250 million in fiscal

year 2007 to accelerate efforts already underway under our Advance Fuel Cycle Initiative to demonstrate technologies associated

with spent nuclear fuel recycling. My testimony today focuses on

the goals, schedule, and anticipated cost of the technology development component of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

The President has stated a policy goal that includes worldwide

expansion of nuclear energy. The reasons for this are obvious: nuclear power is the only mature technology of significant potential

to provide large amounts of emission-free baseload power, resulting

in cleaner air, reduced global greenhouse gas intensities, pollution

abatement, and energy diversity.

To accomplish the objectives of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership, the Department proposes to accelerate the development,

demonstration, and deployment of new technologies to recycle spent

fuel through the Office of Nuclear Energy’s Advanced Fuel Cycle

Initiative. As an initial step, the Department has requested $250

million in our fiscal year 2007 budget request.

As part of this initial step, the Department proposes to accelerate

the demonstration of more proliferation-resistant recycling technologies. In concert with this, the Department will work with international partners to incorporate advanced safeguard technologies

into the design and potential construction of advanced facilities. In

broad outline, the technology demonstration phase consists of developing, designing, constructing, and operating an integrated set

of demonstration facilities: an advanced separations technology,

called Uranium Extraction Plus, or UREX+, which features a group

transuranic separations process; an advanced fast burner reactor

that could consume the transuranics from the spent fuel, significantly reducing the amount of nuclear waste requiring disposal;

and a new fuel cycle laboratory for developing the transuranic fuels

needed for the advanced reactor.

By proceeding with the demonstrations of these technologies, we

will learn the practicality of closing the fuel cycle in the United

States. We have had considerable success demonstrating the adVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00034 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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vanced separations technology at the laboratory scale. However, by

demonstrating the closure of the fuel cycle at an engineering scale,

we will be able to optimize the design of a future full-scale facility

and reduce the cost and time to deploy such a facility.

The Department has established a target range of 2011 to 2015

for initial operation of the advanced separations facility, 2014 to

2019 for initial operation of the advanced test burner reactor using

conventional fuels, and 2016 to 2019 for the first modules of the

advanced fuel cycle laboratory.

Early preconceptual estimates of the cost to bring these facilities to the point of operation range from $4 billion to $10 billion. As the

project matures, we will develop more detailed and accurate baselines of cost and schedule.

Presently, the Department’s efforts are aimed at conducting the

applied research, engineering, and environmental studies needed

over the next two years to inform a decision in 2008 on whether

to proceed to detailed design and construction of these facilities.

In fiscal year 2007, the Department would continue the applied

research to refine the UREX+ technology, begin work on the conceptual design, functions, and operational requirements and other

analyses leading to the development of baseline costs and schedules

for these three facilities.

The Department would also propose to invest in the development

of the advanced burner reactor technology, initiate conceptual design studies, and start a series of extensive studies again, to establish cost and schedule baselines for the advanced burner reactor.

To guide this effort, the Office of Nuclear Energy has instituted

a multi-laboratory process to develop the detailed program plan

that will lay out the scope of work for the next five years. This plan

will establish the milestones and work to be accomplished and establish the research priorities for the next five years, subject to appropriations. This plan is expected to be completed in May 2006.

The integration of basic research and simulation in the Global

Nuclear Energy Partnership is a key priority for the Department.

The Department organized a workshop on simulation for the nuclear industry at our Lawrence Livermore National Lab, and the

Office of Science will lead a program of basic science workshops

this summer. The results from these workshops will help guide our

long-term R&D agenda for closing the fuel cycle.

We are in a much stronger position to shape the future if we are

part of it.

In closing, this is an ambitious plan, and the technology demonstrations will be a key challenge for the United States and our

partner countries. But it is an endeavor, if successful, that can ensure that nuclear energy is available, safe, and secure for generations to come. We seek the advice and support of this Committee

and of the Congress, and I look forward to answering your questions.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Johnson follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF R. SHANE JOHNSON

Chairman Biggert, Ranking Member Honda, and Members of the Committee, it

is an honor for me to be here today before the House Science Subcommittee on Energy to discuss the Administration’s proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership or

GNEP. GNEP is the nuclear energy component of the President’s Advanced Energy

32

Initiative and it addresses the global issues of energy security, the environment, and

nuclear proliferation. To support GNEP, the Department has proposed $250 million

in fiscal year 2007 to accelerate efforts under the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative

(AFCI) to demonstrate technologies associated with spent nuclear fuel recycling. My

testimony today focuses on the goals, schedule and anticipated costs of the technology development component of GNEP.

As you know, the President has stated a policy goal of promoting a significant expansion of nuclear power here in the United States and around the world. The reasons for this are clear—total world energy demand will double by 2050 and over the

next twenty years, electricity demand alone will increase 75 percent over current

levels. The safety and performance record of nuclear energy in the U.S. has been

outstanding. It is a proven technology that can deliver large quantities of electricity

that will be needed in the future, reliably, predictably, affordably and without producing harmful air emissions.

Building on the efforts of the Administration and because of Congress efforts in

passing the Energy Policy Act of 2005, we are confident that there will be new

plants built in the U.S. over the next 10 years. With more than 130 new nuclear

plants under construction, planned or under consideration world-wide, many countries around the world are clearly moving forward with new nuclear plants.

As such, it is important for our own future that nuclear energy expands in a way

that is safe and secure, in a way that will not result in nuclear materials or technologies used for non-peaceful purposes. But significant growth will not be possible

unless we effectively address the fuel cycle and spent fuel management.

The U.S. operates a once-through fuel cycle, meaning that the fuel is used once

and then disposed of without further processing. In the 1970’s, the U.S. stopped the

old form of reprocessing, principally because it could be used to produce separated

quantities of plutonium, a nuclear proliferation concern. But the rest of the nuclear

economies—France, Japan, Great Britain, Russia and others operate closed fuel cycles, in which spent fuel is processed and the plutonium and uranium are recovered

from the spent fuel to be recycled back through reactors. As a result, the world

today has a buildup of nearly 250 metric tons of separated civilian plutonium. The

world also has vast amounts of spent fuel and we risk the continued spread of fuel

cycle technologies. Furthermore, recent years have seen the unchecked spread of enrichment technology around the world.

Opening Yucca Mountain remains a key priority of the Administration and is a

necessity. We are committed to beginning operations at Yucca Mountain as soon as

possible so we can begin to fulfill our obligation to dispose of the approximate 55,000

metric tons already generated and approximate 2,000 metric tons being generated

annually. Whether we recycle or not we must have Yucca Mountain open as soon

as possible. However, the statutory capacity of Yucca Mountain will be oversubscribed by 2010 and without GNEP simply maintaining existing nuclear generating

capacity would require additional repositories in the U.S.

GNEP seeks to address the challenges of the expansion of nuclear power and limiting proliferation risk by developing technologies that can recycle the spent nuclear

fuel from light water reactors in a more proliferation-resistant manner. In addition,

GNEP supports a reordering of the global nuclear enterprise to encourage leasing

of fuel from what we call fuel cycle states in a way that presents strong commercial

incentives against new states building their own enrichment and reprocessing capabilities. For the U.S., transition to a closed fuel cycle would enable more efficient

use of our nuclear fuel resources, would significantly reduce the nuclear waste that

requires disposal in a geologic repository and would assure sufficient repository capacity through the end of the century.

To accomplish these objectives, the Department proposes to accelerate the development, demonstration, and deployment of new technologies to recycle spent fuel

through the Office of Nuclear Energy’s AFCI program. These are technologies that

would not result in separated plutonium—a key proliferation concern presented by

current generation reprocessing technologies. Moreover, these technologies would be

deployed in partnership with other fuel supplier nations. As an initial step, the Department has requested $250 million in FY 2007.

By proceeding with the demonstrations of the separations, fuels and reactor technologies, we will learn the practicality of closing the fuel cycle in the U.S. We have

had considerable success demonstrating the advanced separations technology, in

particular, at the ‘‘laboratory scale.’’ However, by demonstrating a closed fuel cycle

at an ‘‘engineering scale,’’ will enable us to optimize the design of a full-scale facility

and reduce costs and time to deploy a full-scale facility. This will give us the information we need to design and deploy full-scale recycling facilities by the time they

are needed decades from now.

33

The U.S. would propose to work with international partners to conduct an engineering-scale demonstration of advanced separations technologies (e.g., a process

called Uranium Extraction Plus or UREX+) that would separate the usable components in used commercial fuel from its waste components, without separating pure

plutonium from other transuranic elements.

In addition, the Department would propose to demonstrate the ability to consume

transuranic elements separated from the spent nuclear fuel in a fast reactor called

the Advanced Burner Test Reactor (ABTR). In conjunction with this, DOE would

propose an Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility (AFCF) to fabricate and test the actinide

based fuels for the demonstration test reactor.

The Department has established a target of 2011 for initial operation of the advanced separations demonstration facility, 2014 for initial operation of the Advanced

Burner Test Reactor using conventional fuels, and 2016 for the first modules of an

AFCF. The first mission of the AFCF would be to produce actinide-based fuels for

the ABTR.

Early, pre-conceptual estimates of the ten-year cost to bring the engineering scale

facilities to the point of initial operation range from $4 billion to $9 billion. As the

project matures, we will develop more detailed and accurate baseline of cost and

schedule estimates. The experience with the engineering scale demonstrations will

inform the design, cost estimates and schedule for building full-scale recycling facilities. More accurate estimates of the demonstration phase will be available as the

conceptual and preliminary design phases are completed.

The GNEP technology demonstration program is a phased program. Each phase

would begin after a well defined decision on the results of the previous phase and

an assessment of the risks associated with proceeding to the next phase. DOE would

only proceed to detailed design and construction of these engineering scale demonstrations after the Department is confident that the cost and schedules are understood and after we have put in place the project management framework that will

allow these projects to succeed. Presently, the Department’s efforts are aimed at

conducting the applied research, engineering and environmental studies needed over

the next two years to inform a decision in 2008 on whether to proceed to detailed

design and construction of the engineering scale demonstration facilities. The $250

million requested in FY 2007 is the Department’s best assessment of the funding

required for GNEP program technical development priorities and sequencing toward

demonstration facilities.

This week, the Department approved the mission need for the demonstration facilities. The Department also issued an advance notice of intent, announcing plans

to prepare an environmental impact statement for the GNEP technology demonstration program. The EIS effort is anticipated to be completed over the next two years.

Also last month, the Department announced that it is seeking expressions of interest from the public and private sectors for hosting advanced recycling demonstration

facilities and related activities. The Department anticipates issuing a Request for

Proposals after consideration of the comments received and would anticipate contract awards for site evaluation studies later this year.

In FY 2006 and FY 2007, the Department would continue the applied research

to refine the UREX+ technology, begin work on a conceptual design, acquisition

strategy, functions and operating requirements and other analyses leading to the

development of baseline costs and schedules for the UREX+ demonstration, the advanced burner test reactor, and the advanced fuel cycle facility by 2008. The Department would also propose to invest $25 million in FY 2007 on the advanced burner

reactor technology, to initiate conceptual design studies and a series of extensive

studies to establish cost and schedule baselines and determine the scope, safety, and

health risks associated with fuel design, siting and acquisition options.

To guide this effort, the Office of Nuclear Energy has instituted a multi-lab process to develop a program plan and a five-year technology plan. The effort involves

nine national laboratories. The overall effort also involves several program secretarial offices, including the National Nuclear Security Administration. For example,

NNSA will provide key assistance in assuring that safeguards approaches and technologies are incorporated into the demonstration facilities early in the planning for

the facilities.

The five-year technology plan will establish the milestones, the work to be accomplished and establish applied research priorities over the next five years, subject to

appropriations. The technology plan is anticipated to be completed by the end of

May 2006. Execution would extend from the Department down to the multi-lab

teams.

In addition, while DOE currently sponsors university research grants through the

Nuclear Energy Research Initiative, universities will be engaged through an embedVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00037 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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ded research and development program. Industry will also be engaged as the program progresses through the design process to provide specific expertise.

Demonstration of the key technologies demands that DOE carry out a variety of

research; ranging from technology development for those processes initially identified (equipment, waste forms) to longer-term research and development on alternatives (equipment, processes) for risk reduction. In addition, the Office of Science

is initiating a program of basic science in support of nuclear technology with three

technical workshops in July 2006. Although not specific to GNEP, the results of this

activity will help guide the long-term R&D agenda for closing the fuel cycle.

Furthermore, simulation is expected to play an important role in the development

of this program. DOE organized a workshop on simulation for the nuclear industry

at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory which was chaired by Argonne’s Lab

Director, Dr. Robert Rosner, and Dr. William Martin from the University of Michigan. We expect to see a greater role for simulation as a result, supported by both

the Office of Science and the Office of Nuclear Energy.

Systems analysis forms an important part of the ongoing AFCI program and will

have an increased role during the next two years. The systems analysis will investigate several key issues. One such issue is the required rate of introduction of burner reactors and separations facilities to avoid a second repository this century. Another would be a detailed study of the technical requirements for the facilities and

how they relate to the top level goals of the program. The results of these analyses

are essential to establishing the basis for each key decision in the accelerated AFCI

program and will have a profound effect on GNEP program planning.

In closing, the U.S. can continue down the same path that we have been on for

the last thirty years or we can lead a transformation to a new, safer, and more secure approach to nuclear energy, an approach that brings the benefits of nuclear energy to the world while reducing vulnerabilities from proliferation and nuclear

waste. We are in a much stronger position to shape the nuclear future if we are

part of it. This is an ambitious plan and the technology demonstrations will be a

key challenge for U.S. and our partner nations. But it is an endeavor, which if successful, can ensure that nuclear energy is available, safe and secure for generations

to come. We seek the advice and support of this committee and of Congress and I

look forward to answering your questions.

BIOGRAPHY FOR R. SHANE JOHNSON

Shane Johnson is the Deputy Director for Technology within DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy. Since 2004, Mr. Johnson as served as Deputy Director for Technology,

responsible for the Department’s nuclear energy research and support to U.S. nuclear engineering programs. Mr. Johnson served as Acting Director for the Office of

Nuclear Energy, Science and Technology between May 2005 and March 2006.

For the last six years, Mr. Johnson has led the Office’s nuclear technology initiatives, serving a key leadership role in the initiation and management of all of the

Office’s major research and development initiatives, including the Generation IV nuclear systems initiative, the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative, and the Nuclear Hydrogen Initiative.

Mr. Johnson serves a central role in the Department’s efforts to reassert U.S.

leadership in nuclear technology development. He is the senior principal in NE responsible for the recently announced Global Nuclear Energy Partnership. He also

led the formation of the Generation IV International Forum (GIF), an international

collective of ten leading nations and the European Union’s Euratom, dedicated to

developing advanced reactor and fuel cycle technologies. He leads the Office’s international cooperation activities, including establishment of cooperative research

agreements with other countries and the development by the GIF of the Generation

IV technology roadmap, which resulted in the selection of six promising reactor and

fuel cycle technologies by the GIF for future development efforts. Mr. Johnson currently serves as the U.S. representative to the GIF policy committee.

Mr. Johnson has over twenty years of relevant management and engineering experience within the Government and industry. During his career with NE, he has

had direct management responsibility for all of the NE programs, including nuclear

and research facilities. Prior to joining DOE, Mr. Johnson was employed for five

years by Duke Power Company and Stoner Associates, Inc. where he was responsible for performing engineering studies for nuclear, natural gas, and water utilities.

Mr. Johnson received his B.S. degree in Nuclear Engineering from North Carolina

State University and his M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Pennsylvania

State University. He is a licensed professional engineer.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you very much.

35

I would just like to interrupt a moment to extend a warm welcome to our colleague from California, Mr. Rohrabacher, who I

know is very interested in this issue. And I would ask unanimous

consent that he would be allowed to sit with the Subcommittee and

participate in today’s hearing. Without objection, so ordered.

Dr. Todreas, you are recognized for five minutes.

STATEMENT OF DR. NEIL E. TODREAS, KEPCO PROFESSOR OF

NUCLEAR ENGINEERING; PROFESSOR OF MECHANICAL ENGINEERING, MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

Dr. TODREAS. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman and Members of

the Committee.

It is an honor to appear before you to discuss GNEP. The program offers a strategic vision for expanded use of nuclear energy

in the world and in the United States. Its achievement of its goals,

as a long-term objective, is highly desirable.

However, my concerns deal with the apparent schedule of rapid

implementation of GNEP program elements, a schedule which implies near-term choice and deployment. And here, I am not speaking of R&D. I am making a distinction of R&D with choices on reprocessing technologies, fast reactor fuel, fast reactor design characteristics, and associated reactor demonstration facilities. These

near-term choices are not necessary since alternate approaches are

sufficient for spent fuel and proliferation management over the

time period before GNEP could provide an effect. Rapid implementation of choices is unwise since it threatens the successful execution of a GNEP program. By successful program execution, I mean

effective integration and coordination of program elements, expenditures which are both reasonable and sustainable, protection of the

public as well as worker health and safety, facilities with adequate

and demonstrable physical protection, and an expanding nuclear

deployment with adequate proliferation safeguards.

My focus this morning, and in my written statement, was on the

formulation and timing of the R&D program. I speak on GNEP

from limited literature materials. I must say the depth of detail

provided by DOE on GNEP through these sources is technically

very meager.

I framed my views in the written statement and this morning,

as I talk, on the key facilities for GNEP, particularly their missions

and their time scales. It is these deployment schedules which shape

the allowed depth and breadth of the R&D associated with each facility.

First is the simulation and visualization lab.

Simulation and visualization are properly the initial step underlying all subsequent selections among process, fabrication, and reactor design choices. It is here the R&D data are used to formulate

and/or validate predictive models for such selections. Our MIT

study highlighted the lack of such a capability in the Nation’s nuclear program and recommended that among 11 program elements

we proposed, it received the largest R&D expenditure, that of $100

million per year over 10 years. I applaud the launching and the

plan for this.

The Engineering Scale Demonstration is next to be operable in

2011. It is here the process for separation of uranium and shortVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00039 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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1Previous hearings of this subcommittee reviewed the security and economic aspects of reprocessing, a key element of the GNEP vision.

lived fission products from the transuranics and the long-lived fission products is to be demonstrated. The selection of the separation

process is the first critical step. As has been mentioned, UREX+1,

or perhaps UREX+1A, I haven’t been able to figure that out yet,

has been selected at a capacity of 100 to 200 tons per year. The

important question is whether there is a satisfactory basis for this

selection for scale-up from the laboratory to pilot plant since it is

an important and large expenditure. The criteria against which

these questions must be answered are process economics, safety,

materials accountability, and physical protection. Some demonstration above the laboratory scale must be made, but it shouldn’t be

premature, because it locks GNEP into a critical, likely irreversible, plan.

I have comments on each of the facilities. We can discuss these,

if you want. I will move toward a conclusion.

By the facilities, I mean the test reactor, the advanced burner reactor, and the fuel cycle—advanced fuel cycle facility, as well as,

actually, small-scale reactors. Those four are additional critical facilities.

I wanted to close, though, with pointing out to you that while the

partnership is very technically-intensive and long-term, its execution and the probability of the success will depend heavily on the

technical strengths of the new generation of nuclear professionals

recruited to its ranks.

The U.S. academic community today lacks depth in its faculty in

reprocessing technology and in reactor design. So it is unfortunate

in two aspects that the existing AFCI fellowship program in the

new budget proposed has been cut in half and also that the Department terminated the broader, all-encompassing university research

fuel and assistance support program, which is the primary vehicle

for supporting the infrastructure of the nuclear engineering academic community.

In summary, GNEP is worthy of pursuit, however, there are serious decisions about its possible and optimum pace to be resolved,

which involve technical readiness, facility processes and scale selection, and the consequences of redirecting most of the available

funding for nuclear energy to this program.

Thank you.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Todreas follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF NEIL E. TODREAS

Madam Chairwoman and Members of the Committee:

It is an honor to be called before you to discuss the subject of the Global Nuclear

Energy Partnership, a matter of considerable importance to the future of nuclear

energy as well as to the effort to prevent the further spread of nuclear weapons.1

The GNEP program offers a strategic vision for the expanded use of nuclear energy in the U.S. and the world. Its goals are to ease the long-term management of

spent fuel by destroying the transuranic (TRU) elements that contribute most to the

long-term radiological risk and to reduce proliferation risk by creating a fuel cycle

supplier and user state regime. This will enable other nations, including developing

nations, to acquire/expand nuclear energy while minimizing proliferation risk.

Achievement of these goals as a long-term objective is highly desirable.

37

2Lanthanide fission products are likely extracted in the TAL SPEAK process before TRU conversion and fabrication into fuel elements.

However, my concerns deal with the apparent schedule of rapid implementation

of the GNEP program elements—a schedule which implies near-term choice and deployment of reprocessing technologies, fast reactor fuel, fast reactor design characteristics as well as associated reactor demonstration facilities. These near-term

choices are not necessary since alternate approaches are sufficient for spent fuel and

proliferation management over the time period before GNEP could provide an effect.

Rapid implementation of choices is unwise since it threatens the successful execution of a GNEP program. By successful program execution I mean effective integration and coordination of the program elements, expenditures which are both reasonable and sustainable considering program benefits, protection of public as well as

worker health and safety, facilities with adequate and demonstrable physical protection and an expanding nuclear deployment with adequate proliferation safeguards.

My focus this morning will be on the formulation and timing of the R&D program

underlying such a successful GNEP program execution. The broader questions of the

alternate approaches to deal with GNEP goals in the next several decades as well

as GNEP’s potential detrimental effect on nearer-term nuclear priorities such as

achievement of the Nuclear Power 2010 program I’ll set aside for industry representatives and your later questions.

I speak on the GNEP program based on the limited open literature materials I

have found (Appendix A). As a member of the general nuclear community, I have

not been briefed on GNEP; as a member of NERAC, I have had access to only a

very general DOE briefing and the recent report of our relevant Subcommittee. In

sum, I must say the depth of detail on GNEP provided by DOE through these

sources is technically very meager.

I will frame my views through comment on the key facilities of GNEP and particularly their missions and timelines. (Appendix B) It is these deployment schedules which shape the allowed breadth and depth of the R&D associated with each

facility. I have found no information on the projected costs of these facilities. This

is not unreasonable since the process selection and designs of these facilities are

likely in their infancy—a situation I respect but which reflects the significant R&D

challenge ahead.

From the GNEP website, the first facility to be operational is the Simulation &

Visualization Laboratory. Simulation and Visualization are properly the initial step

underlying all subsequent selections among process, fabrication and reactor design

choices. It is here that R&D data are used to formulate and/or validate predictive

models for such selections. Our MIT Study on the Future of Nuclear Power (7/03)

highlighted the lack of such capability in our nuclear program and recommended

that it receive the largest sustained R&D expenditure ($100M/year over 10 years)

among the eleven program elements we proposed.

The Engineering Scale Demonstration (ESD) is the next facility to be operational,

in 2011. Here the process for separating uranium and short-lived fission products

from the transuranics and longer-lived fission products is to be demonstrated at an

engineering significant scale. The transuranics are to be supplied to the next facility, the Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility (AFCF), for conversion and fabrication into

fast reactor fuel.2 The selection of the ESD separation process is the first critical

fuel cycle step of GNEP. The UREX+1 process and its capacity at 100–200 tons per

year have been selected. This capacity is about four to eight percent of the anticipated full-scale need for our LWR fleet. The important question is whether there

exists satisfactory basis for this selection process for scale-up from the laboratory

to a pilot plant. The criteria against which these questions must be answered are

process economics, safety, materials accountability and physical protection. I have

not been privy to the evidence which supports the current GNEP selections. Some

demonstration above laboratory scale must be made—it must not be made prematurely because it locks GNEP into a critical, likely irreversible path.

The Advanced Burner Test Reactor (ABTR) is next operational in 2014. Nuclear

fuel, because of the long lead time needed for irradiation testing, is always the critical path item in reactor development. For transmutation in TRU fueled elements

such testing is essential, hence the need for a test reactor. Limited testing capability

exists in Japanese, Russian, Indian and—for a very limited future period—French

reactors, which I presume is being arranged. The U.S. facility, the FFTF, is now

unavailable—is it irretrievably lost to us? I support the need for a U.S. fast spectrum test reactor as part of a robust R&D program. Timing dictates it be sodium

cooled and, likely at least initially, oxide fueled. Since Advanced Burner Reactors

of similar design may follow, the construction and safety standards as well as the

regulatory review process developed for this test reactor can be tailored to set preceVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00041 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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dent and practice for this follow-on fleet. This was the practice followed in the execution of the FFTF project. While costly to the test reactor schedule, such a practice

significantly enhances the progress of deployment of any follow-on power reactor

fleet. A 2014 operational target date is most aggressive but the goal can be reached

in the 2010s decade.

The Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility (AFCF) is envisioned as a multi module facility

first operational in 2016. It will have modules to perform production scale

1) separations operations on spent LWR fuel,

2) remote fabrication of TRU-bearing fuel for Advanced Burner Reactors,

3) spent fast reactor fuel processing,

4) waste and storage form development,

5) advanced separations process development.

This is the mainstay facility for execution of the closed fuel cycle. It is critical that

the fast reactor fuel selected allow achievement of both the desired fast reactor performance characteristics and the needed processing and fabrication characteristics.

The economics, safety, materials accountability and physical protection of the GNEP

closed cycle must be reasonably assured through simulation and visualization based

on firm R&D results before construction of such a facility is undertaken. The announced schedule of achievement of operational modules for these three functions

between 2016 and 2019 is highly optimistic.

The deployment of Advanced Burner Reactors (ABR) for TRU management then

follows beginning in 2023. These fast reactors are likely to be sodium cooled, although gas and liquid lead cooled designs are possible. This selection was one of the

goals of the Generation IV down-select process which the current level of research

activity does not support. ABRs will be electricity producers owned and operated by

industry along with the thermal LWRs needed to achieve expected nuclear power

demand. Significant deployment of ABRs will be needed to measurably impact TRU

management. It is therefore essential that these ABRs produce electricity at cost

competitive with the LWRs. Given that the fuel cycle is likely to be more expensive

than the existing once-through cycle and when last built in the 1990s sodium fast

reactors were 1.2 to 1.5 times the capital cost of LWRs, this prospect is daunting.

To achieve cost competitiveness a major R&D effort on cost efficient fast reactor innovations is essential. Its success is far from assured. The proposed timeframe of

ABR deployment in 2023 is most unlikely considering the time needed to select and

test its fuel, develop its reprocessing technology, make its design cost effective and,

importantly, effectively engage industry as the owners and operators of the subsequent ABR fleet.

It is also not obvious why, at least for a transition period of multiple decades, a

two-tier strategy is not envisioned to allow a fast reactor concept to be designed and

tested. One such strategy would recycle the plutonium plus the other actinides in

fertile free pins which comprise a fraction of a LWR core. Although final passes in

a fast spectrum are likely needed because of curium buildup in a thermal spectrum,

thermal recycling has been determined to destroy significant quantities of TRU. The

benefit of this scheme is the existing availability of operating LWRs to do this transmutation function.

The final facilities in GNEP are Small-Scale Reactors for developing economies for

which fresh fuel would be provided and spent fuel returned to the supplier states.

The small scale is not necessitated by the fuel cycle but rather the electrical grid

and capital structure of the developing economy. Such a supply and spent fuel return arrangement would provide adequate proliferation safeguards in an era of

worldwide expansion of nuclear technology. It is, however, by no means certain that

the capital and fuel cycle costs of these small-scale reactors would yield an attractive cost of electricity (COE) for these economies. Considerable R&D needs to be

supported by DOE to refine such designs to a level where realistic COE can be projected and proliferation resistant effectiveness assessed especially if fast spectrum

design options are to be considered. There are, however, some innovative LWR designs already existing and pebble bed reactors being developed in South Africa and

China that offer considerable advances in reactor safety features which bode well

for introduction of nuclear power into technically unsophisticated nuclear economies,

if competitive COE can be achieved.

Two important topics remain—first, the proliferation dangers of diffusion of reprocessing technology and second, the readiness of the U.S. educational infrastructure to sustain the GNEP. The first involves the proposition that these dangers are

so serious that all work should be avoided, especially since the practical need for

deployment of reprocessing is so distant. The alternate view is that U.S. R&D is

necessary to maintain U.S. credibility and influence in international affairs.

39

Quoting from a working paper of the MIT Study (Deutch, 2/03), ‘‘There are basically three costs of the U.S. not supporting separation technology going forward.

First, and most importantly, we will lack the technical knowledge to be credible and

influential in the evolution of commercial nuclear power. Second, we will not acquire

the knowledge necessary to develop effective safeguards for operating reprocessing

facilities in other nations. Third, we will not acquire the knowledge to permit us

to make timely and informed judgments about long-term options for closed nuclear

fuel cycles that may be of importance in future generations.’’ These costs dictate

that we pursue such R&D.

In closing, let me remind you that this Partnership is a very technically intensive

and long-term undertaking. Its execution and certainly its probability of success will

depend heavily on the technical strength of the new generation of nuclear professionals recruited to its ranks. The U.S. nuclear academic community today lacks

depth in faculty skilled in recycling and particularly reprocessing as well as fast reactor analysis and design technology. Consequently, the stream of graduates in

these areas is very small. The Department’s AFCI program has started an education

assistance initiative which I presume will be subsumed by a GNEP program although it has been proposed to be halved by DOE for FY 2007. However, these very

limited actions need the existence of the broader program of Department nuclear

education support to build and sustain the infrastructure necessary for the success

of these limited, targeted AFCI/GNEP fellowship programs. University administrators look to government and industry support of such programs for indication that

the nuclear renaissance is real. It is ironic and self-defeating that, coincident with

the launching of GNEP, the Department has proposed termination of its University

Reactor Fuel Assistance and Support Program, which is a primary vehicle for supporting nuclear engineering graduate students and university faculty research.

In summary, GNEP is worthy of pursuit; however, there are serious decisions

about its possible and optimum pace to be resolved which involve technical readiness, facility processes and scale, and the consequences of redirecting essentially

most of the available funding for nuclear energy to this effort.

40

Appendix A

Sources Consulted

1. DOE websites

www.gnep.gov or

www.gnep.energy.gov

2. Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative, FY 2007 Congressional Budget Request

3. Statement of Clay Sell to FY 2007 Appropriations Hearing on the Global Nuclear

Energy Partnership, March 2006

4. GNEP Presentation to Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee (NERAC)

on February 22, 2006 by R. Shane Johnson, Acting Director, Office of Nuclear

Energy, Science and Technology, U.S. DOE

5. Presentation on March 10, 2006 by Phillip Finck, Argonne National Laboratory,

‘‘The Benefits of the Closed Nuclear Fuel Cycle’’

6. EPRI–INL, Nuclear Energy Development Agenda, January 4, 2006

7. Report of NERAC’s ANTT Subcommittee of March 22, 2006 transmitted to

NERAC for review.

41

42

BIOGRAPHY FOR NEIL E. TODREAS

Dr. Neil Todreas is the Korea Electric Power Corp. Professor of Nuclear Engineering and a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of

Technology. He has served at MIT for 34 years, including an eight-year period from

1981–1989 as the Nuclear Engineering Department Head. From 1975 to 2003, was

a co-director of the MIT Nuclear Power Reactor Safety summer course,. He holds

Bachelor and Master of Mechanical Engineering degrees from Cornell and the Sc.D.

in Nuclear Engineering from MIT. His area of technical expertise is thermal and

hydraulic aspects of nuclear reactor engineering and safety analysis.

He has an extensive record of service for government (Department of Energy—

DOE, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission—USNRC, and national laboratories),

utility industry review committees, and international scientific review groups. Dr.

Todreas started his professional career with nine years of service with the U.S.

Atomic Energy Commission, four years initially with Naval Reactors and a subsequent five years with Civilian Reactor Development. He is a member of the National

Academy of Engineering and a fellow of the American Nuclear Society (ANS) and

the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME).

His current service is as a member of the National Accreditation Board of INPO,

the DOE Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee, and the CEA Nuclear Energy Division Scientific Committee.

HONOR & AWARDS

Effective Teaching Award, MIT Graduate Student Council—1975

Outstanding Professor Award, Nuclear Engineering Department—1976, 1980

Fellow, American Nuclear Society—1981

Fellow, American Society of Mechanical Engineers—1983

American Nuclear Society Best Paper Award, Thermal-Hydraulic Div.—1987

National Heat Transfer Conference Best Paper Award—1987

Member, National Academy of Engineering—1988

Chair, Korea Electric Power Corp. Professor of Nuclear Engineering—1992

American Nuclear Society Technical Achievement Award, Thermal-Hydraulic Division—1994

MIT School of Engineering Ruth & Joel Spira Award for Distinguished Teaching—

1995

American Nuclear Society Arthur Holly Compton Award—1995

Inaugural Lecture, Distinguished Lecture Series of the Department of Mechanical

& Nuclear Engineering, Pennsylvania State University—2001

Inaugural Lecture, O’Hanian Engineering Lecture Series, University of Florida—

2002

Henry DeWolf Smyth Nuclear Statesman Award—2005

PUBLICATIONS

Professor Todreas has made important contributions in the areas of reactor heat

transfer and fluid flow. He has written or been co-author of more than 190 publications, a two-volume textbook published in 1990, which is widely used internationally

for the study of reactor thermal analysis and a reference book on safety features

of light water reactors.

43

44

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you, Doctor.

And now, Dr. Garwin, you are recognized for five minutes. Could

you make sure your mike is on?

STATEMENT OF DR. RICHARD L. GARWIN, IBM FELLOW EMERITUS, THOMAS J. WATSON RESEARCH CENTER, YORKTOWN

HEIGHTS, NY

Dr. GARWIN. Thank you. I have provided some visual aids to help

me keep on track.

So I am speaking on my own. Affiliation is given for identification only.

The U.S. nuclear power plants, 103 of them, provide almost 20

percent of U.S. electricity, and we want to see that expanded in the

future. So first, the requirement for GNEP is that it do no harm

to this industrial base and its future expansion.

Now GNEP includes the provision of reactor fuel to international

partners and take-back of spent fuel for disposal. This is a policy

matter, not so much a technical matter. We need to create an international system. This is not just going to be bilateral.

Reprocessing can extend uranium resource for light water reac- tors by 20 percent at most and at a cost that is very high, $130

to $1,000 per kilogram of uranium saved. The DOE purpose in reprocessing is primarily to save the repository resource. But at what

cost and risk? How much does it cost to save compared with expanding the repository, as we will see?

Yucca Mountain can be extended and replicated. Dry cask storage is cheap and safe for 50 to 100 years, so there is really no

hurry to move on reprocessing, if we do it at all.

GNEP doesn’t propose reprocessing and recycle into light water

reactors, and for good reason. This was really a failed bet on the

part of the Japanese, French, and British. The price of uranium did

not rise, so it has cost them a lot of money and immobilized a lot

of radioactivity that would otherwise be sitting pretty harmlessly

in spent fuel.

The once-through U.S. fuel cycle is far more proliferation resistant than is the proposed UREX+ reprocessing. For example, to obtain 10 kilograms of plutonium to make a bomb, you must steal

and reprocess 1,000 kilograms of self-protecting spent fuel. With

UREX+, you steal 11 kilograms of separated plutonium plus some

other transuranics.

GNEP’s proposed UREX+ separation for LWR fuel and burning

in fast neutron advanced burner reactors is far more costly than

enhancing repository space. Yucca Mountain is estimated at

200,000 tons technically, and there is a proposal to expand it halfway there. The cost that—the charge from DOE is 1 mil per kilowatt hour. Eminently affordable, reprocessing and burning is going

to be at least five times that much.

Refining the GNEP program without the promised systems analysis tool is like driving without a map. Such a tool would show that

the $155 million first year UREX+ program is misguided. UREX is

not significantly better than PUREX when conducted in the United

States or other nuclear weapon state.

The advanced burner reactor fuel reprocessing needs to be 99-

plus percent efficient, not the LWR reprocessing that is done just

45

once. So the goals for UREX+ for reprocessing light water reactor

fuel are set technically too high. We don’t need them. We could approach them gradually.

The ABRs, at least 30 percent of the light water reactors, will

need to be government-operated or heavily subsidized. With this

heavy subsidy, it is important to know how much it is going to be

and for how long. It is very important to have the ABR, its fuel

form, its fuel reprocessing all decided together with an extended

design competition that should justifiably take decades in order to

minimize the subsidy that would be required and to find out how

much it is.

Well, what should we do? Lift the arbitrary cap on Yucca Mountain, commit to dry cask interim storage, take the lead in creating

an international system for a short supply of LEU reactor fuel and

assured disposal, lead in the institutional design to encourage commercial competitive mined geologic repositories that would be certified by the IAEA to accept IAEA certified spent fuel and waste

forms, and we should outsource to repositories elsewhere, not just

in the United States.

And finally, the United States Government should fund worldwide evaluation of resource versus cost of currently uneconomic terrestrial and seawater uranium resources. Are there 170 million

tons of terrestrial uranium up to $260 per kilogram? Can we obtain

2,000 million tons of uranium from seawater at $300 or $1,000 per

kilogram? If we are talking about reprocessing and saving uranium

at $1,000 per kilogram, we ought to know the alternatives. And we

need, urgently, to complete and use the systems analysis tool to

guide decisions, not to justify them after the fact.

Thank you. My prepared testimony, I hope, justifies these comments.

[The prepared statement of Dr. Garwin follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF RICHARD L. GARWIN

I provide here a narrative form of discussion of elements of the proposed GNEP,

in order that the Committee should understand better my recommendations.

Most important is to understand that 103 reactors in the United States provide

some 17 percent of U.S. electricity needs now with high reliability and that dry cask

storage of spent nuclear fuel from these reactors is a safe, low-cost approach to covering any further delays in the availability of the mined geologic repository at Yucca

Mountain.

I begin by answering the four questions in the invitation from the Chairman.

1. How realistic are the goals, timelines and budgets being proposed under

the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP)?

Garwin Reply: The goals and timelines advanced under the major portion of

GNEP are unrealistic. Such a long-term program should not be considered without

consideration of the long-term budgets rather than the near-year expenditures.

2. What does the Department of Energy (DOE) need to do to develop a robust program to meet its goal of an advanced nuclear fuel cycle—one

that includes both recycling and transmutation—while sufficiently addressing non-proliferation and waste management needs?

Garwin reply: DOE needs to step back from its dirigiste/gigantesque (in English,

government-directed) approach in GNEP to one that more modestly and realistically

addresses the primary goal—a reduction in repository requirement, while highlighting the cost of alternative approaches that include expanding Yucca Mountain,

taking the initiative toward international commercial competitive mined geologic repositories, and greatly expanding the spectrum of reactors to be considered for burning the TRU waste.

46

1 Book by R.L. Garwin and G. Charpak, ‘‘Megawatts and Megatons: The Future of Nuclear

Power and Nuclear Weapons,’’ University of Chicago Press, January 2003. 2French publication of book by G. Charpak, R.L. Garwin, and V. Journe ́, ‘‘De Tchernobyl en

tchernobyls,’’ Odile Jacob, September 2005.

3. What significant research and development (R&D) questions, both

science and engineering, exist for UREX+? Sodium-cooled fast reactors?

Mixed-actinide fuels? In your view, how well do the GNEP R&D priorities coincide with these research needs?

Garwin reply: GNEP R&D priorities hardly match the needs for decision—whether the burner reactors will be sodium or lead cooled, or whether they will indeed

be thermal high-temperature encapsulated fuel reactors. Whether the fuel for the

fast-neutron reactor will be metallic, carbide, nitride, or based on an inert matrix

for one of these forms. GNEP assumes the answer and would launch us into a costly

program that would surely cost more to do the job less well than would a program

at a more measured pace guided by a more open process.

4. DOE is in the process of developing the tools to carry out a cradle-tograve systems analysis of the advanced fuel cycle. What questions

should that systems analysis be able to answer?

Garwin reply: The GNEP program must await either good human leadership or

the promised cradle-to-grave systems analysis of the advanced fuel cycle. In particular, the questions should include:

a. Cost and availability of competitive commercial mined geologic repositories

for the direct disposal option.

b. Costs and performance (including safety and nonproliferation measures) for

reactors suitable for burning TRUs separated from LWR fuel.

c. The spectrum of fuels for such burner reactors, understanding that reactor

type, fuel choice, and reprocessing approach are coupled, and that not only

fast-neutron reactors but some thermal reactors can achieve reductions in

transuranics that would expand capacity of a given repository at least several

fold.

d. The benefit associated with government-funded resource estimation for

amount of uranium available as a function of price. This needs to include research and demonstration on obtaining uranium from seawater, where there

is at least 2000 million tons readily available, but at a price that is very uncertain. Yet the exploration of seawater uranium at costs up to $1000/kg is

vital for decision-making in this field and is long overdue.

There are important points to be made beyond the answers to these specific questions.

There is wide agreement that the ABRs cannot operate economically as power

producers in competition with LWRs. Yet there is no estimate of the government

subsidy that would be required for private operation or the cost of government operation of these plants. All the more reason for a combined technical and economic

effort to provide the least-cost solution for this vision, in competition with evaluating the straightforward approach of commissioning more mined geologic repositories.

As emphasized in my book with Georges Charpak1 and in the September 2005

book with Charpak and Venance Journe ́,2 we believe that the expansion of nuclear

power can best be helped now by the United States and other nuclear states taking

the lead in changing the rules to permit and encourage competitive, commercial,

mined geologic repositories. These would be approved by the IAEA, and would accept only spent fuel forms and packages (and vitrified fission-product forms and

packages) approved by IAEA.

Commercial firms operating the repositories would provide employment and benefits to the local communities, and rather than seeing a repository as a burden, it

would be seen by many as a commercial opportunity. Russia, China, the United

States, Australia, and even Sweden might be locations for such repositories.

The other urgent matter for the U.S. and other governments is to determine the

cost to obtain vastly more uranium. It is essential to know whether half of the 4000

million tons of uranium in seawater can be extracted at a cost of $300/kg, as is tentatively suggested by the Redbook. Or whether the GEN–IV working group approach that leads to an estimate of 170 million tons of uranium from terrestrial deposits at an extraction price less than $260/kg is valid.

47

So in general I admire the goal of GNEP, but visions that ignore technical reality

have often led to disasters, since they preclude more conventional and incremental

approaches.

Aside from important elements such as the assured fuel supply—provision of enriched fuel and take back of spent fuel—and the supply of cartridge reactors (in

competition with other nuclear supplier countries, no doubt) GNEP embodies a

major vision for the United States and for the world.

THE GNEP VISION

This is to handle in the intermediate term (on the order of 100 years) the spent

fuel from existing nuclear reactors by separating the plutonium and other actinides

so that they can be burned in fast-neutron reactors. This is quite different from the

reprocessing and recycle that has been practiced in France and that is going to take

place in Japan as well, where the plutonium is fabricated into MOX fuel and burned

in LWRs. This recycle in LWRs does not in any way solve the actinide problem, nor

does it help with repository space, because the spent MOX fuel element has at least

four times the long-term heat output of a spent UOX fuel element, and so does not

diminish the repository space required. Reprocessing as practiced in France, Britain,

and about to begin in Japan has been a costly way to delay putting spent fuel into

the repository that all agree is necessary; far cheaper would have been the straightforward approach of dry cask storage for whatever delay was desired.

The GNEP vision, however, would have most of the fission products extracted

from the spent LWR fuel, together with most of the uranium, so that a fuel form

that might be 15–20 percent actinides mixed with some of the initial uranium would

provide fuel for a generation of fast-neutron Advanced Burner Reactors—ABRs,

which are essentially breeder reactors without the uranium ‘‘blanket.’’ All of the

actinides can be fissioned with fast neutrons, so they do not accumulate to the extent that curium does, for instance, in multiple recycle into LWRs. However, since

one obtains only about 25 percent burnup of fuel in a fast reactor, that fuel needs

to be reprocessed and recycled many times before the LWR actinides are substantially destroyed. In addition, if the actinides are mixed with uranium, the ABR is

likely to have a ‘‘conversion ratio’’ on the order of at least 0.50, so that half of the

actinides destroyed are replaced by Pu-239 that will need to be burned in the ABR

and thus reduce the rate at which LWR actinides are destroyed, for a given thermal

output power of the ABR. The question for the GNEP vision is how big a repository

is needed for U.S. commercial fuel (and for possible U.S. reprocessing of foreign fuel)

and at what cost for the repository and for the measures to reduce the necessary

size. All indications are that the cost of direct disposal of spent LWR fuel is much

less than the cost of the reprocessing and ABRs that are intended to reduce repository size.

There are major questions as to the fuel form for the generation of ABRs. Will

it be metallic fuel, carbide fuel, nitride fuel, or oxide fuel? Will it be normal ‘‘mixed

fuel’’ with uranium, that gives rise to more Pu-239, or will it be a ‘‘sterile fuel’’—

so-called inert matrix fuel (IMF)—rather than uranium-based. What will be the delayed neutron fraction in that reactor, and how will a safe operating margin be

achieved?

Will the ABRs be cooled with liquid sodium or with molten lead? There are good

arguments on both sides, but GNEP and its supporters appear to assume that the

cooling will be liquid sodium, in order to be able to build the first ‘‘demonstration’’

ABR rapidly. This haste and ill-defined purpose recall the Clinch River sodiumcooled reactor project, terminated in 1977 and against which I testified, which would

simply have demonstrated the high cost of fast-reactor power in comparison with

LWRs. If the purpose is to have a ‘‘demonstration/test reactor which would be used

to effect qualification of advanced burner reactor fuel to consume transuranic elements (TRU) from spent light water reactor fuel and spent fast reactor fuel,’’ why

not use existing fast reactors in Russia and France for this purpose, thus saving

years of delay? Simply building another sodium-cooled fast reactor to show that it

can be done in the U.S. is not likely to advance the acquisition of knowledge necessary to the coupled choice of reactor type, fuel, and approach for the really difficult job of reprocessing ABR fuel with process losses of 0.1 percent or less.

The reprocessing for the ABR is a more important choice than the reprocessing

for the LWR, since it needs to be done multiple times, and will also set the basis

for a later breeder economy. So why is $155M of the $250M first-year budget sought

for GNEP to go to the demonstration of UREX+ reprocessing for LWR fuel? Contrary to the 99.9 percent efficiency (0.1 percent loss) sought for each of the many

reprocessing cycles for ABR fuel, 90 percent efficiency for the one-time reprocessing

of PWR fuel would obtain most of the benefit. The proposed UREX+ ESD plant for

48

3 ‘‘Separations and Transmutation Criteria to Improve Utilization of a Geologic Repository,’’

by R.A. Wigeland, T.H. Bauer, T.H. Fanning, and E.E. Morris, Nuclear Technology, Vol. 154,

pp. 95–106, (April 2006). 4 ‘‘Nuclear Wastes: Technologies for Separations and Transmutation,’’ by the Committee on

Separations Technology and Transmutation Systems, (‘‘STATS’’ for short), National Research

Council, National Academy Press, Washington, DC (1996).

PWR fuel is excessively large and has technical goals totally unnecessary for this

task.

That fuel for the ABR will need to be available only when we have the first-generation ABR coming on-line, and it is an economic waste to reprocess the LWR fuel

prematurely. The discounted present value (cost) of reprocessing is much less if reprocessing is delayed by a further 20 years, for instance.

It seems that one ought to have multiple design competitions for fast-neutron

ABRs, and when the best two ABR designs have been chosen after the detailed technical evaluation that such a momentous step warrants, two separate engineering designs should be commissioned for each, in order to have some confidence of being

able to choose the better.

One of the chief concerns with the ABR, as indicated, is its fuel composition, and

the ABR reprocessing choice needs to be made in conjunction with the choice of fuel

composition.

My major concern with the GNEP program as it has been presented is that it has

the priorities all wrong—with premature initiation of an engineering scale demonstration—ESD—of UREX+ for LWR fuel, when what we need is to move rapidly

to see whether it is technically and economically feasible at all to deploy the vast

numbers of ABRs that are required. This is an old dream, and if it is not feasible,

the reprocessed LWR fuel will be a security and economic nightmare and an impediment to the expansion of nuclear energy supply. Furthermore, the technical goals

of the program are set far higher than is needed to obtain the benefits of reprocessing of PWR fuel.

The goal of ‘‘proliferation resistance’’ is not met in any case, because the UREX

process itself separates essentially all of the uranium. To obtain 10 kg of plutonium

from ordinary PWR spent fuel containing one percent Pu, a terrorist would need to

acquire and reprocess 1000 kg of highly radioactive material. Once the uranium and

the fission products have been removed in any of the UREX processes, the plutonium will be contaminated only with a modest amount of transuranics (TRU) so

that the terrorist would need to reprocess a mere 11 kg of material, and according

to recent DOE studies, this would have only about 1/2000 of the penetrating radiation that would count as ‘‘self protecting.’’ In fact, Pu metal contaminated with

minor actinides could perfectly well be used in an implosion bomb. So UREX really

offers no significant benefit over PUREX so far as resistance to proliferation or terrorist acquisition of weapon-usable materials. Of course, radioactivity could be left

with or the Pu (actinide) fraction and removed after shipment from the PWR reprocessing plant to the ABR complex, but the likely contaminant, lanthanides, offer relatively little protection and, in any case, does not change the fact that only one percent as much material needs to be diverted and processed as in the case of spent

LWR fuel itself.

The relatively minor goal of reducing uranium requirement comes at an extremely

high price. Recycle of all of the TRU can reduce uranium requirements by about 20

percent (unless one has a breeder reactor that then does not eliminate the plutonium but preserves or expands its supply). Sound, recent studies show that this uranium saved comes at an equivalent cost of $130–1000/kg of natural uranium that

would otherwise need to be bought. At a time when two million tons of uranium

can be mined at costs below $40/kg, this is far from a good investment!

The main benefit claimed for the UREX+ teamed with the deployment of large

numbers of ABRs is the reduced requirement for space in a mined geologic repository. Here we are greatly aided by an April 2006 paper from the Argonne National

Laboratory.3 The authors refer, and appropriately so, to a ‘‘recent review by the National Academy of Sciences, where the potential benefits regarding dose rate, decay

heat load, and nonproliferation were discussed and estimated, at least qualitatively.’’ 4 Strangely, the 1996 report is hardly referenced in the DOE literature on

GNEP, but it is a monumental study that should be understood by all involved. It

concluded:

‘‘The excess cost for an S&T disposal system over once-through disposal for the

62,000 tons of LWR spent fuel is uncertain but is likely to be no less than $50

billion and easily could be over $100 billion if adopted by the United States.’’

49

5 ‘‘The Nuclear Energy Development Agenda: A Consensus Strategy for U.S. Government and

Industry.’’

This is equivalent to $800–1600/kg of fuel (undiscounted), or roughly 2–4 mill/

kWh.

A current EPRI–INL paper provides a sobering assessment both of the prospects

for the reprocessing approach and of its necessity:5

‘‘In addition, reprocessing plants are expensive and not attractive to commercial

financing in the context of the U.S. economy. Thus, the cost increment for reprocessing (i.e., the incremental cost above the cost of repository disposal) will

be subsidized initially by the Federal Government. Although the estimate above

does not include repository costs, it is expected that reprocessing will remain

more expensive than storage (centralized above-ground plus geologic repository)

for the foreseeable future. Projections of major savings in Yucca Mountain repository costs as a result of reprocessing are highly speculative at best. On the

other hand, the increased revenues to the Nuclear Waste Fund from an expanding fleet of new reactors will eventually help defray the costs of operating closed

fuel cycle facilities.

‘‘It is important to note that despite the extended timetable for introducing reprocessing in the U.S. (due to R&D prerequisites to satisfy cost and nonproliferation objectives, policy considerations, etc.), that a single expanded-capacity spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain is adequate to meet U.S. needs,

and that construction of a second repository is not required under this timetable.

‘‘If, however, reprocessing is implemented on an accelerated schedule before it

is economic to do so based on fuel costs, then the Federal Government will need

to bear a much larger cost. As discussed in Appendices B and D, the optimum

scenarios for transitioning nuclear energy to a closed fuel cycle in the U.S. context requires us to focus the R&D on those technologies that would enable a

transition to cost-effective and proliferation resistant ‘‘full actinide recycle’’

mode with fast reactors that would eventually replace light water reactors. This

path is preferred over one that maintains for decades a ‘‘thermal recycle’’ mode

using MOX fuel in light water reactors, because the high costs and extra waste

streams associated with this latter path do not provide commensurate benefits

in terms of either non-proliferation or spent fuel management costs.’’

The Wigeland, et al., paper arrives at conclusions that are summarized, for instance, in its Fig. 7, which I reproduce here.

This bar chart shows the increase in repository capacity that can be achieved by

separating out plutonium, americium, cesium, and strontium, for various assumed

fractions remaining in the waste. Note that the removal of the uranium does nothing to increase the capacity of the repository, which is limited by the decay heat

50

6Personal communication from R. Wigeland, April 5, 2006.

of the radioactive materials. With no removal of these materials, the repository is

planned for a reference value of initial 1.1 metric ton of heavy metal of spent PWR

fuel per meter of ‘‘drift’’ space—1.1 MTIHM/m of the mined drift. If 90 percent of

the Pu and Am are removed from the PWR waste, while all the Cs and Sr are retained, the repository capacity would be increased by a factor 4.3. But repository

space is also required for the reprocessing waste from the ABR recycle process.

The paper notes that separation and recycle of Pu into LWRs cannot achieve this

increase in repository performance, because the spent fuel from this recycle has as

much TRU heat in a single fuel element as in the four or five UOX fuel elements

that were reprocessed to make it. The fast-neutron ABR, however, is able to fission

the minor actinides so that they do not contribute to the decay heat, thus enabling

the increase in repository capacity shown in Fig. 7.

Removing 90 percent of the Cs and Sr results in the bar labeled ‘‘9.5’’ for the factor by which the spent fuel loading in the repository could be increased. Note that

this could be achieved either by chemical separation or by holding the waste for an

additional 100 years, which gives a further factor 10 decay of the amount of Cs and

Sr in the waste.

The 1996 STATS report used a 0.1 percent process loss estimate, and the

Wigeland paper begins with a one percent process loss, as illustrated in its Fig. 6.

In Fig. 6 of Wigeland, et al., the FR fuel was burned to 80 GWD/MTHM, with

about four tons of fuel in the FR. Assumed separation efficiency for the PWR fuel

was 99.9 percent.6

The arguments for GNEP assert that 99.9 percent might be achieved, and a big

part of the UREX+ ESD demonstration is to go from demonstrated 99 percent removal efficiency to 99.9 percent in the case of LWR fuel! But this effort is misguided; it is the ABR reprocessing that would benefit from efficiencies above 99 percent—not the PWR UREX+ process.

No rational business person or economist looking at Fig. 7 would want to do the

UREX+ ESD program at the level requested.

What is happening here is that one has a cost structure that includes the cost

of separation and transmutation (the ‘‘chemical plant’’ and the ABRs) and also the

cost of the repository, presumably reduced by a factor comparable with the increased loading that can be achieved. A factor 10 improvement in repository capacity is sufficient to reduce the already low cost of the repository (estimated at 0.1

cents per kWh) to a much lower value. One could perfectly well leave further reduction in repository costs and increase in permitted loading to the much longer-term

future rather than expending vast sums and time up front to demonstrate on a

large scale unnecessarily efficient processes.

51

7 Its membership included the Chairman of the Advanced Nuclear Transformation Technology

Subcommittee of DOE’s Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee. 8The number ‘‘1/3’’ is often quoted by advocates of Separation and Transmutation, but the

fast-neutron reactor of Footnote 3 (Wigeland, et al., of April 2006) has a conversion ratio (CR)

of 0.64 for TRU. For each TRU atom burned by fission, 0.64 is regenerated (R.A. Wigeland, perContinued

Therefore, a reasonable goal for the performance of the chemical plant on PWR

(or, more generally, LWR) fuel is 90 percent removal of Pu and Am, and similar 90

percent removal of Cs and Sr, if that is economically achievable. Note that even substantially less removal of Cs and Sr would not much diminish the factor 9.5 increase

in repository capacity. Performance already demonstrated far exceeds that required

for PWR spent fuel separations. This minimal requirement for separation efficiency

for the one-time PWR fuel separation contrasts strikingly with the 99+ percent that

is needed for repeated separation and recycle in the ABR, just because of the multiple recycles required in the case of the ABR fuel.

These specific points reinforce my global point that the uncertainty is what kind

of burner reactor can be built to operate 30 or 50 years hence, that will be safe and

as close as possible to economically competitive with the LWR or other thermal reactor for the production of electrical power. This is the critical question and is linked

to the type of fuel to be burned and hence to the separations technology that must

be achieved in ABR fuel recycle.

Since a major element of cost and performance in this ‘‘waste reduction’’ program

is the subsidy that would be required for the ABRs, it is of interest to note that

there is a very different technology under development that would also modestly reduce repository needs. This is the thermal neutron reactor championed and developed by General Atomics that had deployed two plants—one at Peach Bottom and

the other at Fort St. Vrain, that relies on millimeter-size pressure vessels of carbon

and silicon carbide to contain the fissile fuel and the resulting fission products. In

the form of a modular high temperature gas turbine reactor—(MHTGTR)—such systems could be deployed in a ‘‘deep burn’’ mode, without reprocessing of this fuel, so

as to achieve the modest benefits to the repository that could compete with or supplement expanding the repository capacity.

The American Physical Society Nuclear Energy Study Group7 in its May 2005 report concluded,

‘‘Any decision to reprocess spent fuel in the United States must balance the potential benefits against the proliferation risks. Fortunately, there is no nearterm urgency to make a decision on implementing reprocessing in the United

States. No foreseeable expansion of nuclear power in the U.S. will make a qualitative change in the need for spent fuel storage over the next few decades. Even

though Yucca Mountain may be delayed considerably, interim storage of spent

fuel in dry casks, either at current reactor sites, or a few regional facilities, or

at a single national facility, is safe and affordable for a period of at least 50

years.’’

The ‘‘GNEP Program’’ needs to be disaggregated and the technical priorities set

appropriately—the design of the ABR or other waste-burning reactor to be as safe

and inexpensive as possible, and the choice of the nature of that reactor together

with its fuel. As for the role of GNEP in assured supply of enriched uranium and

take back of fuel from much of the world, those policy problems must be addressed,

as to whether the United States wishes alone to dispose of radioactive wastes from

the rest of the world, or whether it wishes to take the lead in a process that is commercially viable and environmentally acceptable to have internationally approved

repositories storing internationally approved waste forms in appropriate areas of the

world.

As noted, the other urgent matter for the U.S. and other governments is to determine the cost to obtain vastly more uranium. It is essential to know whether half

of the 4,000 million tons of uranium in seawater can be extracted at a cost of $300/

kg, as is tentatively suggested by the Redbook. Or whether the GEN–IV working

group approach that leads to an estimate of 170 million tons of uranium from terrestrial deposits at an extraction price less than $260/kg is valid.

So in general I admire the goal of GNEP, but visions that ignore technical reality

have often led to disasters, since they preclude more conventional and incremental

approaches. The reprocessing and transmutation aspect of GNEP must be seen as

a gamble, and an optional—not a necessary—gamble. It is presented as an alternative to expansion of the approved repository capacity, but is linked to the momentous decision to deploy highly subsidized fast reactors in numbers that would generate about 77 percent as much power8 as the light-water reactors with which they

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sonal communication to the author, 04/18/06) so that only 0.36 TRU atom is consumed per fission. Since a LWR produces 0.23 TRU per fission, fast-neutron reactors consuming LWR waste

would have an electric power 0.23/0.36 = 64 percent as large as the LWR complex, if the thermal

efficiency were the same. Because of the higher operating temperature of the liquid-metal fastneutron reactors only about 0.83 as many heat-producing fissions are required in an ABR to

produce the same electrical power as a set of LWRs; the power output of a set of such ABRs

consuming LWR waste is then 0.64/0.83 = 77 percent that of the LWR reactors.

would co-exist. And it blithely assumes above-ground storage for hundreds of years

of separated cesium and strontium waste, as well as the operation of reprocessing

plants, all a high-cost, technically risky, and proliferation-prone approach to saving

a low-cost resource—space in a mined geological repository and the auxiliary interim dry-cask storage.

Note added by R.L. Garwin 06/25/06:

On 06/19/061 received via R.A. Wigeland an analysis by Robert N. Hill of ANL

indicating that in the AFCI program by 2004, fast-neutron reactors were analyzed

with a conversion ratio of 0.25 (TRU atoms produced per TRU atom destroyed).

These ABRs use fuel that is as much as 50 percent TRU. Under these circumstances, the ABR electrical power would be 0.23/(0.75–0.83) = 37 percent of the

LWR reactor power. No such reactor has yet been built; nor has an engineering design been accomplished.

I add here also material from the EPRI report: of May 2006 ‘‘Program on Technology Innovation: Room at the Mountain—Analysis of the Maximum Disposal Capacity for Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel in a Yucca Mountain Repository. EPRI,

Palo Alto CA: 2006. 1013523.’’ There we read, ‘‘EPRI is confident that at least four

times this legislative limit (∼260,000 MTU) can be emplaced in the Yucca Mountain

system...’’ And EPRI believes that with additional site characterization this minimum factor of four could well be a factor nine.’’

I restate my principal conclusions and recommendations:

1. The Engineering Scale Demonstration of UREX+ for the reprocessing of LWR

fuel to 99.9 percent efficiency at a scale of 100 to 200 tons of fuel per year

is highly premature, for the reasons given above.

2. The big technical uncertainty in the program is the design of an affordable

and safe fast-neutron burner reactor, with its associated fuel form and reprocessing. To the extent that reprocessing of LWR fuel is considered, all the

effort under GNEP should be associated with competitive designs for the

ABR, its fuel, and its reprocessing.

3. There is no necessity to reprocess fuel in implementing a fuel leasing and

take back program, if the United States would take the lead in encouraging

the creation of commercial, competitive, mined geologic repositories open to

the deposit of spent fuel and reprocessed spent fuel. The repositories and the

spent fuel should be subject to IAEA regulation. Unreprocessed spent fuel

can be kept in interim storage casks for at least 100 years, thus easing the

ultimate burden on the repositories and providing more time for their construction or for the possible development of economical burner reactors and

associated reprocessing industry.

4. GNEP, as formulated and presented at the hearing of April 6, 2006, is not

necessary to achieve the stated goals of nonproliferation and is more likely

to hinder the achievement of those goals. A proposal to lease fresh fuel and

take back the spent fuel was published by Harold M. Agnew, then Director

of the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (May 1976, page 23), as ‘‘Atoms for lease: An alternative to assured

nuclear proliferation.’’

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BIOGRAPHY FOR RICHARD L. GARWIN

Richard L. Garwin was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1928. He received the B.S. in

Physics from Case Institute of Technology, Cleveland, in 1947, and the Ph.D. in

Physics from the University of Chicago in 1949.

He is IBM Fellow Emeritus at the Thomas J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown

Heights, New York. After three years on the faculty of the University of Chicago,

he joined IBM Corporation in 1952, and was until June 1993 IBM Fellow at the

Thomas J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, New York; Adjunct Research Fellow in the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University; and Adjunct Professor of Physics at Columbia University. In addition, he is a consultant

to the U.S. Government on matters of military technology, arms control, etc. He has

been Director of the IBM Watson Laboratory, Director of Applied Research at the

IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center, and a member of the IBM Corporate Technical Committee. He has also been Professor of Public Policy in the Kennedy School

of Government, Harvard University. From 1994 to 2004 he was Philip D. Reed Senior Fellow for Science and Technology at the Council on Foreign Relations, New

York.

He has made contributions in the design of nuclear weapons, in instruments and

electronics for research in nuclear and low-temperature physics, in the establishment of the nonconservation of parity and the demonstration of some of its striking

consequences, in computer elements and systems, including superconducting devices, in communication systems, in the behavior of solid helium, in the detection

of gravitational radiation, and in military technology. He has published more than

500 papers and been granted 45 U.S. patents. He has testified to many Congressional committees on matters involving national security, transportation, energy policy and technology, and the like. He is co-author of many books, among them Nuclear Weapons and World Politics (1977), Nuclear Power Issues and Choices (1977),

Energy: The Next Twenty Years (1979), Science Advice to the President (1980), Managing the Plutonium Surplus: Applications and Technical Options (1994), Feux

Follets et Champignons Nucleaires (1997) (in French with Georges Charpak), and

Megawatts and Megatons: A Turning Point in the Nuclear Age? (2001) (with Georges

Charpak).

He was a member of the President’s Science Advisory Committee 1962–65 and

1969–72, and of the Defense Science Board 1966–69. He is a Fellow of the American

Physical Society, of the IEEE, and of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences;

and a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, the

National Academy of Engineering, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the American Philosophical Society. In 2002 he was elected again to the Council of the National Academy of Sciences.

The citation accompanying his 1978 election to the U.S. National Academy of Engineering reads ‘‘Contributions applying the latest scientific discoveries to innovative practical engineering applications contributing to national security and economic growth.’’ He received the 1983 Wright Prize for interdisciplinary scientific

achievement, the 1988 AAAS Scientific Freedom and Responsibility Award, the 1991

Erice ‘‘Science for Peace’’ Prize, and from the U.S. Government the 1996 R.V. Jones

Foreign Intelligence Award and the 1996 Enrico Fermi Award. In 2003 he received

from the President the National Medal of Science.

From 1977 to 1985 he was on the Council of the Institute for Strategic Studies

(London), and during 1978 was Chairman of the Panel on Public Affairs of the

American Physical Society. He is a long-time member of Pugwash and has served

on the Pugwash Council.

His work for the government has included studies on anti-submarine warfare,

new technologies in health care, sensor systems, military and civil aircraft, and satellite and strategic systems, from the point of view of improving such systems as

well as assessing existing capabilities. For example, he contributed to the first U.S.

photographic reconnaissance satellite program, CORONA, that returned three million feet of film from almost 100 successful flights 1960–1972.

He has been a member of the Scientific Advisory Group to the Joint Strategic Target Planning Staff and was in 1998 a Commissioner on the nine-person ‘‘Rumsfeld’’

Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States. From 1993

to August 2001, he chaired the Arms Control and Nonproliferation Advisory Board

of the Department of State. On the 40th anniversary of the founding of the National

Reconnaissance Office (NRO) he was recognized as one of the ten Founders of National Reconnaissance. In June, 2002, he was awarded la Grande Medaille de

l’Academie des Sciences (France)–2002.

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Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you very much, Dr. Garwin.

Mr. Modeen, you are recognized for five minutes.

STATEMENT OF MR. DAVID J. MODEEN, VICE PRESIDENT, NUCLEAR POWER; CHIEF NUCLEAR OFFICER, ELECTRIC

POWER RESEARCH INSTITUTE

Mr. MODEEN. Okay. Thank you very much.

On behalf of the Electric Power Research Institute and its nuclear utility members, I would like to express our appreciation for

this opportunity to address your Committee, Chairman Biggert, on

the matter of nuclear energy and the research and development we

need to expand its use, not only nationally, but globally.

EPRI, working with the Idaho National Laboratory, recently

completed a document entitled ‘‘The Nuclear Energy Development

Agenda: A Consensus Strategy for the U.S. Government and Industry.’’ I was glad to see that the Committee Members were given a

copy of that, and I also appreciated, of course, listening to your remarks at the most recent NEI R&D summit where we had, really,

our first public unveiling of that strategy.

The agenda that I refer to is included in my written testimony

in more detail, but I will focus here on three main points.

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The first point, for nuclear energy to expand and prosper as a

key element of our national energy strategy, industry and government must work together more. Specifically, industry and government need to reach a consensus on the strategy and work together

on both the planning and the execution.

The second point, the longer-term future of nuclear energy must

be built on a solid foundation that is grounded in the current, ongoing nuclear energy initiatives, which, we believe, must be successful in order for the longer-term elements, those included in GNEP,

I believe, that really have any relevance.

And those three initiatives that form that foundation are: first,

the continued safe and effective operation of our current fleet of reactors; the second, the near-term licensing and deployment of advanced light water reactors; and third, the licensing and construction of a geologic repository of Yucca Mountain.

And the third point, enabled by success in these three nearerterm areas, longer-term goals for nuclear energy become possible

through advances in technology. And here again, there are three

initiatives required: expanding the application of nuclear energy

into process heat applications, including production of hydrogen for

industrial and transportation uses as well as desalination; and the

second is greatly expanding the nuclear fuel resources for longterm energy and environmental sustainability through spent fuel

recycling; and then third, strengthening the proliferation resistance

and physical protection of any nuclear fuel cycle.

And what I would like to do now is expand on each of those three

areas that I just mentioned.

First, on the need for industry and government to work together.

To a large degree, the paradigm, at least in nuclear R&D the past

10 years or more, has been that government only works on the

long-term research and industry works on only the relatively shortterm. We believe that paradigm has been an obstacle to really

achieving alignment on goals and priorities. And in fact, trying to

achieve alignment in forming the basis for a consensus strategy is

why we developed the paper that we did. It was our motivation and

really agreed upon by my CEO as well as the Director of the Idaho

National Lab. And so, consequently, we agreed that the government should dedicate more of its efforts to the short, medium-term

and tried to outline what those might be, and then vice-versa, industry needs to step up to some of those longer-term.

And this really has three objectives. The first is to leverage the

government R&D investment. The second is to introduce mission

focus and market relevance in the R&D decision making. And

third, to accelerate that research and development process and the

transfer of results into the economy in the marketplace. And consequently, again, I can reinforce that I believe the industry and

government, by working synergistically in planning and execution,

will achieve more.

And adding to a point that Dr. Todreas mentioned, I would like

to refer that the industry that I am talking about is more than utilities. It includes the vendors, the architect engineers, the manufacturers, academia, and craft labor: entities that are absolutely necessary to achieve our goals. And we certainly recognize that we

need a more comprehensive plan to restore the nuclear-industrial

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infrastructure in this country. And I share Dr. Todreas’ concern

about the loss of funding to the nuclear university education programs.

The renaissance in nuclear energy that is beginning to take

shape poses challenges for both industry and government, and

challenges, I believe, are probably the greatest of our professional

careers in the nuclear industry. The expectations are high, the

schedules are aggressive, and the resources will be limited. Planning must be realistic and address commercial deployment in a

competitive marketplace, not just the cost of completing the R&D.

And we believe the utility industry has much to offer the Department of Energy as it embarks on major new technology development programs. We want to be part of that planning as well as the

execution, and we are looking forward to working with the new

leadership.

The second area that I talked about was the near-term priorities

for nuclear energy, because they do have some insights relevant to

the GNEP activity.

First, we commend the Congress for its insight and support for

creating a new program authorized in the Energy Policy Act of

2005 focused on the current plants, entitled ‘‘The Nuclear Energy

Systems Support Program.’’ EPRI has long argued that there is an

important federal role in certain aspects of current plant R&D, particularly in areas where there is either a strong federal interest in

the success, and I will give an example in a moment, or where the

technology challenges are just too high or the risk is too high for

the private sector to fund on its own.

A good example is high-performance nuclear fuel, both for the

current fleet and the advanced light water reactors. This high-performance fuel, we believe, can achieve burn-up levels, and that is

really energy production, twice as high as the current fleet, and

this would reduce the volume of spent fuel generated by a factor

of two. And if, in fact, that the stated goal of GNEP—one of the

stated goals is to reduce the volume of waste that would be required in a disposal in a repository by 80 percent, it certainly

stands to reason that this type of technology is in the federal interest and should be a priority.

The second piece is that near-term—or second element is the

near-term licensing and deployment of advanced light water reactors, which is critical to the industry’s ability to provide safe, economic, and reliable electric generation for decades to come. We

were pleased to see that GNEP recognized this strategic importance of the NP–2010 program and believe this cost-shared program requires acceleration to support the new plant project schedule. The recent Nuclear Regulatory Commission called for a designcentered approach for combined license applications will require

more extensive work upfront in standardizing these submittals.

And finally, the EPRI–INL strategy paper calls for an integrated

and cost-effective spent fuel management plan. The lynchpin of this

strategy is the repository at Yucca Mountain. Not only is the geologic repository needed under all strategies and scenarios for the

future, but near-term progress on licensing of Yucca Mountain is

essential to expanding nuclear energy in this country. The other

key elements of that integrated strategy include allowing expanVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00066 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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sion of the Yucca Mountain site to its whole technical capacity, as

Dr. Garwin mentioned, reducing the rate of spent fuel generation

via deployment of high-performance light water reactor fuel, maintaining engineered cooling of the repository well in excess of 50

years prior to closure, providing for interim centralized storage

where aging pads for dry canister passive cooling, deploying multipurpose canisters, and implementing an effective spent fuel transportation system, and eventually the recycling of spent fuel to reduce volume and heat grade, thus making more effective use of the

repository space.

These steps, if taken together and coordinated, provide ample

time for long-term R&D that I will discuss next, to be completed

before concerns arise as to the need for a second repository.

And a final perspective, then, on the longer-term goals regarding

process heat and hydrogen generation. There is a market today,

and we believe that we support the plan laid out in the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

Regarding GNEP specifically, our paper was developed with no

knowledge of GNEP and before it was issued and that we do support the vision and the goals. It is really just a matter of, I think,

the timing. And consequently, we support the funding for it, such

that we can really get in and explore the types of issues that Dr.

Todreas and Dr. Garwin had cited.

And I think I am out of time, Chairman.

Thank you for the opportunity to address your committee.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Modeen follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF DAVID J. MODEEN

On behalf of EPRI and its nuclear utility membership, I’d like to express our appreciation for this opportunity to address your committee. Most of my remarks today

are based on a document prepared jointly by EPRI and the Idaho National Laboratory (INL), entitled, ‘‘Nuclear Energy Development Agenda: A Consensus Strategy for

U.S. Government and Industry.’’

I will focus initially on the rationale and desired outcome of this strategy paper,

as it relates to achieving closer alignment between industry and government on research & development (R&D) priorities, and its value. Second, I will review key content and recommendations from our paper. Finally, I will offer a few observations

relative to the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

To a large degree, the paradigm for nuclear R&D has become, ‘‘Government only

works on long-term research, and industry only works on short-term research.’’ The

EPRI–INL paper attempts to address this situation, which has become an obstacle

to alignment on goals and priorities.

Steve Specker, our EPRI CEO, and John Grossenbacher, the Director of INL, met

in May 2005 and committed to a joint effort to articulate a vision for nuclear energy

and a supporting R&D agenda that could form the basis for a consensus between

industry and government. The framework they agreed to pursue was based on an

80–20 paradigm, to mend the long-term—short-term chasm: government should

dedicate about 20 percent of its efforts to short-to-medium-term R&D, and industry

should dedicate about 20 percent of its efforts to medium-to-longer-term R&D.

EPRI and INL were well positioned to undertake this effort. EPRI is a nonprofit

organization that manages a broad collaborative energy R&D program for the Nation’s electric utility industry, with significant international utility participation. Its

R&D programs cover all technologies for electricity generation, transmission, distribution, and end-use. Specifically with respect to generation, EPRI advocates a diverse portfolio where nuclear plays a key role, along with clean coal, natural gas

and renewables, wind, biomass and solar. My remarks today will only focus on the

nuclear portfolio. All U.S. nuclear utilities are members of EPRI’s nuclear power

sector, along with many international utilities representing about 50 percent of the

world’s nuclear electric generation capacity. Together, they sponsor about $100M/

year in R&D.

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INL was identified by DOE in 2004 as its lead laboratory for nuclear energy research, development, demonstration, and education, with the goal of becoming the

premier laboratory for nuclear energy within a decade. INL has extensive experience and supporting research facilities in all facets of nuclear energy research, including advanced reactor design, advanced fuel cycle design, nuclear materials and

fuel design and testing, and advanced digital controls.

The renaissance in nuclear energy in the U.S. that is beginning to take shape

poses challenges for both industry and government. Expectations will be high for

safe, high quality, high performance technologies, delivered on aggressive schedules.

The technology thrusts are highly interdependent. There will be significant resource

limitations to goal achievement, requiring careful planning and prioritization. Planning must be realistic and address the commercial deployment in a competitive marketplace, not just the cost of completing the R&D. In short, we support industry and

government working synergistically in pursuit of the technologies that will enable

a major expansion of nuclear energy to improve energy security and environmental

quality. For industry and government to achieve common objectives, we need alignment around a consensus strategy, as well as collaboration in both planning and

execution.

EPRI and INL sought to align the technology portfolio with evolving nuclear energy policies and priorities. We reviewed five key government and independent studies on the future of nuclear energy, and found among them a consensus on the basic

priorities for technology development:

1. ‘‘National Energy Policy: Report of the National Energy Policy Development

Group,’’ May 2001. Augmented by Presidential Initiatives supporting the National Energy Policy.

2. ‘‘The Future of Nuclear Power,’’ Massachusetts Institute of Technology

(MIT), July 2003.

3. ‘‘U.S. Department of Energy/Nuclear Power Industry Strategic Plan for Light

Water Reactor Research and Development,’’ February 2004.

4. ‘‘Ending the Energy Stalemate: A Bipartisan Strategy to Meet America’s Energy Challenges,’’ The National Commission on Energy Policy (NCEP), December 2004.

5. ‘‘Moving Forward with Nuclear Power: Issues and Key Factors: Final Report

of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board Nuclear Energy Task Force,’’ January 2005.

Starting with consensus goals that were based on these well-recognized government and independent strategic plans, EPRI and INL assessed the nuclear energy

R&D needed in the U.S. over the next half century.

A team of EPRI and INL staff mapped out a common set of high-level goals and

time-based planning assumptions for nuclear energy, and then identified the R&D

needed to prepare for deployment. These assumptions were formulated to be aggressive yet achievable, and were grounded upon open market principles. R&D challenges were identified, after which an assessment of current nuclear R&D programs

was made to identify opportunities for action. The resulting strategy paper is currently undergoing industry review. We have shared the paper with DOE and are

looking forward to discussing its merits and implications with DOE in detail.

These goals, paraphrased, are:

1. Ensure continued effectiveness of the operating fleet of nuclear power plants.

2. Establish an integrated spent fuel management system consisting of centralized interim storage, the Yucca Mountain repository, and, when necessary,

a closed nuclear fuel cycle.

3. Build a new fleet of nuclear power plants for electricity generation.

4. Produce hydrogen for transportation and industry, and eventually for a hydrogen economy.

5. Apply nuclear systems to other process heat applications, including desalination.

6. Greatly expand nuclear fuel resources for long-term sustainability, commercializing advanced fuel cycles when market conditions demand them in the

long-term.

7. Strengthen proliferation resistance and physical protection of nuclear fuel cycles.

The end result of the process that EPRI and INL followed was something we like

to call ‘‘the R&D continuum.’’ The fifty-plus year strategy for nuclear energy expanVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00068 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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sion and enhanced spent fuel management starts with a prioritized set of technology

goals that flow logically and function in an integrated manner to achieve national

objectives. This long time horizon is necessary to assess the R&D and demonstrations required to deploy nuclear fuel recycle systems, which will eventually be needed to assure sustainability as fuel resources are diminished through expanded use

of the present once-through systems. With these ‘‘continuum’’ goals and supporting

planning assumptions, a matrix of technology options was developed to address each

goal, with an assessment of the technology capabilities and challenges of each option. From this matrix, a technology development agenda was derived, with timing

and budgets aimed as much as practical to lead to private sector investment and

deployment. The strategy paper assumed that each future Administration and Congress will expect Federal investments in nuclear R&D to be based on market demand as a key driver for long-term energy investments and deployment.

Planning Assumptions

The planning assumptions are intentionally challenging in order to help identify

potential technology gaps, but also realistic and achievable. The predicted rapid

growth is enabled by economic competitiveness and is also accelerated by the growing societal demand to increase non-emitting sources of generation. The planning assumptions are summarized below:

Currently Operating Nuclear Plants:

• All existing plants remain operational in 2015, and all have applied for and

have been granted a 20-year life extension. Despite continued high safety performance and reliability, materials aging and equipment obsolescence demand

rigorous monitoring, maintenance and modification with enhanced technology.

Continued high performance is maintained in part by strategic, safety-focused

plant management, and in part by new technology solutions, e.g., advanced

monitoring and repair techniques, improved fuel performance, remedial coolant chemistry, greater reliance on advanced materials and digital controls.

• In the 2020–2030 timeframe, some plants are granted an additional 20-year

license renewal (i.e., to 80 years). Advanced high performance fuel designs are

introduced to enable longer fuel cycles, increase fuel economy, and significantly reduce the spent fuel generation rate.

New Plants for Electricity Generation:

• Many new nuclear plants are in commercial operation by 2015, with many

more under construction. About 30 GWe of new nuclear electric generating capacity is on line or under construction by 2020. A cumulative total of about

100 GWe of new nuclear capacity has been added by 2030. By 2050, nuclear

energy is providing roughly 35 percent of U.S. electricity generation, by reaching a cumulative total of about 400 GWe of new nuclear capacity. These numbers include electricity generation from all reactor types. They also include replacement power for a large segment of the current fleet of reactors, most of

which have been retired or are close to retirement by 2050. This assumed

build-rate severely challenges the existing U.S. industrial infrastructure.

New Plants for Process Heat:

• Based on a prototype Very High Temperature Reactor (VHTR) built and operating by 2020, a few VHTRs are in commercial operation by 2030, with more

under construction. The VHTRs are initially dedicated to producing hydrogen

for commercial and industrial use, focused primarily on rapidly expanding hydrogen demand by the oil, gas and chemical industries. They expand to a sizable fleet by 2050, still focused primarily on industrial applications, but also

serving a growing market for hydrogen to power fuel cells in hybrid and plugin hybrid vehicles. U.S.-built commercial VHTRs are also serving hydrogen

demand for U.S. companies at some petrochemical facilities operating overseas.

• Commercial versions of the VHTR, without hydrogen production equipment,

also begin to serve process heat needs in the petrochemical and other industries. High value-added applications above 800 C are found in recovery of petroleum from oil shale and tar sands, coal gasification, and various petrochemical processes (e.g., ethylene and styrene).

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Spent Fuel Management and Expanding Nuclear Fuel Resources:

• Licensing of a spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain Nevada is completed

by 2015, with construction and waste acceptance into the repository and into

a co-located used fuel aging facility by that date. Interim storage away from

reactor sites is established at two locations in the U.S., one east and one west

of the Mississippi River (per NCEP recommendation).

• With a rapidly expanding nuclear energy industry and a growing inventory

of spent fuel, an integrated spent fuel management plan for the U.S. emerges

by 2015 that obtains bipartisan support for implementation. Key elements of

this plan include expansion of the capacity of the Yucca Mountain repository;

engineered cooling of the repository well in excess of 50 years (e.g., up to 300

years) prior to closure, in combination with centralized interim storage of

spent fuel. Reprocessing of spent fuel is expected to begin in a demonstration

plant by about 2030. The integrated plan addresses reprocessing, reactor and

repository strategies, and offers a least-cost path for safe, long-term management of spent nuclear fuel.

Æ The reprocessing part of this integrated strategy is based on an aggressive R&D program aimed at identifying cost-effective and diversion-resistant means to recover usable reactor fuel. These technologies will also

demonstrate the ability to separate isotopes that contribute the most to

heat output from spent fuel, thereby increasing repository storage capacity.

Æ The reactor technology part of this integrated strategy develops fast reactors to recycle light water reactor spent fuel in order to transmute minor

actinides as well as produce electricity. Following a demonstration plant,

built and operated with government funding by about 2035, new fast reactors are deployed commercially, with government subsidy as needed for

the waste-consuming mission. In the long-term, the price of uranium increases to a level that supports recycle and eventually breeding.

Timing and Costs of the Nuclear Energy Development Agenda

The length of time that each technology will need to become commercially competitive to support the planning assumptions was estimated; and the R&D timeline

needed for each technology was set to assure in-time licensing, demonstration, and

commercialization. It is important to be realistic and objective about the time and

resources needed to commercialize new technologies, factoring in technological, licensing, and funding uncertainties. The time required to prepare for and successfully complete regulatory approval was included.

The near-term deployment goals for Advanced Light Water Reactors (ALWRs) for

electricity generation, and a renewed commitment to R&D applicable to all LWRs

(including current plants), are the least expensive. The bulk of federal investments

are envisioned to occur over the next ten years, with continued modest funding after

that as necessary, particularly on strategic areas such as advanced LWR fuels and

materials. Costs of federal spending on electricity generation are based on continued

funding of the NP2010 program on a cost-shared basis, and projections that the private sector will deploy ALWRs for electricity generation by 2015, based on limited

federal incentives. No federal funding is expected for NP2010 after initial deployment of the first six plants. Total federal costs are roughly $500M, with equal or

greater cost share by industry. This does not include costs of completing Yucca

Mountain, which are uncertain; nor does it include the costs of revitalizing the nuclear industrial infrastructure.

Federal spending for nuclear generated hydrogen and other process heat applications are based on projections that the commercial VHTR technology can be demonstrated and will become competitive in the 2020 timeframe for industrial applications. This timeline assumes that conservative technology choices are made to maximize near-term licensing and commercial deployment potential. Total federal RD&D

costs for the nuclear hydrogen mission are estimated at $2B through about 2020,

after which VHTRs will go forward as commercial units.

The costs of establishing nuclear fuel recycle are considerably higher than reestablishing the ALWR option for electricity generation and creating a commercial

VHTR option for hydrogen generation. There are a number of significant technical,

cost, and institutional challenges facing reprocessing that likely will delay the start

of prototype demonstration until about 2030, and large scale deployment until about

mid century. Rough costs to the Federal Government may reach $35B by 2050 and

$60B by 2070. These estimates include both the RD&D costs and government-funded subsidies for a portion of the construction and operation of fast reactors and nuVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00070 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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clear fuel reprocessing plants. These costs assume significant reliance on the private

sector to construct and operate fast reactors as commercial power plants (after the

technology is demonstrated and licensed, and the learning curve is ascended). These

costs are highly uncertain because of the speculative nature of estimating when

nominal commercial viability can be achieved for these facilities.

Rough costs to the Federal Government through mid-century depend primarily on

whether the reprocessing plan has been structured to be the least-cost path for safe,

long-term management of spent nuclear fuel (per above planning assumptions), or

whether an accelerated plan is chosen for deployment that does not wait for the

market price for uranium to drive the shift from the once-through fuel cycle to a

closed fuel cycle, and from LWRs to a mix of LWRs and fast reactors.

There are fundamental differences between the deployment of nuclear energy generation with ALWRs and commercial VHTRs, and technologies to close the nuclear

fuel cycle. There are commercial markets for electricity and hydrogen that enable

near-term deployment of ALWRs and a transition of VHTRs to the private sector

as soon as the technology is ready. There is no comparable existing commercial market for fuel recycle.

A market will evolve for the fast reactor component of closed fuel cycle systems

because fast reactors can produce electricity. However, based on today’s technology

and uranium ore/enrichment costs, fast reactors are not expected to compete with

ALWRs in power generation until about mid-century. Economic parity could be

achieved when ALWR fuel based on enriched U–235 becomes sufficiently more expensive than fast reactor fuel using recycled components. In the long-term, as uranium prices rise, the alternate fuel cycles will advance to breeding and the need for

subsidy will end.

Even with the extended timetable for introducing fuel recycle in the U.S., a single

expanded-capacity spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain is still adequate to meet

U.S. needs. Construction of a second repository is not required under this timetable.

If, however, reprocessing is implemented on an accelerated schedule before it is economic to do so based on fuel costs, then the Federal Government will need to bear

a much larger cost.

In the U.S. context, the optimum scenarios for transitioning to fuel recycling require an R&D focus on those technologies that enable ‘‘full actinide recycle,’’ and

fast reactors. This path is preferred over one that maintains a ‘‘thermal recycle’’

mode using MOX fuel in light water reactors, because the high costs and extra

waste streams associated with this latter path do not provide the desired benefits

in terms of either non-proliferation or spent fuel management costs.

Priorities for R&D Programs

Light Water Reactor R&D

Significant R&D needs exist for the current fleet and the new fleet, especially in

areas of age-related materials degradation, fuel reliability, equipment reliability and

obsolescence, plant security, cyber security, and low-level waste minimization. Also,

developing a new generation of high reliability LWR fuel with much higher burnup

will better utilize uranium resources, improve operating flexibility, and significantly

reduce spent fuel volume and transportation needs, resulting in additional improvements in nuclear energy economics. These are mid-term R&D needs whose impact

would be considerable if accelerated with government investment.

Process Heat R&D

An essential consideration in reducing dependence on foreign sources of oil and

natural gas is that hydrogen is necessary today in upgrading heating oil and gasoline, and in making ammonia for fertilizers. Making hydrogen today consumes five

percent of all natural gas in the U.S. and demand for hydrogen is growing rapidly.

This situation can be improved with a nuclear system having hydrogen production

capability as soon as it can be developed. In the long-term, many believe that a hydrogen economy is essential for revolutionizing transportation, in which case the demand for competitive and environmentally responsible hydrogen production will

greatly increase. A large-scale, economical nuclear source would hasten that future.

Fuel Recycle R&D

Establishing a fuel recycle with the demonstrated ability to improve the management of nuclear wastes will bring added confidence in greatly expanding the use of

nuclear energy. More importantly, advanced fuel cycle technology options provide

the ability to supply sufficient nuclear fuel in the future to ensure long-term energy

and environmental sustainability.

Necessary technologies include cost-effective and diversion-resistant reprocessing

to extract fuel and separate and manage wastes, as well as alternate reactor conVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00071 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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cepts (e.g., fast reactors) to generate electricity as they generate additional fuel and

consume the long-lived actinides and other constituents. These increase confidence

in achieving a sustainable economic fuel supply, reducing the spent fuel backlog,

and increasing the effective capacity of Yucca Mountain many-fold in the long-term.

While there are significant technology challenges and market uncertainties, largescale deployment of fuel recycle by government and industry could begin by midcentury.

Conclusions

• The strategy for nuclear energy development and implementation in the

United States requires a consensus of industry and government.

• The overall strategy should be determined by considering a combination of

market needs and national goals for energy security, national security, and

environmental quality.

• The strategy should integrate near-term, medium-term, and long-term priorities. R&D needs to proceed now on all fronts, but priorities for deployment

are as follows:

– Near-term: License renewal for the current fleet, and licensing and deployment of new, standardized ALWRs are high priorities within the next

decade. Timely near-term deployment of ALWRs will require demonstration of a workable licensing process, and completion of first-of-a-kind engineering for at least two standardized designs. Industry and DOE

should cost share these R&D programs at a level to achieve deployment

by 2015. In addition, DOE and industry should cost share certain LWR

technology thrusts with significant national benefits, e.g., a new generation of LWR fuel. The newly authorized Nuclear Energy Systems Support

Program is key to this objective.

To enable the resurgence of nuclear energy, the near-term elements of an

integrated spent fuel management plan must proceed. These near-term

elements include completion of the repository at Yucca Mountain, deployment of multi-purpose canisters approved by the NRC, implementation of

an effective spent fuel transportation system, and provision for ‘‘aging

pads’’ to allow cooling prior to placement in the repository.

– Medium-term: Development of a high temperature commercial VHTR is

needed, capable of generating hydrogen at competitive costs, for initial

use by the petroleum and chemical industries. Deployment will require

concept development, defining end-user requirements and interfaces, resolution of design and licensing issues and prototype demonstration. This

effort should be funded primarily by government, but targeted for expanding industry cost-sharing as commercialization becomes more promising.

– Long-term: Development of fuel recycling technologies will eventually be

needed for a sustainable nuclear energy future. These technologies will

also support an integrated and more cost-effective spent fuel management plan. Key elements of this integrated plan include expansion of the

capacity of the Yucca Mountain repository; provisions for engineered cooling of the repository well in excess of 50 years prior to closure, in combination with co-located ‘‘aging pads’’ for spent fuel. Reprocessing of spent

fuel is expected to begin in a demonstration plant by about 2030, based

on an aggressive R&D program aimed at identifying cost-effective and diversion-resistant means to recover usable reactor fuel. Successful development of fast-spectrum reactors will be required for ‘‘recycling’’ the usable uranium and plutonium recovered from spent fuel, while consuming

the long-lived actinides. These facilities should be funded by government.

• The strategy should address rebuilding the nuclear industry infrastructure in

the U.S. Currently, major equipment for nuclear plants must be procured offshore. Long-term energy security requires that the U.S. industry have the capability of supplying and supporting U.S. energy producers, and better integrating energy supplier and end-user needs. These infrastructure needs include large numbers of new skilled construction workers, engineers, nuclear

plant operators and other key personnel needed for construction, operation

and maintenance of new facilities.

69

Initial Observations Relative to GNEP:

The above Consensus Nuclear Energy R&D Strategy for U.S. Government and Industry was drafted prior to DOE announcing its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.

Nevertheless, there is significant agreement and alignment between these independent planning efforts.

EPRI supports the vision and goals of the GNEP. We look forward to the opportunity to work with DOE on this important initiative.

The consensus strategy paper was intended to address the continuum of nuclear

energy R&D needs. In contrast, GNEP has a somewhat more focused scope, so there

are understandable differences between the two approaches.

Important areas of substantial agreement include:

• Near-term deployment of ALWRs and the licensing of Yucca Mountain. The

NP2010 program is critical to the future expansion of nuclear power and ultimately to moving the Nation to a more sustainable and secure energy future.

Further, we agree with GNEP that under all strategies and scenarios for the

future of nuclear power, the U.S. will need a permanent geologic repository.

• Creating a nuclear fuel leasing and used fuel take-back regime for ‘‘user’’ nations in return for their commitment to refrain from developing and deploying

enrichment and reprocessing technologies. This central foundation for GNEP

was supported by the EPRI–INL paper, based primarily on the recommendation in the Dec. 2004 report of the National Commission on Energy Policy,

as a vital non-proliferation initiative.

• Improving the cost and diversion resistance of reprocessing technologies before

deployment. Advanced separation technologies that are more proliferation resistant and more cost effective than currently available technologies are essential objectives. Today’s recycling technology has significant limitations that

effectively eliminate it as an option to accomplish the GNEP non proliferation

and spent fuel management objectives.

• Developing advanced fast spectrum reactors for reducing the long-lived, heat

producing isotopes present in spent fuel. This is an essential step for improving spent fuel management, since single-pass recycling in LWRs provides little or no reduction in long-lived waste volume and heat output. The alternative, ‘‘full actinide recycle’’ will reduce heat output, and may also contribute

to diversion resistance by relying on processing schemes that keep minor

actinides and plutonium together.

• Advanced reactors will need to be certified by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

• Perhaps most important to Congressional deliberations, our work and the

GNEP agree that well-crafted, deliberate, and rigorous R&D is needed now to

advance both reprocessing and fast reactor technologies.

As discussed above, our estimate is that reprocessing in a large scale demonstration plant would begin operation by about 2030, with fast reactor technology demonstration in the same timeframe. Smaller scale pilot demonstrations may be feasible earlier than 2030. Full scale commercial deployment would occur in the 2050

timeframe. These timelines are more conservative than corresponding deployment

estimates provided in GNEP documents. We believe that the significant technical,

resource, and licensing challenges facing these advanced technologies will drive deployment dates.

It is important to note the origin and implications of these timing projections. As

previously stated, we believe that starting the R&D now is a high priority. In short,

our longer timelines should not be interpreted as a recommendation to ‘‘go slow,’’

but rather as a belief that the technical challenges to moving from laboratory to

commercial scale are daunting, and that achieving end results that are cost effective

is equally challenging. Hence we encourage adequate funding for GNEP, with a program timeline and challenging yet achievable milestones. We also encourage adequate funding for other priority nuclear energy programs such as NP2010, Nuclear

Energy Systems Support Program, and the nuclear hydrogen mission. We believe

that an aggressive nuclear fuel recycling technology development program, even if

it takes longer than currently envisioned, will still be beneficial.

On the subject of repository deployment, we found that ‘‘a single expanded-capacity spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain is adequate to meet U.S. needs, and

that construction of a second repository is not required under this timetable.’’ This

is due to a number of factors, including:

• Modifying the legislative limit on the Yucca Mountain repository capacity to

permit utilization of its full technical capacity.

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• Developing a new generation of high performance LWR fuel in the 2010–2020

timeframe, which will reduce the rate of spent fuel generation in the U.S. by

up to a factor of two.

• Maintaining engineered cooling of the repository before final closure for periods of time in excess of 50 years to allow for decay of the shorter-term fission

products.

• Alternatively or in combination with in-repository cooling, temporary centralized storage or aging pad sites can be provided where spent fuel is cooled for

an appropriate length of time before repository emplacement.

• Deployment of reprocessing and fast reactors can be initiated in time to adequately manage used fuel within a single expanded-capacity geological repository.

The EPRI–INL paper identifies energy and environmental sustainability as the

primary justification for fuel recycling. Recycling nuclear fuel may also enable

breeding of new fuel, which will extend nuclear power’s contribution to future energy supplies for many centuries to come. We believe that improved spent fuel management is a potential inherent benefit of recycling, with the degree of improvement

dependent upon technology advances. Based on its extensive work, EPRI believes

that the current repository design poses a small and acceptable risk to society. This

will remain so, whether or not the long lived actinides are reduced by recycling. So

the advantages of recycling to the repository primarily relate to the efficient use of

repository space, and having the flexibility to recover and recycle prior-emplaced

used fuel, if and when technical and economic conditions so dictate.

We support the assured fuel supply and used fuel take-back regime proposed by

the Administration. For this regime to gain acceptance among user nations, the U.S.

and other fuel supplier nations must provide assurance of their ability to meet commitments for both fuel supply and take-back, in order to obtain early commitments

from the user nations to forgo enrichment and reprocessing. This is an important

reason why completion of centralized interim storage facilities and a permanent repository are urgent to success of the fuel supply and take-back regime, even before

recycling is ready.

Finally, we support development of a comprehensive plan and joint efforts to rebuild our national nuclear infrastructure. Currently, major equipment must be procured offshore, and aging workforce issues point to the need for aggressive training

and recruiting initiatives. Long-term energy security requires that the U.S. industry

have the capability of supplying and supporting U.S. energy system vendors, architect-engineers, and better integrating energy supplier and end-user needs. Workforce infrastructure needs include large numbers of new skilled construction workers, engineers, nuclear plant operators and other key personnel needed for construction, operation and maintenance of new facilities. I share with other industry

spokesmen the current concern for lost funding to nuclear university education programs.

In summary, EPRI would like to work with DOE on creating a consensus nuclear

R&D strategy for the future. U.S. utilities accept the DOE premise that GNEP is

primarily a federal initiative for governmental purposes, and thus should be funded

by federal appropriations. Our members are presently focused on maintaining excellent performance of current plants and preparing for near-term deployment of

ALWRs. These are the areas that utilities believe justify cost-sharing with DOE at

the present time. EPRI and its members are interested in helping inform the R&D

agenda for long-term programs. If the R&D is successful, they will be ready to cost

share advanced reactor deployment in a manner consistent with the EPRI–INL Nuclear Energy R&D Strategy paper and the ‘‘80–20 paradigm’’ discussed earlier.

BIOGRAPHY FOR DAVID J. MODEEN

David J. Modeen has over 29 years of operational, technical and policy experience

in the nuclear field. Dave joined EPRI in March 2003 as the Vice President, Nuclear

Sector & Chief Nuclear Officer. In this capacity, he leads the team responsible for

development of EPRI’s Nuclear Power technology research and development program and business development, in close concert with its advisors, both domestic

and international. The technology development plans and outcomes are reflected in

annual, three-year, and longer-term nuclear strategic planning documents aligned

with EPRI’s overarching Electricity Technology Roadmap.

Previously, Dave was a Director at the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) located in

Washington, DC, with responsibilities in a variety of areas, including engineering,

security/access authorization, training and risk assessment. During his 14 years at

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NEI and its predecessor organization, he managed the development and ultimate

approval of a number of formal industry positions requiring collaboration among

EPRI staff, INPO, vendor and utility advisors. His leadership resulted in industry

executives endorsing industry guidance from NEI that effectively mandated implementation.

Prior to his Washington experience, Dave spent seven years with the Portland

General Electric Company as a Senior Engineer, and obtained a Senior Reactor Operator certificate and stood watch as a Shift Technical Advisor at the Trojan Nuclear Plant. He had broad technical responsibilities at Trojan including upgrade of

the Emergency Operating Procedures, development of Safety Parameter Display

System, Control Room Design Review, and fire protection safe shutdown analysis

and alternative shutdown procedures.

An honors graduate of Iowa State University, Modeen holds a B.S. degree in industrial engineering. He served five years in the U.S. Navy as a submarine warfare

officer, qualifying as Engineer while serving on board the USS Patrick Henry. He

serves on the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations Advisory Council, is a registered nuclear and mechanical professional engineer in the state of Oregon, and is

a member of ANS.

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DISCUSSION

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you very much.

And we will now have—Members will ask questions. Again, we

have a time limit for us, for five minutes. And I will begin with the

first question.

Mr. Johnson, Dr. Garwin supports the vision of GNEP, but he asserts in his testimony that technical goals of the program are more

ambitious than is really needed. Achieving GNEP’s technical goals

could increase the effective storage capacity of Yucca Mountain’s

repository by a factor of 100 whereas a 10-fold increase in capacity,

which could be achieved at lower cost, would enable Yucca Mountain to store the waste produced by commercial power reactors operating for the next century. Do you agree with this?

Mr. JOHNSON. Based on simply hearing the statement this morning, I can’t say that I hear anything I disagree with, but I would

prefer to read a little bit more in detail and understand the basis

for the conclusions.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Well, then would you think that DOE

would consider scaling back the technical requirements for separation efficiency in the—in your systems analysis?

Mr. JOHNSON. If, upon further study and investigation, that is

the correct course of action; yes.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Okay. Thank you.

Then this is for Dr. Garwin, Mr. Johnson, and Dr. Todreas. I

cannot say that. Todreas. Is that right?

Dr. TODREAS. Todreas.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Todreas. I am putting an extra syllable in

there. Thank you. Todreas.

Again, Dr. Garwin asserts in his testimony that the ordering of

R&D priorities in GNEP is all wrong, and he suggested any nearterm demonstration of UREX is premature and wasteful and we

should instead focus on the advanced burner reactors and the fuels

for the ABRs and the reprocessing technology necessary for the

ABRs. So do you agree with that, Dr. Todreas?

Dr. TODREAS. Yes, let me start.

The other thing Dr. Garwin said is that the fuel reprocessing and

the reactor design have to be done together and in coordination.

This is new in reactor technology. We always used to design the

reactor with the fuel then throw the fuel over the fence and let people take care of it from a waste management point of view. In this

new activity, particularly with reprocessing, you have to do them

all together in terms of coordination. And so the bottleneck here is

the reactor design and its fuel selection, as well as successful reprocessing. So my answer would be you have got to pursue UREX,

or whatever comes out of it, and in parallel, design a fast reactor,

select the fuel, and most importantly, which hasn’t been mentioned, is you have got to get the capital cost of the fast reactors

down so they can be cost-competitive so that industry will take

over the operation of these, which will make electricity on the competitive market.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. If there were to be built, then, a new reactor, the light water reactor, wouldn’t that show how to cut the cost

on that? We haven’t built a reactor, you know, in this country, in

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so long. Would that help to start with that and then determine how

to build the other?

Dr. TODREAS. Yes. First, getting a light water reactor order to get

the industry going to rejuvenate people, that is critical. But if you

are implying that there is not significant difference between the design and the objectives of a fast reactor for——

Chairwoman BIGGERT. No, I am not suggesting that.

Dr. TODREAS. Okay. So you have to start with the light water reactor, but then the challenges of a fast spectrum reactor for transmutation with its fuel, with its reprocessing, are a factor above a

light water reactor design. And you have got to get after that, too.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Well, I think we need to start that process

right away, but—and some of you are saying we should wait, but

I think that—also with the industry to start.

Mr. Johnson, do you have anything to add to that?

Mr. JOHNSON. What we have tried to do is lay out a development

program where we are scaling up to an appropriate size of demonstration facilities to better inform the question and the cost of

any further commercialization of the technology. We are trying to

walk through this in a step-wise fashion, better understand the

technology, better understand the ultimate cost and schedule requirements.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

Dr. Garwin, how would we obtain enough material to fabricate

and test new fuels without a sizable UREX demonstration plant?

Dr. GARWIN. You know, there is plenty of separated fuel available abroad. There is MOX fuel, if you wanted to go to mixed oxide

fuel, 40 tons of it that was prepared for the Superphenix in France.

So it is no problem, and what you want is test fuel. That is, you

want small amounts of fuel, not a full reactor load. The advanced

burner test reactor is to be a neutron source, a fast spectrum

source, for testing small amounts.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. And if we don’t want to use MOX, then

what——

Dr. GARWIN. Well, it is very much up in the air as to whether

one uses metal fuel or oxide fuel or carbide fuel or a nitride fuel.

And there are advantages to both of them. As Dr. Todreas says, it

has never really been considered altogether, the reactor design, its

safety, its margins, the fuel form, and the reprocessing. And that

is exactly what needs to be done here in order to get the capital

cost of this fast reactor down.

So this is a big gamble, and the question is can we increase the

odds of winning it. But I do emphasize that the engineering scale

demonstration for UREX+ is far too big, whatever its technical requirements. It assumes that there will be a single 2,000 ton per

year plant, and one percent is a typical demonstration scale. That

would be 20 tons per year, not 200 tons per year. Much too big,

much too soon, much too high requirements are set on it.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. I think we have wasted 25 years since we

have stopped this process. I hope that we will move ahead.

Mr. Modeen, you wanted to make a comment?

Mr. MODEEN. Yes, Madame Chairman. I—just a couple of things.

Listening to the answers to the—first, as an example to support

Dr. Todreas, the French experience with the Phoenix and then the

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Super Phoenix reactor. Phoenix, the smaller reactor, worked very

well. In fact, it is still working today. Scaled up to large commercial

size, 1,300, 50-megawatt electric Super Phoenix ran on and off, but

eventually, after 10 or 12 years, made the decision to decommission

it. They just could not make it work right at that level.

The second piece is relative to our study with the Idaho National

Lab, I think our view, and I think what I am hearing from the panelists, is not so much that we don’t do the research, but it is all

things in time and trying to figure out what does one do first and

then next and next and understand and make informed decisions

based on that research prior to this construction of some of these

engineered facilities and otherwise. That is, kind of, the industry’s

perspective.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

Mr. Honda, you are recognized.

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Madame Chair.

I am trying to wrap my head around this whole discussion and

this whole process, and I think what I am hearing is that we have

made decisions, we have made decisions quickly, and there are

some concerns about the one process to the selected process or the

solution set, and there is a lot of concern about the magnitude and

cost and readiness.

Mr. Johnson, you have talked of GNEP being a phase program

in which a decision and plans will proceed only after sound assessments of costs, risks, and schedules are understood. You plan to

conduct applied research, engineering, and environmental studies

to reform these decisions. What do these studies need to show to

justify the current technology down-selections and how will the

studies affect these decisions should they prove to be adverse to the

current plan?

Mr. JOHNSON. What we are planning to do and what we have to

do over the next two years is to continue the research that has

been underway in our laboratories over the last four years on the

separations technology, develop the conceptual designs of these facilities, conduct the necessary National Environmental Policy Act

analyses, and develop a better understanding of cost and schedule

of moving forward with the demonstration facilities. We also want

to have completed the types of systems analysis that have been discussed so far this morning to better understand and make a completely informed decision as to whether this is the right path to

continue down or is there a course correction that is necessary or

is it something to abandon altogether.

Mr. HONDA. Well, you know, that is within the context of

UREX+.

Mr. JOHNSON. That is in the context of all of the demonstration

facilities, sir.

Mr. HONDA. So you are saying that you would be looking at different processes and making a comparative analysis of their—the

cost-effectiveness and the timeliness of these?

Mr. JOHNSON. With respect to the separation technology, the

work that we have done to date in the laboratory gives us full confidence that the UREX+ process is, indeed, the correct process to

continue with. So while we may continue some—a small level of efVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00079 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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fort in some other advanced aqueous processes, the majority of our

work would be focused on the UREX+ process.

Mr. HONDA. Okay. I think I am getting clearer now.

On the UREX process, as if we have already made a decision

that we want to go down that path, prior to looking at all processes

first, is that a correct statement that there have been some decisions already made to go down that path in spite of the fact that

you are saying that we are going to study others or——

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir, that is a——

Mr. HONDA. And was that choice made through some sort of a

peer-review process where other folks were involved in deciding

that, or how was that decision made?

Mr. JOHNSON. The decision has been made from an informed position, one, knowing and understanding the PUREX process that is

used internationally——

Mr. HONDA. Excuse me. Informed, meaning by peer review or by

a small group of folks? Were there outside folks? Or who did that?

Mr. JOHNSON. Our federal advisory committee, our subcommittee

on advanced fuel cycle program, chaired by Dr. Burton Richter, has

been watching over and guiding this program since it inception.

Mr. HONDA. So he guided a group that was brought in its input

within the government in the technical fields and other folks? I

guess that is what you call peer review. Is that what you are saying?

Mr. JOHNSON. It is one type of peer review, sir.

Mr. HONDA. But the traditional—understanding what peer review means, is that what you are saying, or are you saying it is

a narrow form of peer review?

Mr. JOHNSON. I am saying it is an independent outside body,

which has done monitoring and reviewing the process and the

progress made in the laboratory.

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Can you tell me who chose them or how they

were chosen or——

Mr. JOHNSON. The subcommittee was selected by decision of the

full federal advisory committee.

Mr. HONDA. Okay. And I suspect that you have records of the

discussions and how you approached the consensus?

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir. We have records of their meeting minutes.

Mr. HONDA. Okay. Thank you.

To the—it appears my time is up, but just a real quick question

to the other three. Do you have any comments to the questions I

had?

Dr. GARWIN. I have had the benefit of an exchange of correspondence with Dr. Richter. I don’t think that they had contact with

GNEP until the end of February, and I really don’t understand

whether the UREX process that was proposed at that time separated the plutonium and the transuranics from the lanthanide fission products or not. If not, then the fuel was by no means selfprotecting by a factor of 1,000 or so. I understand now Dr. Fink’s

briefing of March 10 includes the lanthanides to be shipped to the

advanced burner reactor plant and then removed, but this is hardly

a stable program, and it could hardly be said that the transmutation subcommittee reviewed and chose it.

77

Dr. TODREAS. Yes, what I wanted to do is just bring you back to

the criteria that I mentioned for selection, which were coordination,

economics, protection of public health, and worker safety, physical

protection, and safeguards. And before you settle on a process for

UREX and then commit down the road for large expenditures,

maybe some engineering demonstration is okay before that and

more like 20 tons or something. You have got to check that. And

I would just take cost, economics. I know you have had hearings

on the economics of reprocessing, but this reprocessing cost is going

to be expensive. It is going to raise the fuel cycle cost for nuclear

power. You need a systems approach as to who is going to come

up with that cost, and you need to bound that cost. And so before

you pick the process, you need to have enough R&D results in hand

that you know where you are on that factor. So UREX+1 may look

good, but I don’t think it has been through a systematic study evaluation pinning all of the points on these criteria I listed, and I

would go back to cost. And it is no wonder. It has just been at lab

scale. So much more R&D needs to be done.

Mr. HONDA. Thank you.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Mr. Honda, I think that we should keep

in mind that we—the laboratories have been doing reprocessing

R&D for quite some time now. In fact, the—Argonne National Lab

that is in my district, when I first came to Congress, was really

working on the electrometallurgic reprocessing and then went to

the pyroprocessing, and so I don’t think that UREX is new. It is

not new, and it has not been—and it has been studied. But what

we are talking about really now is the R&D and demonstration.

So——

Mr. HONDA. You know, if I may, Madame Chair, I think I understand what you are saying, but what I am hearing, though, even

though it is R&D, that there are still other matters and parameters

that still haven’t been scaled out from R&D into a pilot program,

and it sounds like what we are looking at is 200 tons rather than

20, and there is a concern about the whole rolling out and planning

for this kind of a process.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Well, if—I think Mr. Johnson can address

that, and I would like him to, because I think that is misunderstanding there.

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you, Madame Chairwoman.

With respect to the size of the facility, I am sure the Department

has contributed more to the confusion on that matter than anyone

around, and I would like to take this opportunity to point out that

while initially in the internal discussions within the Department

on the overall Global Nuclear Energy Partnership that—these technology demonstrations, larger numbers or larger sized facilities

were discussed. Right now, though, sir, we have underway an activity looking at making a determination or recommendation on an

adequately sized facility for the separations work. Like you, I will

admit, a facility on the order of, you know, 200 metric tons to 500

metric tons ‘‘scares me to death.’’ One is we don’t know enough to

go to that size facility. Secondly, I doubt we could afford it. So we

have an activity underway which will be informed by experienced

personnel from those countries who are operating such facilities

today as well as scientists and engineers within our laboratory sysVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00081 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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tem. Making a determination of what is an appropriately-scaled

sized facility for demonstrating the physical phenomena that is of

most interest in understanding the processes and being able to determine the safety of operating such a facility is a key consideration. So the final design sizes have not been established. My hope

is that it is significantly smaller than what the stated sizes have

been to date.

Mr. HONDA. Would the Chair—may I ask another question?

Chairwoman BIGGERT. I hate to keep our other Members waiting,

so let us come back to that.

The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Neugebauer, is recognized for

five minutes.

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Thank you, Chairwoman.

I want to kind of move to the more commercial application. I

think one of the things that I am strongly convinced of is that we

have got to do whatever is necessary to get moving again on nuclear energy in the production of electricity primarily from that. I

think we have lulled ourselves here and wasted a lot of time, as

the Chairwoman mentioned, not doing that. What I—as I listened

to the dialogue this morning, what concerns me is that I kind of

heard that Mr. Modeen, in talking about the fact that—maybe that

the scientific community and the commercial community are not

necessarily working in conjunction with technologies that we could

bring out quickly and it is—you know, we have got some people

working on the long-term, some people working on the short-term.

I appreciate some of the comments that Dr. Garwin made about,

you know, let us put—focus on things that work, make sense, and

let us make them cost-effective. And those are wonderful words to

my ears.

I think one of the things that I would ask you, the panel, is , you

know, where are—we can’t just—we can’t go into a demonstration

project and drag this out another 10 or 15 or 20 years without really getting—stepping up to, I believe, the commercial construction

of new reactors in this country. So my question to the panel today

is while some of these things may have some long-range research

value, and that will be wonderful, but the American taxpayers

today need for us to do whatever we need—can to get our dependence on foreign energy reduced fairly quickly. So what are we doing

in a—at—today, and what are some of the things that we should

be doing to get that process moving forward where we really need

to be breaking ground on a new reactor or several new reactors

within the next 12 to 18 months? And are we going to do that? And

can we do that?

Mr. Johnson.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir. The Department’s Nuclear Power 2010

program, which is a cost-share initiative with industry, is finalizing

design of the most advanced light water reactor designs and helping demonstrate the new regulatory processes for siting and operating these facilities. The initiative has been a tremendous success

and continues to be. We are fully committed to that program.

Based on the work that we have done in partnership with the industry, we have seen, and hopefully you have read as well in the

press, many companies which are stepping forward and making indications that they will be making decisions soon on going forward

79

with new nuclear plant construction projects. I think the outlook

looks very good.

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Dr. Todreas, do you have comments on that?

Dr. TODREAS. I am going to leave this to DOE and EPRI. I was

the co-chairman of the DOE committee that wrote the road map for

nuclear power 2010. I saw it launch, but the execution remains

with these people.

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Thank you.

Dr. Garwin.

Dr. GARWIN. Yes. Well, we need to buy reactors of existing type.

That is, we can’t start to work now designing new reactors, so if

they are not ready for a decision, we should not consider them in

the near-term expansion. What we are talking about here in GNEP

is beyond that, the particular part of it is the waste reduction by

reprocessing and recycling with this great new gamble of a big fast

reactor population. That we need to think about and design and design and design, because we can’t make those decisions right now

if we are not going to lock ourselves into a high-cost structure that

will have to be abandoned.

Mr. MODEEN. Let me answer several ways. First, what Congress

has done with the Energy Policy Act of 2005 certainly took a lot of

the risk, the investment risk, off from the utilities. The second

piece is, and I would agree with Mr. Johnson, the NP–2010 initiative is very, very important. Some concern, I believe, Skip Bowman

from NEI testified relative to the funding, a little bit of plus up on

that. It took a bit of a hit there with the potential GNEP proposal.

Yucca Mountain can’t lose sight of that. It is those things, and I

think we all know what they are, and we are working through

them. In that regard, I would say that, just so my remarks aren’t

misspoken, in the area of advanced light water reactors, the industry and the government, since the late ’80s, has worked very well

in a public-private partnership. We are anticipating and have a

strong desire to do something similar both for the high-temperature reactor for a hydrogen mission as well as then what may come

out of GNEP.

Just a couple of other points relative to the balance. Again, I am

with you on the near-term priorities. The longer-term for GNEP is

really more a governmental role, and I think today our members

are not ready to cost-share in that activity but may be later. On

the point of that I can see in our paper, we justify recycling in the

2035 to 2050 time period based on energy and environmental sustainability, not non-proliferation and those types of issues. But the

second point I think is important to keep in mind, again, there is

sort of a rush to do something, is that the fuel supply and takeback regime that is at the center of GNEP, in the industry’s view,

can be sustained via a once-through cycle for quite a few decades.

Ultimately, again, one needs to get to the reprocessing and recycling. That is why it is important to start and complete the research today, but again, it is a timing issue.

Mr. NEUGEBAUER. Thank you.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

The gentleman from Texas, Mr. Green, is recognized.

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Mr. GREEN. Thank you, Madame Chairlady, and I thank the

Ranking Member as well. Thank you for this opportunity to explore

some new concepts, I suppose.

If we complete this project 100 percent, what percent of our electricity needed will be impacted? Dr. Johnson.

Mr. JOHNSON. Sir, I am afraid I don’t have an answer for you to

that particular question.

Mr. GREEN. Right now—we, right now, get about 20 percent of

our electricity from nuclear reactors.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

Mr. GREEN. If we can successfully complete this project, what

percent of our needs will be satisfied?

Mr. JOHNSON. I can’t give you a percentage, but let me answer

your question in a slightly different way. What this technology

demonstration program we are talking about this morning is focused on is addressing issues associated with the spent fuel that

is generated by these plants.

Mr. GREEN. Well, let me do this. I appreciate your comments and

your commentary.

Does anyone on the panel have an answer for me?

Dr. GARWIN. It is just a different way of doing business. The cost

will go up, so if you are price conscious, you will use less electricity,

less——

Mr. GREEN. Yes, sir.

Dr. GARWIN.—nuclear electricity.

Mr. GREEN. So we will be at the 20 percent level still?

Dr. GARWIN. Well, one hopes to double the amount of electricity

and increase the fraction that is supplied from nuclear, but that is

not at all dependent on this program. That can be done with the

thermal reactors, the light water reactors——

Mr. GREEN. Let me go on.

Dr. GARWIN.—and the high-temperature reactors.

Mr. GREEN. Thank you very much. Let me go on with some additional observations.

DOE Secretary Bodman concedes that GNEP may ultimately call

for an investment of $20 billion to $40 billion, and this is for construction of three facilities, and annual operating costs can run into

the billions. Deployment and operation of additional required reprocessing plants and a fleet of fast reactors and associated power

processing facilities could cost over $200 billion. This would put

GNEP in the realm of the U.S. space program in terms of longterm cost. Building two full-scale spent fuel reprocessing plants

could cost $40 billion to $80 billion. At an estimated price of $3 billion to $5 billion each, deployment of a fleet of these new fast reactors could easily cost over $100 billion. My concern is this. Where

will the money come from? Where is the sense of shared sacrifice

in this country? Right now, we are talking about, over the next five

years, cutting education $45.3 billion, health about $18 billion, income security, which includes housing and childcare, $14.9 billion,

mandatory spending, which includes Medicare and Medicaid, $65

billion. We don’t have a good sense of shared sacrifice with this Administration. This Administration cuts Head Start, cuts Social Security, cuts Medicare, cuts student loans, and we send people to the

moon or we send people to the outer realm of the galaxy at some

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point, hopefully, and I support good scientific programs. I want to

see us do the smart things. But there has to be some sense of

shared sacrifice, and that is what is missing in all of this. We talk

about spending all of these hundreds of billions of dollars, possibly

in the trillions as we go through this over the long-term, but we

don’t talk about who is going to sacrifice for it. And I believe that

there ought to be some shared sacrifice. We cannot continue to expect the least and the last and the lost to pay for space programs

and to pay for nuclear programs. These have to be shared by the

well-to-do, the well-off, and the well-healed. It has to be something

that we all, at some point, understand is needed and we all are

willing to sacrifice to have. And I commend you on what you are

telling us in terms of where we must go. Clearly, there is something we can afford to do and we cannot afford to do, meaning we

must do it at some cost. But there has to be some sense of shared

sacrifice. And my consternation with all of this has to do with who

is going to pay for it. Can we all pay for it? Or will some members

of society pay for it? That causes me great consternation, and I

really don’t think that that is something that I have to have you

respond to. It is something that the American people probably want

someone here in Congress to say, and I just happen to be the guy

who feels that it has to be said. I just believe there ought to be

some sense of shared sacrifice that this Administration has not embraced.

And I thank you for the time, Madame Chairlady. I yield back.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

The gentleman from California, Mr. Rohrabacher, is recognized.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much.

And I would like to thank Chairwoman Biggert for letting me

participate today.

Just one note, my very elegant friend who just made several good

points about costs, and some of the numbers are staggering that we

are talking about, but let us note that in terms of the costs that

you were referring to about the reductions that are being proposed,

we are not talking about cutting spending in the areas that you

outlined. We are talking about reducing the growth in the budget

in those areas. That is a big difference between saying we are going

to cut various programs by so much money. Very—with—and that

is differentiated from cutting the growth in those programs by that

much money. But the point he is making, of course, however, is

valid in terms of the staggering costs and who is going to pay for

it. I think we all need to understand that if there is an energy

shortage, as energy becomes in short supply, whatever—however

that comes about, the electric bills of the American people will go

up, and the energy bills of the American people will go up to the

point that it is costing us those billions of dollars anyway. And

there is a shared sacrifice in that. So—but it would be much better

for us to invest and make sure that those energy prices don’t go

up so that that revenue isn’t being siphoned out of the pockets of

the American people.

Mr. GREEN. Would the gentleman yield for a—just one minute?

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Yes, sir.

Mr. GREEN. And I thank you for the time.

82

Given that this appears to be a risky investment, at best, when

you compare UREX+ to PUREX, when PUREX is producing about

the same thing that we hope to get from UREX+, maybe we will

exceed, well, obviously we hope to, that causes me concern. And

then when you couple that with the fact that—I agree with you, we

are cutting not actual costs but projections. I agree with you. But

the truth of the matter is these things that are being cut back on,

as you stated, are needed things. We are not dispensing with

things that are not needed. This is a country, the richest country

in the world. One out of every 110 persons is a millionaire, and we

are giving tax breaks to millionaires at the expense of these programs. There has to be a point at which we decide that we have

got to debate this question of where is the money coming from and

will there be the shared sacrifice.

And I yield back. Thank you, sir.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Well, I think we both appreciate that in this

democracy, we come at problems, very sincerely, from two different

points of view, and of course, the Republican point of view is if you

would tax that money away from millionaires, they wouldn’t have

the money to invest, and our economy would be growing at a lesser

rate, and there would be less federal revenue for the very programs

that we are talking about. So it is a difference of approach of analyzing that differentiates Republicans.

I do need to make one serious point here about energy before I

get back and forth, and I appreciate the gentleman.

Mr. GREEN. Well, I thank you for the time.

Thank you.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay.

I would like the—I am very—I am on the International Relations

Committee, and I am, of course, on the Science Committee and

other subcommittees than this one, but I have a key interest in

terms of the President’s proposal to expand nuclear power with, for

example, India and other countries that now has decided will be an

Administration initiative. And so this is really an important hearing that we are having today, not only domestically, but internationally, of course. I would like to get the panel’s reaction to

the—to a—the new high-temperature helium gas reactor technology, that is high-temperature helium gas reactor technology.

And from what I understand, that it has the ability to reduce the

production of weapons of this type grade plutonium, which is plutonium-239, I guess, that it produces 95 percent less of that as compared to the other alternative nuclear reactors. So—and especially

when it is used—and in terms of using that reactor for the production of helium—excuse me, the production of hydrogen. And is this

something you have looked at? I would like the panel’s, you know,

just—impressions of that. And also, if you have not looked at it, or

have other thoughts that are more extensive, if you could send me,

personally, a letter—your analysis in writing of this technology.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. If we have brief—briefly, please.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Very brief. Yes. Right.

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir.

The—within the Department’s nuclear R&D program and our

Generation IV program, we are sponsoring research on high-temVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00086 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6601 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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perature gas reactor technology development, which includes both

fuel development, materials development, and, as you may know,

there is a provision in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 for the development and deployment of a very high temperature reactor.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Let us cut to the chase, because we have got

to—the time. Is it thumbs up, thumbs down, or don’t know about

the—in—General Atomics has built one of these reactors in Japan.

Have we studied it? Is it good? Is it a positive reaction? Or we

haven’t studied? Or is it a negative reaction?

Mr. JOHNSON. It has been studied, and it has been favorably disposed to the technology.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. Favorable.

Dr. TODREAS. It is a thermal versus a fast reactor, so its transmutation characteristics are different. I would say it is like this

with a little bit up in your terminology, but it is not a slam dunk,

and I wouldn’t jump on it yet. We have got to study it further.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. And I would appreciate a more in-depth analysis in writing, please.

Dr. TODREAS. Sure.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Yes, sir.

Dr. GARWIN. What is important in the near-term is to be able to

buy electric power generation capability. This modular high-temperature gas reactor—gas turbine reactor has been a long time in

coming, and I would really like to see it take its place in the market, because that is what is most important. You would use it first

in the once-through process. It would not be a proliferation risk at

all. And then it has a role as a moderate transuranic burner, which

could ease the demand on the repository, if it were fed with light

water reactor reprocessed fuel. But that would be a long time in

the future, I hope.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. It sounds like you are giving it a thumbs up.

Dr. GARWIN. Thumbs up.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay.

Mr. MODEEN. From the industry perspective, the advanced light

water reactors are optimized for electricity generation. We expect,

as we deploy those, that they will be the reactor of choice for quite

a few decades to come. However, we also are interested in the hightemperature gas reactors because of that hydrogen mission, and I

think the commercial deployment, really, it is—remains to be seen

as, I think, we see more consolidation on energy companies that

utilities may mesh with natural gas companies and that sort of

thing. But we also believe it is very promising.

Mr. ROHRABACHER. So you are giving it a—that way. And it——

Mr. MODEEN. For a longer time——

Mr. ROHRABACHER. Okay. A more detailed, if you could give it to

me in writing, I would appreciate it very much.

Thank you very much, Madame Chairman.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Okay. Thank you.

I think we are back on track. Let us just—as a reminder that the

purpose of the hearing is to solve the waste problem so that we can

expand the use of nuclear energy beyond 20 percent.

And with that, the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Davis, is recognized.

84

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you, Chairwoman Biggert and Ranking Member Honda, for having this event today, this meeting today. And for

those who are present that are giving testimony, I would like to

read a statement, as well as ask a question.

Before I get into the issues at hand, I would like to express my

support for nuclear energy in this country. As America has become

more addicted to fossil fuels that pollute our air and water, I believe nuclear energy can play a major role in our country’s future

energy needs. Opponents of nuclear energy argue, quite frankly,

that is unsafe, and with that mindset, America has not ordered a

new nuclear energy plan in over 25 years. However, over time, the

Navy has acquired over 80 vessels that contain nuclear reactors. To

date, there have been no instances reported on any of these 80-plus

vessels, and none of the crew on these ships has become ill from

serving on them, nor do any of the glow in the dark.

So clearly, the technology exists that can make nuclear power

safe. It is my hope once we solve the nuclear waste question that

we can add more nuclear power to the Nation’s grids.

Now I have got some concerns. Though I believe that nuclear energy needs to play a major role in our energy future, I also have

serious reservations about the GNEP proposal. My main concern

stems from the fact, I believe, that it appears that the majority of

important decisions about this program have already been made,

such as site locations, specific technologies that could be used for

GNEP. For instance, Japan has technologies. These possible actions concern me because I believe they have excluded the expertise

of energy leaders and scientists who are at the forefront of nuclear

energy. I believe this program, to be successful, we must include

all experts and not just a selective few. As you probably know, Oak

Ridge National Lab is located near my district and employs some

of the brightest and most experienced scientists on nuclear technology.

For years, Oak Ridge has been at the forefront of developing and

maintaining nuclear programs for the Department of Energy and

the Department of Defense. However, to my knowledge, no one

from Oak Ridge was involved in the development of GNEP. To

make—to me, it makes sense to have people involved that have a

clear and long history of working within this field to help plan the

future of this technology.

I have some concerns, and I believe we must act now to deal with

nuclear waste and the successful expansion of nuclear energy in

America. And my hope was that today’s hearing would help relieve

some of those concerns.

The question I have, Mr. Johnson, what is the technical and programmatic basis for the technology that has apparently been used

to choose the technology and the site locations as you went through

the process? And then secondly, to follow up, do these choices represent a consensus among the industry and the technical communities?

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you, sir.

Let me say right off the bat, there have been no decisions made

on siting any of these facilities at any location, contrary to what

may have been written.

Mr. DAVIS. Well, I just—I am sorry. I reclaim my time.

85

I just read what has been written, and you are saying those are

not true?

Mr. JOHNSON. I am saying that is not true.

Mr. DAVIS. I am relieved.

Mr. JOHNSON. Thank you.

With respect to the specific technologies and the basis for what

we are proposing is all based on work that has been done in our

laboratories over the last four to five years and work that was performed, in large part, at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory with

respect to certain parts of the UREX+ separations process. Between

the work at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Argonne National Laboratory, and the Idaho National Laboratory, we feel very

confident that this is a process that is worthy of continued investigation and moving it out of the laboratory into a larger-scale process so that we can better understand the physical phenomena at

a larger scale before embarking on decisions to commercialize the

technology.

With respect to the consensus within the industry or the scientific community, I would safely say there is not consensus, much

like there is not consensus on many issues of a technical nature,

or any other nature, for that matter. But it is—where we are represents the best thought and experience that the Department has

within its laboratory complex.

Mr. DAVIS. Reclaiming my time. I have always felt that science

was pretty exact, so it would seem to me that we are talking about

some pretty exact technology, and there should be a consensus before we start talking about spending billions of dollars on a new

technology. That should be scientifically exact. I yield back.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you, Mr. Davis.

And let me say that I, too, share your concern that we use all

of the research and the knowledge of all of the laboratories in

searching out this question, not just the lead laboratory at Idaho.

And with that, the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Schwarz, is

recognized.

Mr. SCHWARZ. Very briefly, is—should we be talking about the

reprocessing in this country right now for commercial use because

of the need to get additional electric-generating power on line or

should we be building once-through cycle nuclear electric power

plants and get them up and running as soon as possible? And

should we be dealing with reprocessing because of the products of

reprocessing and the fact that one of those is plutonium and could

get into the wrong hands and be enriched and used for the construction of weapons? So I understand Japan, France, and probably

other countries are reprocessing now, Russia. Should we be in that

at all? If so, briefly, why, to a lay person in this, like myself, that

I can explain to people back in Michigan? And if not, should we get

going right away on building nuclear plants that are once-through

cycle uranium plants?

Sir?

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes. With respect to near-term deployment of new

light water reactor plants to add to the baseload capacity of our

country, yes. The Department is working cooperatively with industry on that, and we remain very optimistic we will see new plants

in the not-too-distant future.

86

With respect to the question on recycling spent nuclear fuel, we

are not coming before the Congress saying we are embarking on

commercial reprocessing technology and advocating we move forward at the time with commercial deployment. What we are doing

is asking to accelerate work that has already been going on within

our research and development programs to take the research on

the advanced recycling technologies to the next phase of demonstration such that we can make a better and a more fully-informed decision on this technology should a subsequent decision be

made to embark on recycling of spent nuclear fuel.

Mr. SCHWARZ. Thank you.

Dr. TODREAS. My—there are two reasons we should embark on

R&D and knowledge in recycling. We definitely have to launch and

secure light water reactors. First reason, if you aim for the year

2050 and you want to keep 20 percent nuclear, you have got to expand nuclear by a factor of three in this country. And if you keep

20 percent, you can displace a quarter of the greenhouse gas that

would otherwise be generated as extra between now and 2050.

That is the motivation. If you get to 2050 with that kind of nuclear

expansion, you need to move the nuclear fuel cycle to really robust

ways to deal with the waste, so you need options.

The other reason now to have an R&D program is to have an influence in the world and in our own evolution. You have got to

have technical knowledge to be credible for the evolution of commercial nuclear power in the world, this is Europe, Japan, and

Russia. You have got to have that knowledge to develop effective

safeguards from reprocessing plants that others are building.

And third, we have got to make judgments on what to do with

recycling and reprocessing in this country. If we don’t get in it and

do R&D and get knowledgeable, we are going to be at zero relative

to the ability to do those judgments.

Mr. SCHWARZ. Thank you.

I yield back.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

Mr. SCHWARZ. If no one else has a comment, I would yield back.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson

Lee.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. I thank the Chairwoman very much and for

this hearing.

This is a mountain of issues. Let me say that I am slowly trying

to refocus and redesign my position on nuclear energy based upon

where we are today, and I obviously come from the energy capital

of the world that has been premised on oil and gas in Houston,

Texas, but by the very nature that the term is energy, I expect that

many of the corporations that I represent will be looking at a lot

of alternative issues, alternative fuels, and certainly nuclear will be

something of concern.

While I am in the mold of addressing the question of the magnitude of this challenge, particularly with the apprehension of

many that the excessive use of nuclear energy leaves in the marketplace materials that could be used in weapons of mass destruction and may not, as well, be environmentally safe, let me pose

these questions on this particular project. And as a backdrop, let

me say that I am not a fan of Yucca Mountain, and I am not a fan

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of it, because I question whether the capacity is such that it would

be able to hold all of the fuel necessary, particularly if the current

fleet of more than 100 power reactors operates for their normal

plant lives.

But if we are to look at this proposal that the President has offered, I wanted to ask the question, Dr. Garwin, is this realistic in

and of itself, the GNEP program, particularly the magnitude that

this program or this demonstration project would offer, 200 tons,

I think, as opposed to 20 tons per year? Help me understand, from

your perspective, how realistic this is. And as an oversight committee, instruct us on this particular proposal. What should be the

indicia or the criteria or the limitations that we should raise on

this particular program? And you might add the cost as well.

Dr. GARWIN. Well, for something that is not worth doing——

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Sir?

Dr. GARWIN. Yeah.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. We are—the bells are calling us for a

vote, and I think we have got one more question or so. If everybody

can answer briefly so we can have the last question, and then you

won’t have to wait for us to come back from several votes.

Dr. GARWIN. If something is not worth doing, it is not worth

doing well. So the question is to what extent is GNEP, that is the

recycle—the reprocessing and burning, worth doing. It has one

principal function: it saves repository space. We need the systems

analysis tool or some good decision making to tell us how much repository space costs. And we can buy it not only in the expansion

of Yucca Mountain that we—the President has sent now to the

Congress with the request to expand it, or we can buy repository

space elsewhere.

Now Mr. Davis also asked about science—the exactness of the

science. We need this analysis tool so that we just don’t have to

build things of larger scale, so we can design them differently, so

we can simulate them so that when we build we know pretty well

that it is going to work. And then we will have a cheaper and simpler program.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. But if I may, Dr. Garwin, since I know my

time is short, your assessment of the GNEP program demonstration and the science of it, is that workable versus a smaller demonstration? And do you see the amount—the cost worthy of the ultimate process? And this is on the reprocessing.

Dr. GARWIN. Well, this is reprocessing of light water reactor fuel.

That is easy. We don’t need UREX. We could do PUREX.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. All right.

Dr. GARWIN. We should do more research on UREX. We don’t

need to scale it up. We need to have the people out there at Argonne put their minds to understanding their process better so

they can scale it up on paper and do critical experiments.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. So we don’t need UREX?

Dr. GARWIN. No, the critical point is reprocessing of the fast reactor fuel. That has to happen many, many times compared with

once for the light water reactor fuel, and that is the big uncertainty. There is complex of design, of fuel form, of reprocessing——

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Can PUREX be made safely?

88

Dr. GARWIN. PUREX will do it safely, yes. It is established. And

we can wait. The main thing is that we can wait to reprocess light

water reactor fuel until we build the fast reactors so that we have

fuel to put into them.

Ms. JACKSON LEE. Thank you.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

The gentleman from South Carolina, Mr. Inglis.

Mr. INGLIS. First of all, I would like to congratulate the Chair on

holding this hearing. It is an important hearing. It is important for

us to develop a consensus as to energy alternatives, and surely, nuclear seems to be one very attractive alternative that we have got.

I was interested in Mr. Rohrabacher’s question earlier about

high-temperature reactors.

I was aware there are possibilities for the production of hydrogen. I wasn’t aware that there is some benefit in terms of non-proliferation. Can somebody explain that to me? Perhaps it has already been explained, but it would be interesting to know if there

is, in fact, a benefit as to non-proliferation with a high-temperature

reactor.

Mr. Johnson, is that—or is——

Dr. GARWIN. Yeah. Just quickly, thermal reactors, as well as fast

reactors, can transmute, meaning destroy actinides, meaning destroy plutonium. There are technical differences about downstream

effects and other isotopes, but they can both do it. And so the gas

reactor is in the competition to have a role in that aspect. Is that

enough?

Mr. INGLIS. I think so.

I look forward—anybody else want to help me out there with—

any—now the—it is a concern that the—it didn’t sound like the

utilities are going to exactly be excited about that possibility, the

high-temperature reactor, particularly for a potential new business

for them called hydrogen. And of course, if they are not interested,

I suppose there are other people that are interested in other technologies by way of how to produce that and get in that business.

It seems to me that utilities, though, have an opportunity. They

may miss the opportunity. The railroads missed the opportunity to

become airlines. So did I hear some indication that maybe utilities

are going to miss their opportunity to become the hydrogen commodity suppliers?

Mr. MODEEN. No, I don’t think you heard that. I think it is a

matter of a sequence in priorities. And again, the very first is we

need to continue to focus on the current plants. We need to deploy

this next generation advanced light water reactors, and we really

need to address Yucca Mountain. I think those are the top three

for the commercial utility industry, no question about that.

The next, I think, in that series, from our perspective, really is

high-temperature gas reactors, a hydrogen mission. I happen to

have, in the EPRI program, a very small budget for that, but we

have had leading utilities. Entergy, I think, is probably the most

public of them. But we have taken a part of our program to really

understand what has been going on in the rest of the world commercially, as well as at the labs, and try to compare and contrast

that in deployment time frames for that mission. So—but it is just

really a matter of what is your core business, and still, right now,

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it is really looking at electricity generation, and the advanced reactor—light water reactor is really optimized for that, and that is

where we are putting most our effort.

Mr. INGLIS. Is it fair to say, Mr. Johnson, is that that is a role

for the government if the utilities aren’t concerned about investing

money, at this point, in developing the high-temperature reactors,

particularly in getting into the hydrogen business? Is there because

there are additional breakthroughs that are needed and that is a

role for some government to fund? Is that—would that be accurate?

Mr. JOHNSON. Yes, sir, I believe so. There are some technical

risks or technical questions that need to be resolved, and I think

that that is an appropriate role for the government in terms of

some of these high-temperature operating regimes that we have

very little experience in.

Mr. INGLIS. And how many years, do you think, that is away?

Take a guess.

Mr. JOHNSON. Well, gas reactor technology is in operation today

in other countries, and depending on the country, going from where

the gas reactors that are in operation today to the higher temperature reactors, it is probably 10 years, minimum to demonstrate.

But the gas reactor technology is pretty well understood. It is going

to the higher temperatures needed for the hydrogen production

mission that introduces some technical uncertainties.

Mr. INGLIS. I yield back.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Thank you.

I recognize Mr. Honda for 30 seconds for a yes/no question.

Mr. HONDA. Thank you very much.

And having heard Dr. Todreas talk about the road map, I guess

we are going to need a GPS.

My question is since we have—I get the sense that the Department has gone down the road to some decision-making process, and

it appears that the discussion has not been as broad as I think it

should be, I would like to discuss with my colleagues and the

Chairwoman here the possibility of expanding the process and looking at some sort of independent panel review that would be a little

bit more broad and also discuss not only GNEP but also some of

the economic analysis of the plan. And there appears to be other

approaches to the issue of spent fuel, so I would like to hear more

of that, too, it—so that we can get a better feel of it.

And Madame Chair, I really appreciated this hearing today, because it has really opened up and put more into focus the need for

more understanding, because not only does it speak to UREX or to

reprocessing and to other decisions, but it also speaks to some of

the foreign policy decisions Congress has to make.

Chairwoman BIGGERT. Mr. Honda, I am going to have to cut you

off, because we have to adjourn this meeting.

I think that—keep in mind that we do—have requested the systems analysis, which I think will help with that. Another thing, I

think, that we do need and we will schedule, would be some briefings with Members so that we can come in and really have a discussion. But we also have plans for other hearings on this. We

have had one on the nuclear proliferation and one on the cost, and

this has been on the waste products. So I think that, you know,

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this is one of many hearings that we will have, but I think it would

be important for a briefing for our Members, too.

So before we bring this hearing to a close, I want to thank our

panelists for testifying before this subcommittee today. If there is

no objection, the record will remain open for additional statements

from the Members and for answers to any follow-up questions the

Subcommittee may ask for from the panelists. So without objection,

so ordered.

This hearing is now adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 11:45 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

(91)

Appendix 1:

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by R. Shane Johnson, Deputy Director for Technology, Office of Nuclear

Energy Science and Technology, Department of Energy

Questions submitted by Chairman Judy Biggert

Q1. Please describe the safeguards and monitoring research program under the proposed Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP). Which office at the Department of Energy (DOE) is responsible for overseeing this program?

A1. The Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is responsible for overseeing the safeguards and monitoring research that will help support

GNEP. The program involves the assessment of proliferation risks and the development of advanced international safeguards and monitoring systems. In carrying out

these tasks, NNSA will work with the Office of Nuclear Energy (NE), whose Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative has conducted research since 2003 on enhancing proliferation resistance and monitoring. NNSA and NE will work together to ensure

that features such as international safeguards, physical protection, and enhancing

proliferation resistance, are incorporated ‘‘by design’’ into any GNEP facility, into

the overall GNEP fuel cycle concept, encompassing advanced recycling, fuel fabrication and reactors (both burners and small reactors), as well as into spent fuel transport and storage.

Q2. Some experts suggest that a significant percentage of the existing spent nuclear

fuel will be difficult to reprocess because of the buildup over time of certain radioactive isotopes—particularly Americium 241. How does the decay of

radioisotopes in spent fuel affect the reprocessing technology decision? Is it possible that some of the waste will have passed a ‘‘point of no return’’ for certain

reprocessing technologies before commercial reprocessing begins? Could the

United States end up needing more than one reprocessing technology? Has DOE

been able to quantify how much of the existing waste can and cannot be reprocessed with UREX+?

A2. Spent nuclear fuel which is aged for longer than three years can be reprocessed

by using either PURER technology or UREX+ technology. Short-cooled spent nuclear fuel, defined as three to five years old, contains significantly less americium241 (Am–241), (which is created as the result of plutonium-241 decay) than longercooled spent nuclear fuel. However, this short-cooled spent nuclear fuel has more

curium-242 and curium-244 than longer-cooled spent nuclear fuel and these elements are highly radioactive gamma and neutron emitters. The percentage of highly

radioactive isotopes such as Am-241, Cm-242 and Cm-244 affect the measures necessary to protect workers. However, neither the Am-241 growth nor the presence of

Cm-242 or Cm-244 in spent nuclear fuel eliminates the ability to reprocess it. Therefore, technically a ‘‘point of no return’’ does not exist.

A second reprocessing technology based on electro-metallurgical treatment may be

required for the spent nuclear fuel from GNEP’s Advanced Burner Reactor, depending on the fuel form selected for the Advanced Burner Reactor.

UREX+ reprocessing technology can be used on all existing Light Water Reactor

(LWR) spent nuclear fuel currently stored in the U.S.

While the Department’s technical experts anticipate that recycling of spent nuclear fuel has significant potential, it is not currently known what percentage of existing or future U.S. inventories of spent nuclear fuel would be technologically suitable for recycling if the GNEP technologies ultimately prove to be successful. Some

of the U.S. inventory of spent nuclear fuel is thought at this time to be unsuitable

for recycle using UREX+. This inventory includes the Three Mile Island damaged

fuel, the graphite fuel from Fort St. Vrain, spent nuclear fuel derived from the Experimental Breeder Reactor II as well as other molten salt reactors, and a few other

specialized examples.

Q3. If the nuclear industry believes there is a shortage of expertise for its expansion,

how does DOE plan to recruit and hire the talent necessary to construct four

very large nuclear demonstration facilities at the same time that the nuclear industry begins its expansion?

A3. The Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) is long-term in nature while

the expansion of nuclear power is planned for the near- to mid-term timeframe. As

new nuclear power plants are built and general interest in nuclear energy continues

to grow, more and more students will be attracted to the field, giving DOE and

other nuclear-related entities a strong pool of candidates from which to recruit. In

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addition, DOE can take advantage of capabilities and expertise within our existing

infrastructure, as well as that of our international partners, to support the GNEP.

France, Japan, and other countries have expressed a strong interest in joining the

U.S. in the design, and possibly the supply of key components for the GNEP demonstration facilities. The Department expects significant financial and in-kind contributions from other GNEP partner countries which will help offset some of the

capital needed to carry out GNEP.

Q4. If you face resource constraints in the GNEP effort, what are your highest priorities?

A4. The Department’s GNEP priorities are to identify and resolve the remaining

high risk technology issues. The FY 2007 funding request supports the technology

development activities necessary to address the higher risk technologies associated

with the fabrication of transmutation fuel, spent fuel recycling, the Advanced Burner Reactor, the Advanced Fuel Cycle Facility, and a comprehensive technical and

economic systems analysis.

Questions submitted by Representative Michael M. Honda

Q1. Ninety-five percent of the volume of waste in a spent fuel rod is uranium. Reprocessed uranium from European reprocessing facilities is being managed as

nuclear waste. France has been dumping massive quantities of reprocessed uranium on Russia, which has done a very small amount of work on re-enrichment.

The UK reuses none of their reprocessed uranium. What is the proposed use for

reprocessed uranium under the GNEP plan?

A1. First, it is important to note that uranium recovered by the UREX+ technology

from spent nuclear fuel has been demonstrated to be 99.999 percent pure. All laboratory tests with actual spent fuel have resulted in uranium that could be classified and disposed of a low level waste if it were determined to have no further use.

With regard to the use of this highly pure uranium, at this time we believe there

are several potential alternatives for its use: 1) make-up fuel material to be mixed

with the transuranics for consumption in Advanced Burner Reactors; 2) store for future use in advanced reactors; and 3) use as fuel in Canadian CANDU reactors.

Q2. DOE recently released an advance notice to prepare an Environmental Impact

Statement for the proposed demonstration reprocessing facility [Federal Register, March 22, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 55)]. Why has DOE not announced

an advance notice to prepare a programmatic EIS for the entire GNEP program,

which would be the logical first step for such a large-scale program?

A2. In March 2006, the Department issued an Advance Notice of Intent (ANOI) expressing DOE’s intent to prepare an environmental impact statement to address the

GNEP technology development program activities. The Department is in the process

of reviewing the comments received in response to the ANOI and has not yet made

a final decision on the implementation of its NEPA review. Additionally, in March

2006, the Department issued a Request for Expressions of Interest (EOI) to perform

site evaluation studies. The Department received 43 responses to the EOI. As a result, the Department will be issuing a Financial Assistance Funding Opportunity

Announcement to identify sites that may potentially be considered in the NEPA review. DOE will issue the Financial Assistance Funding Opportunity Announcement

in August 2006.

Q3. How many public-private entities sent in Expressions of Interest for being the

host site for the proposed demonstration recycling facilities? What were the proposed sites? How will DOE allocate the $20 million to these sites, as required

by the FY 2006 Energy and Water Appropriations bill? How will DOE choose

between the sites? When will DOE announce the selected site?

A3. The Department received 43 responses to the Request for Expressions of Interest (EOI). This EOI was released for the purpose of notifying public and private entities that the Department was considering releasing a solicitation to perform site

evaluation studies and to determine the level of interest in such a solicitation. The

Department has posted the names of all interested parties who responded to the

EOI on the Idaho Operations Office website at http://www.id.doe.gov/GNEP-TDP/

index.htm. The EOI was not intended to identify sites. The Department intends to

release a formal solicitation in the near future. Based on formal proposals received

in response to that solicitation, the Department will make decisions about which

specific sites will receive funds from the $20 million, with no more than $5 million

allocated to any one site, as specified in the Conference Report for the FY 2006 EnVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:32 Nov 04, 2006 Jkt 026799 PO 00000 Frm 00097 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 C:\WORKD\ENER06\040606\26799 SCIENCE1 PsN: SCIENCE1
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1 Annual Energy Outlook 2006, Energy Information Administration, DOE/EIA–383(2006), February 2006, p. 149.

ergy and Water Development Appropriations bill. DOE will release the specific criteria for deciding which entities and sites will receive funding, when it releases the

solicitation. It is expected that the Department will announce its decision on the selected sites for site evaluation studies later this year.

Q4. If industry does not buy-in to the GNEP concept it will cost the taxpayer untold

billions and not go forward as proposed. What has been the role of industry in

developing the GNEP concept? Has DOE solicited and received feedback from industry regarding commercial development of fast reactors? Why has no U.S. vendor proceeded with development of fast reactors as envisioned in the GNEP?

A4. The GNEP proposal was developed through normal interagency process within

the government. The Department currently is engaging with industry to solicit their

views as to how industry could most effectively participate in the GNEP initiative.

With regard to a U.S. vendor developing fast reactor technology, the General Electric Company has been working jointly with the Toshiba Corporation on the development of a simplified sodium-cooled fast reactor that could share many of the same

attributes as a sodium-cooled fast reactor currently envisioned for the GNEP program.

Question submitted by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson

Q1. Congress has the responsibility to take on national imperatives such as lessening

both our dependence on fossil fuels and the environmental impact of energy use.

GNEP may be one step in that direction. What is the prospect for nuclear energy,

and specifically GNEP, in replacing fossil fuels in the future?

A1. The Energy Information Administration (EIA), in its reference case, projects

United States nuclear power capacity to be 109 gigawatts in 2030.1 This projection

includes continued operation of current nuclear plants, capacity expansions

(uprates) at current plants and six gigawatts of new capacity, resulting from the incentives of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT). Under this same scenario, EIA

projects that over 900 gigawatts of fossil-fired capacity will need to be added.

While nuclear is not a substitute for oil, it could be used to replace coal and natural gas, and several utilities have decided to investigate this path. The Nuclear

Regulatory Commission has recently testified that the number of expected combined

Construction and Operating License applications is 17 for up to 25 units. Much of

this renewed interest has been sparked by the work performed by the Office of Nuclear Energy through the Nuclear Power 2010 program, which aims to streamline

the licensing process for new nuclear power plants. Combined with the incentives

provided in EPACT, the nuclear industry has great potential to offset coal and natural gas.

Recognizing that nuclear power could expand greatly with the licensing of these

new nuclear power plants, one of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership’s (GNEP)

objectives is targeted towards addressing the resulting spent nuclear fuel using an

enhanced recycling technology known as UREX+. Using this recycling technology,

GNEP has the potential to significantly reduce the amount of spent nuclear fuel requiring disposal, allowing for the further expansion of new nuclear power plants.

Given the complexity of this approach, GNEP faces some technical development

challenges and uncertainties.

The Department continues to work toward developing a systems analysis that can

answer some outstanding GNEP issues and also help develop a roadmap. The Department is optimistic that GNEP holds great potential to facilitate the expansion

of nuclear power (thus offsetting fossil fuels) and looks forward to the results of its

analyses.

Questions submitted by Representative Lincoln Davis

Q1. GNEP will use the UREX+ process as the baseline fuel reprocessing technology,

despite concerns that it may not be the best choice. What is the technical and

programmatic basis for the technology selections that have apparently been

made? Do these choices represent a consensus among the industry and technical

communities, both domestic and international? Were the choices the result of

peer reviewed process? If so, please provide records that such selections were indeed vetted through a peer review process.

95

A1. The UREX+ process has been under development since 2001, and has been successfully demonstrated at a laboratory scale. The recycling technologies DOE is considering are based on the results of significant research conducted since 2001 and

documented in the following public reports:

Reports to Congress:

Report to Congress on Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative: The Future Path for Advanced

Spent Fuel Treatment and Transmutation Research, January 2003

Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative (AFCI) Comparison Report, October 2003

Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative (AFCI) Comparison Report, September 2004

Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative: Objectives, Approach, and Technology Summary,

May 2005

Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative: Status Report for FY 2005, February 2006.

Each of these documents has been available for peer and public review and comment on the DOE website at www.nuclear.gov (Public Information/Congressional

Reports) since its date of publication.

Additionally, the program has issued: AFCI Quarterly Reports four times annually

since January 2001, detailing the work carried out under the AFCI program during

that quarter; and AFCI Annual Highlights, annually since 2003, describing the

AFCI program’s research and development accomplishments during the year.

Also available on the www.nuclear.gov (Advisory Committee/Reports) website are

the reports of the Department’s continuing independent expert review of the program and its technology options. These independent reviews are in the form of Reports from the Nuclear Energy Research Advisory Committee (NERAC) and its Subcommittee on Advanced Nuclear Transformation Technology (ANTT). This Subcommittee, chaired by Nobel Laureate Dr. Burton Richter and staffed by leading experts, has provided oversight and direction on the AFCI research and development

program for the past five years. ANTT reports are provided to the NERAC full committee for review, comment and disposition, which may include adopting the Subcommittee’s recommendations and forwarding them as recommendations of the full

committee to the Office of Nuclear Energy. The ANTT Subcommittee reported on

the AFCI program in public meetings on:

• November 6, 2001

• April 15, 2002

• January 14, 2003

• October 24, 2003

• February 26–27, 2004

The ANTT Subcommittee also prepared a report during calendar year 2005, but

has yet to present it to the full NERAC.

Moreover, over the past five years, UREX+ research has become an international

collaborative effort attracting experts from France, who exchange their research results with the United States and review U.S. progress. In addition, the development

of UREX+ technology has been reviewed by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development/Nuclear Energy Agency (Nuclear Science Committee) based

in Paris, France.

Q2. The nuclear industry charges rate payers 0.1 cent per kilo-Watt-hour (kWh) of

electricity to pay for disposal of used nuclear fuel. Please provide an estimate

of how much this will increase to pay for the construction of GNEP facilities and

their operation.

A2. The Department does not plan to use the Nuclear Waste Fund to fund GNEP

demonstration program activities.

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ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by Richard L. Garwin, IBM Fellow Emeritus, Thomas J. Watson Research

Center, Yorktown Heights, NY

Questions submitted by Chairman Judy Biggert

Q1. Dr. Todreas (and others) support the notion of a two-step approach to recycling.

This approach would initially implement recycling without fast reactors. The

delay would buy time for additional research and development to optimize and

bring down the cost of fast reactors and fast reactor fuel. What are the pros and

cons of a single step to fast reactors versus a two-step approach involving thermal reactors?

A1. I do not support a two-step approach to recycling spent nuclear fuel in the

United States. First, the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel for recycle into light

water reactors produces a product after a single recycle that has as much heat in

the transuranic component as do the fuel elements that were reprocessed to make

that spent fuel. It would not save space in the repository.

Second, the GNEP reprocessing itself (UREX+) or PUREX are entirely comparable

so far as proliferation resistance are concerned, and neither is very important when

implemented in the United States.

There are no pro’s for the two-step approach to recycling.

The ‘‘single step to fast reactors’’ as defined in the GNEP program presented to

the Committee 04/06/2006 is wrong-headed in that it puts the bigger part of the effort initially into an engineering scale demonstration (ESD) of the UREX+ process

for reprocessing LWR fuel with a separation effectiveness of 99.9 percent or more.

This high efficiency is totally unnecessary for the single reprocessing of LWR fuel,

although it might be desirable for the multi-reprocessing of ABR fuel. The technical

effort in the GNEP program must be focused on the simultaneous and competitive

design of the ABR, its fuel formulation, and reprocessing suitable for that fuel. The

very large set of ABRs is generally agreed to be uneconomical, and attention must

be focused on making such reactors economically competitive with LWRs, if they are

to be inflicted on the nuclear power industry.

The nonproliferation benefits of GNEP would be achieved by the leasing of LEU

fuel and the take back from foreign customers of spent fuel for direct disposal into

competitive, commercial mined geologic repositories the world over. There should be

a commitment to above-ground interim storage casks for spent fuel for 100 years

or more, which would indeed give time for ‘‘additional research and development to

optimize and bring down the cost of fast reactors and fast reactor fuel.’’

It is of interest that an EPRI report of May 2006 concludes that Yucca Mountain

will hold at least 260,000 tons and likely 550,000 tons of spent LWR fuel.

Right now the DOE should put real money into determining the resource cost of

additional uranium, including uranium from seawater, and ultimately the fast reactors will be not burners of TRU but breeders of TRU, in order to extend greatly the

resource supply of uranium if nuclear power proves to be a major component of the

world’s energy supply.

Question submitted by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson

Q1. Congress has the responsibility to take on national imperatives such as lessening

both our dependence on fossil fuels and the environmental impact of energy use.

GNEP may be one step in that direction. What is the prospect for nuclear energy,

and specifically GNEP, in replacing fossil fuel in the future?

A1. Indeed nuclear power has a good possibility of replacing fossil fuel especially

for the production of electricity and other uses of stationary power plants. The key

lies in the deployment and operation of safe nuclear power, and it must be extremely safe, since a nuclear accident on the scale of Chernobyl is likely to repel

investors the world over. Certainly a market-oriented approach is desirable, and

that means that individual companies and investors must find benefit in nuclear

power in competition with other forms of energy supply.

I am optimistic about nuclear power. The Department of Energy should play its

role in formulating GNEP as a program for leasing fresh LWR fuel and taking back

spent fuel from clients abroad. This spent fuel should be slated for direct disposal

into competitive, commercial mined geologic repositories, and not only in the United

States.

The fuel for a greatly expanded population of nuclear reactors could come from

higher cost terrestrial resources and eventually from seawater uranium, and the

97

DOE should spend real money to determine whether the cost of seawater uranium

is $300/kg or $1000/kg—either of which would be affordable for LWRs. But the longterm future will depend upon breeder reactors, and a modest effort should go into

the design of breeder reactors to determine how they can be made economically competitive with LWRs at uranium prices of, for instance, $300/kg of natural uranium.

Unfortunately, nuclear power is capital intensive, and as such will take longer to

deploy than low-cost or no-cost measures such as improving energy efficiency. Nuclear power is also somewhat inflexible in that it is primarily at present for the generation of electricity, whereas there is a vast need for the direct substitution for gasoline, Diesel fuel—and natural gas. So liquids from coal and gas from coal plants,

with carbon capture and storage, deserve far more investment than they are getting

from DOE at present. There should be an assured market for the product of such

plants, up to about one percent of U.S. consumption, in order to get a rapid start

on the deployment and improvement of such technology.

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1 Nuclear fuel cycles are divided into two distinct categories: ‘‘open’’ and ‘‘closed’’ fuel cycles.

In the open or once-through fuel cycle, spent fuel discharged from reactors is disposed of in a

repository. In the closed fuel cycle, spent fuel is reprocessed; uranium (U) and plutonium (Pu)

are subsequently recovered for fabrication into oxide or mixed oxide (MOX) fuel for recycle back

into reactors. Plutonium and some uranium recycling in LWRs are currently in use in a few

European countries. ‘‘Full actinide recycle’’ recovers uranium and plutonium along with the

minor actinides (Np, Am, and Cm) and consumes them in fast neutron spectrum reactors. Full

actinide recycle is not deployed today.

ANSWERS TO POST-HEARING QUESTIONS

Responses by David J. Modeen, Vice President, Nuclear Power; Chief Nuclear Officer,

Electric Power Research Institute

Questions submitted by Chairman Judy Biggert

Q1. Dr. Todreas (and others) support the notion of a two-step approach to recycling.

This approach would initially implement recycling without fast reactors. The

delay would buy time for additional research and development (R&D) to optimize and bring down the costs of fast reactors and fast reactor fuel. What are

the pros and cons of a single step to fast reactors versus a two-step approach

involving thermal reactors?

A1. The EPRI–INL Nuclear R&D Strategy Paper discussed in my testimony strongly supported ‘‘Full Actinide Recycle,’’ 1 which requires fast reactors in addition to reprocessing, as the best way to implement GNEP. This path is preferred over one

that includes a ‘‘thermal recycle’’ mode using MOX fuel in light water reactors, because this latter path does not provide significant benefits in terms of either nonproliferation or spent fuel management, and cannot presently be justified by economic considerations.

The approach suggested by this question, i.e., to begin thermal recycle before fast

reactors are ready to deploy, is effectively what has been done to date by those nations engaged in reprocessing—whose initial intent was to recycle plutonium in

breeder reactors for sustainability purposes. However, anticipated shortages in natural uranium resources along with an accompanying rise in fuel costs, and commercial deployment of fast reactor technology, have not materialized as soon as originally anticipated—by several decades. Hence, the ‘‘current technology’’ approach

has, by default, become the two-step process discussed in the question. Because of

the high cost of storing separated plutonium, recycling plutonium in thermal reactors in countries having implemented reprocessing became a necessary step to mitigate fuel cycle costs. Further, the existence of high inventories of separated Pu has

led to international concern about the proliferation potential of these inventories if

the Pu is not burned in the existing thermal reactors in a timely fashion.

The U.S. industry is not faced with these issues since it has not deployed thermal

recycle commercially. Not burdened by this legacy and knowing that the economics

do not currently justify closing the fuel cycle, but realizing that the economics will

eventually favor this transition (and that long-term energy sustainability will further dictate this transition), the optimum strategy for transitioning nuclear energy

to a closed fuel cycle in the U.S. context requires the Nation to conduct the necessary

R&D now, and to time that transition to coincide cost-effectively with the inevitable

rise in nuclear fuel costs. It will take a substantial period of time to develop and

demonstrate the technologies that would enable a transition from thermal power reactors to a proliferation resistant ‘‘full actinide recycle’’ mode with fast reactors.

The question implicitly acknowledges the benefits of a market-driven deployment

strategy for fast reactors, assuming the R&D is started now to enable deployment

at the optimum time. The advantages cited in the question, ‘‘The delay would buy

time for additional R&D to optimize and bring down the cost of fast reactors and

fast reactor fuel,’’ are quite valid. The point that the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper

makes about these advantages is that they apply equally to the timing of deployment of the required reprocessing facilities. Again, the R&D must be done now, so

that all recycling technologies are ready to deploy when needed.

Accelerating the reprocessing part of recycling ahead of fast reactor deployment

(including fast reactor fuel fabrication facilities), before it is cost-effective to do so,

has no advantages in terms of spent fuel management and non-proliferation. In fact,

the recycling technology available today has a number of limitations that effectively

eliminate it as an option to accomplish the objectives of GNEP. In comparison, the

‘‘full actinide recycle’’ option that GNEP supports does have significant long-term

promise in accomplishing these missions. However, it will require much more R&D

before being ready to deploy.

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A summary of the disadvantages of implementing the single-pass or MOX recycle

technology in thermal reactors in the U.S. follows:

• Current reprocessing technology carries a number of additional costs and

new, potentially controversial, safety licensing and environmental permitting

issues associated with the processing and storage of new waste streams.

• Single pass MOX recycling without treatment and recycling of the used MOX

fuel in fast reactors does not provide any significant benefits to high-level

waste management in comparison to an open fuel cycle. Until recycling in fast

reactors becomes operational, spent MOX fuel will need to be placed in interim storage systems. Not only is single pass MOX recycling in itself not an

alternative to Yucca Mountain, it also fails to address the expanded repository space needs that would result from increased reliance on nuclear energy

as a baseload energy supply source.

• Many energy policy and national security policy leaders are opposed to reprocessing on proliferation grounds (because the current technology approach separates pure plutonium).

• Reprocessing introduces its own issues associated with safeguards and public

acceptance.

Examples of policy statements supporting the R&D to enable full actinide recycle,

(implicitly noting its advantages over single-pass recycle) include:

• ‘‘The NEPD Group recommends that, in the context of developing advanced

nuclear fuel cycles and next generation technologies for nuclear energy, the

United States should re-examine its policies to allow for research, development,

and deployment of fuel conditioning methods (such as pyroprocessing) that reduce waste streams and enhance proliferation resistance. In doing so, the

United States will continue to discourage the accumulation of separated plutonium, worldwide. (National Energy Policy, May 2001, emphasis added)

• ‘‘The United States should also consider technologies, in collaboration with

international partners with highly developed fuel cycles and a record of close

cooperation, to develop reprocessing and fuel treatment technologies that are

cleaner, more efficient, less waste intensive, and more proliferation resistant.’’

(National Energy Policy, May 2001, emphasis added)

• ‘‘In a manner consistent with the long standing moratorium on commercial reprocessing. . .the government should continue to support research and development, for potential future application, on advanced reactor and fuel-cycle

concepts offering promise of lower costs, reduced waste-management burdens,

and significantly higher barriers to theft and diversion of weapon-usable material than do the current reprocessing and breeder technologies’’ (National

Commission on Energy Policy, December 2004, emphasis added)

Even though reprocessing is not economic today, this cost disadvantage will diminish and potentially reverse itself over time, as uranium resources become more

scarce, as R&D develops less expensive means of reprocessing, and as R&D develops

fast reactor designs capable of using reprocessed spent fuel that are more cost-competitive with Light Water Reactors as power generators.

Some have argued that a reason to accelerate reprocessing is that it is needed in

the near-term to avoid building additional spent fuel repositories. EPRI analyses do

not support this view. As stated in the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper, ‘‘Even with the

extended timetable for introducing fuel recycle in the U.S., a single expanded-capacity spent fuel repository at Yucca Mountain is still adequate to meet U.S. needs. Construction of a second repository is not required under this timetable. If, however, reprocessing is implemented on an accelerated schedule before it is economic to do so

based on fuel costs, then the Federal Government will need to bear a much larger

cost.’’

Others have argued that a reason to accelerate reprocessing is that it is needed

to implement the assured fuel supply and used fuel take-back regime proposed by

GNEP. Although this supply and take-back regime is a critically important aspect

of GNEP, the deployment of recycling technologies is not a prerequisite to its implementation. For this regime to gain acceptance among user nations, the U.S. and

other fuel supplier nations must provide assurance of their ability to meet commitments for both fuel supply and take-back, in order to obtain early commitments

from the user nations to forgo enrichment and reprocessing. This is an important

reason why completion of centralized interim spent fuel storage facilities and a permanent repository are urgent to success of the fuel supply and take-back regime,

even before recycling is ready.

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Q2. When would you anticipate that R&D would lower the cost—or uranium prices

would rise high enough—to motivate commercial interest in recycling technologies?

A2. The EPRI–INL Strategy Paper projects that reprocessing in a large scale demonstration plant would begin operation by about 2030, with fast reactor technology

demonstration in the same timeframe. Smaller scale pilot demonstrations may be

feasible earlier than 2030. Full scale commercial deployment would occur in the

2050 timeframe.

The reactor technology part of this integrated strategy develops fast reactors to

recycle light water reactor spent fuel in order to transmute minor actinides as well

as produce electricity. Following a demonstration plant, built and operated with government funding by about 2035, new fast reactors are deployed commercially, with

government subsidy as needed for the waste-transmutation mission. In the longterm, the price of uranium increases to a level that supports recycle and eventually

breeding.

Thus, the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper envisions the commercial deployment of recycling facilities on a large scale basis in roughly the mid-century timeframe. On the

R&D side of the question, the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper concluded that the significant technical, cost, and licensing challenges facing these advanced technologies will

determine these deployment time frames, even with an aggressive technology development program. An aggressive recycling technology development program, even if

it takes longer than currently envisioned, will be beneficial, and eventually strategically vital to national energy security and sustainability. On the uranium resource

and market demand side of the question, the Strategy Paper assumed a mid-century

rise in uranium costs sufficient to provide a market incentive for a closed fuel cycle,

based on both national and international estimates of uranium fuel supplies. However, the variables in this estimate are large, and depend heavily on assumptions

of future growth in nuclear energy and the rate at which the world increases its

reliance on nuclear energy.

Questions submitted by Representative Michael M. Honda

Q1. If industry does not buy-in to the GNEP concept, it will cost the taxpayer untold

billions and not go forward as proposed. What has been the role of industry in

developing the GNEP concept? Has DOE solicited and received feedback from industry regarding commercial development of fast reactors? Why has no U.S. vendor proceeded with development of fast reactors as envisioned in GNEP?

A1. Although EPRI was not asked for input prior to the formal announcement of

the GNEP program in February 2006, and EPRI is not aware of any significant industry role in developing the GNEP concept, EPRI supports the vision and goals of

the GNEP, as we have formerly testified. The EPRI testimony noted six areas of

significant agreement between the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper and GNEP, including

a high priority for near-term deployment of ALWRs and the licensing of Yucca

Mountain, as well as the need to develop fast spectrum reactors to close the fuel

cycle with ‘‘full actinide burning.’’ Industry strongly supports the non-proliferation

goals of GNEP.

Based on recent discussions of the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper with DOE’s Office

of Nuclear Energy, it appears that industry input to GNEP will be a priority for

DOE. EPRI worked closely with INL in developing the Strategy Paper, and is very

confident that INL sees commercial industry input as a high priority.

EPRI looks forward to the opportunity to work with DOE on a consensus R&D

strategy for the future, including near-term deployment of ALWRs, integrated spent

fuel management, expansion of nuclear energy into process heat and hydrogen missions, and strategic deployment of nuclear fuel recycling in ways that are cost-effective and proliferation-resistant.

DOE has noted that GNEP is primarily a federal initiative for governmental purposes. Although EPRI cannot speak for the vendors, EPRI’s utility members are

presently focused on maintaining excellent performance of current plants and preparing for near-term deployment of ALWRs. These are the areas that utilities have

been willing to cost-share with DOE to date. EPRI and its members are interested

in helping inform the R&D agenda for long-term, higher risk programs. If the R&D

is successful, history suggests that the private sector will be willing to cost share

the deployment of advanced reactor and fuel cycle systems. EPRI believes that the

most effective way to encourage private sector investment is to engage in joint planning efforts at an early stage, in a manner consistent with the EPRI–INL Strategy

Paper and the ‘‘80–20 paradigm’’ discussed therein.

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Question submitted by Representative Eddie Bernice Johnson

Q1. Congress has the responsibility to take on national imperatives such as lessening

both dependence on fossil fuels and environmental impact of energy use. GNEP

may be one step in that direction. What is the prospect for nuclear energy, and

specifically GNEP, in replacing fossil fuels in the future?

A1. The prospect for nuclear energy to expand and assume a greater role in providing baseload electricity for the U.S. and other nations is very promising, with

clear indications of government and investor support for that expansion in the nearterm. Longer-term expansion of nuclear energy into process heat applications, not

presently a part of GNEP, is also promising.

EPRI is a nonprofit scientific research organization that manages a broad collaborative energy R&D program for the Nation’s electric utility industry, with significant international utility participation. Its R&D programs cover all technologies for

electricity generation, transmission, distribution, and end-use. Specifically with respect to generation, EPRI advocates a diverse portfolio where nuclear plays a key

role, along with clean coal, natural gas and renewables, wind, biomass and solar.

EPRI believes that national policies and private sector investment strategies will

trend toward greater reliance on low-emission or emission-free generation in the future, including reduced emissions of greenhouse gases. Therefore, EPRI is focusing

much of its R&D in the generation sector on technologies that would support a carbon-constrained world. This future world will depend increasingly on nuclear energy, renewable energy, and carbon capture and sequestration of fossil fuel emissions.

Questions submitted by Representative Lincoln Davis

Q1. The nuclear industry charges rate payers 0.1 cents per kilo-Watt-hour (kWh) of

electricity to pay for disposal of used nuclear fuel. Please provide an estimate

of how much this will increase to pay for the construction of GNEP facilities and

their operation.

A1. The EPRI–INL Strategy Paper calls for an integrated and cost-effective spent

fuel management plan. The linchpin of this strategy is the repository at Yucca

Mountain. Not only is a permanent geologic repository needed under all strategies

and scenarios for the future, but near-term progress on licensing of Yucca Mountain

is essential to expanding nuclear energy.

Other key elements of this integrated strategy include:

• Allowing for expansion of the Yucca Mountain site to its full technical capacity,

• Reducing the rate of spent fuel generation per unit power output via development of high performance LWR fuel,

• Maintaining engineered cooling of the repository well in excess of 50 years

prior to closure,

• Providing for interim centralized storage or ‘‘aging pads’’ for dry canister passive cooling,

• Deploying multi-purpose canisters approved by NRC,

• Implementing an effective spent fuel transportation system, and

• Eventual recycling of spent fuel to reduce volume and heat rate, thus making

much more effective use of repository space.

These steps, if taken together and coordinated, provide ample time for the longterm R&D to be completed, before concerns arise as to the need for a second repository.

The costs of establishing centralized interim storage and of completing Yucca

Mountain are covered by the Nuclear Waste fund (funded by a fee paid by nuclear

generating plants). The costs of R&D and deployment of closed fuel cycle facilities

are not authorized expenses to be recovered from the Nuclear Waste Fund. The

Strategy Paper assumed that eventually, after centralized interim storage requirements are met and Yucca Mountain is in operation, and as uranium fuel prices justify a shift from an open to a closed nuclear fuel cycle, that Nuclear Waste Fund

revenues, at the current fee rate of one mil/KWH), would be used by the U.S. Government to defray the costs of closed fuel cycle facilities.

Presently, the nuclear industry in the U.S. pays for all of its environmental externality and safety regulation costs, including high level and low level waste management, pre-paid decommissioning funds, self-insurance under Price Anderson, the full

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costs of nuclear plant regulation by the U.S. NRC, emergency planning expenses,

etc. In the case of spent fuel management costs, roughly 18 billion dollars of the

27 billion dollars of nuclear utility ratepayers’ money that has been collected into

the Nuclear Waste Fund to date has not yet been appropriated for its intended purpose.

While many comparable costs for other energy generation options are paid for by

taxpayers, the assumption that government would continue to charge nuclear utilities for environmental externality expenses is a reasonable expectation. However,

the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper assumes that government would impose on industry

the costs of the least-cost spent fuel management strategy available. If government,

for its own reasons, implements a more costly means of spent fuel management,

then the EPRI–INL Strategy Paper assumes that government would pay the difference, and that Congress would not increase the amount of this fee when recycling

facilities are deployed.

(103)

Appendix 2:

ADDITIONAL MATERIAL FOR THE RECORD

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STATEMENT OF HAROLD F. MCFARLANE

PRESIDENT-ELECT, AMERICAN NUCLEAR SOCIETY

Madame Chair:

On behalf of the 10,000 members of the American Nuclear Society, I am pleased

to provide testimony to the Subcommittee on the Administration’s recently released

Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) initiative.

The ANS applauds the administration for stepping forward with the GNEP concept. For more than a decade, ANS has, through a series of conferences, challenged

global nuclear technology leaders articulate a broad vision of how the world can

greatly expand the peaceful use of nuclear energy while minimizing the risks of proliferation.

The organizational and technological frameworks that have emerged from these

meetings closely resemble the tenets embodied in GNEP. Indeed, I would submit

that a GNEP-like effort to recycle spent nuclear fuel and create a multilateral ‘‘fuel

bank’’ to facilitate the expansion of nuclear power generation to developing nations

is essentially an inevitability in the decades ahead.

As such, the debate about GNEP today should not be about ‘‘if’’ we will accomplish

the broad objectives embodied in the plan, but rather ‘‘what’’ we should do now to

prepare for it.

The ANS recognizes that there are political hurdles that must be addressed before

the benefits contemplated by GNEP can be realized; most notably the Yucca Mountain Waste Repository. ANS believes Yucca Mountain is both scientifically and environmentally sound, and that DOE should move forward with urgency to obtain a

license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and commence operations.

Nevertheless, the central challenge to GNEP is technology. There are several scientific and engineering hurdles that need to be overcome for Congress and the administration to make a ‘‘go-no-go’’ decision in the next few years. As such, ANS

urges Congress to provide funding sufficient to permit timely results from GNEPrelated research on UREX+ recycling, transmutation, pyroprocessing, fast reactor

technology and integrated safeguards technology.

Creating the technology, political, regulatory and human infrastructure needed to

realize this vision will take several decades. For the benefits of GNEP to begin accumulating in the future, the ANS believes that it is essential to start building

GNEP’s foundation now. For the U.S., the building blocks that will enable the benefits of future nuclear expansion are new plant construction, establishing the Yucca

Mountain geologic repository, accelerated research on advanced fuel cycle technologies, and development of human capital.

The ANS applauds this subcommittee for its ongoing efforts to facilitate discussion about the future of nuclear technology, and we look forward to playing a constructive role in the debate.